USA > Kansas > Johnson County > History of Johnson County, Kansas > Part 9
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During the summer of 1857 the following named persons came to Olathe and settled here, some of whom are yet to be seen and who still love the town: Judge John P. Campbell, Jonathan Millikan, Nel- son Wood, J. B. Whittier, Jerry D. Conner, J. Henry Smith, J. Henry Blake, Jonathan Gore, C. M. Ott, Dick Taylor, Eugene Bell, S. F. Hill and family, B. L. Roberts and family, J. B. Mahaffie and family, Mrs. Jonathan Millikan, Mrs. Mary Kirby, Miss Mary Ann Whalen, Fred Hoff and family, J. C. Forrest, William Bronough, J. E. Milhoan, Jacob Thuma, Isom Mayfield, A. A. Cox, William M. Mosley, Charles Mayo, Robert Brown, John Clay, William Cox, Watts Beckwith, Bal- cane Pettit, Pat Cosgrove, S. B. Myrick, J. E. Sutton and family, Dr. Thomas Hamill, Peter Winke and his niece, Charles Osgood, Edwin S. Nash, Henderson H. Boggs and a tinsmith by the name of McClelland, together with a few others who have long since left and can not now be called to mind.
Dr. John T. Barton was the first resident of Olathe. Judge J. P. Campbell was the first resident lawyer. Hamill was the first resident physician. B. L. Roberts was the first blacksmith, Eugene Bell was.
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the first dry goods merchant and the first man to make an assignment for the benefit of his creditors. Dr. John T. Barton was the assignee. Dr. Barton and C. A. Osgood kept the first postoffice. Dr. Barton was the postmaster. Judge Campbell was the first probate judge after the county seat was located at Olathe. J. Henry Blake was the first register of deeds, and recorded the first deed made in the county in the city of Olathe. Jonathan Gore was the first county attorney. S. B. Myrick was the first county clerk in Olathe. John T. Barton was the first mayor.
Whittier & Conner kept the first hotel. S. F. Hill kept the first first- class store. Fred Hoff, the first lager beer. C. M. Ott established the first bakery and was the first baker. Balcane Pettit was the first carpenter. Mrs. Jonathan Millikan was the first white woman to reside in Olathe.
In the fall of 1857, Edwin S. Nash was elected to the Territorial coun- cil from Olathe, it being supposed at the time that it was simply a "Free State" victory, but it was not, the object being a little private legis- lation for the benefit of the Olathe Town Company. On the twelfth day of February, 1858, Edwin S. Nash succeeded, in the Territorial legisla- ture, in having a general act passed and approved to regulate the entries and disposal of town sites.
In section 3 of that act it was provided "that all persons, who select and lay out a town site, and their assigns shall be deemed occupants of said town site."
Now, you may ask, Where is the nub to this piece of history? Well, here it is, and it may have a tendency to open the eyes of a great many real estate owners right here in Olathe.
All town sites in Kansas, laid out upon Government lands, were preempted under an act of Congress which provides that certain sub- divisions of Government land may be preempted by the mayor or other chief officer of an incorporated town "for the several use and benefit of the occupants thereof."
You can see the dilemma that stood staring this speculative town company square in the face. Under the act of Congress the preemp- tion of the town site was for the exclusive benefit of the persons who resided upon the land selected for a town site at the date of the pre- emption, and not for a mythical town company whose members may or may not have had an existence.
In Olathe only two of the town company, Dr. Barton and Judge J. P. Campbell, resided upon the town site, at the date of the preemption, May 17, 1858. William Fisher, Jr., and C. A. Osgood were both living upon their farms at that date, and claiming to be occupants of their lands for the purposes of preemption, under a different act of Congress. from that of the town site preemption law, and therefore were not occu- pants under the act of Congress of the town site of Olathe.
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The other members of the town company of Olathe, under the act of the legislature of February 20, 1857, were non-residents of the Terri- tory of Kansas and resided, principally, in Jackson and Platt counties, Missouri, and never were occupants of Olathe or Kansas, in any sense of the term, but were mere town site speculators at the expense of the citizens of the town sites in Kansas.
Under the act of Congress the town site was to be preempted for the several use and benefit of the occupants, the resident owners, and where no division of the property had been settled upon the preemption was completed, then the lots and blocks would have to be divided equally among the occupants per capita.
The Olathe Town Company, by one of their silent partners, were, as they supposed, relieved by the act of February 12. 1858, from deeding any share of the town after its preemption to the poor devils who, by their occupancy or residency, made it possible for the town company to preempt any land belonging to the general Government. Under this same act of Congress, it was necessary to have every legal subdivision of the land settled upon and improved before they could prove up at the land office and receive their certificate of preemption, and in doing this it required a goodly number of citizens to spread over 320 acres of land and have someone living on each forty acres of the town site at the date of the preemption. It could not very conveniently be done without inhabitants, and Olathe was not an exception to this universal rule throughout Kansas. Hence, you see, the necessity of some show of right at least by this speculative town company, in the act of the legislature, approved February 12, 1858, for their own and other town companies' benefit.
They knew very well when the act was passed and approved that it was unconstitutional and void for the simple reason that the legis- lature of the Territory had no power to legislate upon the subject or to pass laws controlling the disposal of the Government lands in any manner, shape or form, or to change the well known meaning of an act of Congress. It answered their purpose, however, as a large ma- jority of the occupants, actual residents, knew no better, and in the excitement consequent upon the early settling of a community, did not wish to interfere with the company's little game of speculation by entering into law about their rights, without some assurance as to what the profits would be in the end, but there were a few who protested in Olathe, and the legal title of the whole, old original town, today is in Dr. J. T. Barton, the trustee, of the real and bona fide occupants, who preempted the Olathe site as president of the Olathe town site incorporation, and the equitable title is where the act of Congress places it, in the occupant at the date of the preemption.
The town company's deeds to parties, whether occupants or non- residents, are entirely worthless, being in direct violation of the act
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of Congress, and as the town company owned nothing, the titles emi- nating from the town company are not only absolutely void, but are fraudulent in the bargain.
The only title now to real estate upon the original town site of Olathe is occupancy, cured by the general statutes of limitation making fifteen years peaceable and continued possession a good and sufficient title to real property in Kansas.
The town site of Olathe was preempted by Dr. John T. Barton on the seventeenth day of May, A. D. 1858.
During the year 1858 the following named persons settled in Olathe : John M. Giffen, F. W. Chase, James W. Parmeter. A. J. Clemenans and family, D. W. Wallingford, Col. J. E. Hayes and family, Mr. Swartz and family, A. J. Hill and family, C. J. Coles, Hank Cameron, Col. J. T. Burris and family, M. J. Posey Drake and family, L. S. Cornwell and family, Dr. A. J. McIntosh, Noble Carithers and family, and Dr. Torrence.
The resident lawyers of Olathe, for the year 1858, were Jonathan Gore, county attorney ; J. P. Campbell, probate judge : Col. J. T. Burris and John M. Giffen.
The doctors for the year 1858 were Dr. Thomas Hamill, Dr. Torrence, Dr. A. J. McIntosh, Dr. Burton, then being treasurer of Johnson county, Kansas, and not in the practice of medicine.
Some time during the latter part of the summer season of the year 1858 a Mr. Drummond, an Episcopal minister, who had settled on a claim near Spring Hill, came to Olathe and preached the first sermon in Olathe; then came the Fishers, Bowles and other Methodist minis- ters, whose names have slipped from our memory, and finally Father Isaac C. Beach, late in October, 1858, came to Olathe and commenced the organization of the Presbyterian church, and preached regularly from that time on, until the war was over and peace had again been restored, and then being an old man and feeble, finally gave up the charge.
In the summer of 1858 A. J. Clemans established his blacksmith shop.
Col. J. E. Hayes, during the summer of 1858, built the store room now owned by Ross Walker, on the south side of the square, next door east of J. E. Sutton's dry goods house, also a dwelling house on the lot where George H. Beach's hardware store is now situated, being the same house that now stands between Beach's store and the Congre- gational church; and William Tuttle built a dwelling house on the lot where Dr. Bell's house now stands, on the corner of Park and Water streets. Several other small buildings were erected during the summer and early fall and winter of 1858, but they have gone. the way of all temporary worldly things, and the places that knew them then know them no more.
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HISTORY OF JOHNSON COUNTY, KANSAS
During the summer of 1858, the county officers who had located in Olathe after the election held in March of that year, fixing the county seat of Olathe, were ordered by Governor Denver to go back to Shaw- neetown, or "Gum Springs," as it was then known in the statutes, mak- ing that place the county seat of Johnson county, Denver claiming that there was no authority for the election held in March, 1858, remov- ing the county seat from "Gum Springs" to Olathe.
At first they refused to go, but when Governor Denver told them they must go, or he would declare the offices vacant, and fill them with men who would obey orders, they silently, but grumly, gathered up their books and papers and as a matter of course went, to the great disgust of the citizens of Olathe.
During the remainder of the year 1858 the good people of Olathe took time by the forelock and put in their best licks for the county seat, and when the contest that followed later came off, Olathe was victorious and the county seat boys came back from "Gum Springs" to Olathe and were received with open arms and happy rejoicings.
During the winter of 1858 we were planning for better and more numerous mail facilities, having only one mail a week from the east, by Hill & Hockidy's overland stage line from Westport, Mo., to Santa Fe, N. M. S. F. Hill was our postmaster. Then the office had to go begging for someone to look after it, as the emoluments of the office were not sufficient inducement to tempt even a man out of employment.
The town of Olathe commenced early in the fall of 1858 to organize a school, and E. R. Annet, of near Gardner, was employed to teach, and he taught a five-months school in Dick Taylor's house, where Miller is now running his grocery store.
During the winter of 1858-59, everything was quiet in Olathe, and a few old settlers in the county moved into town-Col. J. T. Quarles and family, from the old town site of Lexington, moved to Olathe, also his son-in-law, David Bailey, and his family. Along toward spring came William Peck and family, Philander Craig and family, Archie Carahan, Tappy, William B. Stone, and later came W. H. M. Fishback and family, James Ingals and family, Joe Clark, W. A. Ocheltree, Thomas W. Roy and his mother, Mrs. Jennet Chapin, Charley Tillotsen and Dr. A. E. Edwards, William Pellett and the Rev. James Lackey, a Baptist minis- ter from near New Athens, Ohio.
William B. Stone came to Olathe during the month of March, 1859, with his photograph gallery, being the first institution of the kind in Olathe or Johnson county.
In the month of August, 1859, John M. Giffen and A. Smith Devenney established the Olathe "Herald," and the first issue of the paper was on the twenty-ninth day of August, 1859. W. A. Ocheltree was fore- man, C. J. Coles and Hank Cameron were principal type stickers and R. A. Frederich, later a leading attorney of Topeka, devil; A. Smith De-
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venney and John M. Giffen, editors, type stickers, business managers and general agents, etc. During the month of October, 1859, Judge Devenney retired from the paper and visited Washington City during the winter. The "Herald" was the first paper published in the county and was Democratic.
The contract was let to build the county jail and Col. J. F. Hayes was awarded the contract. James W. Parmeter was the principal car- penter in town and did the carpenter work of the jail, as he then did all fine jobs of work in that line in the town. We felt good, all of us, every- body in town, when the contract was let to build the jail, as we felt con- fident that it would be built if Colonel Hayes got the job, and when the jail was once built, and so large a sum of money expended that the county seat business would be settled, let it be recorded.
On the ninth day of April, 1859, William B. Stone opened up the second term of school taught in Olathe. From that time up to the pres- ent, Olathe has always been provided with good teachers. During the fall and winter of 1859, Mr. Annett again taught the Olathe school.
During this season a good many improvements were made in Olathe, but a large portion of them were of such a flimsy character that they were entirely obliterated by the close of the war.
Fred W. Case, in the spring of 1859, commenced the erection of the stone building, now used for the court house, on the southeast corner of the public square, and by fall had it completed and enclosed ready for occupancy, except plastering.
A. J. Hill, during the summer of 1859, built a stone building on the east side of the public square.
Philander Craig, in the spring of 1859, built the frame house now standing on the northeast corner of Wiley street and Santa Fe Avenue.
The Rev. Isaac C. Beach, early in the spring of 1859, built the build- ing lately burned, on the southwest corner of block 62, on the northeast corner of Cherry and Cedar streets.
B. L. Roberts during the year of 1859, built the house standing just north of the old stone building on the east side of the public square, where Henry Blake formerly sold drugs, and later as Dr. J. B. Morgan's drug store.
John Logan, in 1859, also built a dwelling house.
Sam Erwin also in June, 1859, built a dwelling on the lots where Dr. J. B. Morgan afterwards built the house, later occupied by William L. Lawrence on Santa Fe Avenue. These constitute the substantial in- provements made during the year 1859. The town was well represented in the carpenter line during this year, among whom we might mention, James W. Parmeter, Joe Clark, Tappy, Balcane Pettit, Robert Ingalls and some others whose name we have lost and cannot at this moment remember.
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Andy Clemens was the sole blacksmith, B. L. Roberts being engaged on his farm during the summer.
Dr. Hamill, Dr. McIntosh, Drs. Barton & Edwards, and occasionally Dr. Peter Julien would come from Wyandotte. This constituted the whole number of physicians for the year of 1859.
The lawyers for this year were increasing in numbers. They were John T. Burris, John M. Giffen, A. Smith Devenney, William Roy and W. H. M. Fishback.
In writing this article we have this object in view. There are a great . many little things that usually happen to the early settlers of almost every county, and at the same time they may become very valuable as a matter of history.
In the fall of 1859, the citizens of Olathe came to the conclusion that an agricultural society would be a good thing for Olathe and Johnson county, and a call for a meeting of the citizens of the county was inserted for that purpose, in the columns of the Olathe "Herald," and on the eighth day of October, 1859, at the court house in Olathe, the first effort in the county was made, to organize an agricultural society. It was one of those wet, rainy days, about like Monday, and the citizens of Olathe did the principal part of the wind work necessary to start such an institution, but it dried up, as every other thing did, throughout Kansas, during the year 1860, that followed. This was the last rain, sufficient to wet the ground, that we poor mortals saw in Johnson county until the last of January, 1861. It did rain a few drops occasion- ally during the year 1860, but not enough to lay the dust or make the roads muddy. In proof of what we have here stated we may be per- mitted to make a statement of a little circumstance that happened in Olathe on the twelfth day of May, 1860. A man by the name of Self, liv- ing on the border of Jackson county, Mo., had kept a register of the weather for forty-three years in that locality, and during that time it had never failed to rain on the twelfth day of May, and some of the citizens of Olathe had so much faith in the statement that it always rains on the twelfth day of May, that large bets were made that it would rain in the public square in Olathe, on that day. Here is where we made bets on it raining and missed it. It did sprinkle along the border near Mis- souri, but not a drop fell in the public square, and ye local lost his shot gun, a silver watch and twenty-five dollars in Johnson county scrip. Others lost three or four times as much, and those who believed it never intended to rain again got away with our baggage, but they were aw- fully scared for fear they would lose the bets, as about sundown a large, dark and ominous-looking cloud came up from the west, and passed directly over the public square, but the cloud was as silent as the tomb and it gave forth not one drop of water until it reached the town of Oxford, adjoining Little Santa Fe, Mo. The whole winter of 1859 and 1860 was like the most delightful September day of late years, not one
.
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cloud to be seen and the warm, southern wind came continually without frost or snow to enliven the monotonous scene. We then thought the winter delightful, but when vegetation refused to come forth at nature's bidding in its season, we longed for a season of rain, sleet, snow, or even a hurricane with all its dire consequences, rather than have the dry weather continue, but none came in answer to the prayers of our people, and during the entire summer and winter of 1860, our soil was parched up by the almost unendurable heat and hot southern winds. The air was full of dust all the time. and the Santa Fe freighters had to take the road at night, and lay by during the day time to save their cattle and mules from perishing. Corn in some instances did not even sprout when planted, and some of the corn, after it did come up, was dried up before it got up knee-high, while in some localities, near the streams from twen- ty to thirty-five bushels of corn were raised per acre. The grass around Olathe never grew above a foot high in length during the season, when the years 1859 and 1861 gave us grass waist high. The people of John- son county most certainly suffered the dry season, but as the entire popu- lation were newcomers and were generally prepared to stand a siege, very little aid was asked or obtained, and we were living and unwilling wit- nesses of the swindle practiced upon the charitable people throughout the East.
On the twentieth day of February, 1860, the Good Templars organized a lodge in Olathe with forty-four charter members. In one week the number had increased to seventy members and before the spring had fairly set in 165 members had been gathered into the folds of sobriety and included every single man and lady in town and in the country for four or five miles out. James Evans was worthy chief templar and C. J. Coles, worthy scribe. Evans became obnoxious to the balance of the lodge, and they determined to abandon their charter for the purpose of getting clear of him and so some one moved that the Olathe lodge of Good Templars adjourn sine die. Then it was that Evans made his famous speech and declared that the "lodge could not sign the die, so long as there was a decorum of seven," but the lodge did "sign the die," and thereby got clear of Evans. A few members who were not mixed up in these proceedings, made applications for a new charter, and in a week from that time all were back again in the Good Templars lodge, save and except Evans. So, you see, there are more ways of choking a dog to death than doing it with butter.
The next affair of importance to the citizens of Olathe, happened on the twenty-seventh day of February, 1860: Dr. J. T. Barton, the then mayor of the city of Olathe, caused to be published the following notice. We copy it as we find it in the Olathe "Herald" of that date:
NOTICE
The Trustees of the Town of Olathe will meet at the mayor's office on the fifth day of March, 1860, for the purpose of taking into considera-
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tion the propriety of fencing the public square, and planting the same in shrubbery.
"J. T. Barton, Mayor."
February 27, 1860.
And on the fifth day of March, 1860, the contract was made with Mr. S. F. Hill, to put a good substantial fence about the public square, and before the middle of April, of that year, the fence was completed and the square was planted with black locust trees. Dr. Barton had purchased the seed and employed Tom Mockabee, of Jackson county, Missouri, to raise the trees for this purpose.
On the eighth day of March, 1860, Olathe Lodge, No. 19, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, contracted with James W. Parmeter to build the first Masonic hall ever erected in Olathe or Johnson county. It is stand, ing, and since the building of the room over the postoffice, was lately occupied by L. H. Dow as a residence, and is now owned and occupied by the Canutt brothers as a residence. This building was dedicated on the twentieth day of June, 1860, and L. S. Cornwell made the dedication speech.
On Monday, the second day of April, 1860, the following named per- sons were chosen trustees of the town of Olathe for the year 1860: S. F. Hill, J. E. Hayes, A. J. McIntosh, Robert Mann and W. H. M. Fish- back. S. F. Hill was elected mayor.
The citizens of Olathe, on the fifth day of April, 1860, had the pleasure of seeing the first stage coach on the tri-weekly mail line through Olathe established. It ran from Kansas City, Mo., to the Sac and Fox agency.
On the twenty-first day of April, 1860, the first railroad convention was held in Olathe. It was held for the purpose of appointing delegates to attend a railroad meeting to be held at Baldwin City on the twenty- eighth' day of April, 1860, and to appoint a railroad executive committee for Johnson county.
During the first week of May, 1860, 700 "prairie schooners" passed through Olathe on their way to Kansas City, Mo., from Santa Fe, N. M.
Corwell & Barton's addition had then begun to open up inducements to settlers, and W. S. Peck was the first to build over in that part of town. Mr. Swartz came next, and then A. J. Hill, James Ingall and Aaron Mann, and Cornwall & Barton's addition became a part of the town of Olathe.
On the seventeenth day of May, 1860, eight persons, all "kinfolks," landed in Olathe, direct from Western Virginia. They were relatives of B. L. Roberts, and some of them still live in Johnson county. The Duffields, Fishers, Roberts and Davises and among them, Mrs. Ecken- green, who has since resided in Olathe, and Joseph Hutchinson and family.
On the twenty-fifth day of June, 1860, the new Masonic hall was dedi- cated ; J. P. Campbell, William Roy and J. E. Hayes were the commit-
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tee on invitation, and L. S. Cornwell made the dedication speech, and James W. Parmeter played the part of Hiram.
The celebration of the Fourth of July, 1860, was the first of the kind ever held in Olathe. Olathe had been unfaithful in this respect, and her citizens finally concluded, in 1860, to have a grand old "Fourth," and advertised a free dinner on that day for all who would come, and made preparations to feed 1,000 strangers ; but 2,000 strangers came, and, as a natural consequence, somebody had to go away hungry ; and from that day to this, Olathe has never again said free dinner to the people of Johnson county.
On Sunday, July 15, 1860, Patrick Sullivan was found dead in the public square. It appeared from the evidence before the coroner's jury that Pat had been on a "bit of a spree" for several days before, and had gone over into the square for a "nap" and had been forgotten until found there on Sunday, dead. The verdict of the jury was that he had died of congestion of the brain, caused by excessive use of intoxicating liquors, and by exposure to the heat of the sun.
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