Biography of Holmes, Samuel

Samuel Holmes has shown an ability amounting to genius for the successful handling of business affairs, especially landed transactions, and during his long residence in Kansas had accumulated some of the finest sections of farming land in Greenwood and surrounding counties. Mr. Holmes learned the value of industry when a boy, also the principles of straightforward integrity, and it may be said that in consequence he had always been a successful man. He is now eighty-three years of age and lives practically retired at Eureka. One of the connections he still retains is as vice president of the Home National … Read more

Biography of John Kiene

John Kiene is one of the younger men in the educational affairs of the state and is principal of the high school at Madison. Mr. Kiene is broadly and liberally educated, and had a practical knowledge that comes not from books alone. He was born on a farm at Valencia, Kansas, December 30, 1893. His father is Mr. F. A. Kiene, a well known citizen of Shawnee County now living on his farm near Topeka. He was born in 1834 in Alsace Lorraine, France, but in 1846, as a boy of twelve, was brought to America by his parents, who … Read more

Biography of Howard J. Hodgson

Howard J. Hodgson, who had practiced law at Eureka since 1888, had gained a strong hold on the business, professional and civic affairs of his home county, and is one of the prominent Kansans of today. Mr. Hodgson had lived in this state since he was six years of age, his people being pioneers of Greenwood County. He is a native of Canada, having been born near Lindsay in County Victoria, Ontario, October 6, 1863. His grandfather, John Hodgson, was born in England in 1795, and as a young man immigrated to Canada and spent his active years as a farmer in … Read more

Biography of Thomas W. Morgan

Thomas W. Morgan is warden of the Federal prison at Leavenworth. He began his career in Kansas as a newspaper man. Newspaper work brought him naturally into touch with all sorts and conditions of men and affairs and he is only one of many examples that might be noted of newspaper men who have graduated into other spheres of interest and activity. For a number of years Mr. Morgan had been connected with the penal and reformatory institutions of the state, and had become deeply interested in the many sociological problems involved in the handling and administration of prison affairs. … Read more

Kansas Registrations of Enemy Aliens, 1917 – 1921

Enemy Alien Registration Affidavit for Bernhardt Vick - Cropped Photo

The series contains original affidavits of registration that record personal information about each registrant, their photograph affixed to the majority of documents, and the registrants fingerprints. All of these are specific to Kansas, and most have the actual documents attached.

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 C. G. Pierce

C. G. Pierce. A quarter of a century is a long time to be identified with any line of business in one location, and twenty-five or more years of continuous management of a country paper almost constitutes a record in itself. C. G. Pierce was the founder of the Severyite at Severy, Kansas, more than twenty-five years ago, and is still its editor and proprietor. He was born at Cobleskill, New York, January 1, 1869. His Pierce ancestors came out of Ireland and settled in New York in colonial days. His great-grandfather is buried at Fergusonville in Delaware County, New … Read more

Biography of Sylvester Freemont Wicker

Sylvester Freemont Wicker. In point of experience and continuous practice Mr. Wicker is one of the oldest members of the bar in Greenwood County. He had been identified with a general practice as a lawyer and many business affairs in that section for the past thirty-three years. He now had his home and interests at Eureka. The stock from which he is descended is Scotch-Irish. The Wickers settled in North Carolina during colonial times. Mr. Wicker’s father and grandfather were natives of the Old North state. His grandfather James Wicker was born in North Carolina in 1807, and was an … Read more

Biography of William E. Robb

William E. Robb. The thriving and prosperous Town of Neal in Greenwood County stands on land which a number of years ago William E. Robb plowed and cultivated and ranged his stock over. From his farm he furnished the townsite, and while he had still extensive farming interests in that locality his main business is as a merchant in the Town of Neal. More than any other individual he had had a direct influence upon the growth and development of the community. Mr. Robb had an unusually interesting family history. From the data he had collected from time to time … Read more

Biography of William Thomas Grove, M. D.

William Thomas Grove, M. D. Doctor Grove had been one of the foremost physicians and surgeons of Eureka for twenty-two years. He is a man of high attainments in the profession. While most of his work had been in general lines he is a recognized expert in diseases of the eye, car, nose and throat and had largely specialized in that department of practice. His standing as a citizen is not less than that he enjoys in his profession. Doctor Grove found the road to a professional career somewhat uneven and punctuated with difficulties. He began working for his own … Read more

Biography of Irvin F. Benest

Irvin F. Benest. The Benest family came to Kansas in 1871. Two years later came the great financial panic following the failure of Jay Cooke on the famous Black Friday. It was an era of wide spread distress, but Kansas people during those years had even more grievous burdens than hard times. The grasshoppers came as a plague, there were successive seasons of drouth, crops were a rarity, and there was little market for what the farmers did produce. It was during the height of the hard times of that decade that Irvin F. Benest, a lawyer and president of … Read more

Biography of Orval Duane Allis

Orval Duane Allis is a Kansas educator, superintendent of schools at Virgil. He is a graduate of Baker University, is a native of Kansas, and his people settled in the state while the Civil war was in progress. Mr. Allis had in his veins the blood of a substantial ancestry, the English and Holland Dutch predominating. His paternal ancestors came from England to Vermont in colonial times. His great-grandfather, William Allis, was born in Vermont, but early moved to Steuben County, New York, where he married, where he spent his career as a farmer, and where he died. F. G. … Read more

Skaggs, Henry T. – Obituary

Enterprise, Oregon Henry T. Skaggs was born in Indiana, Sept. 13, 1848, and died at his home in Enterprise on Dec. 25, 1920, aged 72 years, 3 months and 7 days. When a young man he moved to Missouri, and soon afterward to Madison, Kansas, where on Sept. 18, 1881, he was married to Miss Effie Martin. About 31 years ago Mr. and Mrs. Skaggs moved to Dayton, Washington, and 28 years ago they moved to Wallowa county, locating near Flora. A year ago last October they moved to Enterprise. He leaves a wife, Mrs. Effie Skaggs, one daughter, Mrs. … Read more

Biography of Ralph M. McKee

Ralph M. McKee is superintendent of the consolidated city schools at Neal in Greenwood County. He is one of the younger men engaged in educational work in Kansas, and had a highly creditable record for the work he had already done and stands high both among his fellow teachers and in his home community. Mr. McKee was born at Xenia, Ohio, December 1, 1893. His McKee ancestors were early settlers in America. Mr. McKee had strains of English and Irish ancestry, and inherits good qualities through both lines. His father, W. T. McKee, was born in Ohio in 1861, and … Read more

Biography of Fred Schuyle Jackson

Fred Schuyle Jackson, of Topeka, prominent lawyer, former congressman, ex-attorney-general of Kansas, is one of the many able men who have made Kansas notable as a commonwealth. His father was Martin Van Buren Jackson, who bore a conspicuous part in the border warfare of Kansas. Fred S. Jackson was born April 19, 1868, and his birth occurred in the block house at Stanton near Osawatomie. His early education came chiefly from the public schools of Miami and Greenwood counties, and of earlier experiences and service readered should be mentioned five years spent in the schoolroom as a teacher, In the … Read more

Biography of Charles E. Moore

Charles E. Moore. When Charles E. Moore came home from college in 1887, his first efforts were directed along the line of the loan and mortgage business. He had been at it continuously ever since, now for thirty years, and had built up the largest organization handling loans and mortgages at Eureka or in that section of the state. As the head of a successful business of this kind Mr. Moore’s interests have naturally gone into a wider field of finance and business affairs. Since 1908 he had been president of the Citizens National Bank of Eureka. He is an … Read more

Biography of Granville T. Ledgerwood

Granville T. Ledgerwood. The community around Beaumont in Butler County and also in Greenwood County had known Mr. Ledgerwood as a substantial farmer citizen and business man for over thirty years. As a farmer he attended strictly to his business, worked with all the power that was in him and in time acquired a well developed farm and sufficient property for his needs. Mr. Ledgerwood is now a resident of the Village of Beaumont, and among other interests is looking after the local postoffice as postmaster. He comes of that fine stock of people that located in East Tennessee during … Read more

Biography of Anthony Wayne Fairchild, M. D.

Anthony Wayne Fairchild, M. D. The work which he had done as a member of the medical profession in Fall River had already attracted much attention to Doctor Fairchild, whose attainments and abilities are much above the average. Not only does a large clientage esteem him for his services, but his wife, Mrs. Fairchild, is likewise a graduate physician and had a considerable practice, specializing in discases of the eye. The Fairchild family originated in England, coming to America in Colonial times. Doctor Fairchild’s grandfather was Minor Fairchild, who was born in Pennsylvania in 1818, and became a pioneer farmer … Read more

Biography of John H. Smythe

John H. Smythe. The life of John Henry Smythe, who for many years had served as city clerk of Eureka, had been one that exemplifies the true spirit and practice of service. He had always been a worker. He had performed faithfully those duties that have come to him in a long career, whether as a soldier on the battlefield, as an employe of business concerns, or as a public official. While he had attained none of the conspicuous places in business or public life, there is much that is honorable, instructive and praiseworthy in what he had done, and … Read more

Biography of Robert E. Kenner

Robert E. Kenner. No better lesson relative to the value of honorable effort intelligently directed can be found than that offered by the career of a man who has risen to a responsible position through his own initiative, and in this connection the life of Robert E. Kenner presents an example. Still a young man, he has worked his way to an important post, that of superintendent of the American Zinc, Lead and Smelter Company, at Dearing, Kansas, and in so doing has been dependent only upon his own resource and industry. Mr. Kenner was born at Eureka, Kansas, August … Read more