James G. Adam has performed and is performing a most important work as secretary of the Independence Commercial Association. He is himself a man of wide experience in business affairs, and had the progressivenass, energy and enterprise which are unusual qualiflecations for his present position.
The Commercial Association is an organization of local citizens whose principal object is to promote the growth and solid welfare of the city. The club is now in a flourishing condition with 210 names on its membership roll. Mr. Adam as secretary was primarily instrumental in securing for Independence the National Sash and Door Company, who took over the old glass plant of the city. They still conduct the glass plant for glasing the glass doors and windows, but the operation of the glass works is confined, as is usual with glass plants during the colder part of the year from October to May. The company gets its wood supplies from the North and West in car lots. This is one of the best industrial plants of Independence, employing 250 men the year around. Mr. Adams was also the Commercial Club’s leader in persuading the Prairie Oil and Gas Company to establish its principal headquarters at Independence. This company had recently completed the second largest office building in the state, and most of the executive officers of the company have bought property and have built themselves homes in Independence, and the same is true of many of the employes. These two cases are cited as examples of the constructive work which the Commercial Club, with Mr. Adam as secretary, is doing to increase the welfare of Independence.
Representing a family that was long identified with the State of Indiana, James G. Adam was born in Ripley County in that state August 18, 1880. His father is B. S. Adam, who was born in Indiana in 1847, was reared and married there, and in the fall of 1882 came to Montgomery County, Kansas, locating on a farm twelve miles west of Independence. He was a farmer there until he retired to Independence six years ago, and sold his farm at that time. He now resided at 408. South Eleventh Street. B. S. Adam tried to enlist in the Union army during the Civil war, but was rejected on account of his age. He was reared in the faith of the United Brethren Church. He married Miss Jennie Ellwell, who was born in Indiana in 1850. They have reared a large family and their sons and daughters still living are already subatantially situated in places of usefulness and honor. Alice, the oldest child, is the wife of J. M. Davidson, a retired business man and farmer at Cherryvale, Kansas; Florence is the wife of D. P. Curlis, in the elevator and grain business at Liberty, Kansas; Maggie, died young; James G. was the fourth among the children; Nellie died at the age of two years; Harry died in childhood; Edns is the wife of R. A. Gill, a telegraph operator at Cherryvale, Kansas; R. C. Adam is a baker at San Francisco, California; W. H. Adam is an oil driller at Independence; Ada married L. E. Henry and they reside on their farm twelve miles southwest of Independence; C. H. Adams is a chauffeur at Independence, and a member of Company K, Kansas National Guards.
Two years of age when brought to Kansas James G. Adam acquired his early education in the country schools of Montgomery County and spent the first eighteen years of his life on his father’s farm. After one year in the restaurant business at Cherryvale he sold out and then spent a year in the Independence High School. Following that came four years assisting his father in the management of the farm, and he then entered the mercantile business at Bolton when that was a booming oil town. About the time the tide of prosperity began to ebb he sold his interests and in 1909 came to Independence. Here for one year he was employed by the leading merchant, Henry Baden, and then for three years was an employe of the city waterworks. From that position he entered upon his present duties as secretary of the Independence Commercial Association.
Politically he is independent. He is affiliated with Lodge No. 69, Independent Order of Odd Fellows, at Independence, and with the Encainpment degree and with the Rebekahs of the same order, and is a charter member of Camp No. 648, Loyal Order of Moose, of which he was secretary a year and a half; had served as dictator and was twice elected delegate to the national convention, though other duties prevented his attendance. He also belongs to Independence Lodge No. 17, Ancient Order United Workmen.
In December, 1902, at Bolton, Kansas, Mr. Adam married Miss Ida Woody, a danghter of J. W. and Hannah Woody. The father died in 1915 at the age of eighty-three, having spent his active career as a farmer, while her mother is now living at Bolton, Kansas. Mr. and Mrs. Adam have three children; Opal, born in January, 1904, and a pupil in the public schools; Bertha, born in January, 1905, and also in school; and Grant, born in July, 1907, who died July 15, 1909.