By Dr. Ferrell Miller, Geary County Historical Society Researcher
WW II strategist, hero and later 34th U.S. President of the United States from 1953-1961 Dwight Eisenhower (Ike) had a connection with Junction City. Ike’s younger brother, Roy, lived in Junction City most of his adult life.
The storefront at 622 N. Washington Street was the site of the Eisenhower Drug Store from 1920 until the mid-1940s. Roy had taken a special course in pharmacy after graduating from Abilene High School. He received a diploma and a certificate from the State of Kansas permitting him to practice his vocation within the state. Though Roy always referred to himself as the “druggist,” Ike preferred the term “pharmacist” when describing his brother.
Roy was born in 1892 and was 28 years old when he got the opportunity to purchase the Reed Drug Store in Junction City . He moved his family here from Ellsworth, Kansas. In 1917, Roy married Edna Shade, who was a registered nurse and whom he had met while working at a hospital in Ellsworth. They worked and struggled to make their new venture prosper during the lean years immediately following the WW I boom in Junction City. For a while the young family lived in the rooms above the drugstore. As their daughters, Pat and Peggy, and son, Lloyd Edgar, grew, they lived in several locations around town until about 1930 when they moved into the house at 417 West First Street.
Roy was described as a “red-hot Republican,” and took more of an active role in local politics than did any of his brothers. Because of the relationship between Fort Riley and Junction City, Roy Eisenhower was better known to the officers and men at Fort Riley than was his military brother.
Fred Souttar, a former Junction Citian recalled one of the times when Ike visited Junction City. In a letter written to the Geary County Historical Society, Fred shared the following memory: “ It happened many years ago in the early 1920s. It was a Sunday night in Junction City. In those days only a few drugstores and cafes were open. Theaters did not have Sunday shows and all other stores were closed. Several of us high school students had gathered in the drugstore on Washington Street for want of something to do. We were chatting away when the door opened and the owner, Roy Eisenhower, entered with a young man in uniform. Only a few of us were in the store, but Roy walked back to where we were seated and introduced his brother, “Ike”, who had graduated from the military academy at West Point. I remember the proud way Roy looked at his older brother.”
Roy Eisenhower died suddenly of an apoplectic stroke in 1942 at the age of 49 and did not see his brother attain his greatest glory. However, to many in Junction City, the General, the President and the Stateman, was best remembered as Roy Eisenhower’s brother.
Fred Beeler, a Junction City native who later lived in Manhattan, recalled that when Ike was in Abilene during and after his presidential years, “he would drive his Secret Service guys nuts when he’d occasionally slip away and borrow a car from one of his Abilene friends and drive himself over to Junction City to pay a visit to his brother’s widow.” She died in 1989 at the age of 97.
The address at 622 N. Washington was a drug store as early as 1880. In the late 1940s and 50s the Leedy Drug Store was both a pharmacy and gathering place at that address where people could go to get caught up on the latest gossip, have an ice cream soda, a Coke or similar product. There were other businesses at 622 N. Washington. For a while Netquest Computers used the building, but 622 N. Washington Street is now used by Activated Dance Studio.
Source: JC Union. November 12, 2011; Junction City’s Connection To Eisenhower – His Brother by Gaylynn Childs, retired Executive Director of the Geary County Historical Society.