Roll of Honor

The following men represented Lincoln County in the State Legislature in the years indicated:

1872 F.A. Schemerhorn

1873 Geo. Green

1874 Vollany Ball

1875 Jas. B. Goff

1876 E.S. Pierce

1877 Reuben Williams

1879 W.S. Wait

1883-1886 R.F. Bryant

1887 & 1889 J.D. Miller

1891 & 1893 A.N. Whittington

1895 & 1897 J.J. Lambert

1899 Arthur J. Stanley

1901 F.G. Dunham

1903 J.D. Miller on resignation of D.E. Books

1905 to now E.T. Skinner

Ira C. Buzick was the first Representative, also State Senator in 1881. Geo. W. Anderson was also a representative from Lincoln County. In 1895 A.P. Gilpin was Journal Clerk at the State House. He held this office two terms. William Baker, of Linco[l]n, was a Congressman and represented the Sixth District in Washington D.C.

Hon. E.T. Skinner Representative from Lincoln County	Who secured as appropriation for the Beecher's Island monument. He belongs to one of the oldest and best families in the county, his people having moved here in 1866. His mother was the first school teacher in Lincoln County and his uncle, D.C. Skinner, was one of the Forsyth scouts.
A.J. Stanley County Superintendent of Schools	The man who made Lincoln County famous. Born and raised here. Went to the Legislature and helped make laws while still in knee pants. As County Superintendent of School he introduced the study of agriculture. Helped revise the school laws. The fact that he once lived at Colbert could not keep a good man down.
Arthur Artman Probate Judge	His title should be "The Marrying Judge" or "The Lightning Knot-Tier." He was born and raised in New York State at Hunter. Came to Kansas in 1879. Taught school for a number of years. Elected to his present office in 1902. He has married a great many people and everybody that he married voted for him, so he will probably be there as long as he wants to stay.
J.W. Meek Clerk of the District Court	Here is a man with some real history. Born in Meigs County, Ohio, November 2, 1841. Enlisted in Company E, 75th Ohio Volunteers in 1862. Taken prisoner at the Battle of Gainsville, Florida, August 17, 1864, and was in Andersonville and Florence prisons until February 26, 1865. Came to Lincoln County, Kansas, in 1879, and took a homestead. Elected County Clerk in 1889, and served four years.
Geo. E. Hutchinson Register of Deeds	He was born in Missouri, but please don't hold that against him, for he has been in Lincoln County long enough to be an old settler, and has lived it down. Came to Kansas at the age of eight and his home was at Beloit till he came here. Mr. Hutchinson is one of the jolly men of the court house crowd, and has plenty of friends.
S.H. Brunt County Surveyor	Born and raised in Iowa. Took a special course in surveying at Grand Island, Neb. Became a government surveyor and surveyed through Wyoming, Colorado, and New Mexico. Came to Lincoln County and served a number of terms as deputy County Surveyor, and was appointed to fill a vacancy. Has been elected four times since. As there is not much surveying to do Mr. Brunt makes abstracting his main business.
W.H. Taylor County Commissioner	One of the Barons of the Spillman. He lives in one of the finest homes of the county. He is giving eminent satisfaction in his office as the people of the west side consider he has done more for them than any other man they have had. He is the good looker among the county officers. This picture does not do him justice.
S.H. Long County Commissioner	He is a Democrat, but the Democrats are a majority on the Board of Commissioners, so it is all right. He was born in Pennsylvania in 1850, and came to Lincoln County, Kansas, in 1878, and engaged in farming. His home is on his fine farm not far from Lincoln. He was elected to office four years ago.
C.H. Berry County Commissioner	Born in England in 1859. Came to Lincoln County, Kansas, in 1872. His business as official career is as follows: Farmer thirteen years, merchant ten years, auctioneer a number of years, city councilman, deputy sheriff and county commissioner. He is smaller than the other two commissioners, but he can hold his own and ably represents the First District.
X X X X	Here is where the other county officers disappeared when they saw us coming after their pictures for this book. They'll never come back any more; they're dead ones.

Some Old Settlers

Mr. N.B. Rees	Mr. Rees is one of our old settlers, having come to Lincoln County in 1872, and lived here ever since, except for a short time when he was in Oklahoma. He has the honor of having made the first picture made in the county, and was in the photograph and jewelry business for ten years. He is now in the laundry business. Mr. Rees is a civil war veteran, and his native home was Bloomington, Ill.
Adolph Roenigk	This is one of the old timers who was born in "Der Vaterland" in 1847. His birthplace was Prussia, and he is the son of Gotlob and Marie Roenigk, who were honest thrifty farmers in good circumstances. He received a common school education, attending school until the age of thirteen, when he came to America, leaving his parents in the old country. He settled first in Wisconsin and later went to St. Louis, where he learned the trade of saddler and harness making, attending night school. In 1866 he made a tour of Kansas, visiting Lawrence, Topeka, and Manhattan, returning by way of Leavenworth. In 1868, he came to Kansa to make his home, working for the Government during the Indian troubles of the year. These pioneer days were the most enjoyable of his life, although he saw the usual hardships and sometimes came near loosing his life, being shot through the lungs once. But judging from his writings, he appreciated the freedom of the plains. He and some of his companions were in a fight with the Indians in 1868. Two of them were killed. Mr. Roenigk came back the next year and put up headstones of limestone and cut their names and the inscription "Killed by the Indians May 28, 1868." He was one of the first white men in what is now Russell County, having come there at the time the first railroad built from Kansas City to Denver. He settled in Clay County in 1870, and the next year his parents from Germany joined him. He engaged in the saddle and harness business in Clifton, Washington County, and was worth $20,000 at this time. He came to Lincoln County and engaged quite extensively in manufacturing, and has always done a prosperous business. He built several business blocks, but was burned out in 1897 without insurance, and met with other losses. He is still engaged in the harness business, as much for pleasure as profit. He received the white ribbon on manufactured leather goods at the Kansas State Fair in 1890. Mr. Roenigk once went to California for his health, and is now on a tour around the world. He is a bachelor, an Odd Fellow, and a Royal Arch Mason, also a valuable member of the Kansas State Historical Society, for which he had written many articles, of his own and others experiences.
George Snapp	George Snapp is one of the younger old settlers. He was born in West Virginia in 1859. Came to Kansas with his parents in 1873, being nearly 14 years old. His parents located in Salt Creek Township, and George's first work in Kansas was herding cattle. The Snapp family came just in time to be "at home" when the grasshoppers came on the fourth of July, 1874. George put in most of his time farming, and what time he could spare from the farm he devoted to carpentering and plastering. He was married in 1885 to a Mitchell County girl then living near Coursen's Grove, named Winnifred Wines. To this union have been born six children, five of them still living. Their first child, a girl, died fourteen years ago. About the year 1885 Mr. Snapp bought the farm he now lives on four miles and a half northeast of Barnard. There are 240 acres in the place, and it is choice land. One hundred acres is under cultivation, the balance being used for pasture. The place is well improved, there being a fine double-gabled six-room house and many other conveniences. He turns off a carload of cattle every year. For the past twenty years Mr. Snapp has found time to do a great deal of carpentering and plastering. In later years the demand for his work in these lines has been greater than he could accommodate. He has built five houses since the middle of last October, and had several contracts waiting for him. It is a pretty good record, considering that he only devotes to his trade what time he can spare from the farm. The he is a past-master in his line of work is evident from the fact that he can't take all the work that is offered him. [The above is copied from the Barnard Bee. Since it was written Mr. Snapp has become owner of a section of land in Ellis County, south of Natoma.]
	T.J. McCurry was born in North Carolina in 1841. Was married to Miss Mary Bowen in Georgia in 1866, and three years later he brought his family to Kansas, locating on what is now the Adams place. He farmed this place about fifteen years and then bought of David Swank the place he is now on near Milo, which consist of 880 acres in all, about 350 of it under cultivation. Mr. McCurry commenced buying grain at Milo in 1889, and in 1891 he built the elevator now being operated by his son Thomas. After conducting the grain business with profit for several years he this spring turned the business over to his son, who we feel confident possesses the elements necessary to make a success of the undertaking. Mr. McCurry's success furnishes another example of what Kansas will do for a hard worker. When he landed in this country he had a team and a wagon, but no money. That was in 1869. He gained a little on adversity during the next three or four years, but along came the grasshoppers in 1874 and set him back -- 'way back. They cleaned up everything and left him as bad off or worse than he was when he came. But he stayed with the proposition, and to-day he is one of our solid men. He is a stockholder in the Barnard mill, lumber yard, investment company, a director of the Bank of Barnard, and president of the Barnard Telephone Company. Mr. McCurry tells us that the chief industry in Kansas in the early days was cattle raising, which greatly held back the farming industry. But the herd law of 1874 came to the relief of the farmers, although it was at first feared that it would be a detriment to them on account of having a tendency to drive the cattle out of the State, but such was not the case. Cattlemen were compelled to herd their cattle, and the farming industry took on a boom, and it has been booming ever since. Another red letter day for Kansas was when the agricultural department introduced Russian hard wheat. It is a good thing and a money maker for the farmers, and has stayed with them ever since. Mr. and Mrs. McCurry have raised a family of five daughters and one son. Three of the daughters are married: Mrs. Ella Borgan, Mrs. Ida Richardson, and Mrs. Esther Lenhart. The first two live not far from Barnard, the last one at Plymouth, Kans.