Submitted by: Mary Snyder
In the process of researching Judge George Chandler, who was the Assistant secretery of the dept of the interior when Oklahoma territory was opened for settlement, I found this obit for Judge Ritter in a Baxter Springs, Kansas newspaper. Baxter Springs News, February 16, 1896 (Baxter Springs, Cherokee county, Kansas)
Judge J. N. Ritter dead John N. Ritter died at Battle Creek,
Michigan on Saturday, Feb. 8, 1896, at 10 o’clock a.m.
Death was due to a complication of kidney and stomach troubles
and to mental worry brought on by the failure some time ago of
the banking house of Ritter & Doubleday of Columbus. John
Newton Ritter was born in St. Joseph county, Indiana, near South
Bend, on February 8, 1844. He died February 8, 1896, on his
fifty-second birthday anniversary. His father, Jacob
Ritter, who still lives, and who was present at the bedside of
his son when he died, was the first white settler of St. Joseph
county. His grandfather, on his father’s side was a
native of Germany, and a soldier under Gen. Harrison in the war
of 1812. His mother, Elizabeth Miller, was the daughter of
a Dunkard minister. Mr. Ritter’s early education was that of
the common schools of Indiana at that time – three months
schooling to nine months of toil on the farm or in the shop.
He spent a year however, in the Northern Indiana College and then
entered the law office of Hon. W.G. George of South Bend to study
law. He subsequently, in March, 1866, graduated from the
law department of the State University at Ann Arbor, Michigan,
and was admitted to the bar in the courts of Indiana. In
the fall of 1867, he located in this county, which has ever since
been his home. He was married May 5th. 1870, to Miss
Anna E. Patty, daughter of Dr. and Mrs. L.P. Patty, at that time
residents of Chetopa, afterward residents of Wichita. Five
children was the result of the union, three sons and two
daughters, all of whom are living except one son. Judge Ritter
was elected county attorney in 1868; was re-elected in 1870, and
again in 1878, serving in all six years as public prosecutor and
during most of the turbulent times incident to the early
settlement of the county. In the spring of 1871 he was elected
mayor of Columbus and re-elected in 1872. In the fall of 1884 he
was the candidate of the Republican party for state senator from
this district, and was elected. In the spring of 1889 Hon. George
Chandler, then judge of the Eleventh judicial district, having
resigned to accept the position of Assistant Secretary of the
Interior at Washington, Mr. Ritter was appointed by Gov. Humphrey
to fill the vacancy on the bench. The appointment was only
good until the general election in the fall, but so
satisfactorally had Judge Ritter fulfilled the duties of Judge
that no one thought of his having any opposition to election
untal a very short time prior to election. The election
that fall was the beginning of a revolution in Kansas politics.
A candidate was sprung on the eve of election in opposition to
Judge Ritter and he was defeated with others who were so
unfortunate as to be candidates that year. Funeral services were
held on Monday, Feb 10, and the remains interred at South Bend,
Ind.