Samuel V. Mallory

SAMUEL V. MALLORY, now superintendent of the city schools of Morrill, Brown County, has been a Kansas educator for many years. He has been connected at different times with the public schools of three states--Nebraska, Kansas and Oklahoma--and both as a teacher and administrator his work rests upon the secure foundation of sincere and effective service. Mr. Mallory has lived in Kansas since early youth and he represents some of the best elements of American ancestry. His great-grandfather, John William Mallory, spent his life in Virginia, having been born near Harper's Ferry. He married Elizabeth Peyton, who was the daughter of an officer the Revolutionary war. Mr. Mallory's grandfather was Valentine Roger Mallory, who was born at Harper's Ferry in Virginia in 1797, and moved from that state to Sangamon County, Illinois, near the capital at Springfield, and was an early farmer in that district. He died at Springfield in 1866. His wife was Nancy Dawson, a native of Kentucky.

Several generations of the family were represented in and around Springfield, Illinois, and it was in that city that Samuel V. Mallory was born April 16, 1856. His father is the venerable R. U. Mallory, who was born at Springfield in 1828 and is still living, nearly ninety years of age, at Morrill, Kansas. He grew up and married at Springfield, became a farmer, and in 1871 migrated to Kansas and located in Ottawa in Franklin County. Subsequently he pre-empted 160 acres in Jewell County and only recently left his farm to take up a retired residence in Shawnee, Oklahoma. He has been a republican since the organization of that party. At the beginning of the Civil war he raised a company at Springfield, Illinois, but his own services were rejected on account of a defective arm. He has long been an active supporter of the Christian Church and has served as an elder. R. U. Mallory married Mary Jane Nesbitt, who was born in Springfield, Illinois, in 1833 and died in Jewell County, Kansas, in 1895. Her father, Samuel G. Nesbitt, was for a number of years on the staff of the Illinois State Journal at Springfield, and for a time he had read law in Lincoln's office at Springfield. Samuel G. Nesbitt gave to his grandson, Samuel V. Mallory, a copy of Blackstone, the pages of which had been frequently referred to by Lincoln and by his then young law partner, John Hay, afterwards secretary of state. Mr. Mallory cherishes this book as the choicest in his entire library.

Mr. Mallory was the oldest in a family of eight children, three of whom died in early childhood. His brother, W. E. Mallory, is general agent for the Jackson Automobile Company at Kansas City, Missouri; Charles is a farmer at Charleston, Oklahoma; James H. is a physician and surgeon at Shawnee, Oklahoma; and Arthur Melvin is in the nursery business at Caldwell, Kansas.

Samuel V. Mallory was fifteen years of age when his father removed to Kansas, and in the meantime he had attended the public schools of Sangamon County, Illinois. He also attended school in Franklin County, Kansas, and while teaching was a student in the high school at Fall City, Nebraska. He did his first work as a county school teacher in Kansas, but in 1879 entered the University of Nebraska at Lincoln, where he took the full course and was graduated Bachelor of Science in 1883. Since then, a period of thirty-four years, he has been identified with school work with practically no interruption.

In 1883 Mr. Mallory became principal of the high school at Junction City, Kansas, and five years later was elected city superintendent, holding that office five years. In 1893 he went to the new territory of Oklahoma and took charge of the city schools at Guthrie, then the capital of the territory. He did much to formulate and institute the program of the early schools of that city. He remained there two years and returning to Kansas in 1895 served successively as superintendent of schools at Clyde and Phillipsburg, and in 1901 was elected principal of the Sherman County High School. He had charge of that institution six years, and in 1907 became superintendent of schools at Dodge City. During 1910-11 Mr. Mallory taught in village schools, and also pursued a course in the State Agricultural College at Manhattan. Mr. Mallory has been superintendent of schools at Morrill in Brown County since 1912. He has done much to develop the standard of these schools, and has under his supervision a corps of six teachers and 200 scholars.

In 1917 Mr. Mallory was unsuccessful candidate for the office of county superintendent of schools of Brown County. The office went to a woman candidate. In his home township his popularity was well attested by the fact that his opponent received only thirty votes. Mr. Mallory is a republican, has been elder and always an active member of the Christian Church, and is affiliated with St. Bernard Lodge No. 222, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, at Dodge City. He is a member of the Brown County Teachers' Association and of the Kansas State Teachers' Association. He has served as president of four different state district teachers' associations and is a member of the State Historical Association.

Mr. Mallory married at Junction City, Kansas, in 1888 Miss Louise Colvin, daughter of Milton and Sarah (Van Horne) Colvin, who are still residents of Junction City. Her father came to Kansas in 1882 and is a retired farmer. Mr. and Mrs. Mallory have two living children: Charles Winans is a graduate of the Sherman County High School and is a railroad conductor living at Hutchinson, Kansas. He married Hazel Duffin, of Hutchinson, Kansas, November 18, 1915. Louis Valentine, who also attended Sherman County High School, is now a machinist at Horton, Kansas. He married Bessie Carre, of Alamosa, Colorado, December 24, 1913. They have two sons, Roland and Donald.

When a contest was proposed by the University of Kansas to determine what third class city of Kansas is best for rearing children, Mr. S. V. Mallory proposed the name of Morrill. He took an active part in the campaign for his town, and he says the proudest day of his life was that on which he received a telegram, saying "Morrill has won the Thousand Dollar Prize."

TABLE OF CONTENTS
VOLUME 1 & 2
BIOGRAPHIES — VOLUMES 3, 4, & 5
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