John Kearns
Mill Township has some splendid farms, but for its acreage, probably none is better in quality and more skillfully managed, than that of John Kearns in Section One of the the Township. Its one hundred and thirty-two acres are all highly cultivated, and Mr. Kearns is one of those progressive farmers, who understand the profit to be derived from so called mixed farming, so that he feeds practically all his grain and forage crops to stock on the place. His livestock are also of a more than average grade, and he has found it profitable and good business to keep the best of cattle and hogs and horses and his permanent improvement are likewise of a high order. He has a large and comfortable white frame house, and a good barn.
John Kearns was born at Jonesboro in Mill Township May 13, 1863. He represents an Irish family, whose founder arrived in this country and emigrant entirely dependent on the work of his hands, and who eventually acquired a place of influence as a citizen of Grant County, and was the owner of the estate now cultivated by his son. John Kearns has spent all his life in Mill Township, and lived with the family for thirty-five years before he became owner of his present place. His parents were Thomas and Anna (Murphy) Kearns, both of whom were born in County May, Ireland. His parents on both sides lived and died in their in their native land, and were tillers of the soil. The Kearns family stock is noted for its long lives. The father of Thomas attained to the wonderful age of one hundred and eight years. The religion of the family in all the various generations ahs been Catholic. Thomas Kearns, one of a family of children, was born in 1809, and in 1848 came to America. The sailing vessel on which he was a passenger encountered rough seas and variable winds, and was three months and thirteen days in crossing the Atlantic. When it landed its passengers at New Orleans, the boat itself had several times narrowly escaped shipwreck, and its passengers and crew were suffering from ship-fiver, and all of them nearly starved. Thomas Kearns was so weak when the vessel arrived at dock, that he had to crawl ashore on his hands and knees. He recovered and came north up the Mississippi and Ohio Rivers, and soon found work in railway construction labor in Ohio. For that hard manual toil he got fifteen dollars a month, and from those wages accumulated the little fund which gave him his real start in the world. Subsequently he came to Grant county, and here was employed in building ditches and digging wells.
He was not only an industrious, but an economical man, and with his earnings finally went back to New Orleans to marry the girl whom he had known in Ireland, Miss Anna Murphy. After their marriage they came to Grant County and located at Jonesboro, where Thomas Kearns continued his work and built up a prosperous business as a contractor for ditch and well digging. The accumulations from that business were finally invested in the one hundred and thirty-two acres of land now owned and occupied by his son. Thomas Kearns died near Gas City, in February, 1886, and his wife had passed away on the site of what is now Gas City in July, 1871. Her death occurred about the time Gas City was laid out and started as a village. Thomas Kearns owned sixty-two acres of land included within the present limits of Gas City, and he sold that to the company which started one of the best known little cities in the gas belt. Thomas Kearns and wife lived and died in the faith of the Catholic church. Their children were:
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Kate or Katherine, who is unmarried and lives on a farm in Mill Township with her brother Joseph.
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Grace, who also lives with Joseph.
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William, who is unmarried and is in Illinois.
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Sadie, who is employed in Marion, but has her home with her brother Joseph in Gas City.
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Thomas, was accidentally killed near his home on the Pennsylvania Railroad, and was unmarried.
Mr. John Kearns was married in Gas City to Miss Maggie Riley, who was born in County Mayo, Ireland, about 1870, and when a young woman, seventeen years of age, she came alone to the Untied States and located in Grant county, where she has lived ever since. She is the mother of five children, namely:
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Thomas
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Joseph
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William
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John
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Michael
All but the youngest are of public school age. Mr. and Mrs. Kearns worship in the Catholic Church, and in politics he is Independent.
Source: Centennial History of Grant County Indiana 1812-1912. The Lewis Publishing Co., 1914.