MARION COUNTY COURTS
by J. H. SMITH
District Clerk Marion County, 1901

AN ARTICLE EXTRACTED FROM THE PEABODY NEWS 1901
Contributed by Charmaine Keith (charmain@southwind.net) 24 November 1998

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Peabody News
1901

	
	Mr. Editor: The first law suit filed Oct. 5, 1867 in the District Court of this county 
was that of A. Akin & Sons vs. Sam'l Parker, an attachment for twenty cases of liquor, etc., 
and C. R. Roberts was Clerk. The county was then a part of Judicial District and William R. Brown
was the first Judge. Since that time fully sex thousand cases have been filed and disposed 
of-some in a very brief period of time, while some have ground between the upper and the nether 
millstone of justice for a long period of years. I recall one from a cursory glance through 
the dockets that has occupied the attention of this court in some form or other for more than 
twenty years. A veritable "Jarndyce versus Jarndyce." Some have been very frivolous and have 
apparently developed into the contention as to "who should pay the costs."

	But there have been many which involved tremendous issues, and in some of them both civil 
and criminal, precedents have been established which will be consulted and quoted for years to come.
I can not give you a list of the civil and criminal separately for the reason that in the early 
history of the office all cases were docketed in consecutive order in one form of docket; now 
two are kept, civil and criminal. Since the Criminal docket was introduced in 1887 there have 
been 307 criminal cases filed. The most notable ones of these are the Calhone, Shanner, O'Neil, 
McCarty, North, Kelley, Grimmitt, Morgan, Mason and Burton Cases.

	In one civil case involving the foreclosure of a mortgage there were 109 parties made 
defendants. The real flood tide of law however was in the later eighties and the early nineties, 
and practically all foreclosures of mortgages. Mr. Brooker, during his term of six years, had 
2,639 cases, of which 614 were foreclosures. Mr. Funk had in four years 1,024 cases and 394 of 
these were foreclosures. Mr. Wheeler in four years had 554 cases of which 127 were foreclosures. 
During the last two and on half years there have been only 278 cases and only 24 foreclosures. 
At one time there were over six hundred cases on the trial docket.

	Verily, the records of this office reveal the fact that the people ate in better 
circumstances and that less and less do men resort to the courts to adjust their differences with 
their fellow men. The district judges have been men of splendid ability and worthy of the high 
office. They were; Sam Wood, who was appointed but never held court here, W. R. Brown, 
S. R. Peters, L. Houck, F. Doster, Lucien Earle and the present incumbent O. L. Moore.

	The District Clerks were C. R. Roberts, J. H. Costello, San Howe, Sam Bown, S. B. Tubbs, 
F. L. Frazer, C. F. Booker, F. H. Funk, D. W. Wheeler and J. H. Smith.

	I can not close with out a brief reference to the crying need of this office. The 
vault is inadequate to accommodate the voluminous and valuable records that have accumulated 
during the years. Something must be done to provide against the growing possible destruction of 
valuable records and to accommodate the growing demand of the public in consulting them. I say, 
these records are valuable advisedly, for the day of foreclosures has gone by when good Kansas 
farms were sold on the court house steps for a song.
	Men are now buying farms because they are worth the money and it is not impertinent to 
suggest that the important link in the chain of title to many a goodly farm in this county is 
lodged in the archives of this office. This land will get more valuable as the years go by and 
the files and the records will be consulted more and more. Let us do now what is so much needed 
and which will be so exceedingly important in very few years at most.

						Respectfully,
						J. H. Smith, District Clerk