| Birth Date: | 13 April 1823 |
| Birth Place: | Strafford, Vermont |
| Death Place: | Kenilworth, Illinois |
| Occupation: | Educator, clergyman, politician |
| Education: | Wesleyan University |
| Party: | Greenback |
The Rev. Dr. George McKendree Steele, D.D., LL.D. (April 13, 1823 - January 14, 1902) was an American educator and Methodist minister, president of Lawrence University in Appleton, Wisconsin from 1865 to 1879.[1] He was the author of the 1876 pamphlet The Currency Question – regarded as a major statement of the philosophy of the Greenback movement – and was a Greenback Party nominee for Congress and other public office.[2]
Steele was born in Strafford, Vermont on April 13, 1823,[1] one of seven children of Joel Steele (a Methodist minister) and Jerusha (Higgins) Steele.[3] He spent his youth on a farm in his native town, with little formal schooling; but was able to attend Newbury Seminary, after which he taught briefly and then entered the Wesleyan University, from which he graduated in 1850.[1]
He spent three years thereafter (1850–1853) as a teacher of Latin and mathematics at Wilbraham Wesleyan Academy in Wilbraham, Massachusetts, and married Susan J. Swift on July 1, 1852.[1]
In 1892, Steele and his wife moved to Auburndale, Massachusetts, when he accepted a professorship at Lasell Seminary (now Lasell University).[4]
He died in Kenilworth, Illinois in 1902.[1]