John D. Stewart

JOHN D. STEWART was the organizer and from the beginning has been cashier of the St. John National Bank. Throughout its existence this bank has enjoyed a liberal patronage and is one of the best conducted financial institutions in Stafford County. It has a capital stock of $25,000, a surplus fund of equal amount, and at the close of business in 1918 its deposits approximated $250,000. Its total assets are more than $325,000.

Mr. Stewart is a native of Kansas, born near Eureka in Greenwood County October 4, 1874. His ancestors came from Scotland in colonial times. His father, J. S. Stewart, was born in Williamson County, Illinois, in 1847, was reared in that county, and in 1871 established a home in Greenwood County, Kansas, where he was a farmer for a number of years. In 1878 he removed to Eureka, and for eight years served as clerk of the district court, and after that was connected with the Eureka Bank. He died there in 1895. He was a republican and was a charter member and active in the Methodist Episcopal Church. In Greenwood County J. S. Stewart married Kate Smyth, who was born in Missouri in 1856 and now lives at Wichita. Her parents came to Kansas in 1859 and were among the first settlers of Greenwood County. Mr. Stewart and wife had five children: Clarence, a farmer at Neal, Kansas; John D.; George R., a ranchman at Coldwater, Kansas; Florence, wife of Joseph Clark, a Wichita druggist; and Walter, owner of a garage at Coldwater.

John D. Stewart graduated from the Eureka High School in 1891, from the Southern Kansas Academy, at Eureka in 1894, and the next year went to work in the Eureka Bank as a clerk. He learned the banking business in that institution, and was there until 1905, when he came to St. John and, with R. B. Temple, now president of the Merchants Reserve State Bank at Wichita, organized the St. John National Bank. F. B. Gilmore is now president and William Dixon vice president of the bank.

Mr. Stewart and his brother, George H., are large landowners, the farms aggregating 2,700 acres in Commanche and Stafford counties. His modern home at St. John was built in 1909. He is a past master of St. John Lodge No. 254, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, and is a republican. In 1898, at Eureka, he married Miss Martha Burns, daughter of A. P. and Lydia A. (McVannan) Burns. Her parents now live retired at Eureka. Mr. Burns came to Kansas in 1859.

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