KSGenWeb Digital Library Biographical Sketch of William H. Warters Atchison County, Kansas

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The following transcription is from a 750 page book titled "Genealogical and Biographical Record of North-Eastern Kansas, dated 1900.  These have been diligently transcribed and generously contributed by Penny R. Harrell, please give her a very big Thank You for her hard work!

William H. Warters.

On both his father's and his mother's side the well known resident of Shannon, Atchison County, Kansas, whose name is above, is of that good, honest, progressive and thoroughly patriotic English stock which has done so much to make American citizenship all that is claimed for it by its most enthusiastic admirers.  The Englishman may never forget that he is an Englishman, but, transplanted to our soil by emigration or by birth, he never forgets that he is also an American and his loyalty is never shaken or discredited.

William H. Warters is a son of Luke and Caroline (Aldroyd) Warters, and was born in Morgan County, Illinois, November 4, 1856.  Luke Warters was an Englishman and a gentleman by birth and education.  Circumstances made it appear desirable to him to seek his fortune in the new world, and he came over to this country while yet a single man and took up his residence in Illinois.  He began his career in Illinois as a farm laborer, and being steady, saving and industrious laid the foundation early in life for a career of usefulness.

Luke Warters married Caroline Aldroyd, daughter of Sidney and Elizabeth (Stubbs) Aldroyd.  Her father was, like Mr. Warters, a native of England.  The means of Mr. Warters and his young wife were small when they began the battle of life together.  Indeed, they were limited to the stock necessary to the operation of a small rented farm and the goods their modest home contained.

They were located in a productive portion of one of the best states in the Union and having from early life cultivated habits of industry and economy, they laid by something each year so that when they came to Kansas, the state of cheaphomes, they were enabled to bring with them the funds necessary to enable them to secure a fertile farm.  In 1878 they brought their effects to the finely located farm between Lancaster and Shannon, which is the best kept and most intelligently operated along the road between the two towns.  There Mr. Warters died.  Luke and Caroline (Aldroyd) Warters were the parents of two children: Elizabeth A., the wife of M. S. Mocraft, of Henry County, Illinois; and William H., the subject of this sketch. 

His education was probably the most sadly neglected feature of William H. Warters' youthful life.  He had the strength of body, the mental vigor and the capacity for acquiring knowledge, but the opportunities for doing so were few and remote.  Nature frequently comes to the relief of one the development of whose powers has thus been neglected, and provides him with good judgment sufficient to meet the demands of the world as they are presented; and so it has been with Mr. Warters, who has been equal to every emergency and who by his native ability, made greater by reading and observation, has been able to extract from life his full share of success and satisfaction.

Mr. Warters was twenty-one years of age when he began work upon his present farm.  In the past twenty-one years it has been wonderfully improved and transformed, but not without great labor and much expense.  It has been his province to conduct the management of the business of the farm, in all its branches and ramifications, and everything that should have been done seems to have been done and done well.  His most recent extensive improvement was the erection of his handsome and commodious residence, built in 1896, a year in which business was at a low ebb and stagnation, industrial and commercial, was everywhere present and money was almost at a premium.

Notwithstanding these forbidden conditions Mr. Warters drew a few thousand dollars from his surplus deposit and built his home.  Mr. Warters was married, in February, 1889, to Cora Keithline.  Andrew Keithline, his wife's father, was born in Pennsylvania and came to Atchison County many years ago.  By his marriage to Rose Warner he had two children: Gilbert Keithline, of Huron, Kansas; and Mrs. Warters.

Mr. and Mrs. Warters' children are Bessie, Andrew and Cora. Mr. Warters is a Democrat, but is in no way a political worker or seeker for office, preferring to trust to the honesty and integrity of men elected to transact public business, while he devotes his time to the farm and other business interests.  Like thousands of others of our citizens of English parentage, he has noted with unbounded pleasure the tendency to an international alliance between the land of his forefathers and the land of his birth. 

His public spirit is of so pronounced a type that his participation in any movement proposed for the benefit of the people of his town or county is taken as a matter of course.  He is an earnest advocate of good schools, believing that the character of our government in future generations will be influenced by the quality and extent of present educational facilities.  He is helpful to churches and to all charitable interests.

Last update: Thursday, January 15, 2004 01:03:57

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