| WOODSON COUNTIES, KANSAS. | 289 cont'd |
COLUMBUS L. RICE.
COLUMBUS L. RICE—On the roll of the business men of Humboldt appears the name of Columbus L. Rice. He was born in Jasper county, Missouri, on the 12th of September, 1854. His father, George D. Rice, was a native of Pennsylvania, and when a young man removed to Ohio, where he was united in marriage to Eleanor Taylor. On leaving the Buckeye state he took up his residence in Missouri, and the year 1862 witnessed his arrival in Allen county, Kansas. Soon afterward he joined the Union army as a member of the Ninth Regiment of Kansas Volunteers, and served throughout the remainder of the war, loyally aiding in the preservation of the Union. During much of his life he followed farming, but in later years he located in Humboldt, where he was engaged in the coal business until his death, in July, 1899, when he was seventy-three years of age.
Columbus L. Rice was reared upon the home farm and through the sunny days of early spring followed the plow as it turned the furrows for the planting. He afterward engaged in farming on his own account for a short time, when he entered the machinery department of the business of Johnson & Bragg at Humboldt, being thus employed for nine and a half years. On severing his connection with that firm, he entered the employ of William Rath, who was in the same line of business, and with whom he remained for seven and a half years. While there he learned the trade of a tinner and gas fitter. Subsequently he opened a hardware store of his own, conducting it for two years, when he sold out to E. W. Trego, with whom he has since remained in the capacity of tinner and gas fitter. He has always been an industrious and energetic man and has never had trouble in keeping himself employed.
Mr. Rice was married on the 23rd of March, 1879, to Miss Lydia Ann Shellman, a daughter of Joseph and Elizabeth Shellman. She was born near Bloomington, Illinois, and in 1872 came to Kansas with her parents, who settled in Humboldt, where her father was proprietor of the Sherman House. Unto Mr. and Mrs. Rice has been born a son, Robert Charles, whose birth occurred in October, 1880. In his political affiliations Mr. Rice is a Republican, but though he keeps informed on the issues of the day he has never been a politician. He is connected with the Modern
| 290 | HISTORY OF ALLEN AND |
Woodmen of America, and is well known in his community for those traits of character, which in every land and every clime command respect.
Pages 289-290, transcribed by Carolyn Ward from History of Allen and Woodson Counties, Kansas: embellished with portraits of well known people of these counties, with biographies of our representative citizens, cuts of public buildings and a map of each county / Edited and Compiled by L. Wallace Duncan and Chas. F. Scott. Iola Registers, Printers and Binders, Iola, Kan.: 1901; 894 p., [36] leaves of plates: ill., ports.; includes index.
