Charles H. Pocock. Postmaster of Tyro, in Montgomery County, a farmer and well known citizen of that locality, Charles H. Pocock for many years was identified with educational work both in Kansas and other states. In character and attainments he is type of man whom the people instinctively respect and repose confidence in, and again and again he has been called to duties of a public nature.
By ancestry he is English, and his grandfather, Eliyah Pocock, came from England to Ohio in the very early days. He was a farmer and blacksmith and died in Wayne County.
Mr. Charles H. Pocock was born in Storey County, Iowa, August 12, 1863, a son of E. H. Pocock. His father was born in Ohio in 1834, was reared in that state, and married there Mary Hinkle, who was born in Pennsylvania in 1840 and now resides at Caney, Kansas. E. H. Pocock graduated from the College of Physicians and Surgeons at Columbus, Ohio, with the degree of M. D., and during the Civil war served as an assistant surgeon in that division of the Union army commanded by General Thomas. In 1856 he had moved to Storey County, Iowa, where he practiced his profession for a number of years, and then went back to Ohio, locating at Shreve, and from there to Walnut, Indiana,, where he was engaged in his professional duties for twenty years. Doctor Pocock moved from Indiana to Norman, Oklahoma, where he acquired a farm, and later sold it and retired to Oklahoma City, where he died in 1910. He was an active republican and a Knight Templar Mason. He and his wife had three children: Charles H.; Lee, who was a railroad man and died in Old Mexico at the age of twenty-five; Frank, who is a farmer at Caney, Kansas.
Though a native of Iowa, Charles H. Pocock spent most of his early years in Ohio and Indiana. He wisely improved his opportunities to obtain an education, and at the extremely early age of fifteen was given his first certificate and taught his first term of country school. He continued teaching for several successive winters, spending his wages during the summer in attending school as a student. In 1882 he completed the teachers’ course in the Northern Indiana Normal School at Valparaiso, and from that time forward for nearly twenty years was closely identified with school work. Until 1888 he taught in Indiana, and in that year moved to Kansas and has since been a resident of Montgomery County His first home was four miles north of Tyro, and he continued teaching in Montgomery County until 1901.
In 1898 Mr. Pocock bought a farm of a hundred acres a half a mile west of Tyro, and so far as he has had leisure from other duties has improved and developed it and is still owner, managing it with the aid of his sons. He makes his home on the farm, though for many years his interests have been in the town. From 1901 to 1908 Mr. Pocock was postmaster of Tyro and was again appointed to that official position in September, 1915, taking charge of the office on January 1, 1916. Since 1908 he has carried on a business in real estate, and is one of the reliable dealers and brokers in farm lands in his part of Montgomery County.
Since reaching manhood Mr. Pocock has steadily affiliated with the republican party. For eight years he was clerk of Caney Township, was trustee of the township a term of two years, and has also served on the school board, his interest in school affairs never having been allowed to wane, though he has been out of active school work as a teacher for the past fifteen years.
In 1893, at Independence, Kansas, Mr. Pocock married Miss Minnie E. Brown, a daughter of Andrew J. and Lena Brown. Her father, who was a farmer, died in April, 1916, and her mother still resides on the old farm in Montgomery County. Mr. and Mrs. Pocock have three children: Victor, who was born July 10, 1897, completed the public school course at Tyro and attended the Fredonia Business College, and is now assistant postmaster under his father. John, who was born June 10, 1899, is in the senior class of the Tyro High School. Teddy, born February 27, 1902, graduated at the head of his class from the eighth grade of the grammar schools of Tyro in 1916.