James B. Weaver was born in Dayton, Ohio, June 12, 1833. He moved with his parents to an area near Bloomfield, Iowa in 1835. There he attended the common schools and studied law at Bloomfield 1853-1856. He graduated from the Cincinnati Law School in April 1856 and began practicing law in Bloomfield in that same year. At the same time, he joined the army, enlisting as a private in the second regiment in Iowa volunteer infantry. He was brevetted brigadier general of Volunteers by March 13, 1864. In 1866 he was elected district attorney for the Second Judicial district of Iowa, serving this position for four years. He was then appointed assessor of internal revenue for the first district of Iowa by President Johnson March 25, 1867, and served until May 20, 1873. He was elected as a Greenbacker to the Forty-sixth Congress (March 4, 1879-March 3, 1881). This was his first role in fighting against the power of big business over the working class, especially farmers. He was not renominated, but he was elected in Chicago for the National Geenback-Labor Party's US-presidential candidate. After serving in the forty-ninth and fiftieth Congress, he was not reelected for the fifty-first Congress. He was then the Populist Party's (also known as People's Party) candidate for president in 1892, unsuccessfully. However, he remained involved in the Populist party where he worked for the rights of the working class, especially farmers. James B Weaver died in Des Moines, Iowa, February 6, 1912.