IV
The Kokomo of Kern’s time was one of the live-wire towns of the state. He has himself described it in his address at the James Whitcomb Riley birthday dinner many years afterward, when he said: “And where did I first meet Riley? Where do you suppose I met him? Why, in Kokomo, of course! Where else could I have met him? What was he doing in Kokomo? Why did he come to Kokomo? Because the afflatus was in Kokomo in those days. The divine afflatus, the prophetic afflatus, afflatus in unbroken and original packages; some in broken and aboriginal packages.”
When the sign “John W. Kern, Attorney at Law,” was hung out in 1870 there were no factories as now and no artisan class. It was above the average of county seats at the time and yet they were just beginning to build streets and it was not an extraordinary sight to see wagons mired in the thoroughfares. There were no clubs, but the “poor man’s club” was all too much in evidence, and the Clinton House, standing on the present site of the Frances Hotel, was a favorite gathering place for the gossips. It was a paradise for the gambler—the happy hunting grounds of the sporty element who flocked from afar, flamboyant in its cheap finery, unafraid of the law or the authorities, plucking the innocents without let or hindrance, crowding the “poor man’s clubs” with boisterous company. And just beyond this element in a sort of a mysterious haze loomed a more sinister element supposed to be engaged in transactions frowned upon by the laws of state and nation. This was the situation during the first twelve of the fifteen years of Kern’s residence in the town. Then something happened that brought about a cleansing. For many years the most powerful citizen, politically, among the lower strata was a physician, who was highly skilled in his profession, and known professionally over the state. He never charged the very poor for his services and thus he ingratiated himself into their affections, and he exercised a sway over the sporty element which was long hard to analyze. Many feared him without knowing why. One day, while mayor of the city, the police were informed by a traitor in his camp, who apparently feared him, that he proposed to burn the flour mill belonging to one of his enemies, and carry a leaking sack of flour to the home of another of his enemies, feared by the doctor, with the view to getting him out of the way by way of the penitentiary on the charge of arson. The police appeared at the mill as the doctor emerged with his sack of flour, and in his attempt to escape he was shot down. The incident created a sensation. The community was divided as to his guilt or innocence, and to this day there are some who cling to his memory as to the memory of a martyr. But the fact was developed that the prominent physician, potential politician and mayor was the head and brains of a lawless gang which had been under the observation of the federal secret service. His death scattered the gang, and with the gang the criminal element which revolved about it. The gamblers took to their heels. The new Kokomo emerged. But it was in the old Kokomo that John Kern passed his younger days.
It was in the midst of this environment that he was left alone, master of his own destiny, at the age of twenty. For almost immediately after he began the practice of his profession his father, hearkening to the call of the Old Dominion, and taking his daughter Sally with him, bought a home in Carvin’s Cove, a basin seven miles from Roanoke, and so surrounded by spurs of the Blue Ridge Mountains that there is but one entrance to the cove for vehicles. Here during the remainder of his life he lived the life of a recluse with his books, dogs, poultry and cattle, going every Sunday to church to teach a Sunday school. Here in the Cove Alum church on the frequent occasions of John Kern’s visits, the father listened proudly to the eloquence of the son he idolized.
But the young lawyer was always surrounded by a multitude of friends, good, bad and indifferent. His witticisms were passed about. His practical jokes were laughed over. His popularity was extraordinary. He was eagerly welcomed in every home. A slight figure, he had temper and it was known that he would “fight at the drop of a hat,” no matter how much larger and heavier his adversary.
Recognized as the orator of the community, the young lawyer was in constant demand as a speaker on all imaginable occasions, from old settlers’ meetings and Sunday school picnics to mass meetings to serve some public end.
We shall now see in tracing the story of John Kern’s political activities in the Kokomo days that when he paid tribute at a mass meeting to Garfield, the martyred president, he spoke as the long-recognized Democratic leader of the community.