It produced a strong impression on the public mind and gave Powell a national reputation which was afterwards of great service, although based on an adventurous episode by no means essential to his career as an investigator." The qualities which enabled him so splendidly to perform his many self-imposed tasks were an inheritance from his parents, who possessed more than ordinary intelligence.

Joseph Powell, his father, had a strong will, deep earnestness, and indomitable courage, while his mother, Mary Dean, with similar traits possessed also remarkable tact and practicality.

Both were English born, the mother well educated, and were always leaders in the social and educational life of every community where they dwelt.

Especially were they prominent in religious circles, the father being a licensed exhorter in the Methodist Episcopal Church.

Both were intensely American in their love and admiration of the civil institutions of the United States and both were strenuously opposed to slavery, which was flourishing in America when they arrived in 1830.