Did You Know This About Geary County History?”By Dr. Ferrell MillerGeary County Historical Society Board Member<figure>
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 </figure>“Abraham Lincoln Visits The Kansas Territory”Abraham Lincoln’s birthday is February 12th, 1809. With the Uniform Monday Holiday Act of 1971, Lincoln and George Washington’s birthdays are celebrated on what is called President’s Day. It is not a federal holiday. States are permitted to make their own decision about closing offices and schools.Today’s story is not specifically about Geary County history, although the news about Abraham Lincoln visiting the Kansas Territory was likely read about and/or discussed in various places around the county.On December 1st, 1859, a tall gangly traveler got off a riverboat in the little Kansas town of Elwood, which is just across the Missouri River from St. Joseph, Missouri. The traveler was identified the next day in the Elwood “Free Press” as the honorable Abraham Lincoln, who according to the report “kindly consented to make a speech here although he was somewhat under the weather and fatigued with the journey.” During the following week, Lincoln visite the few towns and settlements in the eastern part of the strife-torn Kansas territory. He had come to see for himself the situation and the territory. The issue of concern, of course, was whether to allow or prohibit slavery.Albert Richards was one among a crowd of forty people who gathered to hear Lincoln speak in the little town of Troy in Doniphan County. Mr. Richards recorded the following about the future President:“There was none of the magnetism of a multitude to inspire the long angular, ungainly orator, who rose up behind a rough table. In a conversational tone he argued the question of slavery in the territories in the language of an average Ohio or New York farmer. I thought, if the Illinoisans consider this a great man, their ideas must be very peculiar. But in 10 or 15 minutes I was unconsciously drawn by the clearness and logic of his argument. His fairness and candor were very noticeable. He ridiculed nothing and misrepresented nothing.”The address lasted three quarters of an hour and when Lincoln concluded his remarks an older man originally from Kentucky, the heaviest slaveholder in the area, was asked to respond. He began with this honest comment: “I have heard, during my life all the ablest public speakers, all the eminent statesmen of the past and the present generation and candor compels me to say - that this is the most logical speech I ever listened to.”On January 29, 1861, Kansas entered the Union as a “Free State”. In March of 1861, just 16 months after his visit to Kansas, Lincoln became our 16th President until his assassination in 1865.“A Valentine’s Day Wedding”One of Geary County’s earliest love stories began during the turbulent days in July 1855,when the first territorial legislature met in the little town of Pawnee, which no longer exists.That area is now a part of the Fort Riley reservation. New settlers were pouring into the new town every day.A 16 year old girl by the name of Ruth Barry, had come from Pennsylvania with her brother-in-law and his family. Arriving at the same time as the delegates to the Kansas legislature, the Barry family was recruited to assist with the efforts to feed the delegates, even before they had found lodging or shelter for themselves. Young Ruth was put to work making over 70 pies under the most primitive conditions.Among the dignitaries was Governor Andrew Reeder and a young man by the name of Gabert Fischer Gordon. Gabert was placed at the Governor’s table that night when Ruth served pieces of the pies she had made. According to family accounts, it was love at first sight. Even though Mr. Gordon was considerably older than Ruth he courted her persistently during the cholera epidemic and destruction of the town of Pawnee and… he eventually won her hand.On a February night in 1856, Ruth and her sister crossed the frozen Kansas River in an ox-drawn sleigh made from a converted lumber wagon. Their destination was the former Territorial Capitol building which had become the quarters of the Post Chaplain and his family.It was in that building and on Valentine’s Day 1856 where she and Grabert Gordon were married. The wedding took place in the same room where just months before the issues of slavery, freedom and the future of Kansas had been debated.

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