USA > Missouri > Bates County > History of Bates County, Missouri > Part 57
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In the public schools of Clark county, Ohio, E. A. Bennett received an excellent common school education. When the Civil War broke out in 1861, E. A. Bennett was but a child twelve years of age. Nevertheless he felt the call of his country much more keenly than many of his elders and from 1862 until 1865 served in the Clark county, Ohio militia. He was then a growing boy, from thirteen to sixteen years of age. Mr. Bennett came to Missouri in 1869 and located in Holt county. His first mercantile experience was at Whig Valley in that county, in a crossroad store near the site of Mariland, where he was employed until 1878 when he accepted a position as traveling salesman for the Deere-Mansur & Company of Kansas City, Missouri, later the John Deere Plow Company.
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Mr. Bennett was on the road for this company for five years, when, in 1882, he came to Butler.
Mr. Bennett mastered the mechanic's trade when he was a youth. He was for many years with John A. Pitts, of Dayton, whose father invented the Pitts separator. B. G. Bennett was foreman of the wood- working department of the factory owned by John A. Pitts and there E. A. Bennett learned to make every piece of a threshing machine except the iron parts. His part of the work was to assemble the different por- tions of the machines. Mr. Bennett also learned thoroughly the car- penter's trade, which knowledge later proved to be of inestimable benefit in the implement business that he followed in after years. He was one of the three organizers of the Bennett-Wheeler Mercantile Company of Butler in 1890, from which organization he resigned probably in 1900. Since that time, Mr. Bennett has been engaged in the loan business at Butler, with the exception of six years spent in Colorado.
In 1878, E. A. Bennett and Hannah J. Roberts, of Holt county, were united in marriage. To this union were born four children: Mrs. Doctor Zey, Butler, Missouri ; Mrs. Charles McFarland, Butler, Missouri ; Charles R., who is employed as civil engineer, by the United States Government, in the city of Manila, Philippine Islands ; and Gordon, a successful farmer and stockman, Holt county, Missouri. In November, 1910, E. A. Bennett and Minnie Chandler were united in marriage. Hannah J. (Roberts) Ben- nett had died in May, 1909.
The Bennett-Wheeler Mercantile Company of Butler, of which O. A. Heinlein is now manager, was organized in 1890 by E. A. Bennett, C. S. Wheeler, and J. B. Armstrong with a capital stock of thirty-five thousand dollars. This firm succeeded Bennett-Wheeler & Company, organized in 1882 with a capital stock of five thousand dollars, successors of B. G. Wheeler, who occupied a small frame building, 25 x 50 feet in dimensions, located on the present site of the Missouri State Bank build- ing. There B. G. Wheeler had started in business in partnership with Mr. Harwi, under the firm name of Wheeler & Harwi. The latter retired from the firm later and went to Atchison, Kansas, where he established a wholesale and retail hardware and implement business and became wealthy. Mr. Harwi died about 1912. B. G. Wheeler left Butler after selling his interest in the store in 1882 and went to Boston, Massachusetts and in that city he died, probably in 1908. C. S. Wheeler (38)
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was engaged in the real estate business at Westplains, Missouri at the time his death occurred. He died at a hospital in Kansas City, Missouri in 1909. J. B. Armstrong is still with the Bennett-Wheeler Mercantile Company. Mr. Bennett retired from the company after eighteen years service.
E. A. Bennett was one of the original stockholders of the Farmers Bank and for many years was a member of the directorate. He later became vice-president of this bank and also served as president of the Farmers Bank until January 1, 1911. He has been a member of the city council two terms, during which time the city ownership of the waterworks was being agitated. Honored and respected by all who know him, there is no man in Butler or Bates county, who occupies a more enviable position in commercial and financial circles than does Mr. Bennett, not alone on account of the marked success he has achieved, but also because of the honest, straightforward policy he has ever pursued.
J. F. Kern, the well-known promoter of Drainage District Number 1 in Bates county, Missouri, is one of the most progressive and ener- getic citizens of Bates county. Mr. Kern is a native of Indiana. He was born in 1859 in Boone county, Indiana, a son of William Perry and Caroline (Potts) Kern, both of whom were natives of Kentucky. Mr. and Mrs. Kern were the parents of four children, who are now living: .Charles P., San Francisco, California; Mrs. Josie K. Pease, St. Louis, Missouri; Mrs. Emma Hutchison, Boise City, Idaho; and J. F., the sub- ject of this review. The father died many years ago in Indiana. Mrs. Kern was making her home with her daughter at Kansas City, Missouri, when she died. Both parents were interred in the cemetery near the Kern homestead in Boone county, Indiana.
In the public schools of Indiana, J. F. Kern obtained a good com- mon school education. His boyhood days and early manhood were spent in that state. He came to Missouri in 1898 and located at Kansas City. Four years later, in 1902, Mr. Kern settled at Butler. Prior to his coming, he had purchased six hundred fifty-eight acres of land now included in Drainage District, Number 1 and since he has added to his holdings twelve hundred acres. Mr. Kern is the present owner of eighteen hundred fifty-eight acres of land in the above named district, some of the very best farm land in Bates county, on which vast tract he has five sets of improvements. Eight hundred acres of his farm are, at the time of this writing in 1918, under a high state of cultivation. Mr.
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Kern is constructing a large levy along the ditch which passes through his land as an additional protection.
In 1895, J. F. Kern and Fannie Beatty, daughter of Joseph and Ruth Beatty, of West Virginia, were united in marriage. Mrs. Kern's parents are both now deceased. To Mr. and Mrs. Kern have been born two children: Ruth, who is a student in the Butler High School; and Frances, who is in the grade school. Although the Kerns are com- paratively newcomers in Bates county, they have made countless friends in the county and in Butler, where they are numbered among the best families.
As has been above mentioned, J. F. Kern was the chief promoter of Drainage District, Number 1 in this county. The preliminary work on the ditch, twenty-three and a half miles in length, was begun in 1906. The labor of digging was begun in the autumn of 1907. This ditch drains forty-one thousand three hundred acres of land. There are eleven miles of lateral ditches cut and the entire work, as originally planned, was com- pleted in 1909. The assessment on the land was ten dollars and ninety- three cents an acre for the original labor, but in 1911 it was decided to cut the ditch ten feet deeper and an additional assessment of four dollars and ninety-eight cents was made. The statutes of Missouri provided for the organization of drainage districts where a majority of the acreage in the district petitioned the court for such organiza- tion. The statutes also provided for bonding the assessments. Drain- age District, Number 1 issued bonds at six per cent. for twenty years, which bonds were sold for a premium of fifteen thousand dollars. Mr. Kern states that the crops grown in this particular valley, where none ever grew before the ditch was dug, last year, of 1917, would pay the indebtedness created at the last assessment, namely one hundred sev- enty-one thousand dollars. The land is being gradually put under the plow and ultimately all will be under cultivation, one of the richest agricultural sections in Missouri. Naturally, at the beginning of the stupendous undertaking, as does every man who introduces an inno- vation, J. F. Kern met with much opposition but time and experience have proven conclusively the wisdom of the splendid improvement. Mr. Kern is a clear, logical thinker and the type of man who does big things. He plans and then studies practical means of carrying out his plans, keeping persistently at one attempt until he has accomplished his pur- pose and success comes. At the present time, Mr. Kern is "boosting" the Torrens system of land transfer. He was instrumental in getting
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a bill introduced at the last session of the Missouri State Legislature for the adoption of the system in Missouri. The bill passed the House but failed in the Senate. Mr. Kern has not given up the fight and some day the bill will undoubtedly become a law of the state, for it has much to recommend its adoption. The Torrens system of land transfer is practical and would save thousands of dollars to land owners of Missouri.
Interested in everything that tends to benefit the public J. F. Kern is no idle spectator of current local events, but in a large degree he has directed and controlled them. Firm in his individuality, Mr. Kern never lacks the courage of his convictions. He is a gentleman of lively sym- pathy, abiding charity, and sterling integrity, one of the strong, note- worthy citizens of Bates county, and in the years to come he is destined to be an important factor in the history of public affairs in this section of Missouri.
John Lawson, a prosperous farmer and stockman of Summit town- ship, is one of the favorably known citizens of Bates county. Mr. Lawson is a native of Sweden. He returned to his native land in 1903 to visit his brother and four sisters still residents of that country and to again see the old home at Orklejunga, near Helsinborg, which is located on The Sound between Denmark and Sweden in the southern part of Sweden near the Cattegat in Malmohus lan or province. There he was reared and, in the schools of Sweden, educated. After coming to America, Mr. Lawson mastered the English language, learn- ing to both speak and read it. He was born in Sweden in 1846 and emigrated from his home land in 1869.
On coming to the United States, Mr. Lawson located at Kansas City, Missouri, where he was employed in bridge work, laboring on the first bridge that ever spanned the Missouri river. Later, he worked on the first street railway line in Kansas City, Missouri, and he recalls that when the old depot was built, there were but three or four houses in the bottoms. He left Kansas City to accept a position on the St. Louis & St. Joe railroad, after which he was employed on a farm in Clinton county, Missouri, for three years, on a farm in Nebraska for eight years, and again on a farm in Clinton county for four years. Thirty-two years ago, Mr. Lawson came to Bates county, Missouri. He purchased his present country place in 1890 from Mr. Davis, of Indi- ana, and since he acquired the ownership of the farm he has improved it, "dding all the well-constructed buildings, putting up all the fencing, and planting all the trees and shrubbery. The residence is a pleasant,
JOHN LAWSON AND FAMILY.
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comfortable house of seven rooms and there are two large barns on the farm for the use of stock and hay. The Lawson place is one of the excellent stock farms of Summit township, conveniently located and six and a half miles east of Butler. When Mr. Lawson was in Nebraska eight years, having gone there in 1874, a plague of grasshoppers descended upon them like hail stones and for three years their crops were entirely destroyed by the pestiferous pests, but-in spite of the ravages of the insects-he proved his claim and sold the farm one year after leaving the state. The last year in Nebraska, 1882, eight feet of snow embanked the house and Mr. Lawson knows that he scooped more snow that winter than all the people in Bates county combined ever saw. Two of the children were born in a "dug-out" on their claim in Nebraska.
The marriage of John Lawson and Sarah Miller was solemnized in 1892. Sarah (Miller) Lawson was born in 1850, in Clinton county, Missouri, a daughter of William and Margaret Miller, honored pio- neers of Clinton county, Missouri. Mr. and Mrs. Miller entered land in Clinton county for twelve and a half cents an acre. Both parents are now deceased. To John and Sarah Lawson have been born five children : George, Adrian, Missouri; Vina, the wife of Charlie Williams, of Kiowa, Oklahoma; Myrtle, who resides in Nevada; Oliver, who resides in Montana; and John, Jr., who is engaged in the real estate business at Kansas City, Missouri. Mr. and Mrs. Lawson are justly proud of their only grandson, John David, the son of John, Jr., of Kansas City, Mis- souri.
John Lawson is a striking example of what an immigrant, beginning life in America with no capital and no knowledge of the spoken tongue, can by constant industry, pluck, and perseverance accomplish. Begin- ning at the very bottom round of the ladder, without one dollar, he has steadily ascended until he has gained the top, directed and con- trolled throughout his career by honorable and upright principles. Mr. Lawson long ago won the respect and confidence of all with whom he came in contact and his life, measured by the usual standards of success, presents much that is worthy of emulation.
H. G. Cook, the widely and favorably known manager of the Ameri- can Clothing House, is a native of Iowa. Mr. Cook is a son of Capt. N. W. and Mary E. (Green) Cook, the former, a native of New York and the latter, of Indiana. Capt. N. W. Cook was engaged in the mer- cantile business practically all his life. He served in the Union army dur-
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ing the rebellion as captain of Company D, Third Iowa Volunteer Cavalry and came to Missouri in 1882 and was in the real estate busi- ness at Rich Hill for several years. N. W. and Mary E. Cook were the parents of nine children, who are now living: William H., Los Angeles, California; E. G., Tacoma, Washington; N. G., Springfield, South Dakota; G. B. M., Chicago, Illinois ; H. L., Ottumwa, Iowa; Mrs. J. D. Wiseman, Centerville, Iowa; Mrs. W. R. Heylmun, Iola, Kansas ; Mrs. C. C. Cain, Tacoma, Washington; and H. G., the subject of this review. The father died in 1889 at Rich Hill, Missouri and the mother joined him in death in 1907. Mrs. Cook died at Centerville, Iowa.
H. G. Cook attended the public schools of Red Oak, Iowa, and in that state was reared to manhood. He came to Bates county, Mis- souri in 1883. The American Clothing House was incorporated by Mr. Cook and others in 1901. Since locating at Butler, H. G. Cook has been a member of the city council four years and mayor of Butler two years. During his administration as mayor, the water works system was purchased by the city, a seventy-five-thousand-dollar bond issue voted, the old water works system taken over for thirty-two thousand five hundred dollars, a pumping station built on the railroad and a transmission line to the old plant at the river installed which station pumps water by electrical power for city purposes. By this means the water and light plants were consolidated at a great saving of labor and expense. The opposition, naturally, was exceedingly strong at the beginning of the undertaking as there always is at the proposal of any improvement, but Mr. Cook, with a progressive council backing him, pushed through these innovations to a successful termination and the experience of the years which have followed have proven their wisdom and excellence. He was one of the organizers of the Butler Commercial Club and served as its first president two years. During his adminis- tration the bond issue for the new high school was carried, the Com- mercial Club having charge of the campaign.
In 1891, H. G. Cook and Sallie Easley, of Rich Hill, Missouri, were united in marriage. Mrs. Cook is a native of Pleasant Hill, Cass county, Missouri. Her father was a prominent merchant in the pioneer days. To H. G. and Sallie Cook have been born three children : Pauline, St. Louis, Missouri; Helen, who is a student at the Missouri State University, Columbia, Missouri; and Josephine, who is attending St. Terresa Acad- emy, Kansas City, Missouri.
The American Clothing House was established by Coy Carrithers
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& Company in 1885 and was incorporated by H. G. Cook and others in 1901. The store was originally located in the middle of the north block and the stock of merchandise was moved to the present store building in 1892. The establishment has fifty feet frontage and occu- pies two floors of the building. Originally the stock of goods consisted of clothing and men's shoes exclusively. In 1912, ladies' shoes, dry goods, and ready-to-wear garments were added. The American Cloth- ing House now carries a mammoth stock of merchandise and enjoys a liberal patronage in Butler and Bates county. Much of the company's marked success has undoubtedly been due to the efficient management of the store.
Mr. Cook is affiliated with the Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, the Modern Woodmen of America, and the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks. Mr. Cook is essentially a business man, a firm believer in the efficacy of honest and honorable labor. He possesses excellent judgment and taste and is seldom mistaken in his judgment of men and affairs. He conducts all business operations fairly and justly and has financially met with success commensurate with the ability and energy displayed.
Charles L. Fisk, the head of the amusement business in Butler, owner and manager of the Butler Opera House, an active member of the Butler Commercial Club, is one of Bates county's most progressive citizens, one who is known far beyond the confines of this part of the state. Mr. Fisk was born in Carrollton, Missouri in 1875, a son of Tilford Lewis and Caroline (Albert) Fisk, natives of Kentucky. His mother died when he was a babe three weeks of age and the boy was chiefly reared by his grandmother, Mrs. Martha ( Medcalf) Fisk. At the age of fourteen years, Charles L. Fisk came to Bates county to make his home with his father, who resided on a farm four miles east of Butler and with whom he remained two years. The young man was then apprenticed to a merchant at Carrollton and later was employed on the section of the Santa Fe railway. Afterward, Mr. Fisk had the opportunity he had always longed for to acquire a knowl- edge of music and started on a career which has taken him to every capital and leading city in the United States.
For two and a half years, Charles L. Fisk was in the employ of the Dain Mower Manufacturing Company at Ottumwa, Iowa. With this company, he received his start in music, with the Dain Mower Manufacturing Company's band, and Mr. Fisk has kept up his work
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in music for the past fifteen years. He is the present capable leader of the Butler band, one of the best in Missouri, a band that has never missed a contest, the winner of six first prizes in competition with such bands as the Colorado Midland, the Marshall, the Topeka, Kan- sas, and the Gownley's bands, the last named of Ottawa, Kansas.
In 1890, Mr. Fisk located at Butler. For the past five years, he has had charge of the Butler Opera House and for the last twelve months has been the owner and manager. He has followed the amuse- ment and music business practically all his life and has been in all the capital cities and principal business centers of the country in pursuit of his vocation. Mr. Fisk is at the head of the Lyceum Course of Butler, which puts on an eleven-hundred-and-twenty-five-dollar course of entertainments annually, bringing to the city the best talent to be found in the United States. On November 5, 1917, Mr. Fisk gave a band contest, in which all the bands, except the Butler band, of Bates county were eligible to compete and had as guest at the Opera House that night Ex-President William H. Taft.
In the Spanish American War, Charles L. Fisk was in charge of the Sixth Infantry band of Gen. Fitzhugh Lee's command. Mr. Fisk was commissioned by Gov. Lon V. Stevens as captain and aid-de-camp to serve on the staff of Brigadier-General H. C. Clark and he holds an honorable discharge from the United States Government.
November 17, 1896, Charles L. Fisk and Mabel Jenkins, a daugh- ter of J. R. Jenkins, president of the Peoples Bank of Butler, were united in marriage. Mrs. Fisk died November 26, 1899. Mr. Fisk was united in marriage with Leta Van Doren, of Pontiac, Illinois, on December 6, 1906 and they reside in Butler at the Opera House block. Mr. and Mrs. Fisk are widely known and universally respected.
Walter Henry, the pioneer garage man of Butler, Missouri, the well-known agent for the Dodge Brothers' automobiles, is a member of a highly respected and prominent pioneer family of Butler. Mr. Henry is a native of Bates county. He was born in 1880 on his father's farm which is located due east of the townsite of Butler, a son of E. P. and Gertrude (Garrison) Henry. E. P. Henry, better known as Captain Henry, was a native of Ohio. He was born at Marietta in Washington county. He was a veteran of the Civil War, having been in service with Company B, Thirty-sixth Ohio .Infantry, commissioned as lieu- tenant. Captain Henry came to Bates county, Missouri in 1869, at about the same time the Garrisons settled here. He was united in
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marriage with Gertrude Garrison and to them were born the follow- ing children : Alice, the wife of Dr. J. T. Hull, Butler, Missouri; Bertha, the widow of Judge J. S. Francesco, a late ex-judge of the probate court of Butler, Missouri; Charles E., who is engaged in farming on the home place northeast of Butler, adjoining the city; Walter, the subject of this review; and one child, a daughter, died in infancy. Captain Henry was for several years engaged in the real estate business at Butler, Mis- souri, associated in partnership with Mr. Hartwell under the firm name of Henry & Hartwell. His name has been inseparably connected with the early history of the development of Butler. Captain Henry was one of the promoters of Butler Academy, one of the organizers of the Butler Presbyterian church, and one of the first interested in the old Bates County Bank at Butler. He took a keen interest in horticulture and an active part in the horticultural society, the members of which used to meet at the farms of the members, and he did much to promote orchard growing in Bates county. To encourage clover raising, Captain Henry purchased a clover huller and hired a man to operate it in order that clover growers might without incurring this expense thresh and save their seed. Captain Henry was an excellent citizen, public spirited, enterprising, and industrious. He did all in his power to help his fellow- men and how well he succeeded in his most laudable desire was attested by the universal esteem and respect in which he was held by his neigh- bors and friends. E. P. Henry died and was taken to his last resting place in the cemetery at Butler in 1889.
Walter Henry attended the public schools of Butler and Butler Academy. He resided on the home place with his mother and his brother, Charles, until 1907. Mr. Henry is the pioneer garage man of Butler. He opened his present place of business on North Main street in Febru- ary, 1911 and for the past three years has had the agency for the Dodge Brothers' automobiles. Mr. Henry has been very successful as a sales- man and is selling cars as fast as he can obtain shipments. In addition to holding the agency for the Dodge cars, general repair work of a high order is done at the Henry garage.
In April, 1907, Walter Henry and Hope Stubblefield were united in marriage. Mrs. Henry is a native of Bates county, a daughter of Mr. and Mrs. R. N. Stubblefield, of Butler, Missouri. Mr. Stubblefield is a native of Missouri and for many years was actively and successfully engaged in farming in this county. To Walter and Hope Henry have been born three children: Robert E., Walter F., and an infant son. Mr.
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and Mrs. Henry number their friends in Butler and Bates county by the score and they are very popular with the young people of their com- munity, moving in the best social circles of the city.
J. K. Norfleet, a prominent merchant of Butler, Missouri, the senior member of the firm, Norfleet & Ream, is one of Bates county's best business men. Mr. Norfleet was born in Kentucky in 1846, a son of Larkin and Frances (Gann) Norfleet, both of whom were natives of Kentucky. Mr. and Mrs. Norfleet were the parents of ten children: Mrs. L. M. Phillips, Higginsville, Missouri; Mrs. J. J. Bell, Little River, Texas: Mrs. Rosaline Blevins, who resides in Arkansas; Rev. L. P., Sedalia, Missouri; A. L., a prosperous banker of Oklahoma City, Okla- homa; J. K., the subject of this review; Mrs. E. E. Wheatley, deceased ; Mrs. Fannie Dickson, deceased; T. I., deceased; and one child died in infancy. The mother died about 1890 and the father followed her in death in 1909. Larkin Norfleet died at Mayview in Lafayette county. Both parents are buried in Marvin Chapel cemetery in Lafayette county.
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