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McNEELY, Thompson Ware, a Representative from Illinois; born in Jacksonville, Morgan County, Ill., October 5, 1835; attended the public schools and Jubilee College, Peoria, Ill.; was graduated from Lombard College, Galesburg, Ill., in 1856 and from the law department of the University of Louisville, Kentucky, in 1857; was admitted to the bar in 1857 and commenced practice in Petersburg, Menard County, Ill.; member of the Illinois constitutional convention in 1862; elected as a Democrat to the Forty-first and Forty-second Congresses (March 4, 1869-March 3, 1873); did not seek renomination in 1872; delegate to the Democratic National Conventions in 1872, 1892, and 1896; resumed the practice of law in Petersburg, Ill.; master in chancery for Menard County from 1910 until his death in Petersburg, Ill., July 23, 1921; interment in Rosehill Cemetery.