Difference between revisions of "Thomas Perkins Kennard (1828-1920)"

Revision as of 12:25, 23 October 2014

Thomas Perkins Kennard was born on December 13, 1828 in Ohio. His relatives were Quakers and came over from England, perhaps on the same boat as William Penn. His family lived in Pennsylvania; his father, also named Thomas, moved to Ohio in 1814. Thomas P. was born of Thomas Sr.’s second wife, Elisabeth. The Kennards moved to Indiana when Thomas P. was young. Typical of farmers at the time, Thomas P. received little schooling; he said he had only one year of formal education by the age of 16. He did not want to be a farmer and instead apprenticed at a mill. In the 1850s, he decided to become a lawyer and get married to a non-Quaker. Both actions caused him to be expelled from the Quaker faith.

Kennard was successful in his training as a lawyer and worked in Greensboro and Anderson, Indiana. A firm abolitionist, he soon became involved in the early Republican Party in Indiana.

Two of his brothers moved to Nebraska in 1856. Thomas followed suit in 1857. They all lived in De Soto, a settlement north of Omaha near modern-day Blair. Thomas and his brother Levi started a land agency that became successful. Thomas’ family joined him in 1858. In addition to helping with the land agency, Thomas remained a lawyer and ran a hotel.

Like in Indiana, Kennard was involved in Republican politics. In addition to abolitionism, he supported women’s suffrage and opposed the death penalty, two interesting positions for a man in the 1860s to take. He was elected to several local positions, including mayor of De Soto.

In 1866, Kennard made the Union (Republican) Party ticket as secretary of state. In the elections of that year, Nebraskans narrowly voted to become a state and selected Kennard as the first secretary of state. He won his office by 130 votes. J. Sterling Morton, a prominent Democrat and the founder of Arbor Day, was the losing candidate for governor that year and mocked Kennard and other Republicans in his newspaper.

Nebraska’s statehood became official on March 1, 1867. David Butler became governor on March 27. As secretary of state, Kennard had the second highest position in the early state government. He was in charge of handling official documents and ensuring that all necessary supplies were in order during legislative sessions.

Capital Controversy

In 1867, Nebraska became a state. Omaha had been the capital since 1854, when Territorial Governor Thomas Cuming selected it as the site of the capital. The location of the capital became a major point of controversy after Nebraska became a state. At the time, more people lived south of the Platte than north, but the north part of the state had more representation. Those living south of the Platte wanted to move the capital to a location south of the Platte to even up the representation.

On June 14, 1867, a commission was created by the legislature to select the site of a new capital. Governor David Butler, State Auditor John Gillespie and Kennard made up this committee. They were instructed to pick a site in Seward, the southern portions of Saunders and Butler or the northern part of Lancaster County. Whatever site they chose would be renamed “Lincoln.” (Omaha Republicans passed that resolution in an attempt to dissuade Democrats in the southern part of the state from moving the capital.)

After touring the area marked in the bill, the commissioners chose a town called Lancaster in Lancaster County to be the new capital on August 14, 1867. (Ashland was Gillespie’s choice, but he joined Butler and Kennard in choosing Lancaster.) At the time, Lancaster was geographically in the center of many population centers and was also located near some salt flats, which the commissioners thought could one day become economically profitable (they didn’t).

To increase confidence in the new town of Lincoln, Kennard and the other commissioners built expensive houses within the city plat. Kennard’s house stands to this day.

Kennard's Later Life

Kennard chose not to run for reelection in 1870. Impeachment charges were brought against both of his fellow commissioners the following year. Butler was impeached, but Gillespie was not. Kennard got into business after leaving public life, including dry goods, banking, and railroads. His work in the railroad business was his biggest endeavor. In 1867, he helped lay out the towns of Blair, Arlington and Kennard along the Omaha, Sioux City & Pacific Railroad. He served as a lawyer for Union Pacific in 1878 to help that company build a track to Lincoln.

Kennard still maintained an interest in politics. In 1876 he was elected to the state senate. In 1877 he served as a commissioner to Indian Territory to appraise land. After that, he again returned to private life, mostly focusing on a law firm he opened with his sons. He was still a major player in state politics, though he never again ran for office. In 1878 he helped found the Nebraska State Historical Society.

In 1887, his wife died. That same year he sold his famous house and built a new one on the same block. He participated in several business ventures in his later life. At one point he rented space in one of his offices to William Jennings Bryan, who used it for his newspaper The Commoner. A joint venture with his son-in-law, James Riggs, ended in scandal when Riggs and Lulu Kennard were divorced in 1893. Thomas was elected to the Republican National Convention in 1896, and in 1898, he was appointed the receiver of public moneys for the US Land Office in Lincoln. He held the post until 1902; it would be his last time in public office. He spent the next few years dealing with streetcars and railroads until his retirement in 1910. After He died in 1920, remembered as the “Father of Lincoln.”

References

Buecker, Thomas R. “The Father of Lincoln, Nebraska: The Life and Times of Thomas P. Kennard.” Nebraska History. Summer 2014: 78-93.