1905 History of Crawford County Kansas

Hon. A. J. Cory, proprietor of the Maple Grove farm in Lincoln township, is one of the ablest farmers in Crawford county, and has made a fine record in every department of his activity. He has enjoyed liberal success in business affairs, but he has also been actively interested in public matters, having served in the state assembly and been a leader in county affairs in general.

Born at Syracuse, Kosciusko county, Indiana, November 10, 1846, he had attained the age of eighteen years when he became a soldier in the Civil war. He enlisted in January, 1865, in the One Hundred and Fifty-second Indiana Infantry, in Captain Smith's company and under the command of Colonel W. W. Giswold. From the camp at Indianapolis they were sent to Virginia in February, and during the last weeks of the war were stationed in various parts of that central field of the war, being at Charleston, West Virginia, for a time, and being at Harper's Ferry when the war closed. He was honorably discharged, and returned home when still in his teens.

Mr. Cory is a member of a prominent family of Kosciusko county, Indiana, which settled in that county in the pioneer year of 1834. His father, Abijah C. Cory, born in Pickaway county, Ohio, in 1818, was a son of Jeremiah Cory, who was a native of Pennsylvania, of Scotch ancestry, and was a soldier in the war of 1812. Jeremiah married Dorothy Martin, whose grandfather was with Daniel Boone in Kentucky, and her father was a native of Belfast, Ireland. Jeremiah Cory and wife moved from Indiana to Story county, Iowa, where they both died. Abijah C. Cory married for his first wife Sally Mann, who died in 1845, leaving three children, Samantha, deceased at fourteen years; Almeda and Alonzo. After the death of his first wife he married Mrs. Matilda (Wood) Gunter, a daughter of John G. Wood, a soldier of the war of 1812, and by this marriage there were the following children: A. J., Jesse, F. Malinda, P. Celestine, Elizabeth. The father, who died at Syracuse, Indiana, at the age of seventy-five, was a successful farmer and stockman, politically was a Whig and Republican, active in party affairs though never seeking office, and was a member of the Baptist church.

Mr. A. J. Cory was reared on the homestead farm in Kosciusko county, and attended the public schools. At the age of twenty-one, November 14, 1867, he was married to Miss Rhoda C. Watson, who was born near Warsaw in Kosciusko county, and reared and educated there, being a daughter of Robert and Sarah (Voss) Watson. Mrs. Cory faithfully performed her duties as wife and mother for twenty-seven years, until called to her final rest in 1894. She was a devoted member of the Church of God. She left three children, Minnie A. Lesher, of Lincoln township, this county; Sarah B. Love, of Franklin, Oklahoma; and Clarence, who is nineteen years old and at home. Two children died in childhood, Curtis L. at the age of four years, and Jessie Pearl at fifteen months. In 1896 Mr. Cory was married to Miss Anna Todd, a lady of education and refinement and a daughter of Henry and Margaret (Emerson) Todd, both deceased, and formerly of Bourbon county, Kansas.

Mr. Cory moved from Syracuse, Indiana, to Crawford county in 1870, in a wagon, and has ever since been closely identified with the county's interests. He is owner of one of the fine places in Lincoln township, the Maple Grove farm consisting of two hundred and eighty acres of choice land and being one of the best improved and most valuable places in the township. He has a comfortable and sightly residence, his barn is thirty by ninety feet and one of the best of its kind, and all other equipments show progressiveness and the latest advances in agriculture.

In politics Mr. Cory is a Socialist, and has always worked and stood for the principles of his conviction rather than for regular party. He voted for Peter Cooper in 1876. In 1890 he was elected by the citizens of Crawford county as a member of the state assembly, and while there he acquitted himself most creditably by his efforts for many needed reforms and in the interest of his constituents. He affiliates with the Odd Fellows, and is a member of the Church of God. As an old soldier he is a member of the G. A. R.