USA > Kansas > Atchison County > History of Atchison County, Kansas > Part 41
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such was the life of this fine old gentleman of whom it has been a pleasure to write this brief review.
Andrew Keithline departed this life December 14, 1915. The end came peacefully, as he had wished. The worn-out body of this grand old patriarch ceased to be able to hold the immortal soul of one of the grandest and best loved men of the early pioneer days of Atchison county. Mr. Keithline was a good and honest citizen whose upright and sturdy character will long prove an inspiration and guidance for the present and future generations of Kansans who may peruse these pages. He was a prominent factor in the building up of Atchison county, and was intimate with the great men of his day and genera- tion. When his time came and the Angel of Death called him to the long rest he was content to go and had no regrets. Death had no terrors for him as his life was unspotted and clean, and in keeping with the attributes of the man himself.
ABRAM STEVER.
Abram Stever, one of the early settlers of Benton township, Atchison county, and now deceased, was born November 3, 1837, and departed this life on July 27, 1881. He was born in Schoharie county. New York, a son of Abram and Nancy Stever, both of whom were born and reared in New York State, the father being a son of German parents, who were founders of the family in this country. Two brothers emigrated from Germany, one of whom settled in New York and the other made his home in Ohio. Abram was reared to young manhood in his native State and when twenty years of age migrated to the new State of Wisconsin, then in process of set- tlement. He became a farmer in Walworth county and cleared a home from the timber. Five years later he was married, and in 1867 came to Kansas, driving his movable possessions across the country, his wife and children coming by train to St. Joseph, Mo., where they crossed the Mis- souri river by ferry. The first location of the family was in Brown county, Kansas, where they lived until 1874 and then came to Atchison county, where Mr. Stever purchased 160 acres of wild prairie land in Benton township, one and three-fourths miles northwest of Effingham. He improved his farm, erected a good home and beautified the premises with fine shade trees and shrubbery. After his demise in 1881, Mrs. Stever made her home on the farm until 1893, when she removed to Effingham, and has since resided
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here, with the exception of a few years' residence in Mankato, Jewell county, Kansas, with her daughter, maintaining a permanent home in Effingham.
Abram Stever was married December 24, 1862, to Sarah Elecia Bailey, of Walworth county, Wisconsin. To this union have been born the fol- lowing children : Leona May, died at the age of fifteen years; Jennie Bailey. died at the age of thirteen; Joseph Warren, died when twenty-two years old; Arthur Carlton, a clothing merchant at Wetmore, Kan., who married Maud Hawk, of Effingham, and they have one daughter, Leona May; Carrie Adella Stever, at home with her mother, a graduate of the county high school, and taught for seven years in the Effingham schools, and is a special- ist in music, having graduated from Bethany Conservatory at Lindsborg, Kan., in 1906. She pursued a post-graduate course at Lindsborg during winter vacation, and studied during one winter under William H. Sher- wood, America's greatest pianist. She was for five years a successful teacher of music at Mankato, Kan. Returning to Effingham in 1911, she became mu- sic director in the Atchison County High School, but resigned to take up studio work entirely : Ray Howard, conducting a suitatorium at Frankfort, Kan., married Inez McFarlan ; Ralph Roy Stever, a teamster at Nevada, Mo., mar- ried Treva Spell, and has had four children: Lloyd Orr, Warren Clayton, Ralph Vern, Lola Esther, deceased; Ernest Clayton, a graduate of the county high school, proprietor of a suitatorium at Macon, Mo., married Charlotte Henderson, and has one child, Roy Estell; Frank Abram Stever, county high school graduate, located on the family estate in Benton town- ship, married Daisy McFarlan, and is the father of three children: Coral Nadine, Geneva Fay, and Mildred Lorene. Mrs. Stever was born January 10, 1843. on a farm in Walworth county, Wisconsin, a daughter of Joseph and Sarah (Perry) Bailey, natives of Maryland and Dundee Ill., respec- tively. An uncle, Amos Bailey, was one of the first surveyors in the city of Chicago, and run the first line in what is now the city. Joseph Bailey was one of the first settlers in Walworth county, Wisconsin, at a time when there were very few people in the State and neighbors were twelve miles distant from one another. It was a common custom for a number of settlers to band together and market their produce together in the city of Chicago. Amos Bailey was the owner of several sections of land near Lake Geneva, Wis., which is now the great millionaires' resort, near Chicago. Joseph Bailey was twice married, his second wife being Mary Catharine Sipperly. It is also worth recording that a brother of Abram Stever, named Wash- ington Stever, was a soldier in the Union army and fought in the Army of the Potomac from the beginning to the end of the war. At the time of Mr.
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Stever's death, the oldest son was only thirteen years of age, and Mrs. Stever was left with a large family, the youngest of whom was six months old.
Abram Stever was a Republican in his political affiliations, but will best be remembered for his activity in behalf of the organization of the Pres- byterian church in Effingham. He was one of three men who raised the fund to pay for the building of the First Presbyterian Church erected in Effingham, and was a deacon and trustee, having been one of the only two ileacons ever installed in the early church. He was active in church work during his entire life and was a thoroughly honest, religious gentleman, who carricd his belief into his daily life and in all his undertakings. He was a good husband, a kind parent and an excellent citizen, and loved by every- one who knew him.
REV. Z. S. HASTINGS.
Few pioneer citizens of Atchison county have lived more useful or cleaner lives than Rev. Z. S. Hastings, retired minister and farmer, of Ef- fingham, Kan. During his nearly fifty years of residence in Kansas as a farmer, educator, preacher, and statesman, he has worked continually for the well-being of his neighbors and friends. Without fear of contradiction it can be stated that Rev. Hastings has performed a greater number of marriage ceremonies and officiated at the funerals of more deceased residents than any minister in Atchison county. Despite his three score and seventeen years this grand old patriarch bears his age lightly and takes an active inter- est in the affairs of his community.
Rev. Z. S. Hastings was born March 15, 1838, on a farm near Bed- ford, Lawrence county, Indiana, a son of Howell and Edith ( Edwards) Hast- ings, natives of North Carolina. On his father's side the family is of Quaker origin and a very old one in America. The first Hastings having been a follower of William Penn, came from England to settle in the Quaker col- ony in Pennsylvania. A descendant of the first American Hastings, Joshua by name, migrated to North Carolina and there founded another branch of the family. Here in the Southland, Howell Hastings was reared and married, and with his wife and two sons migrated to Indiana to become one of the pio- neer settlers of the Hoosier State. He died at his home in Indiana Decem- ber 25. 1854, leaving seven children: Joshua Thomas, deceased; William Henry. John Arthur, Nancy Elizabeth, deceased; Zachariah Simpson, with whom this review is concerned; Charlotte Ann, deceased; Rufus Wiley, liv-
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ing in Arkansas. Of the foregoing, Joshua Thomas and William Henry fought in the Union army during the late rebellion of the Southern States; Joshua first fought in the Home Guards of Missouri, and. returning to Indiana he raised a company for service in the war, after fighting under General Lyons at the battle of Springfield. He taught school for a time in Missouri, but returned to Indiana. He died in Kentucky. William Henry enlisted in a Missouri regiment.
Z. S. Hastings was educated in the common schools of his native State, studied in Indianapolis, and also pursued a course at Hiram College, in preparation for the Christian ministry. In 1857 he went to Missouri and taught school for five years, studying in the meantime while teaching. In 1862 he returned to his native State and began preaching the Gospel in the Christian denomination. He taught and preached at the same time while preparing himself further for the ministry. His first experience in the min- istry was obtained in 1860 while in Missouri. In 1867 Mr. Hastings came to Kansas, resided in Leavenworth county for one year and in 1868 came to Atchison county and located on a farm near Farmington. He taught the Farmington school for five years and preached in the vicinity of his home during this time. He cultivated his farm of 130 acres and preached at the Farmington church and in the surrounding country for a period of twenty- five years. In 1895 he removed to Effingham and continued preaching until 1903 when he retired from active work in the ministry. Mr. Hastings was an excellent farmer as well as minister and made a success of his farm- ing operations, having the distinction of selling an eighty acre tract of farm land, the first for SIoo an acre ever sold in the county up to that time. This farm was located east of Effingham, and was the first tract near the town to bring the price of $100 an acre.
He was married on June 28, 1870, to Miss Rosetta Butler, and to this union have been born seven children: Harry Howell, an electrical en- gineer, located at St. Louis, and who was educated in Holton College and Kansas University; Paul Pardee, assistant freight and passenger agent of the Santa Fe railroad, with headquarters at San Francisco; Otho Ono, a graduate of the Atchison county high school, taught school for ten years, served as county superintendent of Atchison county four years, and grad- uated from the Atchison Business College, and is at present bookkeeper for Urich's planing mill at Independence, Kan .; Wiley Wyatt died in infancy ; Clara Charlotte, deceased, formerly a teacher, wife of Charles Sprong, of Potter, Kan .; Edith Eliza, deceased, who was also a public school teacher; Milo Milton, a journalist and author, of New York City. Milo graduated
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from the Atchison county high school, the State Agricultural College at Manhattan, and pursued a post-graduate course in the State university. The mother of these children was born August 5, 1844, in Sandusky Plain, Ohio, a daughter of the Rev. Pardee Butler, a famous figure in Kansas his- tory, and who was an outspoken advocate of the anti-slavery principles dur- ing the struggle which made Kansas a free State. He was so frank and fearless in the expression of his views and so strenuous in the support of the anti-slavery doctrine that his utterances brought him frequently in contact with the pro-slavery men and border ruffians, and on one occasion when in Atchison he was captured by ruffians and sent down the Missouri river on a raft. Complete details of the life and activ- ities of Pardee Butler are given in another chapter in this volume. "Pardee Butler's Own Book," begun during the latter part of his life, and finished and published by Mrs. Hastings, tells of his life and adventures in Kansas. Speaking biographically, Mr. Butler was born March 9, 1816, and died October 20, 1888. He first saw the light of day at Skaneateles, N. Y., and immigrated with his parents, Phineas Butler and wife, who came to Ohio in 1818. Phineas Butler was born in New York State. Pardee Butler was reared to young manhood in Ohio and there married Sybil Carlton, of Sul- livan, Ohio, who was born July 4. 1823, and died August 7, 1898. She was a daughter of Joseph Carlton, a native of Massachusetts, who immigrated to Ohio in an early day. In his boyhood,. Pardee herded sheep on San- dusky Plain, and after his father's death resided in Sullivan, Ohio. In 1850 he removed to Iowa and settled on a farm in Cedar county, where he lived for five years. While a resident of Iowa he preached in Illinois for two years. In May of 1855 he set out for Atchison county, Kansas, on horse- back and settled on a farm at Farmington. For many years he served as a Christian minister and conducted farming operations. He had a remarkably retentive memory, which enabled him to memorize the whole of the New Testament while herding sheep in Ohio. Rev. Butler was the first State evangelist of the Christian denomination to visit Iowa and was also the first State evangelist to take up the work of his church in Kansas. Practically all of his traveling while engaged in missionary work was accomplished on horseback. Night coming on he would picket his horse in a grassy spot and use his saddle for a pillow. Pardee Butler was one of the notable figures in the history of Kansas, and will be remembered as long as history endures, as a brave, useful and faithful patriot, and minister, whose life was full of good deeds and who always stood for the right. He was the father of seven
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children : Mrs. Rosetta Hastings, Clara Louise, Eugene Pardee, Maria Corintha, all of whom died in infancy; Charles Pardee on the home farm ; Ernest, died in infancy; George, living at White City, Kan.
Rev. Hastings has always been a steadfast advocate of prohibition, but has generally allied himself politically with the Republican party principles. In 1876 he was selected by the Republican party in the county as their can- didate for the legislature, although at the time he was an avowed Prohibition- ist, and was elected, serving in the Kansas legislature during the ensuing session. For eighteen years he served as a member of the school board in his home district, and was for six years a member of the Atchison County High School Board. He believes in education for the young to the fullest and is heart and soul in favor of giving young men and women every op- portunity to acquire a higher education, as is attested by the splendid train- ing which he was enabled to give each of his own offspring. Rev. Hastings has baptized hundreds of converts during his ministerial career and started them onward in the better life. His whole life has been dedicated for good.
KNUD G. GIGSTAD.
Knud G. Gigstad, farmer and breeder of fine cattle, was born in Nor- way September 28, 1856, and is a son of Gulick and Anna Gigstad. He was one of seven children one of whom is now dead. Four of the boys and one daughter are living in the United States. The father was a native of Nor- way and spent his life in that country.
Knud G. Gigstad left Norway at the age of twenty to try his luck in America. He came without funds and went to work as a farm hand in Brown county, Kansas. He remained at that place two years and then rented 160 acres from his uncle, Benedict Mutson. This was a profitable venture and before long he was able to buy eighty acres of unimproved land in section 28, Lancaster township, Atchison county, for which he paid $16.25 an acre. Mr. Gigstad worked hard to get his farm in workable shape, each year find- ing him a little more prosperous, and finally he added 320 acres to the farm, besides 436 acres of rice land in Liberty county, near Houston, Texas. Eighteen years ago he built a large house on the farm and has since erected a large barn and other substantial buildings. Mr. Gigstad is a breeder of Shorthorn cattle and has made exhibits at the American Royal stock show in Kansas City, Mo., and in 1913 was awarded the prize as grand champion of
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America on his Shorthorns. This is a high honor and is ample testimony of the quality of Mr. Gigstad's stock. He is an extensive shipper to all parts of the United States. His reputation as a breeder is firmly established among cattle men all over the country. He is almost sure of one or two first prizes whenever he enters his cattle in a fair. Mr. Gigstad also has a fine three acre orchard. He is a hard working man and has succeeded despite great handicaps, and his financial success has not caused him to neglect the wel- fare of his county, as he has always been active in supporting measures for the good of Atchison county.
He is married to Lena Olsen, a native of Atchison county, and a daughter of Herrol and Julia Olsen. She was born in 1866. Her parents are natives of Norway and her father was an early settler of Atchison county. Mr. and Mrs. Gigstad have eleven children: Anna Flattre, of Lancaster township; Mrs. Julia Henz, of Lancaster, Kan .; Harry, Clara, Gena, Gilbert, Matilda, Lillian, Gladis, Carl, Charles, all living at home. Mr. Gigstad is a Repub- lican and a member of the Lutheran church.
ALBERT BARNES HARVEY.
The memory of a good and noble man lingers long after his demise in the hearts and minds of those who knew him best. The late Albert Barnes Harvey, of Muscotah, Kan., during the course of a long and notable career, covering over forty years in Atchison county, accomplished much in a material sense and left behind him an unimpeachable record for integrity and upright living which will long endea. his memory to his former mortal associates. He lived in the days when men were more closely drawn together in the great struggle to create a State from a wilderness of prairie and unpeopled waste, and did his part in the development of his adopted county, of which he was one of the real pioneers. Soldier, farmer, banker and religious worker who lived true to his ideals as a man and citizen, he walked with the leaders of the great State which he assisted in up-building.
Albert Barnes Harvey was born May 12, 1841, at Williamsport, Pa., a son of Samuel and Margaret Harvey. His parents went from their native State to Illinois in the early days of the settlement of that State, developing a fine farm in Henderson county, Illinois. Samuel Harvey prospered in the State of his adoption, reared a fine family, and in his later days retired to a comfortable home in Monmouth, Ill., removing to the city for the purpose
AB, Harvey
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primarily, of giving his children the advantages afforded there for obtaining a good school education. He died at the home of his son in Henderson county after a long and useful life." The subject of this review, Albert Barnes, when a young man twenty years of age, hearkened to the first call of Presi- dent Lincoln for troops with which to quell the rebellion of the Southern States and enlisted in Company G, Tenth infantry, regiment of Illinois volun- teers, and served faithfully throughout the Civil war. He was engaged with his regiment in many great battles, such as Corinth, Island Number Ten, Mis- sionary Ridge, Lookout Mountain, Chickamauga, Siege of Vicksburg, and Capture of Atlanta, and took part in Sherman's famous march from Atlanta to the sea and the subsequent taking of Savannah. He marched in the Grand Review at Washington, D. C., and was mustered out of the service July 12, 1865. He then returned home and engaged in the peaceful pursuit of farm- ing until 1874, when he came to Kansas and settled on a farm southwest of Muscotah. This farm was only partially improved at the time of his pur- chase and he improved and cultivated it until 1880, at which time he came to Muscotah and engaged in the hardware business in partnership with A. J. Harwi; later he was in partnership with F. S. Roberts, who was succeeded by W. C. Allison. In 1890 he became associated with J. H. Calvert in the banking business at Muscotah, he and his partner purchasing the bank founded by George Storch and changing the name to the Muscotah Exchange Bank. This bank was later changed to the Muscotah State Bank and is one of the thriving financial concerns of Atchison county, now incorporated with the Farmers State Bank. Mr. Harvey was in the banking business for twenty years and served as president of the Muscotah State Bank, and was success- ful in his business ventures to such an extent that he became one of the wealthy citizens of the county. During his later years he and Mrs. Harvey enjoyed traveling about the country, the condition of his health becoming such that it was practically necessary for him to spend his winters in the Southland. He and Mrs. Harvey spent many happy days in visiting the battlefields of the South over which his regiment had fought and they enjoyed life to the utmost during those later years.
Mr. Harvey was married October 25, 1871, at Stronghurst, Ill., to Miss Viola Allison, who was born October 25, 1841,. in Washington county, Penn- sylvania, a daughter of John and Margaret (Carter) Allison. John Allison was born in Pennsylvania and was a second cousin of President William Mc- Kinley, whose mother was an Allison. Margaret Carter Allison was born in Scotland and accompanied her parents to this country when twelve years of age, where they settled in Henderson county, Illinois. Both of Mrs.
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Harvey's parents died in Illinois, and a brother. John C., who enlisted in the Union army at the age of seventeen years, died at Ft. Donelson. An older brother, Hugh, also served in the Union army, and a half brother, W. C. Allison, now of Horton, resided in Muscotah for many years and was one of the pioneer business men of the city. The Allison family is a very old and numerous one of Scotch descent. No children came to bless this happy wed- ded life of Albert H. and Viola Harvey, but they reared two adopted daugh- ters, who are now established in comfortable homes of their own, namely : Lela, wife of A. P. Bishop, of Topeka, now a farmer living southwest of Muscotah, and Lula, wife of E. H. Purdy, of Kansas City, Mo. Mrs. Bishop has four children : Albert. George, Dorothy and Ruth. Mrs. Harvey spends the spring and summer seasons in her beautiful residence in Muscotah and invariably travels in the South during the winter. Mr. Harvey retired from active banking pursuits in 1910.
Mr. Harvey was a member of the Congregational church at Muscotah and served as deacon of the church from 1898 until his demise, on Monday, July 22, 1912. For many years he was superintendent of the Sunday school and was very fond of young people, nothing giving him more pleasure than to gather about him a group of intelligent young folks with whom he was always at his best. He took a keen interest in church and Sunday school work and endeavored to follow the precepts of the Greatest of All Teachers during all the days of his long and useful life. He was prominent in Masonic and Odd Fellows lodge circles and served as worshipful master of the Muscotah Masons on two occasions. He was a member of the Grand Army of the Republic. He was a Republican in politics and took a keen interest in the political and civic affairs of Atchison county, serving three terms as a member of the Atchison County High School board and a term as mayor of his home city. Many of the distinguished men of Atchison and the State of Kansas were his personal friends, among them being the late Governor George W. Glick, with whom he spent a winter in Florida, Ex-Governor W. J. Bailey, and the late Judge Horace M. Jackson, of Atchison. He was, withal, a home and church man above everything else. He loved his home and his family and was hospitable to the core of his being, always ready to entertain friends or even strangers at his board, jolly and big-hearted, always.
MARTIN KLEIN.
Martin Klein, living a retired life in the town of Potter, Atchison county, Kansas, at the advanced age of four score and two years, is one of the oldest of the Kansas pioneers, who for over sixty-one years of his long life has
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lived in the Sunflower State, and has seen the steam railway take the place of the overland freight trains, hauled by oxen and mules, and has witnessed the automobile superseding the farm wagon and horse and buggy as a means of transportation. On his lonely claim in the north part of Leavenworth county, near Potter, he could see the great trains passing along the Ft. Riley road from Leavenworth to Salt Lake; he remembers the dread visitation of the grasshoppers in the seventies, when the "hoppers" came in dense clouds, ate up all the growing crops and left devastation and desolation in their wake. Martin Klein is one of the best known of the old-timers in this sec- tion of Kansas and took an active part in the slavery contest which was bit- terly waged on Kansas soil, and nearly gave his life in defense of his prin- ciples, later to shoulder a musket in defense of his adopted country.
Martin Klein was born March 2, 1833, in Alsace-Lorraine, a son of Peter and Teresa (Miers) Klein, both of whom were born and reared in Alsace-Lorraine, and were of ancient French extraction. When Martin was fourteen years of age, his parents in 1847, left their native land and im- migrated to Oneida county, New York, where they settled on a farm near Rome. The elder Klein prospered in the land of his adoption and Martin grew up imbued with American ideals, along with the other five children of the Klein family. Martin was the youngest of a family of six children born to Peter and Teresa Klein. Three brothers of Mrs. Klein, Joseph Miers, and two others, were soldiers, who served under Napoleon Bonaparte, and were members of the Grand Army of Napoleon which marched to the siege of Moscow. Two of the brothers were killed at Moscow, and Joseph was one of the few out of the many thousands of soldiers who lived to return home and tell about the ill-fated expedition which cost Napoleon his grand army.
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