O. E. Skinner

O. E. SKINNER, secretary and head bookkeeper of the A. Hood & Sons Implement Company, at Columbus, is also one of the most successful poultry raisers west of the Mississippi. He was born in 1855 in Albion, Indiana, and is a son of Alfred and Samantha (Cary) Skinner.

The parents of Mr. Skinner were residents of Indiana until 1881, when they removed to Labette County, Kansas, and settled near Oswego. Both of them are now deceased. The members of the family now living are the subject of this sketch and his brother and sister. His brother is freight agent for the Santa Fe & Colorado Southern Railroad Company, at Pueblo, Colorado; and his sister, Mrs. Lillie Smith, is a resident of Lola township, Cherokee County.

O. E. Skinner was reared and schooled in Indiana, and took a complete business course at an Indianapolis commercial college. He came to Cherokee County in 1880, and began carpenter work for the firm of Branin & Bunch, but gradually drifted into his present occupation of a poultry fancier. He owns 40 acres of suitable land on which he has 45 buildings, miles of poultry fence, and all the equipment necessary for the successful carrying on of this business. Mr. Skinner pays particular attention to fancy stock, and poultry from his yards brings fancy prices. He enjoys the work and it affords a relaxation from his duties as cashier and bookkeeper with one of the large business concerns of Columbus.

In Indiana, Mr. Skinner married Ella Buchan, who was born in Ohio, and is a cousin of former State Senator Buchan, of Wyandotte County, Kansas. The only child of this marriage is deceased.

Politically, Mr. Skinner is one of the active Democrats of this section.

History of Cherokee County Kansas and its representative citizens, ed. & comp. by Nathaniel Thompson Allison, 1904, transcribed by Carolyn Ward, instructor from USD 508, Baxter Springs Middle School, Baxter Springs, Kansas, 5/5/97.