By Wendi Bevitt

In the early 1910s, commissioners at Kansas City, Kansas, started pushing for a sane Fourth of July celebration. Up to this time regulations were very limited. Fire related deaths had been reported as 4,500 in 1903, but with increasing fire awareness had dropped to 1,500 in 1914. Kansas City’s “Sane Fourth” model proposed limiting usage of fireworks as well as a cleanup day on the eve of the celebrations to remove trash and other fire hazards in urban areas. At this time, most buildings in Kansas were wood frame, and the chance of accidental fires was a real threat.

In 1915, newly appointed fire marshal Lewis T. Hussey adopted the Kansas City plan and started promoting its benefits in time for the July 4th holiday.

Lewis Hussey grew up in Coffey County, Kansas, graduating from Burlington High School in 1888. His family moved to Osage County, where his father, Jerry, became register of deeds and Lewis served as deputy until 1893.

Lewis eventually became city clerk and later mayor of Lyndon. As mayor, he led the way to the installation of a city water and sewer system, which had mixed reviews among the citizens of the town. He was also elected to serve as state representative from Osage County and also served as state oil inspector.

During his civil service, Lewis pursued a career in insurance, establishing the Metropolitan Accident Association. He then joined others in organizing the Osage Fire Insurance Company in 1908. His experiences as a civil servant and in the fire insurance field made Lewis a perfect choice for Governor Arthur Capper to appoint him as state fire marshal in 1915. Capper had already started instituting portions of the safety measures of the Kansas City fire prevention plan, such as a statewide clean-up day in April, but Lewis was the perfect person to enforce what had begun.

In his new job, Lewis took protecting Kansas citizens very seriously. He admonished that a “safe and sane” 4th of July celebration was the most consistent way for Kansas to observe the day and that it might be “too much to expect a complete return to sanity after the free range that has been indulged in the celebration in years past, but an effort needs to be made in most cities and towns for a more moderate and intelligent form of celebration.”

Rev. Josiah McAfee, inset, as a Kansas legislator, honored the sacrifice of one of his recruits by naming Rooks County after him.

By Wendi Bevitt

Fifty-six Kansas counties honor the names of soldiers from the Civil War. Only two, however, bear the name of men who held the rank of private – Rooks and Osborne. Rooks County, while located in the western half of the state, is forever connected to Osage County as the recipient of the name of Osage County native, John Calvin Rooks.

John Calvin Rooks, familiarly called “Calvin”, was born in Pennsylvania and came with his family to Kansas in 1858. His parents, John and Delilah, set up their farm two miles south of Burlingame when the county was still known as Weller. The family became members of the Burlingame Baptist church and faithfully attended.

In mid-September of 1862, Calvin enlisted in Company I of the 11th Kansas Volunteer Infantry. Many men from both Burlingame and Grasshopper Falls (modern Valley Falls in Jefferson County) were recruited into this company by the Rev. Josiah B. McAfee.

The new recruits were taken to Fort Leavenworth where they received brief military training and then were deployed to the battle fronts in Indian Territory and Arkansas. Company I saw action at Old Fort Wayne, Indian Territory (Oklahoma), on October 22 and then at Cane Hill in Arkansas on November 28.

Each time the company established a camp, a Thursday night prayer meeting would be held in a large Sibley tent, led by the Rev. Josiah McAfee, who served both as 1st Lieutenant of Company I as well as chaplain. Being a Christian man, Calvin attended each meeting. At the prayer meeting on December 4, Rev. McAfee was shaking hands with each of the attendees and asking them to relate his religious experience. Private Rooks told Rev. McAfee that from the age of nine, he had chosen to be a soldier for Christ.

By Wendi Bevitt

You probably haven’t heard of her, but Aunt Emily Ford was one of the most beloved citizens of Burlingame, Kansas. At a time when prejudice and segregation ran rampant throughout most of the country, the color line however did not exist for Aunt Emily in her adopted community, and she held a special place of honor and respect there.

Aunt Emily Ford was a spry little figure, with toil-scarred hands and a kindly face. “To know her [was] to love her” and later in her life, the local newspapers would run lengthy articles on the occasion of her birthday celebrating her many years, or an interview inquiring about her past.

“I shouldn’t think anyone would want to hear about slaves and slavery,” she said, but the reply was, “Yes, but everyone especially those of the younger generation know little of slavery and such an article would be of interest to the readers.”

This is her story.

Emily was born in North Carolina in 1813. Her family was owned by a family named White. The Whites treated their slaves harshly and used them for hard manual labor clearing trees and grubbing out shrubs when they moved to Tennessee.

As was the custom for slave owners, when Mr. White’s daughter was married to a man by the name of Farmer, she was given Emily as part of her dowry. Emily was two years older than her new mistress, and the two had shared a childhood together. Because of this familiarity, Emily found herself in a much more hospitable environment in her new home. Emily served as a cook in the Farmer household. The family moved to the Springfield, Missouri, area in 1837. It was there that she was allowed to marry another local slave, Daniel Ford.

When the area was invaded by Union soldiers in 1861, the Union forces freed slaves on the farms they encountered. Daniel Haney, of Burlingame, was with the 1st Kansas regiment when their company came upon Daniel Ford hauling potatoes in from the fields with his master’s wagon.

“Come with us to freedom!” was the call. Daniel Haney helped the Fords load all their children, earthly possessions, and even the feather mattress from the big house into the master’s wagon and the family followed the soldiers to a new life.

Their eventual arrival in Burlingame found the family without much means to start their new life. Instead of letting them remain relegated to their poor status, the people of Burlingame gave them a fair shot at success in their new life.

By Wendi Bevitt

If only for a moment in time, Melvern was famous, made that way by the ingenuity of the Warner family and the farm equipment empire they began there.

Priscilla Warner and her husband Emery began their married life in Tazewell County, Illinois. When the Civil War began, Emery signed up to fight for the Union and served as a drum major with an Illinois regiment. Tragedy struck the family and Emery perished from fever in New Orleans in 1863.

Not long after the war ended, newly widowed Priscilla Warner was looking for a place to start over. Flat broke; she packed up her possessions and her five boys and headed from Illinois to the newly opened Indian lands in Kansas. In 1870, she settled on Sand Creek near Waverly. She spent the last of her limited funds on a cook stove, sack of flour and strip of meat for her family.

A strange twist of fate connected a Burlingame man’s patent to the town’s early temperance movement.

By Wendi Bevitt

Carry Nation, the hatchet bearing opponent of saloons and liquor, made her first raid on an establishment selling liquor in 1894. It was 20 years earlier in Burlingame, Kan., however, that two hatchet-wielding women with the same goal of protecting their homes from the abuses of drink, marched up Santa Fe Avenue and took out their aggressions on the local saloon.

By 1830, the average American over 15 years old consumed seven gallons of pure alcohol a year (three times of what is consumed today). This led to the beginnings of a push on restrictions of intoxicating drink. The momentum was stunted by the Civil War, but resurged afterward.

The town of Burlingame passed an ordinance in 1871 to “restrain dram shops and taverns and to regulate the sale of intoxicating liquors”. There was only one saloon, owned by Samuel H. Schuyler, which was licensed to sell liquor in the city, and for this privilege the city charged $300.

A group of concerned women began meeting in Burlingame in 1873 to bring about the end of liquor sales in the city. This had been spawned by the Women’s Crusade began that same year as an effort to give women, who had no direct political or social power, a chance for direct action with prayer vigils, petition campaigns and demonstrations. The women sought to persuade saloon keepers to destroy their beverages and close their doors and thereby protect their homes from the evils of liquor.

Mr. Schuyler was put on notice for his liquor sales by the ladies of Burlingame in August of 1873. Similar notices had gone out to all the establishments in Topeka which read like this: “Sir, you are hereby notified and warned that unless you desist from your present nefarious and soul-destroying business of selling whiskey, to the ruin of businesses and souls of this community, we shall visit your place of crime in a body … and invoke the aid and blessing of Almighty God to so enlighten your mind that you may be enabled to realize the great sin you are committing and forever abandon your present wicked business.”

Schuyler ignored their pleas, and in March of 1874, after the women’s group held a prayer vigil, two of the women greatly affected by the problem of excessive liquor use by their husbands decided to take action. Kate Wortz and Lizzie Allison, armed with hatchets, headed down Santa Fe Avenue towards Schuyler’s Saloon.

When the women arrived, they proceeded to smash the saloon’s front windows, Schuyler and staff watching the attack in shock from the inside. When the housewives finished their work outside, they continued inside, with Kate Wortz leading the charge. She determinedly headed next to the bar with its decanters and mirrors declaring, “I came down here to show you how my husband acts when he comes home drunk from your whiskey!”

By Wendi Bevitt

You might not recognize his name, but if your family lived in Osage County more than 100 years ago, you might have Harry Ford to thank for capturing your ancestors’ likenesses, or just glimpses into Osage County’s past.

Harrison “Harry” Ford came from the small town of Wright, Mich., which is near Grand Rapids. He served his country during the Civil War with Michigan cavalry and infantry units. He mustered out at the end of the war, having been promoted to the rank of first lieutenant.

Ford’s photo of a local family possibly includes the sister of Wyatt Earp (anyone who can verify this is asked to contact the author); photo published with permission of Paul Butler.

Harry’s arrival in Kansas was first noted in 1880 when he stayed at Patton’s boarding house in Burlington, Kan. Residents of boarding houses at this time would expect to pay from about $2.50 to $3.50 per week. While in Burlington, Harry made a name for himself as an exceptional artist and photographer, prompting some to declare him the best artist in the state.

By 1882, Harry was making trips north into Topeka with his photo car. Photo cars could be quite large at 10 by 28 feet and eight feet high on the inside, but lightweight enough to make travel easy on the mules that would be pulling the car. Sometimes photo cars were rented railroad cars converted for this purpose. Photo cars would be furnished with props, fashioning a portable studio. Skylights allowed for natural light and dark curtains were used to block light coming in from the sides. One side would be the location of the photographer’s sleeping quarters and the other a photo lab.