Henry A. Platt, Overbrook's popular postmaster and justice of the peace, who has been instrumental in the improvement and progress of the city, was born in Laporte county, Indiana, July 9, 1860, the son of Ely and Fannie E. (Harrison) Platt. His grandfather was a native of Connecticut, where he was a millwright and a prominent member of the Congregational church, serving as deacon at Wallingford for over forty years. Ely Platt was born in Connecticut, was reared and educated there but immigrated to Indiana at an early day. At the outbreak of the Civil war he enlisted in the Fourth Indiana cavalry and served a little over three years, when he was honorably discharged and located at St. Louis, Mo. In 1869 he came to the State of Kansas and settled near the present site of Carbondale, at that time nothing but unbroken prairie. Mr. Platt was a carpenter by trade and built the first house in Carbondale for L. R. Adams. For a number of years Mr. Platt served as constable of Osage county and as he was absolutely fearless he was able to enforce the law at a time when it was little respected in that part of the state by the lawless class who were employed in the coal mines of that section.

Henry Platt was reared near Carbondale and received the educational advantages afforded by the pioneers of that day, when an education was gained only by a hard struggle. But the little primitive school houses fitted men well for the battle of life and existence, as has been proved in the case of Mr. Platt. In 1890 he located at Overbrook and engaged in the hotel business for ten years. He soon became popular, took part in the political life of the town and was elected justice of the peace, which position he has held for nineteen years. In 1897 Mr. Platt was appointed postmaster of Overbrook and is still in office. In 1896 he ran for sheriff on the Republican ticket, but the wave of Populism was sweeping over Kansas at that time, and he was defeated by a small majority. Mr. Platt is a member of the Masonic order, being a Chapter Mason, and both he and his wife are members of the Knights and Ladies of Security.

On Dec. 23, 1880, Mr. Platt married Sarah, the daughter of J. B. and Sophia Cann, of Carbondale. Mr. Cann was an Englishman who immigrated to the United States in 1879 and located at Carbondale, where he purchased a farm and worked as a miner. He died at the home of his daughter at Topeka, Kan., in April, 1910. Mr. and Mrs. Platt have two sons: Arthur, twenty-nine years of age, who is engaged as a bookkeeper in the postcard department of Arthur Capper's establishment at Topeka, and Irving, twenty-seven years old, who is a successful lawyer at Junction City. The family are members of the Congregational church.