DANIEL B. COWIE. In an article on other pages of this
publication will be found some account of the salt industry in Kansas
and some mention of the more prominent mines and companies. One of the
most striking figures in the development of the salt industry in Kansas
was the late James Cowie, Sr., and the above named is a son of that salt
pioneer and is now general superintendent of the Independent Salt
Company at Kanopolis.
The Cowie family are Scotch people, and in Scotland
they were also identified with mining. The grandfather of Daniel was
George Cowie, who spent his life in Scotland and was a successful coal
contractor. James Cowie, Sr., was born in Stirlingshire, Scotland, in
1839. He grew up and married there and from an early age was a coal
miner. Prior to his coming to America he was general manager for one of
the largest coal companies in Scotland, having supervision over ten
diffierent[sic] coal properties. On coming to the United States
in 1884 he entered the employ of the H. C. Frick Coal Company at
Connellsville Pennsylvania.
James Cowie, Sr., came to Kanopolis, Kansas, in 1889.
The credit is given him for originating the salt mining industry of
Kansas and he was known in the press and to the general public as the
"salt king." As manager of the Royal Salt Company he put in the first
salt mine in Kansas just east of the city limits of Kanopolis. He
managed that company until 1905 and then organized the Crystal Salt
Company, of which he was manager and part owner. He bought from the
Kanopolis townsite the salt rights underneath the town. The Crystal mine
is just outside the limits of Kanopolis but its tunnels and underground
work are partly beneath the town itself. At the time of his death James
Cowie, Sr., was managing director of the Crystal Salt Company and also
owned between 5,000 and 6,000 town lots in Kanopolis. Previously he was
owner of about forty buildings in the town but had sold this part of his
real estate. As an American citizen James Cowie, Sr., was a republican,
was an active Presbyterian, and served a number of terms as mayor of
Kanopolis and well justified the honors bestowed upon him by efficient
service in the administration of municipal affairs. >p> James Cowie,
Sr., married Elizabeth Barrowman. She was born in Scotland in 1842 and
died at Kanopolis in 1915, while her husband passed away there in 1911.
Her father, George Barrowman, was a prominent coal contractor in
Scotland, where he died. James Cowie and wife had five children. George,
the oldest, is manager of the Standard Salt Company at Little River,
Kansas. James Cowie, Jr., is president of the Exchange State Bank of
Kanopolis and is also mine foreman under his brother Daniel. Daniel is
the third in the family. Janette married Samuel Hogsett, a loan and real
estate man at Kansas City, Missouri. Elizabeth, the youngest child, is
the wife of George P. Kelly, of Kansas City, Missouri. Mr. Kelly is
president of the American Salt and Coal Company of Lyons, Kansas, and at
this writing is installing one of the largest combination rock salt and
evaporation salt plants in the United States. The evaporation works are
already in operation and the rock salt mines will be completed and in a
producing state within six months.
Daniel B. Cowie, son of James Cowie, Sr., was born at
Kylswith, Stirlingshire, Scotland, March 20, 1869, and was fifteen years
of age when the family came to the United States. He received his
education in the public schools of Stirlingshire and for two years
taught school in Scotland. At the age of eighteen he began working as a
miner, and had an intimate experience with that industry in every
capacity from tapper boy to general superintendent.
Under his father he became expert in all branches of
salt mining and manufacture. He was general superintendent of the
Kingman Salt Company at Kingman, Kansas, until the plant was burned in
1903, after which he returned to Kanopolis and was general
superintendent of the Crystal Salt Company and since 1913 has been
superintendent of the Independent Salt Company. For 3 1/2 years prior to
1915 Mr. Cowie was at Detroit, Michigan, his services being employed to
straighten out the tangled affairs of the rock salt plant, wherein was
involved an investment of over $1,000,000. The plant was in the hands of
a receiver and the expert ability of Mr. Cowie was called into service,
and he not only put the plant on its feet but developed it so that now
it is one of the best salt mine propositions in the United States.
Mr. Cowie lives close to the Independent Salt
Company's plant and in the superintendent's house furnished by the
company. He owns six dwelling houses in Kanopolis, a farm of eighty
acres near the city, and is a stockholder and director in the Exchange
State Bank.
His fellow citizens have honored him with the office
of mayor two terms and with that of city clerk two terms. For fifteen
consecutive years he was a member of the school board and since 1913 has
again been on the board and is now treasurer. He is a republican, an
elder in the Presbyterian Church, is past master of Kingman Lodge,
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, a member of the Royal Arch Chapter and
the Knights Templar Commandery at Kingman, is past noble grand of
Kingman Lodge, Independent Order of Odd Fellows, past master workman of
Kingman Lodge, Ancient Order of United Workmen, and charter member of
Kanopolis Camp of the Modern Woodmen of America.
Mr. Cowie enjoys an ideal home life and has a large
and happy family. He first married at Uniontown, Pennsylvania, in 1891,
Miss Allie Matthews. She died in 1897, leaving two daughters: Elizabeth,
now the wife of William McVittie, a member of the city fire department
of Detroit, Michigan; and Janette, living at home. In 1900, at Emporia,
Kansas, Mr. Cowie married Miss Ruth A. Haley, daughter of Mr. and Mrs.
Samuel Haley. Her mother is deceased and her father still lives on a
farm near Emporia. Mr. and Mrs. Cowie have seven children: Anna, born in
1901; Daniel, Jr., born in 1903; Margaret, born in 1905; Jane, born in
1907; Dorothy, born in 1909; Evelyn, born in 1911; and James, born in
1914.
Thanks to Lu Hickey for sending this in.