George D. Royer

GEORGE D. ROYER. Gove County was organized in 1886. The Royer family has been identified with that section in Kansas from the year preceding, 1885. They are known as land owners, cattle men and bankers, and one of them is George D. Royer, who came to manhood in this county and is now cashier of the Exchange State Bank of Gove.

All the family came from Carroll County, Maryland, where George D. Royer was born August 6, 1871. He is descended from one of three brothers who came from either Switzerland or Northern France and settled in Pennsylvania in colonial times. His grandfather, Christian Royer, spent his life in Carroll County, Maryland, as a farmer. Jesse Royer, who is now a resident of Gove, was born in Carroll County in 1846, grew up and married there, and in 1872 came west and settled in Nodaway County, Missouri. He followed the trade of stone mason there and in 1885 moved to Gove County, Kansas, homesteading 160 acres of land which is now owned by his son Jacob C. The extent of his prosperity here was measured by the accumulation of 960 acres, all of which is now owned and controlled by his son Jacob. He retired from business in 1908 and has since lived in Gove. Judge Royer is a republican, and during the early days of Gove County served two terms as probate judge. He married Elizabeth Ann Shamberger, who was born in Baltimore County, Maryland, in 1844. They had a family of seven children: Esther, wife of G. A. Jones, now living at Lincoln, Nebraska; George D.; Sarah Julia, who died when seven years old; Mary, wife of Dr. J. J. Barclay, president of the Exchange State Bank of Gove and mentioned elsewhere; Jacob C., who is the owner and occupant of the old homestead; Ethel E., wife of Albert G. Jeffryes, a mine owner and coal operator at Trinidad, Colorado; and Grace, wife of Eugene G. Smith, a rancher in Gove County.

George D. Royer was one year old when his parents moved to Missouri and was about fourteen when they established their home in Gove County. In the meantime he had attended public schools at Graham, Missouri. In Kansas he was a student in the old Salina Normal School. Up to the age of twenty-one he lived on his father's farm. When about nineteen he taught school in Gove County for about a year. After that he was clerk in a store at Gove five years, and in 1895 finished a course in the Wichita Commercial College. Mr. Royer is primarily a rancher and cattleman, the owner of 1,600 acres of land, and has been associated in the stock business with his brother Jacob.

In 1903 he accepted the post of assistant cashier of the Exchange State Bank of Gove. For a number of years he has been its cashier. The other officers are Dr. J. J. Barclay, president, and J. H. Naughton, vice president. The bank has a capital of $25,000 and surplus of $7,500. This institution was established as a private bank in 1889, three years after Gove was founded. If was chartered as a state bank in 1897.

In 1905 Mr. Royer represented Gove County in the session of the Legislature. He is a member and trustee of the Methodist Episcopal Church, is past master of Gove Lodge of Masons, and a member of Hays Chapter, Royal Arch Masons, and Hays Commandery, Knights Templar. His bank is a member of the Kansas State and the Kansas Bankers' Associations.

At Wayne, Nebraska, in 1897, Mr. Royer married Miss Anna B. Simonton, daughter of John L. and Lydia Simonton, both now deceased. Her father was an early settler and farmer in the states of Iowa, Kansas and Nebraska. Mr. and Mrs. Royer have two children, Beula A., born April 12, 1900, now a sophomore in the University of Denver; and George D. Jr. born in August 14, 1902, a senior in the Gove High School.