Thilon J. Rollman. While the community of Brookville in Saline County had known Mr. Rollman as a banker for some years, his chief distinction in that part of Kansas rests upon his long and active service as an educator. He is one of the veteran school men of the state, and for thirty-two years he held the principalship of the Brookville schools, which constitutes the longest continuous service in such a position in any one community in Kansas. The influence exerted by such a man of high ideals in the lives of the hundreds of individuals who came under his instruction during that time and in the entire community is incalculable.
Mr. Rollman came to Kansas after ten years of educational experience in the East. He was born on a farm near Millersburg, Pennsylvania, January 22, 1845, and had already passed the age of three score and ten. His parents were Samuel and Mary (Bordner) Rollman, also natives of Pennsylvania. He was the first in a family of four children, two sons and two daughters. His brother Samuel and his sister Catherine are now deceased, and his sister Mary, unmarried, lives at the old home in Pennsylvania.
Mr. Rollman had a liberal education, much of it acquired at the expenditure of his own labor and means. He attended the Palmyra Academy of Pennsylvania and the Freeland Seminary, and for two years was a special student in the Boston Home College.
After teaching five years in his home town of Millersburg, Pennsylvania, he was made principal of the public schools in that city, and held that office five years.
Mr. Rollman came to Kansas in 1877. For four years he taught in the rural districts of Saline County, but in 1881 was elected principal of the schools of Brookville. For thirty-two years he held that position, and it was with genuine regret that the community witnessed his resignation three years ago.
In the meantime he had made himself a factor in local business affairs, and in 1909 was made a director of the Brookville Bank. On retiring from his school work in 1913 he was elected president, and now directs the affairs of that staunch institution. Mr. Rollman is a thirty-second degree Scottish Rite Mason, being affiliated with the Salina Consistory. In politics he is a republican.
At Millersburg, Pennsylvania, May 22, 1878, having returned to his native city from Kansas for that purpose, he married Miss Mary Ressler. She was born in that locality May 22, 1855. Five children have been born to their union, three sons and two daughters: Ralph R., born February 3, 1881; Jay, born February 17, 1886; Helen, born June 9, 1888; Esther, born May 20, 1891; and Stanley, born February 2, 1895.