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Buchanan County MOGenWeb Project

County coordinator and webmaster: Sharlene K. Miller, CG

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Biographies of Buchanan County Residents:

Buford Adams

Transcribed by Danielle Thompson

From the History of Buchanan County and the City of St Joseph and Representative Citizens

 

     BUFORD ADAMS, district manager at St. Joseph of District No. 2, Missouri & Kansas Telephone Company, and one of the city's well-known citizens, was born in 1876 in Carroll County, Missouri, and is a son of William H. and Martha (Sands) Adams.

     William H. Adams was born in Maryland and his wife in Indiana. After completing his education he taught school in Maryland for a time and then learned the cabinetmaking trade, which he followed for 10 years in Indiana. Deciding to turn his attention to farming, he purchased a farm in Lafayette County, Missouri, which he operated a few years and then removed to Ray County and from there to Carroll County following farming until 1884, when he settled at Carrolltown, where he now resides. He married Martha Sands, of near Frankfort, Indiana, and they had nine children, of whom five survive, namely: Maggie, who is the wife of L.L. Campbell; Dell M., who married Nodia Millstead; Carrie, who is the wife of Dr. Amos Lovell; and Buford, our subject, who married Elma Burrows.

     Mr. Adams enjoyed only the educational advantages offered by the public schools and as soon as he had completed the course he secured employment with the Pacific Express Company. He continued in the express business for some time, but close attention and constant confinement of this character told on his health, and, after a serious illness at St. Louis, he took his physician's advice and sought outside employment, severing his pleasant connection of five years with the express companies. In a short time he was offered and accepted a position of manager of the Missouri & Kansas Telephone Company, with offices at Carrollton, Missouri, where he remained two years and was then transferred to Joplin and was placed in charge as manager of the Joplin and Carthage (Missouri) exchange, where he became manager at St. Joseph. On October 1, 1904, hw was made district manager of District No. 2, composed of 18 counties.

     Mr. Adams' long service with this company is sufficient evidence of his ability and fidelity to duty. Under his intelligent management the company has prospered and the public has been accommodated. In political sentiment he is a Democrat. Fraternally, he is a Knight of Pythias, having his membership in a local lodge at St. Joseph, and is a member of the Commercial, Benton and Lotus clubs.