STURM, Paul B.
Source: Kingman Star Friday, February 28, 1947
Funeral services were held today at the Kersey Funeral Home in Dana, Indiana, for Paul B. Sturm, prominent farm leader of Indiana, who died Sunday morning at the Methodist Hospital in Indianapolis. He has been ill for the past six months.
Mr. Sturm served as a member of the Indiana House of Representative in three regular sessions and two special sessions following his election from Vermillion County in 1932. During this service he was caucus chairman of the Democratic majority in the 1937 regular and the 1938 special sessions of the Indiana House. He also served on the committee appointed by former Governor Paul V. McNutt to write the Indiana Social Security laws.
He was defeated in a race for the Democratic nomination as Sixth District Congressman in 1938.
Mr. Sturm was graduated form Dana public grade and high schools and from Purdue University, receiving the bachelor of science degree in agriculture in 1923. He was appointed to the board of trustees of Purdue University by former Governor M. Clifford Townsend in 1938 and was reappointed by former Governor Henry F. Schricker in 1942.
He was born in Dana, Oct. 28, 1900 and his family moved to a farm two and one half miles southeast of there when he was 8 years old. He lived there until coming to Indianapolis in 1939. Until the death of his father, Dr. John Sturm in 1945, the two farmed approximately 1,000 acres in Vermillion County, where they specialized in grain farming, dairy and livestock operations. Since his father’s death, he had farmed approximately 500 acres near the Wabash River in Vermillion County. He served as legislative counsel for the Indiana Farm Bureau during the 1939 General Assembly and was county agricultural agent of Vermillion County from 1929 to 1931.
Since 1923, he had been active in many organizations in Indiana, including Indiana Farm Bureau, Indiana State Grange, Purdue Agricultural Alumni Association and Purdue Seed Improvement Association and was chairman of the newly organized Indiana Marketing Council.
He was a past master of Asbury Lodge 320, F&AM, Dana.
He and Ernie Pyle were life long friends, the Pyle and Sturm farms adjoining in Vermillion County.
Mr. Sturm was known widely throughout Indiana as a sportsman and his bird dogs won many field trials and other contests.
He is survived by the widow, Mrs. Jean Sturm, Indianapolis; an aunt, Mrs. Hattie Brown of Dana, and three aunts by marriage, Ernie Pyle’s “Aunt Mary” Bales and Mrs. Amy Sturm, both of Dana, and Mrs. Edith Sturm, Indianapolis.