Sedgwick County KSGenWeb

Portrait And Biographical Album of Sedgwick County, Kan.

Chapman Brothers 1888

Pages 155 - 162

 HON. JAMES R. MEAD.  The now numerous family of Meads comprises the descendants of John Mead, one of two brothers who emigrated to this country from England in the year A. D. 1642.  One of the brothers settled in Virginia, where his posterity now reside.  This branch of the family write the name Meade, the "e" being added to distinguish them from the Meads who settled in New England.  The late Bishop Meade, of Virginia, and the late Gen. George B. Meade, of the Union army, are descendants of this branch of the family.  John Mead and his two sons, after a residence of some years in Massachusetts, subsequently removed to Long Island, and in 1660 to Greenwich, Conn.  The following is taken  from the "History of Greenwich, Conn.," published in 1857:  "John Mead was one  of two brothers who emigrated from England about the year 1642.  The family was  then an ancient and honorable one, though it is not within the author's means  to trace their genealogy previous to their emigration to this country.  One of  their ancestors had been the friend and the physician of the talented, though  not very amiable, Queen Elizabeth.  One of the two brothers settled in Virginia, where the family still exists.  The other, John Mead, with his two sons came to New England about the year 1642.  The name is spelled Meade as well as Mead.  They emigrated from Greenwich, Kent County, England."

      Of John Mead, the elder, but little is known.  He was quite aged when he settled in Greenwich, and died not long afterward.  His son, John Mead (2d), after a residence in Greenwich of thirty-six years, died in 1696, at the advanced age of eighty.  He was a prominent citizen, respected not only for his even temperament, but for his energy and decision of character.  In 1660 he purchased a large tract of land of Richard Crabb and other lands of the Indians, and at his death left a farm to each of his eleven children.  The family soon became numerous in the town and exerted a controlling influence for many years.

      Ebenezer Mead was the fourth son of John Mead (2d).  He was born at Greenwich in 1663, married Sarah Knapp, of Stanford, and left nine children.  The record of his death is lost.  Ebenezer Mead, (2d) was born Oct. 25, 1692, and married a lady of Rye, N. Y., Dec. 12, 1717; he died at Greenwich, May 3, 1775.  Ebenezer Mead (3d), born Oct. 8, 1718, married Mary Mead, and died at Greenwich, Feb. 25, 1758, leaving one child, also Ebenezer.

      Gen. Ebenezer Mead (4th) was born Dec. 12, 1748.  This Ebenezer was a military man, receiving his first commission in 1774, and after passing regularly through the different ranks of promotion, received a Major General's commission for the Second Division of the State of Connecticut, in May, 1801.  While in service he was shot through the breast by a musket ball, but recovered.  He had been married, April 6, 1769, and had seven children, all of whom contracted marital ties in their native town of Greenwich, and left large  families.

      The old Mead homestead in Greenwich is situated at the foot of Putnam's Hill, and the farm which has been in the family for seven generations includes that historic place.  Gen. Mead was standing on the porch of his residence and witnessed Putnam's ride and escape, and avers that he did not ride down the seventy-four stone steps, but turned sharply to the left and followed a zig-zag trail to the foot of the hill.   As he galloped by the house he was shaking his fist and shouting back at the British, who, from the top of the precipitous elevation down which they dared not ride, were shooting musket balls after him:  "God cuss ye; when I catch ye I'll hang ye to the next tree."

      An oil painting of Gen. Ebenezer Mead in uniform hangs in the parlor of his  grandson, Enoch Mead, at Davenport, Iowa.  He was entitled to membership in the "Society of the Cincinnati," and died at Greenwich in 1818.  Col. Ebenezer Mead (5th), grandfather of the subject of this sketch, was born at the old homestead in Greenwich, March 3, 1778.  He was twice married, and became the father of eleven children.  A man of high character and influence, he was for many years Colonel of a regiment of Connecticut infantry, his term of service including the War of 1812.

      Enoch Mead, the father of our subject, was the sixth child of Col. Ebenezer Mead (5th).  He was born Sept. 2, 1809.  In his youth he was noted for his skill in hunting, sailing, skating, swimming and all manly sports, being of fine physical development and stature.  Unlike most young men of this temperament, he was also fond of study, and was graduated from Yale College in the class of 1830.  Choosing the ministry as his profession, he studied three years, and was graduated at Andover Theological Seminary, as was also his brother, Rev. Ebenezer Mead (6th).  The latter was also a man of great talent and successful in the ministry.

      After completing his studies, Enoch Mead accepted a call to the pastorate of the Presbyterian Church at New Haven, Vt., where he labored with great success.  While there he made the acquaintance of and married Miss Mary E., daughter of Samuel James, Esq., a prominent citizen of Middlebury, Vt., and a solider in the War of 1812.  This lady descended from one of the foremost families of New England, and was eminent for her culture, learning and piety.  She was a graduate of Mt. Holyoke Seminary.  To this talented pair were born two children:  James R., of our sketch, and Mary Elizabeth, who still resides with her parents.

      Not being pleased with the extreme rigor of the Vermont winter, where the snow fell four feet on a level, and where he witnessed the crossing of heavily loaded sleighs on the middle of Lake Champlain on the ice, on the 10th of May Enoch Mead determined upon a removal, and sought the Territory of Iowa, then just opening up to settlement, with a more congenial climate, and an ample field for missionary work.  Leaving his family with his parents, he took up land near the present site of Davenport, which was then an unsurveyed Government tract, and located there in the winter of 1837, where with his family he still resides, occupying the land he first located upon more than fifty years ago.  There he has spent the best years of his life in the work of the pioneer ministry of Iowa, being one of the band of noble men who devoted their lives to the service of the Master in an unselfish effort to elevate and instruct their fellowmen.

      James Richards Mead was born in New Haven, Vt., May 3, 1836, and was consequently but a young child when removing with his parents, in 1839, to the Territory of Iowa.  The journey was accomplished overland, a distance of 1,200 miles, in their own conveyance.  Their new home was located at the foot of the bluffs overlooking the Mississippi River, near the site of the present city of Davenport.  The entire country was then in a state of nature.  The river bluffs and the islands of the Mississippi were densely covered with a growth of ancient trees, forming a home for myriads of the feathered tribe and four-footed game, and quite recently had been also the home of the Indian.  Here young James and his sister Lizzie were taught at their mother's knee, no schools at that time being accessible.  Later our subject studied three years in Iowa College, while his sister was graduated with honors at Ft. Plain Seminary, in New York State.

      When a boy young Mead assisted his father in the labors of the farm, clearing away the forest growth, planting orchards, cultivating the virgin soil, etc.  One of his daily tasks was hunting and bringing home the cows, which then had an unlimited range of prairie, timber and river bottom.  In this exercise he became early in life an expert horseman.  Game abounded in the woods and river, and inheriting from his ancestors a love of nature and rural life, he was never more happy than when ranging the woods with his rifle, or exploring the islands of the Mississippi in his Indian canoe.  From these expeditions he would return loaded with game, and "thus the happy years rolled around" until arriving at manhood.

      Mr. Mead, now longing for a new field of adventure, and becoming deeply interested in the Free State contest then raging in Kansas, in the spring of 1859, with other young men of his neighborhood, came overland to this section, bringing with him a fine riding horse, the best rifle that could be made, a few dollars for present use, unlimited pluck, natural resources and ability to cope with the savage in his native wilds, the wild beast in his lair, or the elements.  On their way through Missouri they entertained the natives with the song beginning:

      We come to rear a wall of men

          'Round freedom's Southern line,

     And plant beside the cottonwood

          The rugged Northern pine.

      Crossing the Missouri River at Weston they visited Leavenworth, the base of supplies for Kansas; Lawrence, where they crossed the river on a rope ferry; Lecompton, of historic fame, then a United States land-office, with Eli Moore as Register; Tecumseh, a lovely town site; and Topeka, a straggling but ambitious village.  Mr. Mead's first business enterprise was flatboating several thousand sacks of corn from Topeka and Tecumseh down the Kaw River to Wyandotte, which experience satisfied him that the Kansas River was not intended for navigation; but the Pottawatomies, Delawares and Shawnees living along its banks were an unfailing source of interest.  Several Delawares were met and interviewed, who had crossed the plains and mountains with Fremont.

      At that time the Territory of Kansas extended from the Missouri River to the crest of the Rocky Mountains, and excepting a strip of country along this river little more than a 100-miles ride, was a wilderness, roamed and fought over by savage tribes, who subsisted on the innumerable buffalo, elk, deer, antelope and other game which then abounded.  In the eastern part of the Territory dwelt the Shawnees, the Delawares, the Wyandottes, the Kickapoos, the Sac and the Fox, the Kansas, or Kaw, the Osages, Ottawas, and fragments of other tribes, with a few settlers sandwiched between.  On the plains were the Kiowas, Comanches, Cheyennes, Arapahoes, Pawnees, and occasionally the Utes and Sioux, jealous of their hunting-grounds and the encroachments of the pale face.

      This fairy land of romance and mystery had inexpressible attractions for our hero, whose youthful blood constantly longed for adventure.  The descendant of a race of hardy pioneers, he had inherited a love of nature in all its phases, and, like his father before him, was expert in all athletic sports.  In the fall of 1859 he organized a party for a buffalo hunt.  Starting from Burlingame, then his temporary home, they followed out the old Santa Fe trail through Council Grove to Turkey Creek, thence north to the Big Bend of the Smoky Hill, where they found buffaloes and other game in abundance.  After loading their teams Mr. Mead was so enchanted with the country and the wild life that he made arrangements with two of the party to remain.  Together they crossed north to the Saline River, and in the most beautiful location, twenty miles above its mouth, in the heart of the buffalo range, erected buildings suitable for residence, defense and trade.  The whole territory west of Riley and Butler Counties was then included in Arapahoe County, and comprised an area larger than the present State of Kansas.  In the fall of 1869 this mammouth county cast sixty votes.  With this vast territory around him Mr. Mead soon built up an extensive Indian and fur trade, and became widely known as a successful trader and hunter.

      The adventures of our subject while on this river, if written up, would form a most interesting volume.  Upon one occasion he was captured by a war party of Sioux; on another he witnessed a two-days battle between the Otoe tribe and the Cheyennes.  The northern tributaries of the Saline, Paradise, Wolf and Spillman Creeks, were so named by him from some incident connected with their discovery.  A considerable portion of his time, while living on the Saline, was occupied in hunting expeditions, going 100 miles beyond the frontier settlements in the wild Indian range, where all manner of wild animals abounded in their native wilds.  Buffaloes innumerable, elk sometimes seen in bands of 500; black and white tail deer in the hills and cedar canons, and antelope everywhere.  On the creeks were a succession of beaver dams from the mouth to the source.  Droves of glossy bronze turkeys haunted the timber, scratching for seeds and acorns; wildcats of two or three varieties lurked about the prairie dog towns, or followed the turkeys in the brush to pounce upon any straggler; mountain lions lay in wait in the canons or timber for the luckless buffalo calf, or deer, choosing a fresh victim for each meal, while bands of the large gray wolf followed the buffalo, ready at any time to attack and pull down cow, calf or stately bull.  The gay and festive omnipresent cayote (Ki-ote), the Ishmaelite of the plains, a picker-up of unconsidered trifles, always seeking a stray prairie dog, or the bones of an unlucky buffalo, and for diversion would sometimes pull the boots from under the head of a sleeping hunter and chew them up, or serenade his camp at night.  In the hollow of the trees slept the coon; in their branches nested the bald eagle and the raven, and at their roots  burrowed the  badger and the porcupine.  With these surroundings Mr. Mead, accompanied usually by two men with teams to move from place to place, camping in the timber at a bend of some creek or canon, which afforded pleasant shade in summer and shelter form the fierce blizzards in winter, spent many happy days.  On one occasion he was absent in winter nearly three months, not seeing a human being but his two companions, narrowly escaping discovery by parties of Indians passing near, and killing over 400 wolves, many elk, buffaloes, deer and other animals, and after being given up for dead, returning to the settlement safe and sound, with his train loaded with furs of value sufficient to buy a farm.

      On one of his hunting expeditions, Mr. Mead discovered a cave on the Smoky Hill River, the walls of which were covered with Indian carvings, among which was cut in the rock the name "TRUDO, 1786," believed to be the oldest  inscription of civilized man yet found on the rocks of Kansas. 

     Mr. Mead was an expert and highly successful hunter, and an unerring rifle shot.  On one occasion he sought the shelter of a canon on Wolf Creek, a branch of the Saline, during a terrific blizzard, and found a party of thirteen would-be hunters of his acquaintance in camp, who so far had been unable to kill enough game for their own meat.  They said the buffaloes were so wild, no one could shoot them.  The next day, the storm having subsided, but still bitterly cold, Mr. Mead saddled his pony, rode up the creek a couple of miles, tied his pony in a ravine, and crawled through the deep snow in to the midst of a herd of buffaloes, shot thirteen bulls in succession, took out their tongues, strung them on a strip of green buffalo hide, which he hung on the horn of his saddle, and rode back to the party of hunters, who were sitting close about their camp fire, threw the thirteen tongues in the midst of the group,  and rode on without a word.  He had been gone from camp two hours.  On another occasion, on returning from a long trip on the plains, they not only found they had lost the day of the week and month, but were eight days off in their reckoning.  Did space permit, many personal encounters, perils, adventures and narrow escapes, could be narrated.  Most true plainsmen are reticent, and seldom talk of their own achievements of skill, valor or endurance.

      On the 1st of December, 1861, was celebrated the marriage of James R. Mead and Miss Agnes Barcome, at Burlingame, Kan.  This lady was well known, beloved by all, and a worthy representative of the noble women who distinguished themselves in the pioneer days by their courage, patience and endurance.  The young people commenced their happy life at their home on the Saline River amid the haunts of the buffalo, but in the summer of 1862, on account of the increasing depredations of the Indians, they removed to the little frontier town of Saline, then containing about two dozen houses of primitive style of architecture, close by which the savage warrior tented and the buffalo grazed.

      Mr. Mead continued his fur trade and hunting, and became popular among his neighbors, being elected County Surveyor, and securing, with the exception of two, every vote in the county.

      In the spring of 1863 Mr. Mead, learning of an unoccupied fur-trading district in Southern Kansas, transferred his business to the western limit of settlement, and built a trading-post on the Whitewater River, at a big spring called Towanda, where he was subsequently joined by his wife and infant son, who had spent the winter at the home of his father in Davenport, and where the child was born.  Desirous of giving the settlers of that county a practical lesson in hunting, our subject, in the month of June, started off with two of the teams and two men for a three weeks' hunt near the present town site of Wichita.  At the expiration of their stated time they returned with 330 buffalo hides and 3,500 pounds of tallow, besides some elk and antelope, the skins being valued at $500.  Buffaloes were then innumerable, and the country adjacent to the Little Arkansas as beautiful as the "garden of Gul in its bloom."  In the early spring of 1864 the Wichita Indians, who had been driven from their home in the Indian Territory by the war, and who had nearly starved at Belmont, Kan., where they wintered, came out of the Whitewater and the Arkansas Valleys to the junction of the two rivers, now the site of Wichita, to subsist on the buffalo, and some months afterward the Government sent them an agent, who established his headquarters at Mr. Mead's trading-post.  Soon several thousand Indians were  gathered at this point, and "Mead's Ranch" as it was called in border parlance, became the principal point of interest in the Southwest.  From here Mr. M. established branches at the mouth of the Little Arkansas and other points, and sent teams to the camps of wild Indians on the plains and in the Indian Territory, and he and other traders, notable among whom were William Mathewson (Buffalo Bill) and William Greiffenstein (Dutch Bill), by honorable dealing and friendship with the Indians, gained such an influence with them that southwestern Kansas escaped the horrors of border Indian warfare.

      At the time Mr. Mead was engaged in the fur trade on the plains business was conducted upon honorable principles by both whites and Indians.  A trader   could buy upon credit thousands of dollars' worth of goods, load them upon wagons, and embark with them for some Indian camp, one or two hundred miles distant from settlements, be gone perhaps two or three months, and yet was as sure to return and pay as any man is to meet an obligation to-day with all the machinery of law.

      In the spring of 1865 a party of eight Caddo Indians from the Washita River Indian Territory (strangers) came to Mr. Mead's trading-post, a distance of over 200 miles, with pack ponies loaded to trade.  When ready to return they asked of Mr. Mead a credit of $300 each, which was granted.  At the appointed time, about November 1, they returned and paid their debt, except one who died, but his friends sent up and paid the amount of his indebtedness.

      Money was not then much used in business.  Goods were paid for in furs or skins, which were taken to an Eastern market and sold.  On one occasion Mr. Mead sold in the fall to the noted half-breed Indian, Jesse Chisholm, $3,000 worth of goods, to be paid for on his return from the Territory.  In the spring his train returned, and stopping at Mr. Mead's ranch, Mr. Chisholm remarked:  "I have mules and horses, buffalo robes and wolf skins, beaver and otter skins, coyote skins and buckskin, but no money--take your choice."  Mr. Mead chose coyote skins, then legal tender at $1 a piece, and Mr. Chisholm counted out 3,000 in payment of his debt.  This noted and most excellent man died on the 4th day of March, 1878, on "His Own River," the North Fork of Canadian, and was buried on its bank, at the foot of "Little Mountain," the Indian chief Ten Bears taking off his medal and laying it upon the breast of his dead friend.

      Mr. Mead and other Indian traders connected with the early history of Wichita enjoyed almost unlimited credit in the commercial marts of the East.  Going to Leavenworth, St. Louis, Philadelphia or New York, and buying many thousands of dollars of merchandise on credit, they would take them to the plains and in due time exchange them for furs and robes, and with these make payment.

      In 1865 Satanta, the noted Kiowa chief and terror of the plains, with Heap-a-Bear, the chief and great medicine man of the Arrapahoes, then at war, visited Mr. Mead's ranch to communicate to the Government their desire for peace.

      Mr. Mead was present and represented the Wichita Indians at the treaty of the Little Arkansas, their agent, Maj. Milo Gookins, being sick.  On that occasion he was the guest, and camped with the noted frontiersman Kit Carson, and learned from his lips some incidents of his life.

      Descended from the New England Puritan stock of old-line Whigs, Mr. Mead was naturally a Republican and an ardent Union man, and would have joined the army but for the fact that he found himself in a position where he could render his State and country much more efficient service than by carrying a musket, and a position where the death rate was greater from bullet, arrow and exposure than among an equal number of Kansas troops in the war.

      In the fall of 1864 Mr. Mead was elected to the Legislature from Butler County, on the Republican ticket, by a handsome majority.  An admirer and friend of Gen. James H. Lane, he assisted in electing that distinguished man to the United States Senate, and several years later stood by his tragic deathbed.  While a member of the Legislature, Mr. Mead introduced a bill, which was passed, fixing the boundaries of Butler County, the changing of which in later years by his successor resulted in a period of bitter and protracted county-seat contests, and greatly retarded the growth of that section.

      In 1868 Mr. Mead was elected to the State Senate from the district embracing Morris, Chase, Marion and Butler Counties, and all the unorganized territory west of the Estate line, now divided into about thirty-five counties.  For two years Mr. M. was Chairman of the Committee of Ways and Means of the Legislative body, and received a unanimous vote of thanks by the Senate for his labors on that committee.  At the beginning of his term State script was worth sixty cents on the dollar; at its close it was at par.  He was also delegate to one or two State conventions; also one of a few men who called an election and located the county seat of Butler County on a tract of Government land in which he had no interest, but believed then, as he does now, that it was the proper place for a city.  The location was then occupied with but one log cabin, and from that humble beginning has arisen the present flourishing town of El Dorado. 

     In the spring of 1868, the Government having treated with the Osage Indians for their lands, surveyed and opened them for settlement and removed the Wichitas.  Mr. Mead, with Gov. Samuel J. Crawford and others, believing the junction of the two Arkansas Rivers to be the natural and proper place for a future great city, met in Topeka and organized a town company.  On the questions arising as to its name, Mr. M. remarked:  "It already has a name, Wichita, the town of the Wichita Indians," by which name the locality was then known all over the plains; the name was adopted.  Mr. D. S. Munger was employed to go to Wichita, pre-empt land and keep a hotel.  The company then advertised the town extensively in the Middle and Western States, and thus turned a large tide of immigration to the new settlement.  Thus the present remarkable city of Wichita was founded.

      On the 19th of April, 1869, Mr. Mead met the greatest sorrow of his life.  His beloved wife, Agnes, the bride of his youth, the joy of his life, the mother of his children, his faithful companion in all the privations and hardships of frontier life, died from fever following confinement.  Her remains were conveyed to Davenport, Iowa, and repose in Oakdale Cemetery, beside those of her infant son, who survived her but three months.  After her death Mr. Mead sold his trading-post and adjacent farm and removed to his claim at Wichita, the northwest quarter of section 21, town 27, range 1 east, now in the heart of the city.  Upon the ground where his first humble pre-emption dwelling stood he afterward erected a stately mansion, surrounded by shade and fruit trees and flowers, where he still resides.

      During his residence in Wichita Mr. Mead has been active in all measures calculated to advance the interests of the city he was instrumental in founding.  Upon the completion of the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railroad to a point thirty miles north of Wichita on its way west, he realized the imperative necessity of securing railroad connection from some source to control the trade of the Indian Territory and the Texas cattle drives, or Wichita was doomed to be nothing more than an ordinary county seat, perhaps not that, for at that time Park City was an active and dangerous rival.  After several fruitless efforts in other directions he wrote the following letter to the Superintendent and General Manager of the Sante Fe Road, which, in view of its very important results as affecting the cities of the lower Arkansas Valley, is here reproduced.

                     Wichita, Kan., June 2, 1871.

T. J. Peter, Superintendent and General Manager:

     Dear Sir:--Upon what terms will you build a branch of your road to Wichita?

          Very respectfully yours,

               J. R. Mead.

He received the following reply:

           Osage City, Kan., June 5, 1871.

Hon. J. R. Mead, Wichita, Kan.:

     Dear Sir:--In answer to yours of 2d will say, if your people will organize a local company and vote $200,000 of county bonds, I will build a railroad to Wichita within six months.

     Signed,   T . J. Peter,

          Superintendent and General Manager.

      Immediate action was taken, and a company was organized.  The bonds were voted, and within six months thereafter the Wichita & Southwestern was running into the city.  J. R. Mead was honored with the Presidency of this railroad.  This thoroughfare, built at that critical time, secured the supremacy of Wichita in the Arkansas Valley.

      Along with success in life occasionally comes misfortune.  In 1871 Mr. Mead was induced to invest heavily in a National Bank then organizing, and loaned to this his credit, money and good name, but was not an active party in its management, having other business.  The financial crisis of 1873, together with incompetence and mismanagement, wrecked the institution, and to make good to the depositors so far as he was able their losses, Mr. Mead turned over the  property, now worth a quarter of a million of dollars.  Through this trying ordeal he passed without loss of honor or credit, asking no assistance, but having an excellent opportunity to test the sincerity of summer-day friends.

      Reared upon a farm, Mr. Mead has never forgotten that agriculture is the foundation of all wealth, and has eliminated from the virgin soil of Kansas several fine farms, the last and largest near Wichita, in the valley, comprising nearly 600 acres.  This is highly improved with an abundance of fruit, and upon which he successfully raises grain and live stock.  While in nowise neglecting his agricultural pursuits, he has still kept pace with the advanced literature of the age.  For years he has made a study of geology, biology, ethnology and kindred topics.  He is a member, and at this time (1888) President of the Kansas Academy of Science, has an extensive library and cabinet, a large collection of the fresh water mollusca of the State collected by himself, and is entitled by birthright to membership in the "Society of the Cincinnati."  He is Vice  President of the Savings Bank at Wichita, and a member and Director of the Wichita Board of Trade.

      Mr. Mead has never been a politician or a seeker after office.  The various positions he has occupied came to him unsolicited and unsought.  The three most desirable of earthly attainments he believes to be honor, honesty and intelligence.  A considerable portion of his income is devoted to further investigation and research in his favorite lines of study.  He has given liberally to all worthy public enterprises, and several of the church and school buildings of Wichita are erected on lots donated by him.  He is domestic in his habits, preferring the quiet of his beautiful home the society of wife, children, friends and books, and is a lover of the wilds of nature more than the busy marts of trade.

      Mr. Mead contracted a second marriage, in January, 1873, with Miss Lucy A. Inman, of Wichita, an estimable lady, and a sister of Mrs. William Mathewson, deceased.  He has three children living:  James L., born near Davenport, Iowa, Jan. 13, 1863; Lizzie Agnes, now Mrs. George W. Bartholomew, born at Towanda, this State, Aug. 9, 1864, and Mary E., also born at Towanda, Oct. 31, 1866.  The deceased son, Willie, was born at Towanda, March 29, 1869, and died near Davenport, Iowa, August 10 following.

      Mr. Mead is well preserved, scarcely beginning to show age, has yet the vigor and activity of youth, and the present summer engaged in operating placer mines, located near Helena, Mont.  He is Vice President of the Savings Bank of Wichita.  He is also a prominent and valued member of the Masonic fraternity.  the portrait of this highly esteemed citizen, the publishers honor by giving it the first place in this volume.

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