Marshall County KS Archives Biographies.....Hutchinson, Frank W. 1857 - living in 1917
************************************************
Copyright.  All rights reserved.
http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm
http://www.usgwarchives.net/ks/ksfiles.htm
************************************************

File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by:
Joy Fisher sdgenweb@gmail.com July 21, 2005, 4:52 am

Author: B. F. Bowen

FRANK W. HUTCHINSON.

    Frank W. Hutchinson, well-known grocer, of Marysville, is a native of the
state of Iowa, but has been a resident of Marysville practically all the time
since the days of his childhood and has thus witnessed the growth of the city
and the development of this region since pioneer days. He was born at Palo,
Iowa, August 2, 1857, son of Perry and Jeannette L. (Barber) Hutchinson, natives
of New York state, who became prominent and influential pioneers of this county,
active in promoting the interests of Marysville in the early days, and the
latter of whom is still living in that city at a ripe old age.

    Perry Hutchinson was born at Fredonia, New York, December 2, 1831, son of
Calvin Hutchinson, a native of England, and was reared on a dairy farm, in his
youth helping to milk one hundred cows. At Fredonia, in 1853, he married
Jeannette L. Barber, who was born at that place in February, 1837, and
immediately after their marriage he and his wife came West, settling in Iowa.
For some time Perry Hutchinson worked in the timber woods in Wisconsin, rafting
logs and then went to Iowa, where, at Palo, he engaged in the cattle business
and in the milling business, remaining there until 1859, when he came down into
Kansas and pre-empted a quarter of a section of land in Balderson township, this
county. He built a log cabin on his claim and put up a shack to shelter his
horses and the first winter he was there worked with his team, receiving for his
labor daily one bushel of corn, worth twenty cents a bushel. The next spring,
when the tide of immigration out this way began to flow past his door, he was
able to sell that twenty-cent corn for two dollars and fifty cents a bushel. His
place was along the line of the old stage route and one morning about two
o'clock he heard sounds of distress proceeding from the trail. On investigating
he found the mail-stage and the six-horse team stuck in the ice and the driver
nearly frozen to death. The driver was made comfortable for the night at Mr.
Hutchinson's house-and upon asking the next morning what the charge for the
accommodation was, was informed that there was no charge. To show his
appreciation for the favor the superintendent of the mail gave Mr. Hutchinson a
"tip", which was to go to the then new village of Marysville and lease the hotel
that had been started there. Mr. Hutchinson recognized the value of the tip, for
travel through this part of the country was then beginning to become quite
brisk, but he told the superintendent that it would be impossible for him to
enter upon such an undertaking, that all his equipment in the way of
housekeeping consisted of a table that he had made out of dry-goods boxes, three
dilapidated chairs and a few old knives and forks. He picked up courage,
however, and determined to investigate the "tip." With that end in view he drove
over to Marysville, his sole cash possession at the time being twenty-five
cents, and proposed to A. G. Barrett, the owner of the hotel, to rent the same
and operate it. Barrett informed him that he would not rent the place to "a
pauper" and coolly dismissed the proposition. Mr. Hutchinson laid the matter
before Frank Marshall, who was then conducting a store in a log building at
Marysville and after whom Marshall county later came to be named, and Marshall
offered to "go his security" for any reasonable amount sufficient to swing the
hotel proposition. On that basis Mr. Hutchinson secured a lease on the hotel and
in eight months made a clear profit of eighteen hundred dollars operating the
same. By the way, the site of the log store above referred to is the present
site of the First National Bank, of which Mr. Hutchinson was president for many
years and until the time of his death. With the money earned in his hotel deal,
Perry Hutchinson bought an eighty-acre tract of land adjoining the village and
there erected a flour-mill, in a building twenty by eighty feet, said to have
been the first flour-mill in the state of Kansas, settlers coming from distances
as far away as two hundred miles to get their grist ground at that pioneer mill.
Mr. Hutchinson was engaged in milling when the Civil War broke out and he
dropped everything and enlisted a company of men to fight in behalf of the
Union, that company from Marysville going to the front as a part of the
Thirteenth Regiment, Kansas Volunteer Infantry. Near the close of the war,
Captain Hutchinson was taken ill and was mustered out. Upon his return home he
resumed his milling business and in 1867 erected a new mill on the west side of
the river, which old mill is still standing. In 1881 Captain Hutchinson was
elected state senator from this district, on the Republican ticket. About 1878
he engaged in the banking business and was a directpr of the First National Bank
until the death of S. A. Fulton, the president, when he was elected president
and continued to serve in that capacity until his death on December 27, 1914. He
was an active and earnest member of the Grand Army of the Republic and was a
Royal Arch Mason and a Knight Templar. His widow is still living in the old home
erected by her husband in 1868. She is a member of the Presbyterian church and
was among the most active workers in behalf of all good causes hereabout in
pioneer days. To her and her husband four children were born, of whom the
subject of this sketch was the first-born, the others being Dilla, now deceased;
Mrs. Etta Kotsch, of Sturgis, South Dakota, and Wallace W., the well-known
retired miller, of Marysville.

    Frank W. Hutchinson was but a child when his parents moved to Marysville and
he grew to manhood there, a valued assistant to his father in the mill,
remaining thus engaged for four or five years. In the early seventies he was
severely injured by being caught beneath a freight train and while recuperating
from those injuries took a trip to the mountains and on the train was robbed of
what money he had. He stopped at Canon City, Colorado, where he remained a year
or two working for a time in a hotel and then in a wholesale grocery house. Upon
his return to Marysville he was put in charge of his father's lumber yard and
was thus engaged until 1882, when he went to Beattie and there started a grocery
store. A little more than sixty days later his store was destroyed by fire, but
he rebuilt and restocked the place and continued in business there until 1892,
when he sold the store and returned to Marysville to take charge of his father's
mill. In 1894 he bought a grocery stock at Marysville and presently bought the
site of his present place of business and erected his present commodious store
room, into which he moved in 1895 and where he ever since has been engaged in
business, long having been recognized as one of the substantial merchants of his
home town. Mr. Hutchinson also is the owner of a farm of eighty-three acres in
Wells township. He is a Republican, but has not been a seeker after office.

    In 1884 Frank W. Hutchinson was united in marriage to Emma Brumbaugh, who
was born at Valparaiso, Indiana, March 17, 1864, a daughter of Alexander and
Elizabeth (Hawthorn) Brumbaugh, the parents of eight children, three sons and
five daughters, who came to Marshall county about 1889, some time after the
marriage of their daughter Emma, and settled on a farm near Beattie, where Mr.
Brumbaugh died and where Mrs. Brumbaugh is living in the northeast part of
Marysville, now being in the eighty-seventh year of her age. Mrs. Hutchinson
received an excellent education in her girlhood and after her graduation came to
Kansas in response to a call sent out for school teachers and was teaching
school in Marshall county at the time of her marriage. To that union no children
have been born. Mr. and Mrs. Hutchinson are members of the Presbyterian church
and have for years taken a warm interest in the various beneficences of the same.


Additional Comments:
Extracted from:

History of Marshall County, Kansas: its people, industries, and institutions
by
Emma E. Forter

Indianapolis, Ind.: B.F. Bowen & Co. (1917)

File at: http://files.usgwarchives.net/ks/marshall/bios/hutchins8bs.txt

This file has been created by a form at http://www.poppet.org/ksfiles/

File size: 8.6 Kb