Elmer E. Glenn. When Elmer E. Glenn was a young man he learned the blacksmith trade in the railroad shops at Ottawa, Kansas. He spent his early life on a farm near that city. The trade which he learned and worked at for a number of years had been the basis upon which he had built his present successful business at Sedan, where he is proprietor of machine shops specializing in the repair and manufacture of oil well tools.
Though Mr. Glenn had spent most of his life in Kansas he was born at Mattoon, Illinois, November 11, 1874. His ancestors were Scotch-Irish people who emigrated to Pennsylvania in colonial times. His grandfather, Joseph Glenn, who was born in 1800, was an early settler near Mattoon, Illinois, and died there in 1880.
J. R. Glenn, father of the Sedan business man, was born near Mattoon, Illinois, in 1844, was reared and married there, took up the vocation of farmer, and in 1886 removed to Kansas, settling on a farm near Ottawa in Franklin County. That had ever since been his home, though in 1916 he retired, at least temporarily, and had spent his time in Los Angeles, California. J. R. Glenn had always supported the republican party and its candidates, and is an active member of the Methodist Episcopal Church. He is an honored old soldier, having gone out with an Illinois regiment of infantry and seeing much hard service before the close of hostilities. His wife was Catherine Williams. She was born near Mattoon, Illinois, in 1844 and died at Pomona, Kansas, in July, 1893. They became the parents of a large family of children: Joseph, who is a farmer at Fordyce near St. Louis, Missouri; Ella, wife of Harry Huskey, now lives in Los Angeles, California; Elmer E.; Annie, who died in San Bernardino, California, in 1908, was the wife of Charles Johnson, who still resided at that place in California, and is a railroad man; Benjamin is a baker at San Francisco; Madie is the wife of Charles Hughes, a farmer at Pomona, Kansas; William died at the age of twenty-three years.
Elmer E. Glenn received some of his education in his native state and finished it in the public schools near Pomona in Franklin County. Until twenty years of age he lived on his father’s farm, and had a practical knowledge of agriculture in all its departments. In the Santa Fe Railway shops at Ottawa he learned the blacksmith’s trade, and remained a blacksmith in the employ of that company for nine years. In 1901 he went to Independence, Kansas, and took up the work of his trade with special application to its uses in the oil districts. For the first year he was employed by Mr. Short in the Independence Oil Tool Shops. Coming to Sedan in 1903 Mr. Glenn established the Sedan Machine Shops, at first in company with others, but in 1905 he became sole owner and had since continued this successful business under his immediate management and control. His shop is situated on Main Street, and he had all the equipment and facilities for repairs for the tools used in the oil industry. Mr. Glenn is a republican, is affiliated with Vesper Lodge No. 136, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, at Sedan; with Sedan Lodge No. 131, Ancient Order of United Workmen, and is a citizen whose support can always be counted upon for any movement affecting the general welfare of his community.
On October 25, 1893, at Pomona, Kansas, he married Miss Laura Wickham, daughter of Morgan and Ellen (Parkison) Wickham. Her father, who was a farmer, is now deceased, and her mother still lives in Pomona. Mr. and Mrs. Glenn are the parents of four children. Audrey, still at home, is a graduate of the Sedan High School and holds a state certificate and is now teaching at St. Charles, Kansas. Ervin is a junior in the high school and Gertrude and Ralph are both in the grade schools.