The African Methodist Episcopal Church was organized in 1868 by Rev. W. B. Ossley, with nine members. The church building was erected in 1870, at a cost of $525, on a lot presented to the Society. The ministers who have succeeded Rev. Ossley have been the following: Revs. A. Buchanan, Jesse Mills, J. P. Howard, S. F. Frister, D. Carter E. Ferguson, and J. B. Wallace, present incumbent. The present membership is thirty-nine.
A Sunday school was organized in 1873. At present it has forty-six scholars and seventy-six volumes in the library.
 

Ferguson, James Sanderson --MI 1
JAMES SANDERSON Ferguson, farmer, P. O. Paola, was born in Lycoming County, Pa., in 1821. Was brought up a farmer and removed to Kentucky when twenty-two years of age. Spent one year in Louisville and then removed to Indiana. He resided in the latter State about eighteen years, when he removed to Kentucky. In 1868 he came to Kansas and settled in Miami County, near Spring Hill, on the southwest quarter of Section 30, Township 15, Range 24, where he engaged in farming until 1880, when he moved to a farm of 240 acres, which he had purchased, on Section 3, Township 17, Range 23, of Paola, still retaining ownership of his farm of 160 acres, near Spring Hill. In 1882 he sold all but the south eighty acres of his farm in Paola, but has not yet given possession. Mr. F. was married in Pennsylvania in 1845 to Miss Maria H. Snyder., who died in 1859, leaving five children. He was married again January 1,1861, in Gallatin County, Ky., to Miss Juliett L., daughter of Johnston Frank. Mrs. F. was born in Kentucky. There are three children living born of this marriage. Mr. F. still resides near Paola City.
 

Hiram Brewer "Tim" Ferguson (1836-1922)
Submitted by Ken Seaman
Tim, the son of William and Catherine Ferguson, was born in Richland County, Ohio, on February 22, 1836. In the 1840's William Ferguson moved his family to Concord Township in Fayette County, Ohio, where Hiram was principally reared and educated. It was also near here that Hiram began his lifelong occupation of farming (in Cambridge Township in Fayette County, Ohio).
When the Civil War broke out, Hiram answered Lincoln's call and joined Company A of the 48th Regiment of the Ohio Volunteer Infantry (at Dennison, Ohio on September 9, 1861). On September 9, 1862, he was discharged from a hospital in Columbus, Ohio, due to a spinal irritation which had rendered him unfit for any duty for one hundred and fifty days. This disability was caused by a wound received at the Battle of Shiloh (in western Tennessee in the first week of April, 1862).
Upon discharge Hiram returned to Fayette County, Ohio, and resumed farming while recovering from his disability. In July, 1863, he rendered his services to the Fayette County Minutemen and for sixteen days pursued the infamous Rebel raider, John Morgan. Morgan had led 2500 infantrymen into Indiana and Ohio in what became known as Morgan's Raid.
On February 3, 1864, Hiram re-enlisted at Bloomington, Ohio, in Company A of the 1st Regiment of Ohio Cavalry. On January 20, 1865, he was appointed farrier (in charge of the horses). And on June 14, 1865, he was promoted to Corporal. He was mustered out with his company at Hilton Head, South Carolina, on September 13, 1865.
During his re-enlistment he participated in Kilpatric, a cavalry raid around Atlanta; the battles of Lovejoy Station and Kennesaw Mountain (in Sherman's march on Atlanta, Georgia, in June, 1864); fighting at Ebenezer's Church and Planter's Station (Selma, Alabama); and finally, the capture of Montgomery, Alabama, on the day before Lincoln was shot, April 13, 1865.
After his discharge, Hiram returned to Fayette County, Ohio, and resumed farming until the following year (1866) when he moved to McLean County, Illinois to join his parents.
On September 20, 1867, Hiram married Sarah Ellen RANKIN in Saybrook, McLean County, Illinois. Sarah was the daughter of Harrison M. and Adeline RANKIN of Cheney's Grove Township in McLean County, Illinois (they were formerly of Sangamon County in Illinois).
Hiram and Sarah's first child, "Harry" William Harrison, was born July 23, 1868, in Saybrook, Illinois.
Sarah's sister, Mrs. Stansbury, who had moved to Kansas in 1871, wrote to Sarah about Kansas and described a parcel of land near them with "good prairie grass and a never-failing spring". On this information, Hiram and Sarah sold out in Illinois and came by train to Florence, Kansas, the end of the railroad line at that time. This was in February, 1872. There they bought a yoke of oxen, wagon, equipment, and provisions. They then traversed South-Central Kansas for seventy miles to the southwest corner of Butler County, Kansas. They came through El Dorado and Augusta where they filed on their homestead at the Federal Land Office. Their homestead, which they had not yet seen, was the northeast quarter of Section 31 of Township 29 of Range 3E with Maple Creek running through it.
Their first living quarters was a sod and log house. Since the prairie around the homestead was treeless, they hauled lumber from Florence to build the farmhouse, a task that took several trips over a six-week period. Unfortunately, after all this effort, this dwelling was lost to fire a few years later, necessitating the building of a new farmhouse. The prairie was plentiful with pheasant, quail and prairie chicken ... and even an occasional buffalo still to be seen.
The freshly plowed virgin prairie was "harrowed" with tree branches tied into a bunch and pulled behind a team. And the first plantings were made "with a sharp stick struck into the ground and covered over with a little dirt and a stomp of the boot".
In the spring and summer of 1872 several other families took claims near Hiram and Sarah: "Doc" Berger, Jim Walton, R.M. Himbaugh, Fred Feller, Fred Schaper, Ed Smith, John Keller, among others.
On January 19, 1873, Levi Elmer was born on the homestead. During this year Hiram was instrumental in the formation of Maple Creek School where his children eventually went to school. He was also involved in the organization of Richland Township, the naming of which he is credited with (which he suggested after the county of his birth in Ohio).
Hiram and Sarah attended Pleasant Hill Church, five miles to the northeast, of which they were Charter Members and where Hiram was superintendent of the Sunday School for many years.
The grasshoppers came in 1874. The swarms were so great that the "hoppers in the sky made it so dark the chickens went to roost". Hiram would later recount to his grandchildren that he only had fifty cents which he buried so the "hoppers would not eat it". Needless to say, the times were not easy.
On January 5, 1874, Hiram was officially granted ownership of his homestead consisting of the 160 acres of the NE Quarter of Section 31 of the Osage Trust Lands by the Acts of Congress of April 24, 1820 and July 15, 1870, by the Land Office in Wichita, Kansas (Certificate No. 4973).
On January 4, 1875, Oscar Anderson was born to Hiram and Sarah.
On February 2, 1877, Hiram paid James R. Coffman (of Clinton County, Missouri) $200 for the west half of the homestead. (It would appear that either Hiram mortgaged, lost and had to repurchase, or he was obligated to pay this sum to get clear title.)
Arthur Edwin was born on May 30, 1881, and John Lee on May 12, 1884. Five years lapsed before Clarence Raymond was born (May 11, 1889), followed by the birth of their only daughter, Mary Leota (April 11, 1891)
On June 16, 1890, Hiram was granted a military pension on Certificate No. 418852 at $8/month.
On November 7, 1904, Hiram bought Lots 21 and 22 in Block 2 of Hills and Ruckers Addition in the City of Mulvane in Sumner County for $150 from James F. and Rosa A. Siegfried.
In 1906 Hiram retired from the farm and moved to Mulvane. He sold at public auction 8 head of horses, 24 head of cattle, 40 acres of corn in the field, his farm implements and household goods. He rented out the homestead until January, 1910 when his oldest son, Harry, returned from Oklahoma to farm the homestead.
On March 2, 1911, Hiram applied for his military pension under the Act of February 6, 1907, with Alonzo Shull and David C. Scott attesting for him.
On March 10, 1918, Sarah Ellen died. She was buried in the Mulvane Cemetery east of Mulvane in Sumner County, Kansas. After her death, Hiram lived in Mulvane with his daughter Mary, who had married Ottie STOREY.
On June 10, 1918, Hiram's pension increased to $40/month under the Act of June 10, 1918.
Hiram died February 21, 1922, at his home in Mulvane and was buried beside his wife. His funeral services were conducted by Rev. F.H. Poore at the Methodist Church. His military pension at the time of his death was $50/month.
Hiram was a longtime member of the Methodist Church and G.A.R. He is credited with having "witched" Mulvane's first permanent water well.
The children of Hiram and Sarah were:

"Harry" William Harrison Ferguson (b. 1868; d. 1933)
"Elmer" Levi Elmer Ferguson (b. 1873, d. 1903)
Oscar Anderson Ferguson (b. 1875, d. )
Arthur Edwin Ferguson (b. 1881)
John Lee Ferguson (b. 1884)
"Ray" Clarence Raymond Ferguson (b. 1889)
Mary Leota Ferguson (b. 1891

 

WILLIAM T. Ferguson. Kansas is the "old soldier" State. Of all the pages of American history, none breathe the true American spirit with greater fervor than those devoted to the story of her rise and progress, and in every stage of her marvelous development the "old soldier" appears. As a youth he listened to the fireside tales of the Indian and buffalo. In the "fifties" these gave place to even more exciting incidents, in which men of his own race appeared as factors. As the years passed, he himself was frequently found among the actors, so that when the flame of war swept over the nation, superinduced by the same causes that gave birth to the State, there sprang from her prairies a greater proportionate number of defenders of the Union than from any other State. And when the verdict of war had been given, what so natural as that the man, who had offered his life for the same principle which caused the State's birth, should seek to establish his home upon her broad area. There are many of these "old soldiers" in Cherokee County, and we are here privileged to mention one of the most worthy. William T. Ferguson is a farmer, residing in section 12, township 32, range 24, in Cherokee township, where he settled in 1887, coming from Jefferson County, Pennsylvania, where he was born July 24, 1838.
Mr. Ferguson developed a strong physical frame on a farm in Jefferson County, of the old "Keystone State," and among her hills imbibed a spirit of patriotism which early carried him into the struggle for the defense of the Union. He enlisted in 1861 as a private in Company E, 62d Reg. Pennsylvania Vol. Inf., in which he passed three years of strenuous warfare. He was discharged July 17, 1864, at Pittsburg, Pennsylvania, with the rank of fifth sergeant. One needs only to turn to the history of the old 62d Regiment to read the story of Mr. Ferguson s army life. Besides many minor skirmishes and sharp fights, he was at the siege of Yorktown, at Hanover Court House, in the Seven Days' Battle, the Second Bull Run, Antietam, bloody Fredericksburg and "stick-in-the-mud" Chancellorsville, at the immortal Gettysburg, "the high water mark of the Confederacy," and closed his army life with Grant in the operations before Petersburg. Through all this strenuous life, the subject of this sketch passed without a single day away from his company, although he was slightly wounded several times. He received a flesh wound in the left leg at Malvern Hill; in the left hand, July 2, 1862, in the second day's fighting at Gettysburg; and in the right arm, at Laurel Hill, in May, 1864. On June 18 of the same year, he received his last Confederate "love touch," a scalp wound, in front of Petersburg.
Mr. Ferguson took up the routine of civil life gladly enough after his experience in the army, resuming his trade of carpenter, at which he served an apprenticeship prior to the war. He continued to reside in his native county until 1887, and then resolved to change his occupation to that of a farmer. His farm here in Cherokee County consists of 80 acres of fine land, on which are a comfortable farmhouse and all the necessary outbuildings, the whole making a very nice farm property. For the first seven years after coming to the county, Mr. Ferguson worked at his trade in connection with farming, but of late he has devoted his entire attention to the latter.
The marriage of Mr. Ferguson took place on August 25, 1864. His wife's maiden name was Sarah J. Myers. She is a native of Bedford County, Pennsylvania, and a sister of John Lane Myers, a sketch of whom appearing elsewhere in this volume contains the history of her family. Mr. and Mrs. Ferguson have no children.
William T. Ferguson is the son of William Ferguson and Margaret (Summerville) Ferguson. The former was born at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, in 1812; the latter was born in Armstrong County, of the same State, in 1811. There they passed their lives in farming, the father dying in 1852, the mother; in 1883. They had 12 children, of whom the following are still living: William T.; Sarah A. (Mrs. D. B. Mortimer), of Clarion County, Pennsylvania; Samuel M., who married Margaret Mortimer, and resides in Clarion County; Azel F., who married Nancy Cochran, and lives in Butler County, Pennsylvania, and Josiah S., who married Mary Bates, and Hamilton E., who married Annie Lawson, both of whom reside in Clarion County, Pennsylvania.
Having been baptized in the Republican font by casting his first vote for the immortal Lincoln, Mr. Ferguson has always taken pleasure in supporting the principles of that party. He is a member of the A. H. T. A. and of the Grand Army of the Republic. His character in Cherokee County is that of an industrious, upright and patriotic citizen, and he enjoys the respect of all with whom he is acquainted, or with whom he may have business relations
 

W. S. Ferguson is secretary and treasurer of The Locomotive Finished Material Company of Atchison, one of the most important industries of the city. Mr. Ferguson has been identified with Kansas and Atchison for over thirty years, and throughout that time has been connected with the foundry and manufacturing business in different capacities. He is now the oldest executive official in point of continuous service of The Locomotive Finished Material Company.
He represents an old and honored family name in the City of Alton, Illinois, where he was born January 16, 1861. The Fergusons for several generations were linen drapers in Belfast, Ireland. From that city Mr. Ferguson's grandfather crossed the ocean and settled in New York State. F. H. Ferguson, father of W. S., was born in New York in 1838, and when a boy removed to Alton, where the family were old settlers. He grew up and married in that historic city and for a number of years was a merchant. For several years he served as recorder, city clerk and comptroller, and later was connected with the Hapgood Plow Company, one of the largest plow manufactories in the Middle West. He is still living at Alton, being now retired. He is a democrat, a member of the Masonic fraternity, and a Knight Templar. In 1858 he married Julia E. Sneyd, who was born in Philadelphia in 1838 and died at Alton, Illinois, in 1892. Their children were: W. S. Ferguson; Bertha W., living with her father; Harry, who was a railroad employee and died in California in 1912; Frank, who is sales manager for the Illinois Glass Company at Alton, Illinois; and Julia, wife of Rev. Hubert L. Sparks, a Baptist minister now located at Douglas, Arizona.
W. S. Ferguson grew up in his native city, attended the public schools and graduated from the Alton High School in 1876. Almost immediately he found work in the Alton Agricultural Works, where he remained until 1879. After that he was connected with the Drury-Hewitt Hardware Company of Alton until December, 1882.
Mr. Ferguson came to Atchison in March, 1883. Here he entered the employ of John Seaton, an old time foundryman and manufacturer. He was with the business continuously for twenty years and when in 1903 the firm was incorporated as The John Seaton Foundry and Manufacturing Company, Mr. Ferguson became its secretary and treasurer. In 1912 this business was consolidated with The Locomotive Finished Material Company under the latter name. Mr. Ferguson then became secretary and treasurer of the consolidated company, and has held this position since that time.
He is also a stockholder in the Kansas Life Insurance Company. Mr. Ferguson owns his home at 306 S Street. He began voting as a democrat, the politics of his father, but is now a republican. He is affiliated with Atchison Lodge No. 647, Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks, and Atchison Council No. 99 of the United Commercial Travelers.
He married in 1899, at St. Joseph, Missouri, Miss Kate Smith, of an Atchison family.
 

Thomas Thompson Ferguson, an honored Kansas pioneer, and veteran of the Civil war, is a native of the Buckeye State, born in Franklin county, October 17, 1830, a son of William and Zela (Jamison) Ferguson. The father was a native of Kentucky and the mother of Ohio. They spent their lives in Ohio, where the former, died, November 19, 1868, aged seventy years, and the wife and mother departed this life in March, 1876, at the age of seventy-one. They had eight children, only two of whom are now living: Thomas Thompson, the subject of this sketch, and Malinda, now the wife of Joseph Spangler, a farmer residing near Columbus, Ohio.
Thomas Thompson Ferguson was reared on a farm and educated in the public schools of Franklin county, Ohio. He followed farming in his native State until 1874, when he removed to White county, Indiana, engaged in farming there until 1878, when he came to Kansas, settling in Butler county, and followed farming until 1887. He then engaged in the furniture and undertaking business at Latham, which he conducted for three years, when he engaged in the real estate, loan and insurance business, and at the same time was elected justice of the peace, holding that office twenty years. He has also held school and township offices for many years, and was police judge of Latham five years. He has taken an active interest in the public life of his town and county, and is one of the grand old men of Butler county. When the Civil war broke out he responded to the President's call for volunteers, enlisting in Company D, One Hundred and Thirty-third Ohio infantry, and at the expiration of his first enlistment he reënlisted in Company C, One Hundred and Ninety-first Ohio infantry, serving until he was honorably discharged at the close of a military career, of which he may be justly proud. Mr. Ferguson was married, November 7, 1850, to Miss Hannah Newland, of Franklin county, Ohio, where she was born October 10, 1831. She was a daughter of John and Aimy (Waldo) Newland. To Mr. and Mrs. Ferguson were born ten children: Mary Jane, born June 15, 1852; now the widow of Thomas K. Settle; George H., born April 10, 1855, now a hotel keeper at Wolcott, Ind.; Charles W., born March 2, 1859, a retired farmer, Latham, Kan.; William E., born May 22, 1861, now postmaster at Latham, Kan.; Oscar J., born May 23, 1863, now in the United States mail service, Latham, Kan.; Elnora, born June 1, 1867, died July i, 1887; Ira W., born July 27, 1870, now resides in St. Louis, Mo.; Frank T., born February 9, 1873, now Santa Fe station agent at Raton, N. M.; Eva M., born December 8, 1875, died February 20, 1904, and James O., born August 6, 1880, a merchant at Tulsa, Okla. Mr. Ferguson is a member of the Grand Army of the Republic, Latham Post, No. 340, and has been post adjutant for many years.

 

Ferguson
Luther Buell Ferguson, the son of "Harry" William Harrison and "Della" Rhonda Idella (Hooten) Ferguson, was born in Ringwood, Major County, Oklahoma, on March 6, 1906. At the age of four his family left Oklahoma and moved to the Ferguson homestead in Richland Township, Butler County. The family moved to several homes in the vicinity living in the four counties of Butler, Cowley, Sedgwick, and Sumner at different times.
Ina "Irene" Cook, the daughter of "Ed" Edgar B. and Alta Rilda (Smith) Cook, was born on August 9, 1907 one mile west of Udall in Ninnescah Township, Cowley County. She graduated from Udall High School in 1925.
Luther and Irene were married on his twenty-first birthday, March 6, 1927 in the First Congregational Church parsonage in Udall by the Rev. Harry A. Scott.
Luther worked for his father-in-law, Ed Cook for several years then moved to Richland Township, Butler County, to farm. In about 1935, Ed retired and Luther and Irene and girls moved to the farm west of Udall to begin a farming operation there. Through the years, Luther and Irene raised dairy cattle, beef cattle, mules, horses, swine, chickens, as well as corn, oats, barley, wheat, Milo, alfalfa, and soybeans. They also raised five daughters, Barbara Seaman, Joyce Brookings, Jewell Lacey, Caroline Miller, and Linda Morten.
In 1965, Luther and Irene tore down the old two story house which according to Ed Cook had been built for $700 and replaced it with a new brick home.
Luther retired from farming in 197 1. They enjoyed going to Texas for the winter and Colorado for the summer for many years following retirement. Luther is an avid fisherman and Irene enjoys crocheting and quilting. Four of the five daughters still live in the Udall area.