Biography of John L. Robinson

John L. Robinson. The absolute honesty, the feeling of community interest, the intelligent public spirit that belong and illuminate the best type of citizen, are all qualities demanded of men who enter the banking field. The close relation between banks and a community’s prosperity makes the banking business one of paramount importance. One of the well known financiers of Neosho County, Kansas, is John L. Robinson, president of the Fidelity State Bank, at Chanute, áa business man of long and honorable experience. Mr. Robinson was born June 25, 1865, in Delaware County, Iowa, and is a son of A. M. … Read more

Biography of Charles W. Shinn, Hon.

Hon. Charles W. Shinn. In an able and vigorous service of eight years on the bench, Hon. Charles W. Shinn, now city attorney of Neodesha, Kansas, gained an enviable reputation for legal ability, thorough understanding of the law, wise judgments and unimpeachable integrity. As a private practitioner of law this reputation is still justified, while as a citizen Judge Shinn is numbered with the foremost men of Neodesha. Judge Shinn is a native of Illinois, born May 30, 1854, in Hancock County, and is a son of John K. and Tabitha (Ogden) Shinn. The Shinn family is of English ancestry … Read more

Biography of James Otis Tulloss

James Otis Tulloss. In 1856, the year the republican party had its first presidential candidate in the field, and when the Kansas-Nebraska question was agitating the entire nation, the citizenship of this then territory acquired an important addition in certain members of the Tulloss family. It is a name therefore that had been identified with Kansas for sixty years. James O. Tulloss named above had no part in that earlier period of the family’s connection with Kansas. He represents a younger generation, and his active career had been largely confined to the past twenty years, during which time he had … Read more

Biography of Frank D. Custer

With industry and determination as dominant qualities, Frank D. Custer has made steady progress in the business world, being now the owner of a valuable fruit farm near Bartlesville and also having oil wells on his property. He was born in Montgomery County, Indiana, the boyhood home of General Lew Wallace of military and literary fame, on the 6th of August, 1855. Three of his brothers served in the Civil war and one of these, A. R. Custer, is now living retired in Bartlesville with his family. Frank D. Custer acquired his education in the public schools of Thornton, Indiana, … Read more

Biography of Harry Pray Study, A. B., A. M.

Harry Pray Study, A. B., A. M. Among the learned callings there is none, perhaps, that demands a greater degree of patience, tact, specialized knowledge, judgment and natural executive ability than that of the educator, and the individual who enters into this important field, selecting it as a calling, is called upon to make many personal sacrifices and to give many of the best years of his life unreservedly to its demands, often without the emoluments that would be attached to an equal amount of labor expended in another direction. However, there are many satisfying rewards which come to the … Read more

Biography of Henry Clay Dale, Prof.

Prof. Henry Clay Dale. No person in a community wields a greater influence in the molding and shaping of character than does the school teacher. The capable, conscientious instructor stands nearer to the hearts of his charges than does any other persons. On entering the schoolroom the child’s mind is as plastic clay and is as readily made to take shape in the hands of the skilled educator. Therefore his great responsibility, and therefore the honored position which he holds in the community when his duties are faithfully discharged. Of the educators of Columbus, Kansas, Prof. Henry Clay Dale is … Read more

Biography of William C. Suttle

William C. Suttle. Under modern conditions the water works of any thriving and prosperous community is one of the most important branches of the civic service, and its management requires abilities far beyond the ordinary. Fredonia boasts of one of the best water systems in Southeastern Kansas, and much of the credit for the present excellent conditions existing in this enterprising city is due to the capable and experienced work of the superintendent of the water works, William C. Suttle, who had been connected with this department for about eleven years and had been in his present position since 1913. … Read more

Biography of Morillo Abial Spalding

Morillo Abial Spalding. In Morillo Abial Spalding the thriving community of Dearing, Montgomery County, has a citizen who has contributed to its upbuilding a conservative and reliable general mercantile business, who formerly, for eight years, carried on the drug business, and whose long experience in a commercial way has been a decided factor in helping his city to better things. Mr. Spalding was born at Morrisville, Vermont, February 13, 1856, a son of A. W. and Mary (Tenney) Spalding, a grandson of Warren Spalding, a Vermont farmer who spent his life there, and a member of a family, which originating … Read more

Biography of Aldamar P. Elder

Aldamar P. Elder. One of the names that will always have significance in Kansas history is that of Elder. Over the state at large it is most closely associated with the career of the late Peter Percival Elder, who came to Kansas when it was a territory, was prominent in many ways during the early and formative period of the state, and at one time filled with distinction the office of lieutenant governor. Governor Elder had a long and active career, and died in 1914. His only son is Aldamar P. Elder, who for over forty years had been one … Read more

Biography of Frank Geoffroy

Frank Geoffroy, who is a successful commission and grain merchant at Abilene, is a native of Kansas, and he and his people have been identified with this state since early pioneer days. Kansas was a territory and was known throughout the country as”bleeding Kansas” when his father and grandparents came and located as pioneers in Franklin County in 1855. His father, Ernest Geoffroy, was born near Metz, France, September 7, 1841, and was brought to America in 1849. The grandparents lived on a farm in Iowa for a few years, but in 1855 came out to Kansas and began their … Read more

Biography of Samuel V. Mallory

Samuel V. Mallory, now superintendent of the city schools of Morrill, Brown County, had been a, Kansas educator for many years. He had been connected at different times with the public schools of three states–Nebraska, Kansas and Oklahoma–and both as a teacher and administrator his work rests upon the seeure foundation of sincere and effective service. Mr. Mallory had lived in Kansas since early youth and he represents some of the best elements of American ancestry. His great-grandfather, John William Mallory, spent his life in Virginia, having been born near Harper’s Ferry. He married Elizabeth peyton, who was the daughter … Read more

Biography of Edwin B. Morgan

Edwin B. Morgan. When Edwin B. Morgan came to Kansas in 1892, at the age of nineteen, he found his first opportunity for service and work as a school teacher. He taught in Linn County one year, and two years in Franklin County. Already his ambition was set upon the law as a career. Entering the State University at Lawrence, he pursued the studies of the law department until graduating LL. B, in 1898. In July of that year he began practice at Oswego, and was one of the rising young attorneys of that city for seven years. Since removing … Read more

Biography of Elmer E. Glenn

Elmer E. Glenn. When Elmer E. Glenn was a young man he learned the blacksmith trade in the railroad shops at Ottawa, Kansas. He spent his early life on a farm near that city. The trade which he learned and worked at for a number of years had been the basis upon which he had built his present successful business at Sedan, where he is proprietor of machine shops specializing in the repair and manufacture of oil well tools. Though Mr. Glenn had spent most of his life in Kansas he was born at Mattoon, Illinois, November 11, 1874. His … Read more

Biography of Frank Sigel Dietrich

The day of the lawyer who depended upon inspiration, and whose chief preparation for forensic victory was the acquisition of alcoholic stimulants, is past. The lawyer of today depends not alone upon inspiration, but also upon hard work in preparing his cases for trial, and upon their careful presentation and handling in the courts. Usually he has to convince hard-headed business men of the merits of his case, which involves nothing of sentiment or of sensationalism and much of pecuniary interest and of commercial right and wrong, pure and simple. He goes before a judge and jury cool, collected, alert, … Read more

Biography of Marsena St. John

Marsena St. John. A residence in Kansas of sixty years is in itself a distinction. In the case of the venerable Marsena St. John of Ottawa those years have been filled with honorable accomplishment and in all this time he had been one of the mainstays in Franklin County. He was born at Linden, New York, April 20, 1831, and had already passed his eighty-fifth birthday. His parents were Jasper and Julia Ann (Reynolds) St. John, who lived near Saratoga Springs, New York. From New York the family went to Huron County, Ohio, where the father was for ten years … Read more

Biography of Earl A. Davis, M. D.

Earl A. Davis, M. D. A native son of Kansas, who is assisting to maintain the prestige of his state in the field of medical achievement, Dr. Earl A. Davis had attained a position of distinction among the physicians and surgeons of Chanute, where he had been engaged in the practice of his calling since 1903. He is the son of a physician, Dr. J. Davis, and was born May 20, 1875, at Ottawa, Franklin County. The family of which Doctor Davis is a member originated in Wales and came from that country to America during the colonial period, the … Read more

Moravian Tribe

Moravian Indians. Mahican, Munsee, and Delaware who followed the teachings of the Moravian brethren and were by them gathered into villages apart from their tribes. The majority were Munsee. In 1740 the Moravian missionaries began their work at the Mahican village of Shekomeko in New York. Meeting with many obstacles there, they removed with their converts in 1746 to Pennsylvania, where they built the new mission village of Friedenshuetten on the Susquehanna. Here they were more successful and were largely recruited from the Munsee and Delaware, almost all of the former tribe not absorbed by the Delaware finally joining them. … Read more

Treaty of June 24, 1862

Articles of agreement and convention, made and concluded at Washington City, on the twenty-fourth day of June, eighteen hundred and sixty-two, by and between William P. Dole, commissioner, on the part of the United States, and the following-named chief and councilmen of the Ottawa Indians of the united bands of Blanchard’s Fork and of Roche de Bœuf, now in Franklin County, Kansas, viz: Pem-ach-wung, chief; John T. Jones, William Hurr, and James Wind, councilmen, they being thereto duly authorized by said tribe. Article 1. The Ottawa Indians of the united bands of Blanchard’s Fork and of Roche de Bœuf, having … Read more

Biographical Sketch of Herbert Hickman

Herbert Hickman is editor and owner of The Florence Bulletin, and had proved himself a very diligent and enterprising young newspaper man, coming up from the ranks of an apprenticeship as a printer. He was born in Las Animas, Colorado, December 6, 1893, a son of George W. and Maggie H. (Brown) Hickman, both of whom died when he was a small boy. His father was a native of Missouri and his mother of West Virginia. Herbert had a twin brother, Harvey Cecil, who died at the age of five years, and the youngest child, Warren Milton, was born in … Read more

Biography of Dale B. Whybark

Dale B. Whybark who originated from Kansas, was born at Lane, in August, 1887, and is a son of George S. and Mary R. (Walters) Whybark, both natives of that state. The father, who has always followed railroading, is now Superintendent of the Arkansas Central Railroad at Fort Smith, which responsible position he has held for many years. Dale B. Whybark was reared and educated in Fort Smith and after graduating from the high school there, accepted a position with the Drew Hardwood Lumber Company at De Kalb, Texas, remaining in their employ until 1908, when he came to Eufaula. … Read more