USA > Missouri > The history of the bench and bar of Missouri : With reminiscences of the prominent lawyers of the past, and a record of the law's leaders of the present > Part 76
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In 1860, when Dr. Lathrop returned to Missouri, his son Gardiner was a lad of ten years of age, so that he can be claimed as a Missourian, of which fact he has always been proud, and the State has had no more devoted son. His preparation for college was had at Racine, Wisconsin, and in 1863 he entered the freshman class of the Missouri University, and was graduated in 1867 with the first honors of his class. His college record was one of the very best in the history of that institution. He had no preference in his studies, but was equally proficient in every departinent. This unusual intellectual equilibrium has been noticeable in all of his subsequent life.
After his graduation from the University of Missouri, and in the fall of the same year, he entered the junior class at Yale and was graduated in 1869, receiving the second honor of his class, which brought to him special gratification for the reason that it was the same honor his father had received just fifty years before.
In January, 1870, Gardiner Lathrop came to Kansas City from Columbia, Missouri, and entered the law office of Karnes & Ess, both of whom had been pupils of Dr. Lathrop at the University, and with whom the son had been long acquainted. In this office hie pursued his studies most industriously until September, 1872, when he entered Harvard Law School, from which he was graduated in 1873, when he returned to Kansas City and entered upon the practice of the law. He formed a partnership with his brother-in-law, William M. Smith, a son of Hon. George Smith, formerly Lieutenant-Governor of Mis- souri. Both of the young men had been law students in the office of Karnes & Ess. After a few years Thomas R. Morrow was admitted to the firm. Owing to impaired health Mr. Smith retired, and the firm became Lathrop, Morrow & Fox. Subsequently S. W. Moore was admitted, and the firm now is Lathrop, Morrow, Fox & Moore. The first three are all Yale men, and the last from the University of Kansas. They are all men splendidly prepared for the profession and thoroughly devoted to the work. No firm in the West stands any higher.
The senior member, the subject of this sketch, is an exceptionally fine character. As a lawyer he stands in the very front rank. He has a clear and accurate knowledge of the law and is ready and practical in its application. He is strong both before court and jury, and never surrenders until every resource has been exhausted. As an advocate, his sincer- ity and earnestness make his manner most convincing, and render him ever an exceedingly
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formidable adversary. His briefs in the Appellate Court always show his keen analysis, great discrimination and wide learning, and his name, so frequent in the reports, attests the demand for his service in that field. The mistake is often made by the young lawyer, con- scions of superior equipment, that he aims to reach the topmost round of the ladder at one bound. Not so with Mr. Lathrop. He was content to begin at the bottom and took busi - ness as it came to him and demonstrating his ability and fidelity, more profitable employ- ment soon came, until now he represents many of the largest interests in the community. He is the solicitor for the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railway in Missouri and Iowa, the general counsel for the Midland National Bank, was one of the leading attorneys in the great contest between the National Water Works Company and Kansas City, represents inany of the leading mercantile-and manufacturing concerns of the city, and has a busi- ness generally only measured by his time to attend to it.
As much as can be said of Mr. Lathrop as a lawyer, there can be said even more as a man and a citizen. He fully recognizes the fact that no man has the right to live for himself alone, but that he owes an obligation to society which ought to be fully and willingly discharged. Acting upon this, no worthy appeal for his voice or means is ever made in vain. Every charity receives his hearty support. The widow and the orphan are not turned away. Every public enterprise receives his aid and encouragement. For eleven years he was a member of the Board of Education of Kansas City, and no other member of that remarkable body of men brought to it more intelligent, faithful service. In politics he is a most earnest worker, and while a Republican of the strictest sect, he is ever ready to subordinate party zeal to the cause of good government. He has never sought office and seems to have no ambition in that line, though he has been urged to allow his name to be used for some of the most important positions in the State. He has been for several years a member of the Board of Curators of the State University, and in the work of putting that institution on its present splendid financial and educa- tional footing his efforts have been unfaltering. He has been President of the Kansas City Bar Association, and his administration was one of the most successful in the his tory of that useful organization. He is a member of the Commercial Club of Kansas City, and is now Chairman of the Committee on State and National Legislation. He always has the time to turn aside the most pressing business to heed any call having for its purpose the betterment of the community. In his intercourse with his fellow-men he is honest and straightforward, but ever courteous and respectful of the opinions and feel- ings of others.
But the true character of Mr. Lathrop appears best of all in the quiet life of the liome. His great devotion for so many years to his mother was most marked and beautiful. In lier declining years it was his highest pleasure to bring to her every comfort love could suggest. He was married in 1879 to Miss Eva, the beautiful and accomplished daughter of Col. Nathaniel Grant, formerly of the army, and for many years before his death the most faithful and efficient Comptroller Kansas City has ever liad. Of this happy marriage lovely children have been born, and surrounded by his family in his delightful suburban home in Southmoreland, Mr. Lathrop spends every hour he can steal away from his urgent business and professional engagements.
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THE HISTORY OF THE BENCH AND BAR OF MISSOURI.
Of him it can truly be said that he is learned and skillful in the law, a Christian gentle- man, an earnest, upright citizen, a kind neighbor, a loving, loyal husband, a gentle, affec- tionate father.
This sketch is from one who knows whereof he writes and simply speaks the truth.
WILLIAM SHERIDAN LEEPER,
KINGSTON.
W ILLIAM SHERIDAN LEEPER was born at Monmouth, in the famed industrial county of Warren, Illinois, on February 7, 1865, his father being Isaac Leeper, who imarried Miss Jane Shellenbarger. Isaac Leeper was Superintendent of the Weir Plow Works, in Monmouth City. The parents removed to Missouri in 1873, selecting Avalon, in Livingston County, as their future home. The father was a inachinist, and after he had pursued that vocation some time at his new home, he was elected Sheriff, and served, through re-election, from 1878 to 1882, resigning then to pass his remaining days in retire- ment and the enjoyinent of ease. He is now out of business, and resides with his son, Wil- liam S., in Kingston, Caldwell County. The Leepers are a Scotch family, and the origina- tors of the American branchi settled in Kentucky at an early day, being among our country's sturdy pioneers. The Shellenbargers are of German extraction, coming to Penn- sylvania in the days of William Penn. These ancestors of Mr. Leeper served well and worthily in the War of the Revolution.
After a thorough tuition in the common schools of Chillicothe, Missouri, the latter developed his mental talents inore fully at the Brothers' Academy, in the same place, and perfected himself educationally at Avalon College, graduating with high honors in 1886. Then his legal studies were prosecuted in the law office of Judge J. M. Davis, of Chillicothe, whose biographical sketch appears elsewhere in this volume. He was admitted to the bar in 1887. In the same week of his admission he opened an office in association with the noted Charles Mansur, lawyer and Congressinan, the firin name being Mausur & Leeper, and the partnership continuing with unvarying success, until Mr. Mansur removed, through election to Congress, to the City of Washington, District of Columbia. Braymer, in Caldwell County, was then the scene of Mr. Leeper's labors, and there he practiced several years, removing in 1893 to Kingston, which is his present home and where for four years he has conducted his legal business.
Mr. Leeper is a Republican. As Prosecuting Attorney of Caldwell County in 1892 he was elected by the close majority of seventy, and two years later was re-elected by the handsome majority of 1,183, the largest ever received by any Republican office-seeker in the county. He was a member of the State Republican Executive Committee from 1890 to 1896, and fromn 1894 to 1896 was a member-at-large of the State Executive Com- mittee, having control of the office in St. Louis in 1894, when his party swept the State. In all these years of political engagement he has displayed a capacity for the ready grasping of details and an executive force which combined, have given him the reputation in his community of being a most excellent manager. He is a Knight of Pythias and a Captain in the local camp of Sons of Veterans in his county, his father having served as a soldier during the late Civil War.
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Mr. Leeper's marriage occurred at Chillicothe, Missouri. His wife was Gertrude, the daughter of Burlin Price, then a resident of Ohio, but now a prominent farmer of Living- ston County, his farm being considered one of the best in development and advantages in the county. Lawrence Dean Leeper, a boy eight years, is the only child of the inarriage.
FRANK MELVILLE LOWE, KANSAS CITY.
FRANK MELVILLE LOWE was born September 27, 1860, at Davenport, Iowa. Samn- uel Lowe, his father, was a native of Indiana, and was for fifty years one of the lion- ored ministers of the Christian Church. He was a cousin of Hon. William H. Englislı, Vice-Presidential candidate on the Democratic ticket of which General Hancock was the liead. Rev. Samuel Lowe was a man of a high Christian character, and from him the son inherits his oratorical gifts. His mother, Catherine (Pemberton) Lowe, was of a splendid Kentuckian family which has had to do with making the history of that State. She was a sister of the noted General Pemberton of the Confederate Army, and as wife and mother embodied the highest characteristics of womanly virtue. The profession of Rev. Lowe made his place of abode a movable one, and so when the son was one year old, the family removed from Davenport, Iowa, to Missouri. Five years were spent in this State, the residence finally being terminated by a call on the father to take charge of a church in Mc- Lean County, Illinois. There the next ten years of the boy's life were spent, and there also he received the greater part of his education. He has always been an enthusiastic reader, and hence the instruction of the schools was but supplementary to his own efforts. At the age of sixteen he is again found in Missouri, located at Savannah, the county seat of Andrew County.
He studied law in the office of Strong & Mosman, one of the most prominent law firmis of St. Joseph. He was in his seventeenth year and young for a law student. He was admitted to practice by a St. Joseph court in 1880, and located at Rockport, the county seat of Atchison County. There, he became a candidate for Prosecuting Attorney in 1882, and was elected, being at that time but twenty-two years old.
On the expiration of his term in 1884, Mr. Lowe decided to locate in Kansas City, whose phenomenal development at that date lield out allurements to the young man of energy and ability that his ambition would not allow lini to resist. Since that year lie has made Kansas City his home, and has attained a prominence and standing whereby lie now enjoys a satisfactory practice.
He is more especially adapted to the criminal branchi, and his friends believe he will some day make a name for himself as a criminal advocate. The trial of Charles E. Myers was one of the notable cases which served to show his ability and resourcefulness in belialf of liis client. Myers and one Bogard murdered Jolin Wear at Independence. The case was a black one for the murderer, and although he expected "short shirift" at the hands of tlic law, as shown by lis plea of guilty entered on arraignment, the case finally became one of the great and lengthy legal battles of Missouri's criminal history. On the entry of tlie plea of guilty, the Court appointed Mr. Lowe as the miserable man's defender. The latter withdrew the plea of "guilty" and cutered that of "not guilty." That none could have filled the office of defender better, is proved by the result. . The evidence of guilt was con-
Frank M. Lowe
Jagdt Gor Ushing Cn St.Louis
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THE HISTORY OF THE BENCH AND BAR OF MISSOURI.
clusive, and twice was the murderer convicted and sentenced to hang, but solely through his attorney's inexhaustible expedients, he was given the third trial and saved from the gallows by a verdict of insanity. If ever there was a case which had no supporting powers of its own and whose dead weight of damning evidence had to be borne solely by the strength and legal resourcefulness of the attorney, it was this.
While Mr. Lowe has attained a solid position at the bar, all his honors have not come through legal channels. In 1888 he was the candidate for Governor on the Prohibition ticket, and although the Constitution, on account of his youth, would have forbidden his acceptance of the office, had he been elected, he made one of the most remarkable and brilliant campaigns in the political history of the State. He spoke in 109 of the 114 counties of the State and polled the full vote of his party. He has always taken a high ground in politics, and believing that the best theories were only negatively virtuous if inoperative, he has always been a Democrat. In 1896 lie was a candidate of this party for Prosecuting Attorney of Jackson, and his popularity is shown by the fact that he was elected by the biggest majority ever given a candidate for any office in the history of the county .
September 15, 1882, Mr. Lowe was married to Miss Ona May Lowe, his cousin. They have two children, a girl of fourteen years and a boy of ten.
JOHN H. LUCAS, OSCEOLA.
A
LAWYER who has achieved reputation and wealth in his quarter of a century of practice
is John H. Lucas, of Osceola, who, settling in that town twenty-six years ago, has seen that part of the State develop fromn a primitive to a highly civilized condition and has been a prominent factor in shaping the plastic material from which this civilization was erected. He is another of the long line of Kentuckians who adorn this work, having been born at Danville, Boyle County, Kentucky, February 6, 1852, and therefore, is now in the prime of life. His boyhood was passed amidst the scenes of conflict and bloodshed of the Civil War, and the acts of that great tragedy which he witnessed at the most susceptible period of his life, did not fail to impress him profoundly. When peace liad once inore made civil pursuits possible, his father engaged in the mercantile business, and his son, when old enough, clerked in the store. But a commercial career was not to his taste and he early conceived the plan to adopt some vocation better adapted to his talents, and hence he chose the law and began on the "horn books " while still employed as clerk. He applied himself to good purpose and was far along in his studies before he reached his nineteenth birthday.
In 1871, being then nineteen years old, he left his native place, with the object of bettering his condition, and located at Osceola, Missouri. He at once resumed and com- pleted his professional studies and was admitted to the bar there in 1872. Southwest Missouri was then in process of settlement, and in this formative period, litigation crowded the courts and thus the young lawyer's services were in instant demand. He was not forced to pass through that trying hiatus known as the initial "wait," common to the early part of nearly every legal career. In 1874 he forined a partnership with William T. John- son, son of the Missouri pioneer, gifted lawyer and statesman, Judge Waldo P. Johnson.
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THE HISTORY OF THE BENCH AND BAR OF MISSOURI.
In 1883 Mr. Lucas' brother, William H. Lucas, was admitted to the firin, and so con- stituted, it still cxists and has gained strength and prestige with each succeeding year.
In 1879 the firm opened an office in Kansas City, and Mr. Johnson located there to assume charge of that end of the business. Of recent years their business has been very largely connected with corporations, and to this branch Mr. Lucas gives almost his entire time. Although for years the firm has controlled nearly all of the legal business of St. Clair County, its field of practice includes all of that vast, rich territory known as South- west Missouri, and thus it is that Mr. Lucas is a familiar and frequent visitant to courts of the different countics. He is also no less well known in the appellate courts, and his naine frequently appears in connection with a great variety of the involved and important causes to be found in the reports of these tribunals.
In manner Mr. Lucas is suave, kindly and considerate. He is an industrious worker and his broad experience as the representative of various corporations has given him a fund of experience which is worth all theories in the books. He excels in thorough analysis, not only of the facts but of the law as applied to the facts. He has never believed that the surmises of intuition could supply the labor necessary to prepare a case properly. His ex- amination of a witness is as delicate as it is searching, and he gets that by tact and gentle- ness which many lawyers would fail to compel by their methods of unfeeling "bulldozerie." In presenting the vital points of a case to either court or jury he has no superior. He has often spoken in behalf of the Democratic party, of which lie is an active and enthusiastic member, from the hustings, in country school houses, in court houses, and in the various conventions of his party. But he is too busy and too true a lawyer to take any but a per- sonally disinterested concern in politics, and hence he has accepted that only which has carried 110 sacrifices of his legal position, and which was altogether honorary. Such hon- ors have been his in almost every campaign, one of the most important being accorded him in 1888, when he was inade the Presidential Elector for the Sixth District. He has a very large personal acquaintance throughout the State, and his winning manner and kindly dis- position have not failed to popularize him wherever he is known.
Mr. Lucas was married in 1870, the year prior to liis emigration from Kentucky. He chose as a life partner, Miss Nannie Cardwell, of Harrodsburg, Kentucky. The couple have four living children-Lula, now the wife of George B. Linney; William C., the only son, who is now a junior at the Missouri University; Sophia, who inarried J. W. Terwilliger; and Sue-Bell, who is a school girl and is yet in her father's house. Mr. and Mrs. Lucas are active members of the Methodist Episcopal Church and are known as the mnost gener- ous promoters of its charities and auxiliary organizations.
SAMUEL C. MAJOR,
FAYETTE.
THE father of Samucl C. Major was for a long period onc of the foremnost figures at T the bar in Central Missouri, and perhaps it is to the guidance of the father that the son can attribute a part of his legal accomplishments.
Mr. Major was born in Fayette, Howard County, Missouri, July 2, 1869, and received a generous education, first in the public schools of his neighborhood, then in Central College, at Fayettc. Later he studied at the St. James Military Academy, in Macon,
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Missouri, of which institute he is a graduate. Then, deciding to follow in the footsteps of his father, he chose the law as his profession, and studied in the father's office, being adınitted to the bar at Fayette in 1890 by Judge Hockaday.
Our subject's father, Samuel C. Major, son of Samuel C. Major, took for his wife Ione Talbot, the daughter of Dr. John A. Talbot, a prominent physician of Howard County, her brother being Bishop Talbot, an eminent Episcopal prelate of Idaho. The Majors and the Talbots were originally English, but their descendants fought on the American side during the Revolutionary War, the Majors having arrived in Virginia in 1660. After the War of the Revolution they removed to Frankfort, Kentucky. From Kentucky the grandfather of the present Mr. Major emigrated to Missouri, settling in Howard County in 1829, and marrying Miss Elizabeth Daly. His son, the father of our subject, was a well known publicist and lawyer of ability, of whoin a fuller account may be found by reference to page 401. On his father's death, in 1894, the son succeeded to his law practice, and lias displayed not only an inherited force of character, but a men- tality and capability closely akin to those of his parent. During the seven years of his practice he has on no occasion had a client whose gratitude and appreciation he did not fully earn in the conduct of the case in court.
In March, 1891, he was appointed to fill out the unexpired term of Oswald Barton, Prosecuting Attorney of Howard, and proved so efficient that he was elected to the same office for the two following terins. With his partner, Stonewall Pritchett, he has shown himself to be a member of one of the brightest and most promising law firins of Howard County. Mr. Major has never practiced outside of Fayette, and enjoys the distinction of being the third of his name to hold office in the county.
He is a Democrat, and during the past eight years has made a naine for himself of being as hard a worker politically as he is in the practice of law, holding that the princi- ples of his party are above individual considerations. For these reasons it could safely be assumed that ere long he will, like his father, be honored with an offer of office by his fel- low-citizens which may reach the eminence of a Congressional nomination. In the secret orders he stands well, having as a Pythian held the position of Chancellor Commander, and as a inember of the Odd Fellows and of the Royal Tribe of Joseph, lie has combined the doing of good with the inaking of friends.
In marriage he has been unusually happy in choice, his wife being Miss Elizabeth Major Simpson, a daughter of Gen. Samuel P. Simpson, of St. Louis. The wedding occurred December 17, 1895.
WILLIAM MCAFEE, KINGSTON.
CELF-EDUCATED men are the most successful in life, and this remark applies with remarkable accuracy to the case of William McAfee. With the exception of one year's tuition at what was known as Johnson College, in Macon City, Missouri, under the supervision of E. W. Hall, and which is now the St. James Military Academy, his educa- tion was limited to attendance at the common schools of his neighborhood. Then followed his study of law at the office of Dunn & Johnson, the partners being Lemuel Dunn, now deceased, and the Hon. Crosby Johnson, at present of Hamilton, Missouri. After a course
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THE HISTORY OF THE BENCH AND BAR OF MISSOURI.
of three years' legal training of the most thorough kind, Mr. McAfee was admitted to the bar at Kingston, Missouri, on June 25, 1876. He has been a resident and practitioner at Kingston ever since.
The history of the ancestors of Mr. McAfee is of peculiar interest to the descendants of the old pioneers. Our subject was born at Blue Lick, Clark County, Indiana, on Sep- tember 19, 1850, and inoved with his parents from there to Kewanna, Fulton County, in the same State, wlien seven years old. His father, Hamilton McAfee, is still living. His paternal grandfather, whose name he bears, was William McAfee. He was an intimate friend of Daniel Boone, and was one of the four McAfee brothers who assisted the famous old Kentuckian in building the fort and town of Boonsboro, Kentucky. The brothers also rendered good service in aiding that pioneer in his defense of the place against the hostile incursions of the Indians. The original McAfees were natives of the North of Ireland. Hamilton McAfee, the father of the subject of this memoir, was a valiant soldier of the late Civil War, having been First Lieutenant of Company E, Eighty-seventh Indiana Volunteers. The maiden name of the inother of Mr. McAfee was Hannah Hosea, her father, Williamn Hosea, coming from Vermont, and settling in Washington County, Indiana, early in the century.
His youth was a laborious one, embracing work on the farm all day and brief snatches of study at all such odd moments as farm work will permit. For this reason his education and intelligence have in them the natural healthfulness resultant from the combination of outdoor toil with indoor study. It is safe to assume that his sturdiness, mentally and inorally, liad its source in the farm work of his boyhood. Leaving home at the age of eighteen, with but slight advantage in the matter of education, barely being able to read and write, he built himself up to his present fine legal position through his own independ- ent resourcefulness. Like many another disciple of Blackstone, he taught school several terms while striving to equip himself professionally.
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