Charles J. Wartman

CHARLES J. WARTMAN is proprietor of what has become well known for a number of years as the Wartman Ranch in Stanton County. His affairs have been successfully conducted as a cattleman and land owner, and his experience both early and late has brought him a comfortable share of the prosperity that is the due reward of those who have had the courage to remain in this country, grow up with it and develop its possibilities to the point they have now reached.

Mr. Wartman has lived in Stanton County all the years of his manhood. He was only a boy of fourteen when he came into this region of the West with his parents, and he finished his education in a country school. He lived at home until past his majority and laid the foundation of his individual career as a wage worker. He found employment on ranches, and for two years was with David Pitts, a noted rancher of Garden City. At that time men of his capacity were paid from $18 to $25 a month. When he was about twenty-five years of age he abandoned wage working and started farming and running cattle for himself in the western part of Stanton County. He owned no land and did not need to, since the range was open and free. He finally homesteaded the southeast quarter of section 23, township 29, range 42. On this he erected the first shelter which he could really call his own. It was a box cabin 12 by 16 feet, while a barn 14 by 32 feet accommodated his stock. With that as his headquarters he looked after his cattle until he had proved up his homestead. Finally he moved the house to its present location and it is now part of his larger and more commodious residence.

He has occupied the Wartman Ranch since 1906. At that time he bought the west half of section 11. This land, with improvements, was then worth $1,400 a quarter section. While this has been the center of his main activities, he also owns six other quarter sections and is using it for handling his herd of about 300 White Face cattle.

Mr. Wartman began his cattle business with a few cows and calves, pastured along with the stock of his father and brothers. He has been grading them up with registered White Face males, and cows and calves still form the prominent feature of his business. He has secured prices for yearlings ranging all the way from $16 to $45 a head. He grows considerable feed on his land, chiefly maize, kaffir corn and cane, and it is all fed to his own stock. In recent years, he says, crop conditions have been more reliable than that period of fifteen or twenty years ago when everybody in Stanton County was a "poor settler."

Mr. Wartman has assumed his share of public responsibilities, is now serving as a member of the board of school district No. 29, the Rorick school, and was clerk of Stanton Township when he lived there. His present home is in Roanoke Township. Politically he is a republican and began voting that ticket in Stanton County.

Mr. Wartman was born in Newton County, Indiana, January 25, 1875, but grew up and received his early education in Kansas. He is a son of the late John A. Wartman, who died October 15, 1911, while a member of the State Legislature from Stanton County. John A. Wartman was born at Newburg, Ontario, Canada, January 10, 1840. His ancestors had come to Canada from England. He and his two brothers, Calvin and Schuyler, moved from Canada to the United States, Schuyler dying in Iowa, while Calvin returned to Canada.

John A. Wartman came to the United States in 1865, locating near Newton, Indiana, where with his brother he engaged in the cattle business for a number of years. That section of Indiana was then a rather desolate district of sand ridge and swamp and was chiefly suitable for cattlemen. In 1882 he brought his family to Kansas and spent two years each in Labette and Kiowa counties, in which latter he took his first claim. In 1886 he removed to Stanton County, homesteading and proving up a claim southeast of Johnson. For a time he was in the mercantile business at Johnson, but later took another claim and in the west portion of Stanton County. On this farm he lived until his death. He was both a stockman and farmer and left a modest estate.

Politically he early identified himself with the republican party. He served as county commissioner of Stanton County two terms, was elected county treasurer, filling that office two terms, and in January, 1911, was sent to the Legislature. There he acquitted himself as became a man of his years and experience. His worth as a citizen recommended him to the public as a safe man to entrust with public affairs, and in all his individual candidacies he never resorted to any extent to speech making, since that was unnecessary. He was one of Stanton County's best known citizens. For many years he was an active member of the Methodist Church.

John A. Wartman married at Odessa, Canada, January 30, 1870, Miss Jane Emery. She was born at Newvale, Canada, January 26, 1849, and died October 5, 1905. After their marriage they returned to the United States and lived in Indiana until coming to Kansas. Their children were: Amanda, wife of Charles Heinlen, of Stanton County; Charles J.; Fred A., a rancher of Stanton County; Calvin, also in the stock business here; and Eva, wife of Daniel Davis, of Baca County, Colorado.

Charles J. Wartman married in Grant County, Kansas, June 30, 1903, Miss Ruby Lee. She was born at Newton, Kansas, September 23, 1882, a daughter of Albert Lee, who was an early settler in the state, a merchant at Newton but now a resident of Ulysses in Grant County. Mrs. Wartman acquired her early education in the district schools of that county. Children of Mr. and Mrs. Wartman are: Wenonah Susan Jane, Thomas Lee, Blanche Evelyn, Charles Harry, Herma Emery, Delmar Alfred and John Albert.