SNIPPET: John HOWARD, born circa 1726 in London, was an important British prison reformer. He was apprenticed to a London grocer as a young man but inherited a fortune at the age of 25. He built model cottages for his workmen, but did not begin his major work until his appointment as High Sheriff of Bedfordshire in 1773. In this job, shocked by what he found in prisons, he began a monumental study called "The State of the Prisons in England and Wales" (1777). It led Parliament to correct many abuses. To keep his study up to date, Howard visited every prison in the country four times, and traveled throughout Europe visiting prisons and plague hospitals, measuring rooms, inspecting kitchens, and talking with inmates. He died in 1790 while on an inspection tour of military hospitals in Russia. Howard spent his entire fortune on his remarkably thorough work. He stubbornly refused to be sidetracked, and forced reforms by the objectivity of his evidence. Excerpt, "World Book" en! cyclopedia. (Perhaps one of your ancestors benefited from his reforms!)