1905 History of Crawford County Kansas

F. R. Smith, of Hepler, has been in the stock business all his life, and has followed it most successfully for nearly twenty years in this county, and has been a resident of various parts of Kansas for the past thirty-five years. He is one of the leading and progressive business men of Hepler, and he has also been a man of affairs, interested in the public improvement and upbuilding of his community and fulfilling in a public-spirited manner every trust reposed in him.

Mr. Smith was born February 14, 1840, in the state of Tennessee. His parents were Joseph and Minerva E. (Warden) Smith, natives, respectively, of Tennessee and Virginia. The mother died in Kansas in 1885. Mr. Smith lived with an uncle in Kentucky until he was grown, and his educational advantages were obtained in the schools of Albany, Kentucky. On July 14, 1861, he enlisted in Company C, First Kentucky Cavalry, and was in the Union Army of the Cumberland. He fought against Morgan, was in campaigns in Georgia, Tennessee, Kentucky, Indiana and Ohio, being wounded four times, and was discharged at Louisville, July 28, 1865, having gained a most creditable record as a soldier of his country. He had given four years' full service to the government, and is now one of the few surviving and honored veterans of the great Civil war. After his discharge he traveled for some time, and was in Michigan two years. He came to Allen county, Kansas, in 1869, and for sixteen years lived in that and in Bourbon county. He took up his residence in Crawford county in 1885, and five years later moved to Hepler. In addition to his dealings as a stock buyer and shipper from this point, he also does a real estate and loan business of considerable proportions. He is also at the present time assessor of Walnut township.

Mr. Smith is a Republican, and has held the office of justice of the peace. He affiliates with the Court No. 1000, M. W. A., and as an old soldier makes one of the interesting members of the Walnut Post of the Grand Army of the Republic.

October 17, 1872, he married Miss Martha E. Harper, of Ohio, and four children have been born to them: Nora E. is a stenographer for the Chicago Lumber and Coal Company at St. Louis; Charles R. is at Pagosa Junction, Colorado; Minnie is a teacher in the high school of Hepler; and Georgia Euphemia is at home. The family are members of the Methodist Episcopal church at Hepler.