Presley H. Calvert, retired farmer, of Muscotah, Kan., was born November 14, 1835, in Owington, Ky., a son of B. Warren Calvert, a native of old Virginia, and a direct descendant of Cecil Calvert (Lord Baltimore), who founded the Maryland colony in America. The mother of Presley H. Calvert was Lucy J. Hawkins before her marriage with Warren Calvert, and was born in Frankfort, Ky. In 1837 the Calvert family migrated from Kentucky to Platte county, Missouri, and were among the earliest pioneer settlers of that county. Being slaveholders in Kentucky they brought along the family slaves and improved 160 acres of land in Missouri. Both parents ended their days on the old home place in Platte county.
Presley H. was reared on the farm in Platte county and was educated in the Pleasant Ridge College, the same school attended by B. P. Waggener, of Atchison. He followed farming until the outbreak of the war between the States and then served three months in the army of General Price, being under the direct command of Captain Mitchell and in Steen’s division. He fought at the battle of Lexington, Mo., in behalf of the Confederacy and received his discharge on account of sick disability at Osceola, St. Clair county, Missouri. After his marriage in 1867 he farmed for ten years in Platte county, Missouri, and then came to Kansas, settling on a farm three miles south of Muscotah in Kapioma township. For the first ten years Mr. Calvert rented land and then invested in 160 acres of good land three miles north of Muscotah in Grasshopper township. He improved this farm and resided thereon until 1895. He then rented his farm and moved to Muscotah. Mr. Calvert paid twenty dollars per acre for his land and sold it for $5,000 when he retired from active farm work. He is now making his home with Mr. and Mrs. Will Warren. Mrs. Warren is his niece.
Mr. Calvert was married in 1867 to Miss Cora A. Jackson, born and reared in Platte county, Missouri, a daughter of Wallace Jackson, a native of Kentucky and an early settler of Missouri. Two children were born to this union: Edna and Charles, both of whom are deceased. Mrs. Calvert died in 1908, at the age of sixty years. Mr. Calvert has been a life-long Democrat of the old school. When a young man he formed one of the hardy army of freighters who crossed the plains to the Far West in charge of the great overland freight trains before the advent of the railroads. He crossed the plains on four trips to Salt Lake City and other western points in Colorado.
WILLIAM THOMAS WARREN.
William Thomas Warren is one of the younger generation of farmers in Atchison county, and is the owner of 320 acres of land one and one-half miles east of Muscotah on the White Way highway. He was born December 25, 1876, in Brown county, Kansas, and is a son of Rodney T. (born in 1846, died March 5, 1914), and Chariet (Speaks) Warren (born in 1846). Both parents were born and reared in Kentucky and came to Kansas in the spring of 1876 and settled on a farm in Brown county. Later, in 1905, Rodney T. Warren bought a farm near Centralia in Nemaha county, and resided thereon until his demise. Mrs. Warren lives at Hiawatha, Kan.
W. T. Warren was educated in the public schools of his native county and followed farming until 1903, when he left the farm and was employed in the retail meat market of Mr. Zimmerman, at Hiawatha, for a period of five years. He was then employed in the same avocation at Atchison, Falls City, Neb., and Fairbury, Neb., until October of 1911. He then came to Muscotah and entered the employ of E. W. Allen, who conducted a grocery and meat market. He remained with Mr. Allen until 1914, and then he and Mrs. Warren invested their combined capital in 320 acres of land near Muscotah.
He was married on May 22, 1912, to Miss Ella, a daughter of A. H. Calvert, grain merchant of Muscotah. (The reader is referred to the biography of A. H. Calvert, brother of Presley H. Calvert, for further details concerning Mrs. Warren’s parents.) Mrs. Warren served as the assistant cashier of the Muscotah State Bank for fifteen years. Mr. Warren is a Republican in politics and attend the Congregational church, of which Mrs. Warren is a member.
WILLIAM MANGELSDORF.
The name of Mangelsdorf is indelibly linked with the story of the commercial development of northeast Kansas and the Middle West, and the Mangelsdorf family is one of the most respected and substantial of Atchison, Kan. The review of the life of William Mangelsdorf, deceased, begins across the Atlantic in the Fatherland of Germany, where he was born and spent part of his youth, coming to America with his parents when twelve years of age. William not only achieved a wonderful success in business and accumulated wealth, but he assisted in making the family name known and respected throughout a great extent of territory wherever the output of the great seed house founded by him and his brother, August, carried its business. He left behind him a monument for business integrity and upright methods which has made his name universally respected and honored for years to come.
William Mangelsdorf was born in Armin, Prussia, February 15, 1845, a son of Christopher and Marie Anna Dorothy Mangelsdorf. Christopher Mangelsdorf died in Germany in 1849 and his widow married Andrew Stehwein, who with the family emigrated from their native land in 1849 and settled on a farm in Gasconade county, Missouri. In 1868 the family removed to Douglas county, Kansas, where they resided until the mother’s demise, after which Mr. Stehwein came to Atchison to spend the remainder of his days with his children. Five children were born to Christopher and Marie Anna Mangelsdorf: Mrs. Anna Buhman, of Atchison, Kan.; Henry, in New Mexico; Mrs. Dorothy Beurman, Lakeview, Douglas county, Kansas; William, with whom this review is directly concerned; and August, residing in Atchison.