Henry E. Hartman

HENRY E. HARTMAN. - It is rather unusual nowadays to find a man who has followed up the line of work that he decides on when he is a boy. As a rule a boy changes his mind many times before he ever starts in to work and after that time he is apt to find that the work he thought he should like is not suited to him nor he to it. This has not been the experience of Henry E. Hartman. He is a farmer, the very thing he intended to do when he was a lad. He understands his business thoroughly and because he has attended to it so well, he has had great success.

He was born in Hanover in Germany, February 1, 1870, and is the son of Frederick and Louisa (Myer) Hartman, who spent their whole lives in Germany. Mrs. Hartman died in the spring of 1910, and her husband is a resident of Osnabruck, Germany. There were ten children, August and Henry being the only representatives of the family living in America, the balance being in Germany.

Henry was educated in his native country and when he was sixteen years old he came to the United States. He came direct to Kansas, which he had heard was the finest agricultural locality. He went to work on Judge Freeman's farm and worked around in different places until 1900. By that time he had saved up enough money to buy. After looking around for some time he bought twenty-two and one-half acres of land from Charles Sorter. He also bought a second farm which he sold at a profit; he bought another and sold that; he then went to Texas and bought a big farm with the proceeds of his trading and also purchased another. He retained his Texas farms but came back to live on the first farm he bought. During the years he has owned this Kansas farm he has improved it wonderfully. He has built all of the farm buildings; the house is the same one that was on the place, yet he has greatly improved it. He has set out about seventeen hundred fruit trees but is now cutting some of them down and is devoting his land to truck farming. He gets big prices for his products because he puts up none but first class goods and always gives good weight and measure for the money.

In 1896 he married Mary Dechman, daughter of Martin and Helma (Cochan) Dechman, the former a farmer in Quindaro township, who came here in 1840, where he bought thirty-two acres of land. He died here in 1896 at the age of fifty-nine. His wife had died six months before, aged forty-nine. They are both buried in Quindaro cemetery. Mr. and Mrs. Hartman have three children, Lena, John and Frederick, all students in the district school. They have besides raised two children not their own.

Mr. Hartman is a member of the Modern Woodmen of America, Camp No. 6942, at Bethel, Kansas, and of the C. P. A. Association. Mr. and Mrs. Hartman are adherents of the German Lutheran church.

If a man is not fair in his dealings, sooner or later he will be found out. It is the universal opinion that if you want a square deal you will get it at the hands of Henry Hartman.