J. C. Hawkins

HAWKINS, KETMAN, RYAN, FLEMEIGH, MORGAN, CARPENTER

Posted By: Karen AD (email)
Date: 10/24/2006 at 16:21:31

"Unique" is the term that best describes the subject of this review. Not so in a notorious way, nor yet in the realm of cheap tinsel and tawdry accomplishment, but unique as a man who is worth while, who is so original as to be apart from the great rank and file of his fellow men.

J. C. Hawkins looks like Bourke Cochran and can talk almost as well. He is cynical without being bitter, sarcastic without being narrow or unkind. Then he is so absolutely wide-awake and alive to what the world is doing and what life means. He was born in Troy, Doniphan County, Kansas, April 30, 1869, being the son of H. C. and Susan (Wormley) Hawkins, his father being a native of New York and his mother of Pennsylvania. His father was one of the best-known men and ablest lawyers in Kansas, being elected to the Legislature of that State and leading attorney for the Santa Fe Railway Company for many years prior to his death, which occurred in 1874. As a speaker his reputation was equal to his fame as a lawyer. After the death of the father, Mr. Hawkins's mother remarried, her husband being J. Evans Ryan, an Episcopal minister of Troy, Kansas. This marriage took place when the subject of this review was but six years of age, he being the only child by the former marriage. When his mother and stepfather came to Jasper County in 1880, the little boy came with them and he has since remained in Jasper County, although there was a time when he was absent, while traveling for his health for a period of some five years. His stepfather departed this life in 1893 and since then his mother has made her home in the city of Newton. Mr. Hawkins began his career in 1892 by graduating from the law department of the Iowa State University of Iowa City. After this he went to Pueblo, Colorado, where he opened a law office in partnership with William Mitchell, practicing one year. Returning to Monroe, Iowa, he practiced law one year in partnership with Sloan Coder, afterwards coming to Newton, where he has since remained.

Mr. Hawkins, since coming to Newton, has been connected with some of the most important cases in the history of the County, his efforts being characterized by signal success. Until the last year prior to this writing, he has given his attention exclusively to the law, but since then has given much attention to the manufacture and sale of an excellent office device known as the "Clipless Paper Fastener," of which he is the inventor. This device, standing almost alone among paper fasteners, securely fastens the sheets of paper together by the paper itself and is in constant and ever increasing demand, being on sale in every leading city in the world. As an assistance to his salesmen, who handle his invention, Mr. Hawkins has written a delightfully ingenious little book, "Salesmanship, or How to Make Money, which is well worthy of perusal as it contains much trite information which could only be gained by actual experience.

On October 18, 1904, Mr. Hawkins was married to Eva Ketman, of Humboldt, Iowa, daughter of H. J. and Frances Ketman, she being one of twelve children living: Adrian, Abraham, Hermanus and one sister, Mary Flemeigh, wife of Charles Flemeigh, are all engaged in farming near Humboldt; Francis, wife of Fred Morgan, professor in Leland Stanford University, California; Jennie, wife of Frank Carpenter, a jeweler, resides in Trenton, Iowa; Isaac, residing in Winterset, Iowa, is the owner of the Scarless Liniment Company; Peter is in the real estate business in Minnesota; and T. R., a minister, is general manager for the Baptist Publishing Society of Chicago. Both Mr. and Mrs. Hawkins are most affable and cultured people whom it is a pleasure to know. They are among the best of Newton's people. Page 637.

Past and Present of Jasper County Iowa
B.F. Bowden & Company, Indianapolis, IN, 1912
Transcribed by Ernie Braida in July 2003