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Pix #1 - The Charles Leitner Hardware store.

Pix #2 - A view of the Main Street in Kansas, 1975

Pix #3 - Entrance of Odd Fellow's Hall (group of ladies)

Pix #4 - This photo is the only one found showing an earlier postmaster, Otto Day, who also served as a rural mail carrier during the early days of Kansas. Those in the photo, left to right are: Vie Day, wife of Otto who is on her right, Mildred Gee and husband Clyde, parents of Jack Gee, now residing at 10214 W. Ohio 12, east of Fostoria.

Pix #5 - JoAnn Holzwarth Postmistress at Kansas

Author's Note: This is the fourth in a series of articles about a neighboring village, Kansas, which is not in its 130th year. I never realized, initially that the series would extend this long, but the photos and information available in abundance dictated that it was paramount to include all of it for posterity's sake. At this moment it appears the series will extend into a fifth.

READER FEEDBACK: WILLIS WYANT CALIFORNIA PROVIDES INFORMATION

"Today (May 29) I received the first article on Kansas. I am sure readers will enjoy the series".

"Charles Seiger owned the blacksmith shop, mentioned in the article; Lloyd Mowery and Harry (Sock) Chubb learned the trade from him".

"On the top floor above the shop, they built buggies and farm wagons. Albert Hollinger, of Hollinger Insurance Agency, in Fostoria, residing in the rural area near Kansas, has one of the wagons built by his grandfather, Charles Seiger.

"Charles and Jacob Seiger bought the hardware store in Kansas from Leinter and operated ut until a short time before Charles Seiger's death in 1943".

In his letter, Wyant also said that the man on the right in the photo taken in front of the blacksmith shop (in May 22 article) was John Lavar, not John Braves as listed. Lavar was a painter of the wagons and buggies made in the shop.

VIVIAN CRAUN IS ENJOYING KANSAS SERIES

After the first installment of the Kansas series, I received a letter from Vivian Craun, born and raised in Kansas until she left to continue her education and to become a teacher in Bowling Green.

She was fascinated with the picture of the school in one of the articles in the series, since it showed the school where all of her brothers and sisters attended.

With her correspondence she sent two pictures...one showing the Craun family home on Main Street, catty-cornered from the Methodist Church. She said she sold the house after her father and mother both died.

Another old photo (no.3) she sent shows a group of ladies at the entrance to the Odd Fellow's Hall, which is included with today's photos. She isn't sure if the ladies were of the Rebecca Lodge, a ladies aid group, or a missionary group. Nevertheless here are the names of some of those she can put with certain faces, but not in order of position:

Front Row, reading from left: Jones, Brandeberry, Sprout, Diller, Shontz Row 2: Seiger, Tuner, Feasel, Mowry, Reese Top Row: Gross, Hill, Null, Craun. She thinks a Shubert and an Ash may have been in the picture too.

Miss Craun recalls skating on the quarry and has many other fond memories of her home town, which the articles are re-introducing.

PHOTO NO. 1 SHOWS LEITNER HARDWARE

Photo No. 1 taken about 1917, shows a group in front of the Charles Leitner Hardware Store, located on the ground floor of the Odd Fellow's Building. The group on the left, reading left to right: E.L. McDole (justice of peace), John Turner, Jacob Turner, next unknown, John Lavar, John Chubb, The group in center, left to right: Mr. Craun, Charles Leitner (owner of store), next another Craun; boys seated in center, left to right: Harry McDaniel, Nicholas Schoendorff, Reed Chaney, Floyd Chaney; group on right, top to bottom, left to right: Otto Day, Stanley Feasel, Arthur Humbert, next unknown.

KANSAS PO STILL IN USE AFTER 130 YEARS

There has always been an old adage..."The U.S. Mail Always Gets Through". To that old saying, I add my own..."Kansas probably always got mail delivered", even though I couldn't find a date when the U.S. Post Office was established in Kansas, and the name of the first postmaster.

An item about early Kansas indicated the first mail brought into the village was by train in 1860. One historical item mentioned that Abraham Ash was credited with getting the PO established, but no date was mentioned.

JoAnn Holzwarth, the present postmistress, has held that position for five years, previously being a postal clerk for 13 years. Mary Lilly has been the rural mail carrier for that area for three years.

Holzwarth has no record of the postmasters preceding her or their tenures in office. The following list were names listed in Larry Hedden's history, compiled in 1958, plus several Mrs. Michael, a Kansas area resident who has written some historical items about Kansas in the past. The names are not in order of the dates they were appointed: Abraham Ash, Minnie McDole, E.C. Light, Anna A. Schoendorff, Otto F. Day, Mrs. Hipple, J.A. Bowlus, J.S. Jump, Ellsworth McDole, S. Craun, G. King, A. Freese, F. Harpster, Ruth Weaver.

There are 223 rural boxed receiving mail delivery.

On old record listed Alvin Schuster as the first rural mail cariier in the Kansas area in 1903. Later C.A. McDonald established a second route in that area, continuing until 1910, when Ray Rex replaced him. Other rural carriers in the past were Otto Day, Dee Lanning, Bill Snyder, Howard Zirger, Annita Niswander and Mary Lilly.