Butler County Genealogy Trails Kansas John W Kirkpatrick Bio

BUTLER COUNTY'S EIGHTY YEARS BIOS

JOHN W. KIRKPATRICK

(Transcribed by Peg Luce)

John Warfield Kirkpatrick, owner of the Kirkpatrick Jewelry Store, and one of the most widely known, progressive and substantial younger citizens of the community, was born in Holden, Johnson County, Missouri, August 31, 1881. He came to El Dorado in 1900, at the age of 19, and has been a resident here for 35 years.

Mr. Kirkpatrick’s mother died when he was a baby, and he was taken into the home of his grandfather, W. W. Hall, of Anthony, Kansas, where he grew to young manhood. He attended grade and high schools of that city until seventeen years old when he secured a place in a local jewelry store as clerk. While here, he learned the fundamentals of the jewelry business and became expert in the watchmaker’s trade. In 1899, he was offered and accepted a more lucrative place in a jewelry store in Atchison, and the following year, came to El Dorado for two years. He was employed at Wichita for the next several years, or until 1907, when he established and became sole owner of the Kirkpatrick Jewelry Store, which has been a standard in that line in this entire section of Kansas for more than twenty years. His first store was located in the C. H. Selig Building, 105 North Main Street, where he remained until 1925 when he moved to his present location, 102 South Main Street, a part of the remodeled Citizens State Bank building.

During his entire residence here, Mr. Kirkpatrick has been identified with that group of business men who accomplish results. He takes an active part and is a liberal contributor in time and money to the success of the famous Kafir Corn Carnivals of El Dorado. He was a member of the board of directors of the former St. Luke’s Hospital and co-operated with other members of the board in perfecting plans for the erection of the Susan B. Allen Memorial Hospital, presented to the city by Frank S. Allen. He is also a member of the Rotary Club and a charter member of the Country Club. He is one of the group that in 1928 established Forest Park. He is a member of the Chamber of Commerce, having been twice president of that organization, and his constant support of good roads movements has had notable results. He is directly responsible for the improved roads from El Dorado into the Greenwood-Butler oil area and was the first and one of the two heaviest contributors to that decidedly constructive project. He is interested in virtually all progressive movements initiated in the city. Fraternally, he is a thrity-third degree Mason, being the second to attain that distinction in Butler County, and is a member of Patmos, No. 97, A. F. & A. M., El Dorado; the Consistory, Wichita; and Midian Shrine Temple, Wichita. In religion he is an Episcopalian. In politics, he is a Republican.

Mr. Kirkpatrick is of Scotch descent and comes of a line of forebears that settled in Tennessee, Kentucky and Missouri, probably the pioneer stock of that original band of Scots who emigrated into southern North Carolina, shortly before the Revolution and partly responsible for the development of those four great commonwealths. Mr. Kirkpatrick’s parents were James L. and Rebecca (Hall) Kirkpatrick, the former a native of Tennessee and the mother born in Kentucky. The mother died at Holden in 1881 and the father a few years later remarried. W. W. Hall, father of Rebecca (Hall) Kirkpatrick, was a native of Kentucky and came by way of Missouri into Kansas during the pioneer era settling at Anthony, but now is retired and living in Wichita with his daughter.

On June 6, 1906, Mr. Kirkpatrick was united in marriage to Miss Esther Louise Thayer, of Wichita. Mrs. Kirkpatrick was born in Decatur, Illinois, and is the daughter of the late J. L. and Mina (Cash) Thayer, the former one of the best known business men in Butler County and Wichita during the last generation. Mrs. Kirkpatrick is prominent in the club, religious and charity life of the city. She formerly was Regent for Kansas and at present is National Vice-president General of the Daughters of the American Revolution. Her ancestral line is one of the most illustrious in America, one of the Thayers having been the founder of West Point Military Academy and his statue now is a part of the campus attractions of that historic institution. Mrs. Kirkpatrick is a descendant of two of New England’s oldest families, the Thayer and the Adams families – the latter being of such prominence in the Colonial, the Revolutionary and the present period as to be included in every school history in the country. The Thayer family originated in New England with Thomas Thayer, a descendant of Lord Thayer of the British peerage. Thomas Thayer came to this country from England in 1635 and located on a farm near Braintree, Mass., a city, incidentally, that has furnished two presidents (John Adams and John Quincy Adams) of the Untied States. Mrs. Kirkpatrick is the eighth generation descended from Thomas Thayer.