Historic People of Kansas - Last Name starts with "L"

Historic People of Kansas - "L" - Page 1

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James Henry Lane, aka: "The Grim Chieftain," Bloody Jim (1814-1866) - Principal leader of anti-slavery forces in Kansas during the Kansas-Missouri Border War and the Civil War. See full article HERE.

Samuel Lappin (1831?-1892) - Prominent in Kansas political affairs, Lappin was born in Ohio about 1831. He came to Kansas soon after the territory was organized, and in 1855 was appointed Register of Deeds for Nemaha County. He was a member of the first State Senate in 1861-62, and subsequently served in the lower house of the State Legislature. On November 26, 1862, he was appointed Assistant Quartermaster in the Union Army and served in that capacity until mustered out on September 20, 1865. He was elected Kansas State Treasurer in 1874 and served until December, 1875, when he was asked to resign on account of certain irregularities in his office. On December 21, 1875, a suit was filed against him for "forgery, counterfeiting and embezzlement," and on January 13, 1876, he was arrested in Chicago, Illinois The following July, he managed to escape from the jail and went to South America. He returned to the United States in 1880; was recognized in Washington Territory, and on October 23, 1884, was brought back to Kansas for trial. The claims of the state were finally satisfied through the sale of Lappin's property, and on December 24, 1885, the case was dismissed. Lappin then again took up his residence at Seneca, Nemaha County, but later moved to La Center, Washington, where he died on August 4, 1892.

Amos Adams Lawrence (1814-1886) - For whom the city of Lawrence, Kansas, was named, Amos was born in Boston, Massachusetts on July 31, 1814. His preparation for college was made under the instruction of Reverend Jonathan F. Stearns. He graduated from Harvard with a Bachelor's Degree in 1835, and a Masters degree in 1838, after which he entered the mercantile business. He interested himself in the manufacture of cotton, which had been the business of his father, and was president and director of several banks and industrial corporations in Massachusetts. Lawrence married Sarah Elizabeth Appleton in 1842. He became associated with Eli Thayer and others in the colonization of Kansas and was treasurer of the Emigrant Aid Company. He was twice nominated for governor of Massachusetts by the Whigs and Unionists. At the outbreak of the Civil War he assisted in recruiting the Second Massachusetts Volunteer Cavalry Regiment. He built Lawrence Hall for the Episcopal Theological Seminary in Cambridge, at a cost of $75,000. He was treasurer of Harvard College 1857-63, and an overseer 1879-85. In 1846 he gave $10,000 for the establishment of a literary institution in Appleton, Wisconsin called the Lawrence Institute (now Lawrence University) of Wisconsin. He gave nearly $12,000 toward founding a Free-State college in Kansas, which sum, after a series of changes, went to the University of Kansas. He died at Nahant, Massachusetts, August 22, 1886.

Oscar E. Learnard (1832-1911) - Lawyer, journalist and soldier, Leanard was born at Fairfax, Vermont on November 14, 1832. Learnard was educated at Bakersfield Academy, the Norwich University, and graduated from the Albany Law School as a member of the class of 1854. In 1855 he came to Kansas and settled at Lawrence, and the next year he commanded a "mounted regiment" of the Free-State forces in the Kansas-Missouri Border War. In the spring of 1857 he helped to locate and lay out the town of Burlington, where he built the first mill, the first business building, and a building used for school and church purposes. He was a member of the council in the first Free-State Legislature in 1857, was president of the convention which met at Osawatomie on May 18, 1859, and organized the Republican Party in Kansas. After the state government was established he was made a Judge of the Fifth Judicial Circuit. This position he resigned to enter the army as lieutenant-colonel of the First Kansas Infantry, and served on the staffs of Generals Hunter and Denver until in 1863, when he resigned his commission. When Price undertook to enter Kansas in the fall of 1864, Colonel Learnard again joined the forces for the defense of the state, and took part in the Battle of the Blue and the engagement at Westport, Missouri. He served two terms in the Kansas State Senate, was superintendent of the Haskell Institute for one year, was for a quarter of a century special attorney and tax commissioner for the Kansas City, Fort Scott & Memphis Railroad Company. In 1884 he bought the Lawrence Daily Journal, which he published for many years. Learnard died at Lawrence on November 6, 1911.

Mary Elizabeth Lease (1853-1933) - Lawyer, lecturer, and author, she was born at Ridgway, Pennsylvania on September 11, 1853. She was educated at St. Elizabeth's Academy, Allegany, New York and soon after leaving school came to Kansas, where she was admitted to the bar in 1885. In 1888 she made her first public political speech in a union labor convention, and two years later she made over 160 speeches in Kansas for the Farmers' Alliance, attracting wide attention by her radical words. She was appointed president of the State Board of Charities, being the first woman in the United States to hold such a position. She was one of the orators on "Kansas Day" at the Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893; represented Kansas at the National Conference of Charities and Corrections the same year, and was vice-president of the World's Peace Congress. On January 30, 1873, she was married to Charles L. Lease at the Osage Mission. By 1890, her involvement in the growing revolt of Kansas farmers against high mortgage and railroad rates placed her in the forefront of the People's (Populist) Party, and she once again began to make a number of speeches for the cause. However, by 1896, she had become alienated from the Populist Party and thereafter focused on personal interests. In 1901 she obtained a divorce from her husband, and soon after moved to New York. She wrote for several magazines and was the author of "The Problem of Civilization Solved." She died in 1933.

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