USA > Kansas > Kansas; a cyclopedia of state history, embracing events, institutions, industries, counties, cities, towns, prominent persons, etc. with a supplementary volume devoted to selected personal history and reminiscence, Voilume I > Part 43
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In the Cheyenne raid of 1878 (q. v.) some of the Indians entered the state near the southwest corner of Comanche county and passed through Clark, stealing some horses from Driscoll's ranch. One In- dian was killed in the county. In the spring of 1879 a man named Dudley came from Sumner county and settled on Bear creek. Up to this time there had been nothing but cattle ranches in the county, the
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principal ones being Driscoll's and Evans' ranches on Kiger creek; Lustrum's and Carlson's below Bluff creek; Dorsey's at the mouth of the Red Earth, and Collar's on Bluff creek. It was the value of these ranches that influenced the legislature to include Clark county in Ford, as above mentioned.
Clark City was laid out in June, 1884, about a mile and a half north of the present city of Ashland. The first number of the Clark County Clipper, the first newspaper in the county, was issued at Clark City on Sept. 18, 1884, by Marquis & Church. Late in October of that year Ashland was laid out by a company of Winfield men, of which W. R. McDonald was president and Francis B. Hall secretary. The new town company offered for a certain length of time to give each of the house- holders of Clark City a lot and remove his house to the new town site free. Quite a number accepted the offer, and as Ashland went up Clark City went down, until it finally disappeared entirely.
About the time that Ashland was founded, the Clipper said in an editorial: "The immigration into this county from the east does not seem to abate because of the approach of winter. The wagons still pour into the valleys south, southeast and southwest of here at a rate never before equaled, and we expect to see them continue to come all winter. If you have not used your right of preemption, wait no longer, as in all probability it will soon be forever too late."
At the presidential election in Nov., 1884, Blaine received 85 votes in the county ; Cleveland, 70; and Butler, 14, a total of 169 votes. At the same time J. Q. Shoup was elected to represent the county in the state legislature. When the news reached Ashland in March, 1885, that Clark county was again made an independent political organiza- tion by the legislature, it was received with demonstrations of joy. On the roth a meeting was held at the office of Ayers & Theis to take steps to organize the county. J. W. Ayers presided and Robert C. Marquis acted as secretary. A committee, consisting of Messrs. Likes, McCart- ney and Berry, was appointed to attend to the work of printing and circulating petitions to the governor asking for the organization of the county.
Another meeting was held on April 17, when Robert C. Marquis offered the following resolution: "That this convention temporarily divide the county into three districts of ten miles each, running north and south, to be known as the Eastern, Western and Central districts, and that the representatives present from each district select a com- mittee of three to represent their district, and these committees from each district shall meet immediately and select a day, place and man- ner whereby the several districts shall select a man to be recommended to the governor for appointment as county commissioner in their respec- tive districts, and also a person for county clerk."
The resoluiton was adopted and the following committees appointed : Eastern district-C. B. Nunemacher, D. C. Pitcher, C. G. Graham ; Cen- tral district-F. M. Sanderlin, J. M. Bly, J. M. Lockhead; Western
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district-H. W. Henry, A. F. Harmer, Joseph Hall. This committee of nine decided on April 25 as the date of an election, and met at Ash- land on the 27th to canvass the vote. A. F. Harmer, Daniel Burket and G. W. Epperly were chosen for county commissioners and John S. Myers for county clerk, and these men were recommended to the gov- ernor for appointment. In the meantime Thomas E. Berry had been appointed on March 20 to take a census of the county. His enumera- tion showed a population of 2,042, of whom 877 were householders. Upon his report Gov. John A. Martin issued his proclamation on May 5, 1885, declaring the county organized, appointing the commissioners and clerk recommended by the people of the county and designating Ashland as the temporary county seat.
The first meeting of the board of commisisoners was held on May 11, 1885, when the three districts authorized by the resolution of April 17 were declared civil townships. The Eastern district was named Liberty township, with voting places at Weeks' ranch, Kepler's and Mendenhall's; the Central district was named Center township, with voting places at Letitia, Ashland and Edwards; and the Western dis- trict was named Vesta township, with voting places at Appleton. Vesta and Englewood. An election was ordered for June 16, for the election of county officers and the selection of a permanent county seat. The officers elected were: C. D. Perry, representative ; John S. Myers, clerk ; S. H. Hughes, treasurer ; J. J. Kennedy, probate judge ; J. L. Snodgrass, register of deeds; Michael Sughrue, sheriff ; W. A. McCartney, county attorney ; A. F. Harmer, clerk of the district court; C. C. Mansfield, superintendent of education; J. W. Henderson, surveyor; Dr. S. H. Parks, coroner; G. W. Epperly, Daniel Burket and B. B. Bush, com- missioners. For county seat Ashland received 577 votes ; Englewood, 257; Fair West, 98, and 34.were recorded as "scattering."
The first school in the county, of which any record is obtainable, was a three months' term taught at Clark City by W. H. Myers, closing on Nov. 29, 1884. The first banking institution was the Clark County bank, which opened its doors for business on June 24, 1885, at Ash- land.
Since the organization of the county, its history differs but little from that of the other counties of the state. Constructive work has gone forward steadily, highways have been opened, public buildings erected, school districts organized, etc. Two lines of railroads operate in the county. The Wichita & Englewood division of the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe system enters the county near the center of the eastern boundary, runs west to Ashland and thence southwest to Englewood, and a line of the Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific system crosses the northwest corner through Minneola.
According to the U. S. census, the population of Clark county in 1910 was 4.093, a gain of 3,022 during the preceding ten years, or more than 200 per cent. The county is bounded on the north by Ford county ; on the east by the counties of Kiowa and Comanche; on the south
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by the State of Oklahoma, and on the west by Meade county. It is divided into ten townships, viz .: Appleton, Brown, Center, Cimarron, Edwards, Englewood, Lexington, Liberty, Sitka and Vesta. The value of all farm products in 1910, including live stock, was $2,111,518. The five leading crops in the order of value were: wheat, $936,387; corn, $181,084; Kaffir corn, $87,715; oats, $44,677; sorghum, $42,160. Hay, barley, milo maize and broom-corn were also important crops.
Clark, William, soldier and explorer, was born in Caroline county, Va., Aug. 1, 1770. When fourteen years old his parents-John and Ann (Rogers) Clark-removed to Kentucky and settled where Louisville now stands, and where his brother, George Rogers Clark, had built a fort in 1777. William grew up in a wild region, with little opportunity for acquiring an education, but he became well versed in Indian traits and habits. He was with Col. John Hardin in a campaign against the Indians north of the Ohio river in 1789; was made an ensign in 1791; promoted to lieutenant in March, 1792; served as adjutant and quarter- master in 1793, and was with Gen. Anthony Wayne in his Indian cam- paigns of 1796. Ill health forced him to leave the army, but as a hunter and trapper he regained his strength. In 1804 he went to St. Louis, and in March of that year President Jefferson commissioned him a second lieutenant in the artillery and ordered him to join Capt. Meriwether Lewis for an exploring expedition through the Louisiana purchase and across the Rocky mountains to the mouth of the Columbia river. This expedition passed up the Missouri river, along what is now the eastern boundary of Kansas, and some of the streams in the eastern part of the state were named by Lewis and Clark. (See Lewis and Clark's Expedition.) On Sept. 23, 1806, the expedition reached St. Louis, hav- ing been for more than two years engaged in exploring the Missouri river, the Rocky mountain region and the Columbia valley. Con- gress granted Lieut. Clark 1,000 acres of land for his services. For sev- eral years he was Indian agent; was appointed governor of Missouri Territory on July 1, 1813, by President Madison, and served as such until the state was admitted into the Union in 1820. Clark died at St. Louis, Mo., Sept. 1, 1838.
Clarke, Sidney, one of the early members of Congress from Kansas, was born at Southbridge, Mass., Oct. 16, 1831. He was not given the advantages of a liberal education, and at the age of eighteen left his father's farm to work in a general store in Worcester. While thus employed he studied nights, and within a short time began to write for the press. He soon gained recognition as a versatile and forcible writer, and joined a young men's literary society, where his natural ability as a debater quickly developed. In 1854 he returned to his native town and started a weekly newspaper known as the "South- bridge Press," which flourished for five years. He became an active member of the Free Soil party, casting his first vote for Hale and Julian in 1852. In the campaign of 1856 he actively supported Gen. Fremont. In the spring of 1858 Mr. Clark's health became impaired
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and upon the advice of his physician he went west, locating at Law- rence, Kan., the following spring. His interest in politics began to assert itself immediately, and he became an ardent supporter of the Radical wing of the Free-State party. In 1862 he was elected to the state legislature. The following year President Lincoln appointed him adjutant-general of volunteers, and he was assigned to duty as acting assistant provost marshal general for the District of Kansas, Nebraska, Colorado and Dakota, with headquarters at Fort Leavenworth. The same year he was made chairman of the Republican state committee, a position previously held by the ablest of the old free-state leaders. From this time on Mr. Clarke was a conspicuous political figure in Kansas. In 1864 he was elected to Congress and reelected for two. succeeding terms. He was always alive to the interests of his con- stituency while in Congress, and was an able, faithful representative of a commonwealth extensive in territory, with diversified interests and developing resources. In Congress Mr. Clarke was chairman of the. house committee on Indian affairs and a member of the Pacific rail- road commission. He participated in all the leading conflicts which made the history of Congress memorable during the six years he served in that body. The defeat of the Osage Indian treaty and the passage of the Clark bill saved to Kansas much of her public school lands. During his three terms in Congress Mr. Clarke was the only representa- tive from Kansas and he referred proudly to himself as "the sole repre- sentative of my imperial state." He was in Congress at the time of the assassination of President Lincoln, of whom he was a close friend, and was placed on the committee that accompanied the body to its last resting place. He was defeated for election to Congress in 1870, but was elected to the state legislature in 1878 and made speaker of the house. In 1898 he removed to Oklahoma, and few men had a more powerful hand in shaping the destinies of the new state. He united his fortunes with the west at an early day and was an ideal pioneer in both Kansas and Oklahoma. Mr. Clarke was twice married. In 1860 he married Miss Henrietta Ross at Lawrence, and four children. were born to this union: George Lincoln, Sydney, Jr., Lulu Louise and Ella Maria. Mrs. Clarke died in 1873 and in 1881 Mr. Clarke mar- ried Miss Dora Goulding of Topeka. One daughter, Josie, was born to. them. Mr. Clarke died in Oklahoma City, Okla., June 19, 1909.
Claudell, a village of Valley township, Smith county, is located on the Solomon river, and is a station on the Missouri Pacific R. R. 15. miles southwest of Smith Center, the county seat. It has a money order postoffice, a good local trade, and in 1910 reported a population- of 50.
Clay Center, the county seat and largest city of Clay county, is located on the Republican river at the junction of the Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific and two lines of the Union Pacific railroads, a little- northeast of the center of the county. The first settlement at Clay Center was made in May, 1862, by John and Alonzo F. Dexter and.
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Orville Huntress. When it was proposed to make Clay Center the county seat, Alonzo F. Dexter donated the ground for a court-house -a fact which is inscribed on the corner-stone of the building erected in 1900. Soon after that court-house was completed, Mr. Dexter, hav- ing grown old and suffered financial reverses, was made superintend- ent of the structure, with quarters in the building. On June 11, 1875, Clay Center was incorporated as a city of the third class. In April, 1880, the population having increased to over 2,000, a petition was pre- sented to the governor to make it a city of the second class, and in July Gov. St. John issued a proclamation to that effect.
According to the U. S. census for 1910 the population of Clay Center was then 3,438. It has broad, well improved streets, a fine water- works system, an electric lighting plant, a fire department, sewers, a telephone exchange, 2 national and 3 state banks with a capital of $200,000, an opera house, lodges of the leading fraternal organizations, a number of fine church edifices, good hotels, a bottling works, a broom factory, grain elevators, foundries and machine shops, carriage and wagon works, planing mills, flour mills, an engraving company, brick and tile factories, and some well stocked and well conducted mercantile establishments. From the international money order postoffice of Clay Center eight rural delivery routes supply daily mail to the inhabitants of a rich agricultural region. The county high school is located at Clay Center, and the public school buildings of the city are as fine as those of any city in Kansas. The press is represented by one daily and three weekly newspapers, a monthly fraternal magazine, and a religious quarterly.
Clay County, in the northeastern part of the state, is in the second tier of counties south of Nebraska, and its eastern boundary is about 100 miles west of the Missouri river. It is bounded on the north by Washington county ; east by Geary and Riley ; south by Dickinson, and west by Ottawa and Cloud, and has an area of 660 square miles. By an act of the first territorial legislature in 1855, the territory embraced within the present limits of Clay county was attached to Riley county for all revenue and judicial purposes. Subsequently Clay was attached to Geary county. In 1857 Clay was created and named in honor of the great compromise statesman, Henry Clay.
The first white men to visit this part of Kansas were the French, who about 1724, passed up the rivers seeking to open up trade with the Indians. In 1830, David Atchison, an adventurous pioneer, penetrated as far west as the present county of Clay. Col. John C. Fremont, in his expedition to the Rocky mountains in 1843 crossed what is now the southwestern part of the county, and in his report on June II, 1843, says, "For several days we continued to travel along the Republican . . on the morning of the 16th, the parties separated, and bearing a little out from the river . . . we entered upon an extensive and high level prairie."
Among the first permanent settlers were the Younkins brothers from
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Pennsylvania, who in April, 1856, entered land on Timber creek. Within a short time they were followed by J. B. Quimby and William Payne. who took up land on the west side of the Republican near the present site of Wakefield. The first actual settler on the site of Wakefield was James Gilbert, who located there in 1858. Mrs. Moses Younkins and Mrs. Quimby were the first white women in the county. In 1857 John Gill, Lorenzo Gates and a man named Mall located on Deep creek farther up the river, where Gatesville and Mall creek commemorate them. During the fall of 1857 and the spring of 1858 immigration was steady, some of the best claims being taken up by the new settlers. The first wedding occurred on Dec. 18, 1859, when Lorenzo Gates married Lucinda Gill. The first white child born in the county was Edward L. Younkins, whose birth occurred on Dec. 2, 1858.
The drought of 1860 almost entirely stopped immigration and the population of the county increased little until the close of the war. Then a second era of progress opened and many settlers entered land for permanent homes. When these pioneers came to Clay county, they found the land in the possession of the Kaw Indians, who were com- paratively peaceful, but the settlers were so alarmed by reports of depre- dations in adjoining counties, that they left their homes and fled to places of safety. During the war between the Pawnees and Delawares. in the Smoky Hill valley in 1857, many of the pioneers sought refuge in Riley county, but returned when they were assured that the Indians would not wage war in their locality. Late in the summer of 1864, Indian troubles in Nebraska again frightened the settlers in Clay county from their homes. In the Historical Map Book of Clay county the fol- lowing statement is made: "In Aug., 1864, the Indians made a raid on the settlers living on the Little Blue, in Washington and Marshall coun- ties. The settlers from the northern part of Clay and the southern part of Washington county, fled from their homes and gathered at Huntress' cabin, where about 200 of them encamped for a month. . . . During the month the mail went no farther than the encampment; the post- masters took their respective mails and distributed them there." In 1868 the Indians left their reservations, committed depredations in Cloud, Washington and Republic counties and the frightened settlers hastened into Clay county from all directions.
At the outbreak of the Civil war Clay was still an unorganized county. with but few inhabitants, hence but 47 men responded to the calls for volunteers and enlisted in the Union army. The settlers, few as they were, were much depleted by the troublous times of the Civil war. In 1860 there were eleven families in what is now the Wakefield district, but by 1863 only two men were left, J. M. Quimby and Edward Kerby. while the only men left on Mall creek were Lorenzo Gates and John Butler.
Dr. Burt, who came to Kansas in 1868, gives the following descrip- tion of the early settlements in Clay county: "In coming from Milford, the first house after leaving Mr. Hopkins' this side of the river, was Mr.
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Quimby's log cabin, then Mr. Todd's stone house, then an old fashioned log cabin where Mr. Payne's house now stands, then a log house at what is now Wakefield. The next house to the north was, I think, Harvey Ramsey's, and the next ones were in the Avery district, which seemed well on toward Clay Center. In Jan., 1870, there were no houses between Clay Center and Fancy creek, between Clay Center and Chapman's creek, nor between the head of Chapman's creek and Wake- field."
Prior to 1870, nearly all the settlements were made along the streams, as the early settlers did not believe farms would be opened on the upland during their lives. But in the fall of 1869, a party of English colonists located on the prairie between the Republican river and Chap- man's creek, where they entered land and soon developed prosperous farms, the settlement becoming known as the Wakefield colony. (q. v.) The first blacksmith shop in the county was opened there in 1859. The first mail route in Clay county was established in 1862. The route ran from Manhattan to Clifton along the river valleys. The first postoffice was on Mall creek, and the first postmaster was Lorenzo Gates. The second was at Clay Center, with Orville Huntress as postmaster, and the third at Clifton, near the northern boundary, was kept by James Fox. The first carrier was James Parkinson, who made his initial trip on July 1, 1862. At first the service was weekly but soon changed to tri-weekly, and Junction City became the southern terminus.
The settlers of Clay county took deep interest in educational mat- ters from the first, and in 1864 the first school house was built at Lincoln creek on government land. It was a rude structure of logs and was nearly completed when Samuel Allen went to the land office at Junction City and filed on the land, thus appropriating the school house as his personal property. This made it necessary to secure another school house and a log cabin was bought of F. Kuhnle. Mrs. Lack was engaged as teacher and opened the first school in 1865 when the first district was organized. The first physician in the county was Dr. J. W. Shepperd, who located there in 1862. Orville Huntress bought a stock of goods and opened a store in 1861, thus becoming the pioneer merchant of Clay county. About the same time he started the first hotel, where the military road crossed Huntress' creek. In 1865 the first sawmill was established on Timber creek by H. N. Dawson, and the same year the Dexter brothers started the first steam sawmill.
Dissatisfaction arose in 1866 in Clay county over the taxes imposed by the authorities of Geary county, and a meeting was held at the school house in Clay Center on July 28 to consider the question of organizing the county. At this meeting Orville Huntress was chosen chairman and George D. Seabury clerk. A committee, consisting of Lorenzo Gates, William Silvers, Joseph Ryan and John G. Haynes, was appointed to draft a petition and affidavit to be sent to the governor as required by law. On Aug. 10, 1866, the governor appointed Lorenzo Gates, William Silvers and Joseph P. Ryan county commissioners;
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George D. Seabury, clerk, and named Clay Center as the temporary seat of justice. At the first election on Nov. 6, 1866, the county seat was permanently located at Clay Center. The county officers elected at this time were Thomas Sherwood, Henry Avery and William Silvers, commissioners; S. N. Ackley, clerk; Orville Huntress, treasurer ; S. N. Ackley, register of deeds; J. B. Mclaughlin, surveyor; Russell Allen, sheriff ; James Hemphill, ' coroner, and Orville Huntress, assessor. Lorenzo Gates was the first man to represent Clay county in the lower house of the state legislature and L. F. Parsons was the first state senator.
A stone court-house was erected by the Dexter brothers in 1868, and used until 1875, when the county offices and records were moved into the Streeter building. For a number of years the building used as a county jail was rented.
The first board of county commissioners divided the county into three civil townships, viz .: Sherman, in the northern part; Clay Center, in the central, and Republican in the southern part, each extending the full width of the county east and west. As population increased the original townships have been divided to form, Athelstone, Blaine, Bloom, Chapman, Clay Center, Exeter, Five Creeks, Garfield, Gill, Goshen, Grant, Hayes, Highland, Mulberry, Oakland, Republican, Sherman and Union.
The first term of the district court in Clay county was opened by Judge James Humphrey, Oct. 26, 1859.
The first railroad to enter the county was the Junction City & Fort Kearney (now the Union Pacific), completed to Clay Center on March 12, 1873, and terminated there until 1878. It crosses the eastern bound- ary about 7 miles north of the southern boundary and follows the river northwest through Clay Center to Clifton. The Kansas Central, at first a narrow gauge road, was built in 1883. It crosses the county from east to west about the center, passing through Clay Center, and now belongs to the Union Pacific. Since then a line of the Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific system has been built from southeast to north- west through the county, following the general course of the Republican river. The Missouri Pacific crosses the northern boundary near Vining, and a branch of the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe crosses the south- west corner, giving the county over 95 miles of main track railroad within its boundaries.
The first issue of the Clay County Independent, edited by Houston & Downer, appeared on Aug. 20, 1871, being the first paper in the county. On Jan. 11, 1873, it was sold to J. W. Miller who changed the name to the Dispatch, the first number of which appeared March 12, 1873.
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