A Standard History of Kansas and Kansans Collections – Page 48 of 109

Biography of John Byers Heffelfinger

John Byers Heffelfinger, superintendent of city schools at Arkansas City, is a Kansas educator of wide and diversified experience and exceptional attainments. He began teaching in country schools when a boy and since completing his college cours had given his best thought and practically all his time to the profession. Mr. Heffelfinger was vice president of the Kansas State Teachers’ Association in 1912, and in 1916 was president of the Southern Kansas Teachers’ Association. The Heffelfinger family in America produced a number of noteworthy men. Mr. Heffelfinger is of German origin, though his people came to Pennsylvania about the middle … Read more

Biography of John Bunyan Adams

John Bunyan Adams was born in Butler County, Kansas. That county had been his home all his life, and beginning there as a country school teacher and subsequently entering banking, he had achieved a reputation built up on constructive service that had made him widely known over the state as a legislator, banker and financier. He is a former president of the State Bankers’ Association, and for years had been a recognized leader in his part of the state in the republican party. His birth occurred on March 25, 1873, on his father’s farm near Potwin in Butler County. He … Read more

Biography of John Baptist Miege

John Baptist Miege, first Catholic bishop of Kansas, was born in 1815, the youngest son of a wealthy and pions family of the parish of Chevron, Upper Savoy, France. At an early age he was committed to the care of his brother, the director of the episcopal seminary of Moutiers, and completed his literary studies at the age of nineteen. After spending two more years at the seminary in the study of philosophy, on October 23, 1836, he was admitted to the Society of Jesns. The following eleven years he spent in further study, a portion of the time at … Read more

Biography of John B. Morton, M. D.

John B. Morton, M. D., had been successfully engaged in practice at Nashville for nearly ten years. He is a native of Kansas, and his people were pioneers in the vicinity of Cunningham, where he was born July 11, 1884. He is of Scotch and English ancestry and his forefathers were pioneers in the State of Ohio. His grandfather, Barzillai Morton, was born in Monroe County, Ohio, in 1811, and spent most of his life in his native county, where he conducted a mill for many years. About 1882 he came to Cunningham, Kansas, settling on a farm, and lived … Read more

Biography of John B. Favor

John B. Favor, present sheriff of Sumner County, has been a resident of Western Kansas for over forty-five years, and though he was a small boy when the family moved here he knows both by recollection and personal experience all the vicissitudes and trials that beset the early pioneers. This story of a pioneer Kansas family begins with the removal of Gaines and Susan (Lavender) Favor from their native state of Tennessee to a farm near Cairo, Illinois, in 1855. On that farm in the southern part of Illinois was born on January 22, 1860, John B. Favor, first mentioned … Read more

Biography of John B. Andrews

John B. Andrews. Cowley County knew John B. Andrews during the later period of a very active and strenuous time. Mr. Andrews was one of Arkansas City’s substantial business men and highly esteemed citizens, and died there August 7, 1913. His was a long life, and it was lived in a number of different places, practically all over the West. He was born at Massena, New York, June 9, 1837, and he was seventy-six years of age when he died. His father, John B. Andrews, Sr., owned a large part of the townsite of Massena, New York, built the first … Read more

Biography of John B. Adams

John B. Adams is manager of the Security Abstract Company of Independence. This is the largest abstract firm in Montgomery County, and in many ways its business rivals in volums that of any similar concern in the entire state. Mr. Adams had had a very active business career, beginning in boyhood, and taking him into many fields of activity, and during his life in Southern Kansas he had seen Independence grow from a frontier town to one of the metropolitan centers of Kansas. He comes of that same ancestry which, originally transplanted from England to the shores of Massachusetts, produced … Read more

Biography of John August Lindahl

John August Lindahl. One of the families that came as pioneers to Dickinson County in 1870 were the Lindahls. The head of the family, the late August Swenson Lindahl, was a very poor man, having barely enough to bring his family across the ocean and reach this situation almost on the frontier of civilization in Kansas. Like other early settlers he took up a tract of Government land, locating in Center Township, and 2½ miles northeast of the present Town of Enterprise in Dickinson County. There he began the hard work to which he had become accustomed in his native … Read more

Biography of John Appley Ferrell

John Appley Ferrell, lawyer of Sedan, was representative of the Forty-ninth District in the Legislature in 1915-16 and in the general election of 1916 was elected to the State Senate. While in the Legislature he was chairman of the oil and gas committee, chairman of the library committee, and a member of the judiciary and school lands committees. He was also a member on the conference committee on appropriations and exerted a creditable influence in keeping down extravagant appriations during that session. Mr. Ferrell had had a long and active career, divided about evenly between his work as an educator … Read more

Biography of John Alexander Bond

John A. Bond. Among the family names that have been known and respected for more than a half century in Shawnee County, is that of Bond. Industrious, honorable, intelligent and religious, the Bonds have helped in every way the development of this section and have reflected credit on both family and community. John Alexander Bond, the present leading representative of the family and its pioneer settler in Kansas, now lives in comfortable retirement on his fine farm situated in Rossville Township. John Alexander Bond was born in Virginia, May 20, 1834, the eldest of his parents’ seven children. He is … Read more

Biography of John Adams Jones

John Adams Jones. While the main work of his life for over twenty years had been education, and he had served fourteen years as superintendent of the city schools of Highland, Mr. Jones had many other interests and ties to connect him with that thriving town of Doniphan County. Besides his position as a Kansas educator, all the older base ball fans who followed the fortunes of the teams in the Western League know the name of Mr. Jones as a former pitcher and one of the steadiest and most resourceful players of the national pastime. Mr. Jones was born … Read more

Biography of John Adam Endres

John Adam Endres was one of the notable men of Northeastern Kansas, for nearly thirty years was engaged in business and proved an active exponent of the best civic spirit in the City of Leavenworth, and died at his home there August 11, 1893. No finer class of citizens had ever been incorporated into American nationality than the emigrants from Germany in the decade following the Revolution of 1848. They exemplified the soul of patriotism, adapted themselves with wonderful versatility to the life and conditions of the New World, many of them fought for freedom and union, and in all … Read more

Biography of John A. Swenson

John A. Swenson. The clean civic and business record of Lindsborg owes not a little to the sterling integrity of John A. Swenson, a pioneer of the city and for many years its leading banker. Mr. Swenson was born at Falun, Sweden, April 16, 1850, a son of Nels P. and Anna Swenson. His father, who was born in April, 1823, was a blacksmith by trade. In 1865 he brought his family to America, located in Chicago, where he followed his trade two years. Another year was spent in Henry County, Iowa, and in 1868 he became one of the … Read more

Biography of John A. Pottorf

John A. Pottorf. When a man reaches the seventy-fourth milestone of his life’s journey it may be taken for granted that he has had a wealth of experience which, if properly written out, would fill a volume. In the case of John A. Pottorf, who has already passed his seventy-fourth birthday, long life means more than length of years. He was not born with a silver spoon in his mouth and even when he came to Kansas a little over thirty years ago he had to begin as a farm renter. The overcoming of obstacles to success has been a … Read more

Biography of John A. Clements

John A. Clements is assistant manager of the Hutchinson, Kansas, plant of the Morton Salt Company. This is the largest salt manufacturing plant in Kansas and the Middle West. It had a daily capacity of 4,000 barrels of pure salt, and it is one of the industries that have given a just fame to Kansas as a salt producing state. The plant of the Morton Salt Company is located two miles southwest of Hutchinson. Its importance as a local industry is indicated by the fact that it employs 275 hands. Mr. Clements is an active young business man and had … Read more

Biography of John A. Burt

John A. Burt. An old and honored resident of Montgomery County was the late John A. Burt, who came to that section of Kansas in the early days and who died at Tyro November 26, 1905. Mrs. Burt and some of her children are still living in the vicinity of Tyro. Born at Fort Wayne, Indiana, October 24, 1845, John A. Burt was a son of Silas Burt, who was born in Indiana in 1818 and represented a very early family in the settlement of that state. He was a farmer, and died at Fort Wayne in 1850. John A. … Read more

Biography of Joel Moore O’Brien

Joel Moore O’Brien is proprietor of the largest department store in Allen County. The present business is the outgrowth of many years of successful experience and gradual development beginning with a single stock of groceries. Mr. O’Brien had proved himself a merchant of unusual sagacity and had been one of the principal factors in recent years in the development and progress of his home city. The O’Brien family had long been identified with the development of this section of Kansas. Mr. O’Brien’s grandfather Daniel Cornelius O’Brien was one of the Kansas pioneers. He was born in Ohio and in 1857 … Read more

Biography of Joel H. Rickel

Joel H. Rickel. Among the citizens of Chanute, one who had had a most interesting career is Joel H. Rickel, a resident of this city since 1896, and now the owner of a carriage and repair shop and the owner of a valuable farm. Mr. Rickel is a veteran of the Civil war, and had been a prominent figure in Grand Army circles, being a past commander of several posts in Kansas and a past department commander of the State of Kansas. He was born in Ashland County, Ohio, December 8, 1844, and is a son of John S. and … Read more

Biography of Joab Mulvane

Joab Mulvane. The spirit of enterprise which brings about progress is not the possession of every man, but it is the needful factor in accomplishing practical results in the life of an individual as well as a community. It includes foresight, courage and daring, and when caution is added, great things, often seemingly impossible things, may be brought about. Among the truly enterprising men who came to Kansas forty years ago and have achieved so well that their names are known and honored over the state at present is Joab Mulvane, of Topeka, ex-member of a State Legislature and the … Read more

Biography of Jesse White

A widely known and universally esteemed citizen of Riley County, a retired farmer living in great comfort in the pleasant Town of Riley, is Jesse White, an honored veteran of the Civil war. For almost sixty years his home had been in the Sunflower State and he had done his part in aiding in its agricultural, religious and educational progrees. He was born July 10, 1844, in Jackson County, Indiana. His parents were Jesse and Naney (Kinlon) White. From their native state, North Carolina, the parents of Jesse White removed to Indiaua in 1842, and thence to Kansas, arriving at … Read more