Clay Co., KS AHGP-Portrait and Biographical Album of Washington, Clay and Riley Counties-Edward Reed
Portrait and Biographical Album of Washington, Clay and Riley Counties Chapman Brothers, Chicago, 1890
EDWARD W. REED. Among the Garfield Township pioneers of '63, came Mr. Reed in the spring of that year and took up a homestead claim of 160 acres in the month of May, and here for a period of twenty years he has continued to live and is looked upon as one of the old landmarks without mention of whose name the annals of Clay County would be incomplete. His first dwelling was a 10 x 12 frame house and his first operations as a tiller of the soil were conducted in a highly primitive style. He labored under the difficulties of a distant market and imperfect farming implements, but patience and perseverance prevailed and as the seasons passed and the soil responded to the efforts of the husbandman, Mr. Reed in time found himself making decided headway. He added gradually to his first purchase and has now a well-regulated farm of 210 acres with 150 acres under the plow and the balance in meadow and pasturage. He is a man with quiet tastes and lives comfortable without making a grand display.
Mr. Reed was born in the city of Boston. Mass., March 21, 1841, and lived there until a youth of seventeen years, attending the common schools and being otherwise variously employed. He was, however, of an adventurous disposition and at the age mentioned engaged as a common sailor on an ocean vessel and on account of his aptitude and the faithful performance of his duties, was in three months promoted to ship keeper. Later he became a second mate and finally was promoted to the position of mate of the vessel. He sailed from Boston to various foreign ports, meeting many strange people and gaining a wide knowledge of different parts of the world. He met with the usual experience of life on the ocean, enduring hardships and encountering storms. On the 7th of January, 1864, while on board the "H. Grover" bound for China, the vessel was wrecked in the Gulf Stream when three days out and with its cargo was lost. Mr. Reed, with the crew of twenty-two men after being in the water several hours clinging to the wreck, was picked up by the "William A. Grozier" and conveyed to the Island of St. Thomas, where they landed. Mr. Reed had left of his worldly possessions the crown of a strew hat, his pants and a shirt. Eighteen of the twenty-two men afterward died as the result of overeating fruit and the exposure consequent upon the wreck.
From St. Thomas Mr. Reed embarked on the same ship which took him from the wreck, a whaler, as ship keeper and remained with it until 1868. That year he quit the sea and we next find him in Chicago. Ill., as Agent of the Buckeye Harvesting Company. He was thus occupied one year and the following spring found him a homesteader in Northern Kansas where he has since remained. He was married in Cloud County, this State, Nov. 10, 1874, to Miss Mary C., daughter of Conrad and Louisa Kirchner. Mrs. Reed was born in Lafayette County, Mo., April 17, 1860 and came to Clay County, this State, with her parents in 1869. They took up a homestead in Bloom Township where they still live. To Mr. and Mrs. Reed there have been born two children, Mary E. and Charlotte.