Joel K. Goodin, an early lawyer and legislator and a free-state leader, was born at Somerset, Perry County, Ohio, February 24, 1824. He received an academic education, after which he took up the study of law. Early in 1854 he was admitted to the bar in his native state and the following June located upon the Wakarusa River in what is now Douglas County, Kansas. Mr. Goodin was a delegate to the Big Springs convention; was clerk of the lower house of the Topeka Legislature until it was dispersed by Colonel Sumner; was secretary of the council in the free-state Legislature of 1858, and the same year began the practice of law in Douglas County, but soon afterward removed to Ottawa. In 1866 he was elected to represent Franklin County in the Legislature, and was re-elected in 1867. While a member of the House he assisted in organizing the State School for the Deaf at Olathe. Mr. Goodin died at Ottawa on December 9, 1894.
