John B. Morton, M. D., had been successfully engaged in practice at Nashville for nearly ten years. He is a native of Kansas, and his people were pioneers in the vicinity of Cunningham, where he was born July 11, 1884.
He is of Scotch and English ancestry and his forefathers were pioneers in the State of Ohio. His grandfather, Barzillai Morton, was born in Monroe County, Ohio, in 1811, and spent most of his life in his native county, where he conducted a mill for many years. About 1882 he came to Cunningham, Kansas, settling on a farm, and lived there until his death in 1900. His wife, Louisa Morton, also died at Cunningham. Three of their children are still living: Eli, a retired farmer at Cottonwood Falls, Kansas; W. H. Morton; and Clarinda, wife of L. S. Holland, a retired farmer living at Cherokee, Oklahoma.
W. H. Morton, father of Doctor Morton, was born in Monroe County, Ohio, in 1849, grew up and married there, and for several years was a flour miller. In 1880 he came to Hutchinson, Kansas, and for a time did freighting over the surrounding country with a team of oxen. In 1882 he removed to Cunningham, where he had since been active as a farmer. He homesteaded 160 acres and still lives on the old place. Politically he is a republican, is an Odd Fellow and a member of the Christian Church. W. H. Morton married Nancy Jane Dodson, who was born in Monroe County, Ohio, in 1861. Their children are: Lametta, who died young; Fred K., a barber at Cunningham; Dr. John B.; Charles, who is manager of his brother’s drug store at Nashville; Bertha, wife of Bruce Baber, a farmer at Cunningham; Lizzie, wife of Cleve Baber, a Cunningham farmer; Marie, who died at the age of eight years; Thelma, attending high school at Cunningham; and Clarice, a pupil in the grammar school at Cunningham.
Doctor Morton received his early education chiefly in Salina, Kansas, where he attended the public schools and where he was graduated from Salina University in 1902. Following his school career he had an experience of one year in a drug store at Cunningham, and this was the avenue through which he approached the profession of medicine. Entering the Kansas City Medical University, Doctor Morton graduated M. D. in 1907. In 1914 he had post-graduate work in a hospital at Colorado Springs, Colorado. After leaving college he practiced a year at Kansas City, but in 1908 located at Nashville, where he had since built up a large medical and surgical practice. He handles all his own surgical operations and surgery is his special field. He also owned a drug store, keeps his offices there, and in 1908 built a modern home in the southeast part of the town. He owned a farm of 160 acres in Barber County, Kansas.
Doctor Morton is a member of the Kingman County and State Medical societies. He is a republican, a member of the Christian Church and is affiliated with Turon Lodge, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, and Nashville Lodge of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows.
In 1912, at Nashville, he married Miss Eunice Ruth Bennett, daughter of B. C. and Meda (Underwood) Bennett, the latter now deceased. Her father is a business man of Nashville, handling a large stock of general merchandise, lumber, coal and other supplies.