LUTHER CORTELYOU.
For a citizen of a small Kansas city to achieve State-wide prominence, and to become the official head of the body of mercantile men with whom he became affiliated during a long and successful career, is somewhat out of the ordinary, and is decided evidence that the recipient of such honors has received them solely because of pronounced ability of a high order. For several years, Luther Cortelyou, farmer, grain merchant, and banker, of Muscotah, Kan., was the recognized leader among the grain men of Kansas, attaining to his position by virtue of executive ability and powers of leadership. He is one of the first and best known citizens of Muscotah and Atchison county, who for more than twenty-seven years has been active in civic affairs in the county.
Luther Cortelyou was born December 23, 1851, in Somerset county, New Jersey, and is a son of James G. and Cornelia (Polhemus) Cortelyou. James Garretson Cortelyou, the father, was the son of Abraham Cortelyou, who was descended from French Hugenot colonists, who first settled on Long Island in 1624. The original ancestor of the family fled from France to a safe refuge in Holland during the persecution of the Huguenots in France. Jaques Cortelyou was the founder of the family in America and was prominent in the affairs of the colony on Long Island. His son, Peter, was a governor of the borough in which is now located Brooklyn. The descendants of Jaques Cortelyou figured in Revolutionary history.
James G. was reared in New Jersey, and there married Cornelia, a daughter of C. Polhemus, also of an old Holland family. He was the father of three children: John Gardner, deceased; Luther, of this review; and Peter J., now deceased, formerly a resident of Corning, Nemaha county, Kansas. The father died in Middlesex county, New Jersey.
Luther Cortelyou was reared to young manhood on his father’s farm, and received his primary education in the public schools of Somerset county, New Jersey. He received his academic education in Rutgers College, a Dutch Reformed college, at New Brunswick, N. J., and then attended Eastman’s Business College, at Poughkeepsie, N. Y. After his marriage he removed to Maryland, where he lived on a farm which he purchased and cultivated for twelve years. In 1889 Mr. Cortelyou sold his Maryland property and came to Kansas and located in Muscotah, Atchison county. He invested his capital in the M. J. Walsh grain elevator, and for eighteen years was engaged in the buying and shipping of grain. He extended his operations, and owned an elevator at Corning, Kan., which he sold in 1909. Mr. Cortelyou amassed a considerable competence during the many years in which he was engaged in the grain business, and became prominent in mercantile circles in the State of Kansas. For seven years he served as president of the Kansas Grain Dealers’ Association, and gained a wide acquaintance among grain dealers throughout the State and Nation. He served for one year as second vice-president of the National Grain Dealers’ Association, and also filled the post of first vice-president of the national body for one year. He disposed of his elevator in Muscotah in 1907, and has since retired from active business pursuits other than his farming and banking interests. Mr. Cortelyou is the owner of a fine farm of 250 acres in Grasshopper township, and was one of the organizers of the Farmers State Bank of Muscotah, of which thriving institution he is the president.
Mr. Cortelyou was first married in New Jersey in 1876 to Miss Gertrude Stelle, of Middlesex county, New Jersey, and this union was blessed with four children, namely: Luther, Jr., assistant cashier of the First National Bank at Parsons, Kan., married Miss Lola Allison, a daughter of Webb Allison, of Nortonville, Kan.; Stelle, formerly an engineer in the United States Government service, died in Panama of yellow fever, in 1905, at the age of twenty-two, having been the last victim to die from yellow fever on the Isthmus; Peter J., postmaster of Muscotah; Frank Morgan, born in 1886, a talented engineer, who was graduated from Kansas University engineering department, and is connected with the engineering firm of Waddell & Harrington, of Kansas City, Mo., and is now located in Vancouver, Wash., in charge of the construction of an immense bridge across the Columbia river, costing $1,750,000; this bridge connects Vancouver, Wash., and Portland, Ore., and is a link in the Pacific highway. It has twenty-nine steel-spans, and is over 17,200 feet in length. The largest dredges and pile-driving machinery in the world are required in its construction. The permanent roadway of this great structure is thirty-five feet wide with sidewalks five feet in width. Frank M. married Miss Marney Burney, of Green Forest, Ark. The mother of these children was born March 19, 1856, in New Jersey, a daughter of Peter and Sarah J. Stelle, and she departed this life February 5, 1905. Mr. Cortelyou was again married to Mrs. Alice T. Calvert, widow of J. H. Calvert, deceased merchant and banker of Muscotah, February 19, 1907.
The Democratic party has always had the allegiance of Mr. Cortelyou, and he has been prominently identified with the affairs of his party in Atchison county, and was the candidate of his party for county treasurer in 1896. He is a warm admirer of President Wilson and a supporter of the President’s policies. He was elected mayor of Muscotah in April, 1900, and served one term, and also has served as a member of the school board of Muscotah. Mr. Cortelyou is a member of the Congregational church of Muscotah, to which denomination he has been a liberal contributor: he assisted in the building of the church edifice, and has served as trustee of the church for several years. For the past thirty years or more he has been a member of the Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, and he also is affiliated with the Modern Woodmen.