USA > Kansas > Smith County > History of Smith County, Kansas to 1960 > Part 12
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carpenter; and W. D. Lloyd, 90, ran the Ford Garage. 54
The State of Kansas found some loet land in Smith County in 1956 when the highway department prepared to condemn a new right-of-way for US 36 a mile west of the east county line of Smith County. The appraisers, Roes Cline, Eli Shively, and Arden Dierdorf, found a tract of land of .39 acree to which there was no title. The State of Kansas tried unsuccessfully for several weeke to clear the faulty title. Ray Myers, correspondent for sev- eral local newspapers, wrote an item for his column of the unusual circum- stance. Mrs. Milton Rogers, Esbon, sent a copy of the story to her relatives in Oregon, and it was dieclosed that sometime in the 1870's a sod church called Sweet Home had been built on the land owned by a family named Hollingsworth. When hie farm was eold he had reserved the .39 acree the church was on. The church group had gradually died out or moved and the incident forgotten in the realm of time, until the state wanted that particular land. Three descendants of the Hollingsworth family, now living in Oregon, got $11.00 apiece for the site of one of the earliest churches in Smith County. The Smith County Pioneer later reported an interview with Charlie Sargent who etated he had attended services in the old eod church which stood there and was called Shiloh (or Shilow) Church in the eighties. He did not remember who built the church but John Hollingsworth owned the land. A store was originally operated in a ood building near the Sweet Home cemetery and called the Sweet Home store and post office run by a Wr. Shafer. Mr. Sargent's grandfather, Washington N. Rogers, bought the etore and poet office and moved it weet of the Shiloh church in a frame building. There was a blacksmith shop run by Ed Barber across the road on the north side. Sargent could remember when dust several inches deep wae
54 Kansas City Times, December 1, 1950.
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between the two buildings from covered wagons going by. In 1879 his grand- father moved the store one mile north and ran it until the railroad came. One of the pastors of the old sod church, Andy Poulson, married Mr. and Mrs. Sargent.55
An unusual geographic obtrusion in the approximately level plains of Smith County is the high chalk bluff that rears above the range of hills bordering the Solomon Valley and locally termed for many years as Harlan Hill. It stands northwest of Harlan on US 281 and K9 highways and overlooks the Solomon Valley for many miles each way. The land on which the hill is located was homesteaded by the Calvin Harlans for whom the town of Harlan was named, and is now owned by Mr. and Mrs. Guy Caldwell. They donated an area on the extreme top of the hill to the Coronado Area Council of the Boy Scouts of America. A Statue of Liberty replica was erected looking out over the valley and a small park and picnic ground built surrounding it.56
Some Representative Smith Countians
There are hundreds and even thousands of individuals who have a distinc- tive part in the development of a community, not to mention a county, so an attempt to name over a period of ninety years the leading individuals in Smith County who, through individual service, have been outstanding is as impossible a task as naming the several thousand individuals and their contributions to settlement of the county. One can only hope to give some representative
55 Smith County Pioneer, January 17, 1957.
56 Smith County Pioneer, November 26, 1959. The State Highway Depart- ment reported that in 1959 en estimated 2,000 people visited or picnicked there during the year.
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individuals that illustrate the outstanding inspiration and talent found among the citizens of Smith County and the few cited in no way reflects on the contributions of all the others.
It seems appropriate to start with a few homesteaders who became well known over the county and to proceed to those native sons and daughters who followed some profession that brought merit to their native birthplace. Three homesteaders whose interest was interlaced all their lives with Smith County were L. C. Uhl, L. T. (Trube) Resse, and John Goodale. Reese and Goodale had been working on the railroad in their native state of Illinois when they decided to come west. They fitted up a covered wagon and started for Kansas; at Jewell Center they met J. W. George who had besn surveying Smith County and he advised them to come to the vicinity of what was to be Smith Centre. They learned the land office was at Concordia, so unloaded the nagon at Jewell and made the trip there to file on claims. Reese chose the northwest 160 acres in section 10 and Goodale the quarter adjoining on the west. (This later was in Center Township and the road straight north from Main Street in Smith Center ran between the two farms. ) The men then drovs to Gaylord and started north to try to locate their homesteads. They arrived April 24, 1872. After they located their homesteads Reese later described his as "so level a fellow could stand in the middle of it and see a jack rabbit in any corner." Thay planted com with a spade that year and had a dugout built by fall in which they lived together for two years.
In August 1872, while enroute to Jewell for seed wheat with a four-horse team and wagon, Reese and Joe Davis, another homesteader, san a speck on the prairie just east of the breaks of Oak Creek. At first they feared an Indian decoy, but found it to be a small, light-complexioned white man dressed in a
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blue serge suit and white shirt, carrying a red bandana-tied package that afterwards proved to be a law book. He introduced himself as Leonard Uhl and asked if they knew anything about a townsits known as Smith Centre some- where out West. lie went home with them and the next morning chose as a home- atead the SNA, Sec. 9 in Centre Township. Leonard C. Uhl was born in Hessia, Germany and came to America at the age of two with his family, living in Indi- ana and Illinoia where he grew to manhood. He taught school for two years in Decatur, Illinois, then came to Falls City, Nebraska, where his brother, George, was living. There he read law and was admitted to the bar in Nebraska, June 18, 1872, and aoon afterward decided to go to Kansas. In the spring of 1873 he had Reese and Goodale build him a sodhouse on hia claim, then began to practice law in Smith Centre. In his possession he had the one law book he carried to the county. It was "Spaulding's Treaties." L. C. Uhl purchased an eighty acre homestead relinquishment on the west of Smith Center townsits and built a home in which he spent the rest of his life. He went back to Illinois in 1875 and married his sweetheart, Kiss Nancy Widick. They were parents of two sons, L. C. Uhl, Jr. and Fred H. Uhl. His especial enjoyment in later years were the trips hs and his wife took, sspecially one to his native Ger- many in 1905, and the Shrine Pilgrimage to Manila. He came to the county with $5.00, became a noted lawyer and abstracter, and after sixty years of residence passed away Juns 4, 1932.57
John Goodals built a sod house on his farm and he and Laura Ann Logan were married December 12, 1875. She had come to Centre Township in 1873. 5hs always said they made a good living by hard work and using the word "Economy" for their guido. The Goodales moved to town in 1895, and Mrs. Goodals built
57 Krs. Hattie Baker Collection, op. cit.
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a small church of her faith, "The Church of God", near her home. Her group worshipped there for many years until in 1946, when a large church was built in the northeast part of town. He died May 22, 1915 and ohs passed away September 29, 1953 at the age of 96 years.58
Trube Rsese Lived in Center Township for seventy-eight years. His long life was one of adventure. He saw the first etake that designated the town- site of Smith Contre, the firet nail driven in the first building, helped dig the first grave in Fairview Cemetery, saw banda of Indians, herds of buffalo and deer, and helped many newcomers to get located. He had a keen memory of all of these things and even in the last years of his life, he en- joyed writing stories of his experiences or telling them to the children who loved to gather on the porch of his home on West Court Street. In 1879 he had married Miss Florence Webb at the homestead of her parents. They had come to Smith County in 1877. He was postmaster for several years, then went into the real estate business and stock buying. He was a member of the first band, belonged to the Masonic fraternity for seventy years, charter member of the Chamber of Commerce, honorary member of the Rotary Club, and member of the Congregational Church. He became known far and wide over the county as a friend to sveryone. Mr. and Mrs. Reese celebrated their fiftieth wedding anniversary in 1929 with all their seven children and families at home. l're. leess died in 1946 at the age of sighty-four, but for the first time in the history of Smith Center a person lived to be one hundred years of age and this was to be the privilege of Leonidas Troubador Reese. Two days of celebration was held and more than 500 friends signed the guest book. The high school
58 Ibid.
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band serenaded him and he insisted on greeting each of the sixty-five members personally. They knew of his life time interest in music. It was he who had first read the words of the poem, "My Western Home," and urged Dr. Higley to get Dan Kelley to write soms music for what later became "Home on the Range." And so "Truba" Resse, as hs was known to everyona, born at Abington, Illinois, September 12, 1850, died November 29, 1950, at the age of 100 years.59
Another future Smith Countian who walked into the county was Joel Randall Burrow. Burrow was born in Marion County, Illinois in 1853, a collateral de- acendant of John Quincy Adams. lle came to Kansas on the railroad to Clay Center, the end of the line. He made his way to Jewell County with a wagon train, then walked barefooted to a point near Salem where he got a job. Ha had shoes but wanted to savs them. Burrow once told Clyde Myers that he landed at White Rock with $7.50 in his pocket, but later loaned his brother- in-law $7 of that and started his fortuns on the remaining 50g. His brother- in-law, Martin Hall, was a merchant in Salem, then moved to Bellaire when the railroad went through and continued there ths remainder of his lifs or into the 1920's. Later hs sscured the star mail route from Cora to Scandia, then moved to Smith Center where he soon had contracts to handis all the star routes. lis handled thsse routss from 1873 to 1881, during which time he be- came well acquainted with the country and people. He prospered and purchased a hotel, livery stabla, and store. He was asked to sign a nots for a friend so he could borrow $100. Burrow asked how much interest he was to pay. The answer was what amounted to about 25 per cent. Hs mads the loan himself, charging 18 per cent. Ths security was a three-legged cow, a buffalo calf, some horses and rattlesnakes since the friend was Andy Shaffer, who exhibited
59 Ibid.
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the animals for a small sum. After thie he started going farmers' notes. In 1874, so the story goes, he had accumulated checke to the amount of $400, and sent them by a young man of the vicinity to Hastinge to be cached, but this friend went to Kearney, filled up on corn whiskey, and when later found was in the army. Thie was one of hie few bad investments. In 1880 he sold out his other interests and ha and George White organised the People's Bank. George White had come to Smith County in 1873, opened a law office, and waż county attorney in 1874-1875. On August 6, 1886, he organized the First National Bank with a capital of $50,000. A brick and stone structure wae built in 1889. In 1901 he organized the First National Bank in Lebanon with Johnny Mossman ae cashier. He later eold it to Andrew Lull. Early in the 1900's ha formed the First State Bank at Athol with F. Fleming as cashier. The Athol bank merged with the parent bank at Smith Center about 1932, as aleo did the Bellaire Bank which had been established by Burrow about the same time. At one tims he wae president of the First National Bank, Smith Center, Firet State Bank of Athol, First State Bank of Bellaire, First State Bank of Portis, Osage County Bank, Osage City, First State Bank of Canker City, and the Central National Bank of Topeka, Central Trust Company of Topeka, and Home Investment Company of Smith Center. He was Secretary of the State of Kansas from 1903-1907; served as Chairman of the Shawnee County Liberty Loan Committee during the first World War; and was delegate to the Republican National Convention in 1900. It is said he arrived in the county with fifty cente, homeeteaded ad- joining Smith Center, 1873, and died in Topeka in 1930, a financier.
Wabb McNall wae another homesteader who had a varied and colorful career. He was born in New York, came to Iowa with his parents. There he married Miss Annie Humberger in 1868 and they came to Gaylord and homesteaded in September 1872. He was one of the firet township officers of Houston Township, and at
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different times constable and deputy sheriff in Smith County, and editor of the Gaylord Herald. In 1876-77 he was doorkeeper of the House of Representa- tivee, later Commissioner of Insurance for Kansas, and in 1879 he was admitted to practice law in the districte of Kansas. He became a successful lawyer on railroad cases. He worked in the Kirvin Land Office from October 1839 to April 1892.
In the early days the lichalls Lived at Gaylord in the old log school house. Their daughter, Cora May, born March 25, 1872, was the first child born in Gay- lord. Hier death, November 1874, was also the first. Her mother had stepped outside on an errand leaving the children eating breakfast. When two-year-old Cora apparently decided to make some toast, she fell into the fire and died of burns. Several years later Webb came home from Congress to deliver the July 4th oration at the celebration. Itre. McNall started to the picnic grounds with a team and buggy; her mother was in the back seat. The horses became fright- ened at the bridge over Beaver Creek, backed off the bridge and killed Mre. Humburger. Mrs. Roam, a neighbor of the Melall's wrote: "Webb McNall was in a class by himself - a man of mighty ambition and purpose, and who through all the etruggles and all but overwhelming obstacles of his time, made for himself a place in the worthwhile things of Kansas history."60
The Simmonds familiee were homesteaders that came to the Cedarville area and helped the county to grow and mature. William Simmonds and wife with six children had lived in successive places on the new frontier until they finally settled at Buchanan, Iowa. Here Robert was killed in an accident. John, George, and Susan Elizabeth were all married, Harriet and Angus were with their father.
60 Mrs. Cora Ream, op. cit.
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John had been in correspondence with Major John Morrison, with whom he had served in the Civil War. Morrison wes one of the founders of Cedarville. Due to thie the father, William, hie cone, John, George, son-in-law, Nelson Goddard (wife, Susan), a widowed step-daughter of the Goddarde, Sarah Jane Leighton, all with their families, came to Smith County and filed on homesteade in the Cedarville area in 1872. Harriet and Angus were too young to file. William originally homesteaded on the NE; See. 20, Tl:, R14, by pre-emption April 1872. He received the title at the Kirin Land Office March 4, 1880. The final papers showed hie age to be 61, all children married, wife deceased, natural- ized citizen. He had built a stone house and etable, had sixty acree under cultivation, planted fruit trece and hedge. Ilie witnessse were neighbors D. H. Crosby and John Wolcott. In August, 1898, a tornado carried the house away and carried him more than a mile but miraculously did not kill him. He wae eighty-one at the time. He died April, 1902 at the age of eighty-five. One of his eons, Angus M. Simmonda, homesteaded the SW} Sec. 17, T4, R14, January 15, 1876. When he received hie title he gave his age as 29, with wife and three children. He hed a stone house 14 feet by 16 feet, board floore, board and eod roof; forty acree of land broken. Hie witnesses were Dan H. Crosby, Asa Crosby, John Wolcott, and William Lyall, neighbors. Ilis wife was Christiana Tillman, who had come to Marysville, Kansae when alx years old and married Angus in 1876. One of their children, Frank, is included in this section under educators. Angue died at his home in Athol, 1927. John Simmonds, another son, with his wife and small daughter, Rosalie Simmonds (Cole), farmed his homestead, was Deputy Sheriff several terms, and had a livery barn and feed businees. He died at Cedar in 1911 as alav did George. Both were Civil War veterans. Susan Elizabeth, wife of Nelson Goddard, died at Kensington, 1925. Harriet married James Phillipe at Cedarville, then
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homesteaded north of Angus in Harvey Township in 1873. Their home burned down in 1882. They were the only ones not to live their lives out in Smith County. They decided to go farther west after the fire and moved from one place to another until she died at Montrose, Colorado. 61
The above mentioned Daniel Henderson Crosby came to the Cedar community in the fall of 1871 and took a homeetoad. He was born in Delaware County, New York, grew to manhood in Wisconsin where his folks had moved when he was twelve, and came to Smith County at the age of twenty-four. Although too young to en- liet in the Civil War, and rejected twice on that account, he had several birth- days in quick succession and enlisted in 1864 in the lieconsin Infantry which made a name for itself in history. In September 1878, he married Sarah Young, aleo daughter of pioneer parente who came to Cedarville in a covered wagon in 1876 with eleven children and settled on a farm south of Cedarville. John C. Harlan, for whom Harlan was named, and whose con later won fame by substantiating the claim of Smith County as the origin of "Home on the Range, " was the probate judge who married then. (See license in Appendix. ) They had one con, William, and one daughter, Lilly. The first town officers of Cedarville were G. H. Hunt, trustee; D. H. Crosby, Clerk; and Chae. E. Newman, Justice. About 1901, the Croebys moved to Kensington where he opened a hotel that employed a number of people and became noted for the meale served in ite dining room. In the Cedar cemetary, D. H. Crosby and N. P. Draper erected in May, 1921, a lerge monument in memory of their G. A. R. comradee who had passed on. It became a part of the Memorial Day program each year to decorate at the base and sound "Tape" for the veterane that had died. (See G. A. R. history.) Mrs. Crosby died May,
61 Frank W. Simmonds, op. cit., from geneology throughout the book.
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1915, and Dan December 31, 1922. 62
John B. Mahin and his family came to Smith County from Iowa in September 1878. This included five children, Isaac, Frank, Hubert, Caz, and a daughter, Salina. John traded a team of horses to a minister named Daney for the re- linquishment of his claim south of Cedarville. He later gave land on the northeast corner for the Glen Rock school where two of his sons, Isaac and Frank, later taught. Ike (Isaac), Frank, and Dooley all excelled at baseball in the days when it was a rough game. Dooley had a chance to go to the Chicago White Sox for a try-out but "falt Chicago was too far from Cedarville." Isaac and Frank studied law as well as taught school and were admitted to the bar. For many years they were prominent practicing attorneys, both in Smith Center end throughout the state. Salina Mahin married Alonso Teeplo, a pioneer teacher and later attorney. For many years he served as Probate Judge at Man- kato, Kansas and after his death, Salins finished his term and continued in that capacity for several years. Two of the great granddaughters taught school in the school for which their ancestor had donated the land; namely, Emroy, granddaughter of Isaac, and Ilene, granddaughter of Hubert. 63
Mrs. Klas Rice, a widow, and her five sons, William, E. R. (Eliott), T. M. (Mad), J. H. (Harve), and E. S. (Scott) arrived in Smith County in October, 1873. She took a homestead five miles northwest of Athol and as her sons became of age they too homesteaded until in 1912 the homes of the five brothers included 2,640 acres of highly improved farms. During all their Lives the brothers were in daily touch with each other and each made his home in the county. The mother passed away in 1890, a true pioneer. In October,
62 The above pioneer homesteaders were the author's grandparents and rillien her father, thus her interest in Cedar, Kensington, and in Smith Center where she lived until married.
63 A history of the Mahin family written for the Smith County Historical Society and loaned to the author.
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the family had a clan gathering at the old homestead owned then by one of the sons, Mad, to celebrate the fortieth anniversary of the family arrival in the county and the wedding of the youngest brother, Scott. There were a few less than 100 members in the family by then. Late in November 1926, they had a dinner in Smith Center at which time the brothers' average age was 73 years -- "111, Athol, 80 years; Mad, Athol, 76; Kliott, Kensington, 73; Harve, Smith Center, 71; and Scott, Smith Center, 66 years old. The Smith County papers stated that they all were hale and hearty and willing to work, and Fill was one of the few original homesteaders still Living on his land. Scott Rice died July 16, 1937. Scott studied law and was a graduate from the University of Kansas in 1888. He then entered law practice at Smith Center where he had remained. Some of his positions were Assistant Secretary of State, County Attorney of Smith County, and Mayor of Smith Center. Harve died in 1936 at the age of 80 years, Will in 1937 at the age of 92 years, Scott in 1937 at the age of 77, Mad in 1940 at the age of 90, and Eliott in 1942 at the age of 89. Thus ended the lives of five pioneer brothers who had a prominent part in the making of the history of Smith County.64
Two judges may be mentioned for their services in the legal field. Jules Jarvie was known far and wide throughout the county to adults and children alike. He was born in Hahaska County, Iowa, in 1850 and came to Smith County in 1886 where he was in the mercantile business. He was appointed deputy sheriff, then elected sheriff for four years. From 1894 to 1898 he was Deputy U. S. Marshal. lle was elected probate judge in 1908 and although a
64 Smith County Journal, October 22, 1914; smith County paper, December 2, 1926; July 22, 1937. Clippings Loaned by Mrs. Jess Rice, Athol. Mrs. Rice, whose husband is a son of Will Rice, and her brother-in-law, H. V. Dileaver of Kensington, contributed much information and help for this work.
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Democrat, he held the office for twenty-four consecutive years "in the face of repeated Republican landalides." lle died in office in 1932.65
C. Clyde Myers had a dual acclain - one as judge, one as a writer. He was born on the Tom Ricard homestead three miles northwest of Esbon, Jewell County, the oldest of six children. He attended Salem school, and graduated from Lebanon High School in 1907. He taught school in Smith County from 1907-1910. In 1910 he entered washburn Law School, graduated in 1913, was admitted to practice July 3, 1913. He started law practice at Lebanon; in 1913 ha entered a partnership with Judge William Mitchell, Mankato; in 1914 ha was elected county attorney of Jewell County and served four years. July 1920 ha went to Kansas City, Kansas, as Assistant United States Attorney, then stayed in Kansas City to practice lam. In 1924 he served as Probate Judge of Wyandotte County, 1927-28 as Assistant County Attorney. Since 1945 he has been judge of one of the city courts of Kansas City. He says probably the best work he has ever dons was as Government Appeal Agent during World War I, a job for which he was paid nothing and received more ill will than anything else. He passed on claims for exemptions and made recommendations to the government. Politically ha has always been Democratic. Since 1922 he has been on a ballot or holding office or both. His sister, Moda, started teaching school at six- teen after graduating from Lebanon High School. She later attended Colorado Teachers College, University of Hawaii, Alaska University at Fairbanks, Old Heidelberg University in Austria, and taught in Kansas City since 1925. An- other sister, Ethel, became Girl Scout Executive at Middletown, Ohio. His brother, Ray, and sister, Mattis (Mrs. Earl Pixler) live at Lebanon and a
65 Smith County Pioneer, July 28, 1932.
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brother, Fred, in California. He married Grace Smarts in 1933 and they have three daughters. He had done much writing for his own pleasure - "perhaps a million words of fiction, both short stories and book length ones" and another million words of Masonic philosophy that has been published all over the world. He had polio when about a year old. He says he probably would have been prac- tically cured with today'e methods, but was left with a permanent disability below the hips. He takes the attitude that it was probably good for him as it formed a challenge for him to hold his own with others. His philosophy in life and as a judge is "Call them as you see them !" 66
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