Owen S. Myers (Biography)

[genealogynut]

Taken from Kansas: A Cyclopedia of State History, embracing events, institutions, industries, cunties, cities, towns, prominent persons, etc....., edited by Frank W. Blackmar, Vol. III, Part One, pgs. 531-532.

Owen S. Myers, president of the First National Bank at Moline, Kan., and one of the prominent citizens and substantial business men in Elk County, was born in Scott county, Iowa, Jan. 2, 1871.  He is a son of Smith E. Myers and wife, nee Emma J. Merrill, the former born in New York state and the latter was a Virginian by birth.  Smith E. Myers came to Iowa when a young man and there accumulated wealth, his principal commercial activities being as a stockman and money lender.  In 1855 he removed to Kansas and located at Moline, where he resided until his death.  He was a Republican in his political views.

Owen S. Myers spent his early youth in Iowa and received his education in the public school of Princeton, that state, and at the Fort Scott Normal, at Fort Scott, Kan., where he graduated in 1889.  He then began life on his own responsibility, by engaging in railroad work, his first employment being as a baggage man.  Later he learned telegraphy and still later became a brakeman on the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe railroad, in which capacity he was employed twenty-two months.  For some time afterward he was engaged in the stock business, and in the meantime turned his attention to law.  After diligent reading under J. Glascock, of Moline, Kan., he was admitted to the bar, May 22, 1903, and for several years was an active practitioner in the courts of Elk and Chautauqua counties. He is now president of the First National Bank of Moline, of which institution he was one of the organizers, and to which he gives the most of his attention in directing its busines affairs.  Though wealth came to him largely by inheritance, he has fully measured up to his responsibility and has proved a careful, judicious, and energetic financier, guiding the business of the bank in safe and profitable channels and accomplishing for his institution, a steady and substantial growth in its financial standing.  The First National Bank has a capital of $25,000, a surplus of $15,000 and undivided profits of $2,400.  Besides his banking interests, Mr. Myers has extensive holdings of farm lands and town property and is one of the wealthiest men of Elk county.  He is also interested in the development of the natural gas fields surrounding Moline.

In 1894 Mr. Myers was united in marriage to Miss Alice Thompson, of Lebanon, Ky., and of their union one daughter has been born, Jessie, a student in the public schools of Moline. Mrs. Myers is a devout communicant of the Roman Catholic church.  Mr. Myers has extensive and prominent fraternal affliliations.  He is a member of the Masonic order, in which he has taken the Knights Templar and Consistory degrees, and is a Past Master Mason. He is also a member of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, the Modern Woodmen of America, the Ancient Order of United Workmen, the Knights of Phythias, the Improved Order of Red Men, and the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks.  He has passed all the  "chairs" of the Modern Woodmen of America, is a Past Master Workman in the Ancient Order of United Workmen, is a Past Chancellor Commander in the Knights of Pythias, and is a Past Sachem in the Improved Order of Red Men.  Politically, he is a Democrat and served as mayor of Moline two terms--in 1903 and again in 1908-9.  As a financier and as a citizen he is progressive and lends his support and influence to all movements that have as their aim the advancement of his community and of the great commonwealth of Kansas.