Clay Co., KS AHGP-Portrait and Biographical Album of Washington, Clay and Riley Counties-George W. Hays
Portrait and Biographical Album of Washington, Clay and Riley Counties Chapman Brothers, Chicago, 1890
GEORGE W. HAYS, of the firm of Hays & Mowell,lumber dealers, Morganville, Clay County, is an energetic business man, and a highly respected citizen.
He is the only lumber dealer in the place, and has sole management of the business, his partner being a non-resident. They carry a stock of about $8,000, which they will increase as they intend to keep constantly on hand a full line of building material. The business is yet in its infancy, having been begun in August, 1889.
Mr. Hays was born in Beaver County, Pa., in the year 1855. He was a child of five years when his parents, William and Sarah (Fulton) Hays, removed to Columbiana County, Ohio. There our subject was reared, and educated in the schools of Wellsville. There the mother died about the year 1862, the father surviving until 1884. In 1879. Mr. Hays came to Manhattan and worked as a farm hand for a faw months. He then began working at the carpenter's trade, and continued so employed in Manhattan for about one and a half years. Thence he came to Topeka, and thence to Wamego. Following this he went to Clyde, whence he came to this place in the fall of 1884. He worked at his trade and assisted in building the principal part of the city. He was the leading carpenter of the place, and doing a good business when he abandoned it to enter the field in which he is now employed.
In this place, in March, 1887, the rites of wedlock were celebrated between our subject and Mary, daughter of William Silvers (see sketch). The union has been blessed by the birth of one little prattler, Leah.
The parents of Mr. Hays were natives of West Virginia, and when young moved to Pennsylvania. The father was first married to Lutitia Woodrow, who bore him three children. They are. John W.; Lutitia, now Mrs. Harper Ralston, of Clyde. Kan.; and William M. Our subject's mother was the second wife of his father. She bore six children, namely: Samuel F., David C., George W., James H., and Henry A. and Mary (twins). Henry A. was drowned in the Scioto disaster on the Ohio River, by the sinking of an excursion steamer in , September, 1881.
Mrs. Hays is a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church, and holds a high standing among the members of that body. Mr. Hays already has high rank among the young citizens and businessmen of Morganville, where he is recognized as n man of strict probity in business relations and of unblemished private character.