History of Atchison County, Kansas. Sheffield Ingalls

and for over twenty years was a member of the State board of agriculture, serving three years as its president. His long connection with the State Agriculture College gave him an extended acquaintance over the State, and he was appointed regent for that institution by Governor Harvey in 1871, and re-appointed by Governor Martin in 1888, serving until April, 1894. During several years of that time he was treasurer of the board, and gained an extensive knowledge of the college and its history. He served in the State senate during 1863 and 1864 and in the fall of 1885 was elected for another term.

      Joshua Wheeler was born in Buckingham, England, February 12, 1827, and came to America in 1844, locating in New Jersey, where he resided four years before removing to Illinois. In 1857 a colony of seven or eight families of Fulton county, Illinois, farmers, Seventh-Day Baptists, came to Kansas, and located in the southwest portion of Atchison county, covering the entire distance overland. S. P. Griffin and Dennis Sounders preceded the colony in the spring of the same year to look up a location. They went as far to the southwest as Emporia, but found no land equal to that of Atchison county. After locating the land for the colony they went back to Illinois, but did not accompany the colony to Kansas, but came a year or two later. Griffin farmed for nearly twenty years, but afterwards became a Nortonville merchant. He was the father of Charles T. Griffin, at one time an attorney in Atchison.

      When the colony of Seventh-Day people arrived at the end of their destination they found the land in possession of colonists, but they bought them out, preëmpted claims and laid out the now famous Seventh-Day Lane. The land was then an open prairie, occupied only by an occasional hut. It is at this time the admiration of every visitor abounding in well cultivated fields, pastures, groves, orchards, comfortable homes, to which paint is no stranger, large barns, uniformly trimmed hedges, and peopled by as thrifty a class as can be found in the western country. Later on Seventh-Day people came from Iowa, Wisconsin and New York, and joined the Illinois colony on Seventh-Day Lane, which is two miles in length. The Seventh-Day Baptists observe their Sabbath from sundown Friday evening to sundown Saturday evening. Their church has a seating capacity of 400, which is always comfortably filled, and was built in 1884, prior to which time the Seventh-Day Baptists worshiped in their school house.

      A. A. Randolph was the first pastor of the church on Seventh-Day Lane. He came here from Pennsylvania in 1863, and died in 1868. S. R. Wheeler, a brother of Joshua Wheeler, was pastor of the church for twelve years.

      When the Seventh-Day Baptists built their homes on the Lane smooth wire cost eleven and one-half cents per pound in Atchison, and ordinary flooring, $100.00 per thousand feet. Money was loaned at four per cent. per month. They did all of their trading in Atchison until Nortonville was built.

      Joshua Wheeler was not only a successful farmer, but a good business man. He kept a regular set of books, and could always tell exactly what it cost him to produce a bushel of wheat in any of the different years of his farm experience. He could tell also what a bushel of corn, fed to cattle, would produce. In 1877 he sold his wheat for $1.75 per bushel.

      He owned a farm of over 300 acres, just at the west end of the Lane, where he died on the fourteenth day of May, 1896.

WILLIAM HETHERINGTON.

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      William Hetherington, founder of the Exchange National Bank, came to Atchison in 1859, from Pottsville, Penn., where he operated a flouring mill. His three oldest children, Mrs. B. P. Waggener, W. W. Hetherington and C. S. Hetherington, were born in Pottsville. Mrs. W. A. Otis, the youngest daughter, was born in Atchison. William Hetherington himself was born in Milton, Penn., May 10, 1821. He was also married there. When he first came west he stopped in St. Louis, then went to Kansas City, and later to Leavenworth, where he bought a bankrupt stock of goods and hauled them to Atchison in wagons. This was in 1859. The same year he established the Exchange Bank of William Hetherington, absorbing the Kansas Valley Bank, owned by Robert L. Pease, which had been established several years before.

      Mr. Hetherington’s influence in Atchison was very marked. He was a cultured gentleman of the old school, and was so generally respected, although always a Democrat, he stood very high in the sixties when the sectional bitterness was at its height, and did much to maintain peace between the contending factions. He was a very able public speaker. He was never a bitter partisan, and enjoyed the respect of the people to an unusual degree. He was one of the early mayors of Atchison, and had a successful career. He died on the twenty-first day of January, 1890.

WILLIAM C. SMITH.

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      William C. Smith, one of the early mayors of Atchison, came to Kansas in 1858 from Illinois, settling near Valley Falls. Two years later he traded his farm to Sam Dickson for a stock of goods in Atchison and removed to this city. The firm of William C. Smith & Son continued sixteen years. The son was Henry T. Smith, who still resides in Atchison (1915). Another son is William R. Smith, who is at present the attorney for the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railway Company, at Topeka, for a number of years was a justice of the supreme court of Kansas. His oldest daughter married P. L. Hubbard, who afterwards became district judge of Atchison county, and another daughter married H. C. Solomon, for many years a leading attorney of Atchison. Mr. Smith died in 1884. He was mayor two terms; member of the legislature, council and the board of education. Although Mr. Smith came to Kansas from Illinois, he was born at Columbus, Ohio, in 1817.

JOHN M. PRICE.

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      John M. Price arrived in Atchison with his wife on the first of September, 1858, the day the Massasoit House was formally opened for the public. They came here from Platte City, Mo., to visit some old friends from Kentucky, who had moved to Kansas, and after they arrived concluded to remain. The Prices originally came from Irvine, Ky. Mr. Price studied law in Irvine; was admitted and elected county attorney before coming to Atchison. He was a Union man, in spite of the fact that he came from Kentucky, and was very active in a business and professional way during the early days of his residence in this county, and for many years thereafter. He constructed more large and substantial buildings in Atchison than any other individual who ever lived here. He built the house for a residence, now occupied by Mt. St. Scholastica Academy, an opera house and many blocks of business buildings and residences. He was a member of the legislature several times; was prominently mentioned as a candidate for United States senator. Mr. Price died on the twentieth day of October, 1898.

SAMUEL C. KING.

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      Samuel C. King came to Atchison March 27, 1857. His brothers, Ed. and John, together with a sister and his widowed mother, arrived here the year before, coming here with Dr. W. L. Challiss, in the steam ferry, “Ida,” from Brownsville, Penn., where that boat was built. The King family came originally from England, within thirty-five miles of Liverpool, where the children were born, and where the father died. Ed. King was the first pilot of the ferry boat, “Ida,” when it began making trips to Atchison. The three sons and the mother took up claims in Mt. Pleasant township. While living there three old neighbors came out and Samuel C. King went out with them to look for claims. They were told that there was plenty of vacant land near Monrovia, but Mr. King advised them that it was too far out in the wilderness, and they went elsewhere. (Monrovia is fourteen miles from Atchison). While the other members of the family were getting their start Samuel C. King clerked in George T. Challiss’ store, receiving $25.00 per month, and boarded himself. He afterwards went to work for Mike Finney, steamboat wharf master, and was practically the first express agent in Atchison. Later he went out to his farm and split rails to fence it, and afterwards clerked for Bowman & Blair for $25.00 per month