ROBERT PINDER.
Robert Pinder, the efficient and capable manager of the Effingham Lumber Company, while having been a resident of Effingham but a few years, has so identified himself with the life of the community and taken such an active part in the city’s affairs, that his citizenship is an important and component part of the body politic. He is a hustler in both thought and deed, and strives to advance his city as well as managing his business at profit, and so as to gain increasing prestige for the lumber company’s business, which has been under the present management since 1912. The company conducts a general lumber business, and sells all kinds of building material, such as farm gates, Crown and Tulsa silos, of superior make, tiling, roofing and roof paints, etc. The sheds and yards cover six lots, and Mr. Pinder employs two men to care for the business. The president of the company is W. C. Alexander, of Atchison; the vice president is T. B. Pinder, of Clifton, Kan., and the general manager and secretary-treasurer is Robert Pinder, with whom this narrative is directly concerned.
Robert Pinder was born September 5, 1872, in Timberland, England, a son of John and Anna (Burton) Pinder, who were farmers in their native country, and about 1894 immigrated to this country and settled on a farm near Everest, Kan., where they died. In 1886 Robert was indentured at Martindales, England, for three years and one and one-half years at Horncastle, to grocery and provision merchants, with the understanding that he was to receive his board and lodging, and his father was to provide for other necessaries, such as wearing apparel, and medicine, in case of sickness. His periods of indenture required both day and night service and to play no games, or frequent taverns or dice tables, or contract matrimony, or buy and sell. For an American boy to be required to do anything of this sort would be considered the rankest injustice, and he would rebel at being compelled seemingly to sacrifice his liberty and become a bound employe for so long a time. But such is the custom in England, and the training which Robert Pinder received during his four and one-half years of indenture proved exceedingly valuable lo him in later years. After serving his time as an apprentice he continued in the provision business for three and one-half years longer, and then came to America, journeying direct to Doniphan county in 1894. In the spring of the following year he moved out on the farm owned by his father, who had brought the entire family, with the exception of one brother, to this country. He assisted his father in the cultivation of the farm for four years, and then accepted a position in the lumber business of E. L. Alexander, at Everest, Kan., in the spring of 1899. Three months later he became manager of the Purcell Lumber Company, at Purcell, Kan., and remained in this position for three years, following which employment he was manager of the Alexander Lumber Company at Havensville, Kan., for over ten years. In the spring of 1912 Mr. Pinder came to Effingham and took charge of the Effingham Lumber Company. His success in the lumber business has been marked and rapid, and is an indication of true and tireless business ability of a high order. He is secretary and a stockholder of the Alexander Lumber Company, a large concern: secretary of the Harrison Lumber Company, of Garnett, Kan., and is interested in this concern as a stockholder. Mr. Pinder also administered the family estate after his father’s death in 1909, and his mother’s demise in the year following. There were eight children in the family: Frederick died in infancy; John W., living, in England; Edith Mary, wife of William Pinder, of Huron, Kan.; Robert; Charles, a farmer living near Huron: Henrietta died at Everest; Emma A., wife of Arthur Harris, of Everest; Thomas Benton, in the lumber business at Clifton, Kan.
Mr. Pinder was married November 1, 1900, to Harriet M. Pinder, who was born in Denton, a daughter of A. G. Pinder, a farmer, residing near Huron, Kan. Four children have blessed this union: Ruth Mary, born in November, 1901; Cecil Francis, born in 1903; Leslie Benton, born in 1906; John Sylvester, born in 1909.
Mr. Pinder is a progressive Republican, and has pronounced and decided views upon independence in politics, and believes in “a government of the people and by the people,” and not for the benefit of the favored few. He is affiliated with the Methodist Episcopal church, and is fraternally allied with the Knights and Ladies of Security, and the Lumberman’s “Hoo-Hoo” society.