TOWNSHEND, Norton Strange, educator, born in Clay-Coton, Northamptonshire, England, 25 December, 1815. He came to this country in 1830, and settled with his parents in Avon, Ohio, where he attended school and also taught. Subsequently he began the study of medicine, and was graduated in 1840 at the College of physicians and surgeons in New York. He then went abroad, and, after attending the World's anti-slavery convention in London in July, 1840, as the delegate of the Anti-slavery society of Ohio, he studied in the hospitals of Paris, Edinburgh, and Dublin. In 1841 he returned to Elyria, Ohio, where he settled in the practice of his profession, but in 1848 he was elected to the Ohio legislature, where he was active in securing a repeal of the "black laws" of that state and the return of Salmon P. Chase to the United States senate. He was a member of the convention that in 1850 framed the present constitution of Ohio, and in the same year was elected as a Democrat to congress, serving from 1 December, 1851, till 3 March, 1853. At the end of his term he was elected to the Ohio senate, where he introduced measures that led to the founding of an asylum for training imbecile youth, of which institution he was a trustee for twenty-one years. Later he was active with Dr. John S. Newberry and others in the movement that aimed to establish an agricultural college in Ohio. In 1858 he was chosen a member of the board of agriculture and served till 1863, also in 1868-'9. Early in 1863 he was appointed medical inspector in the United States army, and he served in that capacity until the end of the civil war. In 1867 he was named a member of the committee that was appointed to examine and report upon the system of wool appraisement and duties in the custom-houses of Boston, New York, and elsewhere, prior to the tariff revision of that year. He was appointed professor of agriculture in Iowa agricultural college in 1869, but resigned a year later to accept the appointment of trustee and assist in founding the Agricultural and mechanical college of Ohio, in which institution, now known as the University of Ohio, he has held since 1873 the chair of agriculture.