Brown County Biographies
From "The Annals of Brown County", Grant Harrington, 1903
Charles H. Lawrence.
Charles H. Lawrence, the genial
Secretary of the Hiawatha Commercial Club, was horn In Dutchess
County, N. Y. May 13. 1844. He received a two years course In Clark
Seminary at Aurora, Ill. and then
began making a living for himself.
He was anxious to be a soldier during the war and enlisted three times
but was rejected on account of a
broken shoulder received while a
boy. He then went into the railway
military service and served from 1863
to the close of the war. After the
war he continued to railroad in the
south until 1870.
In the spring of 1871 he came to Hiawatha and went into the real estate
business. He was elected Constable
of Hiawatha Township In 1873 and
re-elected in 1874. He was also deputy sheriff of Brown County and held
the office for two years. He broke
up the gang of horse thieves that
were operating in the county and
landed five of them in the penitentiary. On leaving the sheriff's office
he purchased the harness business
from J. O. Gardner and ran this until 1883 when he sold the business to
J. C. Kelsey. He was city clerk of
Hiawatha from 1887 to 1891, serving
through the troublesome times when
the water works system was being
installed in Hiawatha. He was one
of the organizers of the Electric
Light Company and was its secretary for a number of years. He has
always been an enthusiastic worker
in the county fair and was secretary
of the association for eleven years.
When the Commercial club was organized in Hiawatha Mr. Lawrence
was at once picked upon for secretary of the club and he has performed
the duties of that office to the utmost satisfaction of the members of
the club looking carefully after the
details of the office and never letting
an opportunity go by to boom Hiawatha and her business Interests.
Mr. Lawrence is an enthusiastic
Mason and is recognized as one of
the best ritualistic workers in the
state of Kansas. He Is a Past Master
of Hiawatha Lodge No. 35, a Past
High Priest of Mt. Horeb Chapter,
No. 43, and a Past Commander of Hiawatha Commandery, No. 13 K. T.
Mr. Lawrence has been married
twice. His first wife was Miss Lottie M. Beardslee whom he married in
Battlecreek, Mich., in 1871 and who
died five months afterwards. He
was married in 1879 at Hiawatha, to
Miss Emma J. Houghton. They
have one son, Edward K. who graduated from the Hiawatha Academy
with the class of 1899, served in the
Spanish-American war with the
Twenty-Second Kansas, attended
Medical school at the University of
Nebraska, successfully passed the
necessary examination and is now a
practicing physician at Albert, Kansas.
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This website created Jan. 11, 2012 by Sheryl McClure.
� 2011 Kansas History and Heritage Project
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