BIOGRAPHY: John McPhee; Salt Lake City, Salt Lake, Utah

Transcribed by W. David Samuelsen for The USGenWeb Archives Project
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History of Utah
The Storied Domain
A Documentary History of Utah's Eventual Career
by J. Cecil Alter
Vol. 2, published 1932 (expired copyright)
The American Historical Society, Inc.

JOHN MCPHEE, postmaster of Salt Lake City, has lived in Utah since early
childhood. He was born at Kilwinning, Scotland, February 22, 1879, and was
about four years of age when his parents came to Utah in 1883. He is a son of
Charles and Jane (Dickie) McPhee, his father a native of Lanrickshire and his
mother of Ayrshire, Scotland. His father after coming to Utah followed mining
and prospecting.

John McPhee attended the Salt Lake High School and as a youth was employed by
the Street Railway Company. During 1902-04 he was absent from the state on
mission work for the Latter Day Saints Church in Scotland. After his return he
became a salesman for the Breeden Office Supply Company and Arrow Press, and
was with those organizations for nearly a quarter of a century, until
appointed postmaster on May 22, 1928, by President Coolidge. Mr. McPhee has
always been active in the Republican party. As a churchman he has been most
interested in recreational work through the Sunday School and Young Men's
Mutual Improvement Association. He is a former president of the One Hundred
Ninety-fifth Quorum of Seventy. Mr. McPhee is a member of the Salt Lake
Chamber of Commerce and the Kiwanis Club.

He married at Salt Lake City, June 10, 1908, Miss Effie Pyper, and they have
one daughter, Mary Jane McPhee.

The late Alexander Crookshank Pyper, father of Mrs. McPhee, was a man who
contributed to the industrial development of Utah and was an important figure
in the history of the state. He was born at Largs, Ayrshire, Scotland, May 18,
1828. On coming to America he spent some time in Saint Louis, then at Council
Bluffs, Iowa, at Florence, Nebraska, and in 1859 crossed the plains, bringing
several wagonloads of merchandise, with which he opened a business at Salt
Lake City. He also established a chemical laboratory in the Sugar House Ward,
and was employed by Brigham Young to conduct his private outside business. He
was connected with one of the departments of the Zion's Cooperative Mercantile
Institution and was the pioneer in the promotion of the silk industry, his
individual enterprise setting a successful example and resulting in the
upbuilding of this branch of business over the intermountain region. From 1874
until his death on July 29, 1882, he was police judge of Salt Lake City. He
served ten years on the City Council and was bishop of the Twelfth Ward.