Samuel Fremont Goheen. When the City of Manhattan inaugurated the commission form of government in 1912 they chose as the head of the new municipal system a man who had already given efficient service in public office. The people have since kept him in office, and it is to the credit of the city as well as to the man that so capable a public servant as Samuel Fremont Goheen should be entrusted with such responsibility. Mr. Goheen has been a resident of Riley County more than thirty years, has witnessed and has been an important factor in the progress of those years, and filled a responsible post in the county government before his election as mayor of the city.
Mr. Goheen was already grown and a man of considerable business experience when he came to Kansas. He was born in Armstrong County, Pennsylvania, May 2, 1855, a son of George W. and Elizabeth (Holler) Goheen. His parents were also natives of Pennsylvania. In 1883 the family came out to Kansas and settled near Manhattan in Riley County. Mrs. Elizabeth Goheen died there in 1891 at the age of sixty-five. The father died ten years later at the age of eighty-five. In Pennsylvania George Goheen had followed merchandising, but was a farmer in the Sunflower State.
As a boy in Pennsylvania Mayor Goheen acquired an academic education. His first business experience was with his father in a store in Pennsylvania, and the horizon of life was broadened for him by the teaching of four winter terms in the country schools. He married in Pennsylvania and brought his little family to Kansas at the same time with his father. He was then twenty-eight years of age. The first twenty-three years of his residence in Riley County Mr. Goheen spent as a farmer and stock raiser, and a very successful one at that.
His business ability becoming widely known, and his trustworthiness receiving increasing appreciation, he was elected in 1906 as the republican candidate for the office of county treasurer. He filled that post with commendable efficiency for two years. He was then re-elected for a second term. Mr. Goheen left the office of county treasurer in the fall of 1911, and in the spring of 1912 was honored by the citizens of Manhattan by election as mayor. He was elected mayor or head of the commission in 1912 and in 1916 was returned for another term.
On his election as county treasurer Mr. Goheen moved to the City of Manhattan. He has one of the attractive homes of that city and he and his family are well known in social circles. In Pennsylvania in 1876 he married Barbara E. Jack, a native of that state. Their children are: Albert J., George G., John H. and Ethel.