George Washington Akers, born in 1839 in Putnam County, Indiana, met and married Margaret Steele in 1860 and three years later departed for Kansas with their 14-month-old son. Traveling through Missouri, they reached Weston to find the Missouri River frozen over and the ferry ice-bound. Not wanting to remain in Weston, they crossed the river by foot and arrived at what he later called “the land dedicated to Freedom.” In 1875 the family returned to Indiana where Akers attended medical school while also studying the Bible and applying to be a circuit minister. Moving again to Kansas in 1879, Rev. Akers served at the Little River-Stone Corral-Windom Methodist circuit, then the church at Burrton (1880-1881), then at the Sedgwick charge. He was ordained deacon in March 1884 and in 1886 was ordained elder. At the Sedgwick assignment, his health began to fail, and he was given a lighter duty at Douglass but was still compelled to resign. In April 1887 Rev. Akers moved his family to Stafford, Kansas, where he hung out his physician’s shingle and treated the townspeople through a bout of typhoid fever. In that same year, Rev. Akers became part-owner (with his son Nean Akers) of the Stafford Republican newspaper; he was also appointed Postmaster in 1891, a position he held for nearly five years. With his son Arther B. Akers, he started the store Akers & Son, saying later that they did “business as partners for more than 35 years and never had a cross word.” He eventually sold his interest in the newspaper and closed his medical practice so that he could devote full attention to the store. In 1896 he began a 17-year stint as Superintendent of the Methodist Sunday school in Stafford, a position he valued greatly and served faithfully. He was also one of the original directors of the Nora E. Larabee Memorial Library Association (founded 1904) and served on the book committee. Rev. Akers continued his varied duties through the first World War and the 1918 flu epidemic, during which he “had many funerals to conduct.” As he put it in his autobiography, Rev. Akers had “been mixed up with many things in the history of Stafford…. In all the trusts, both public and private, I have endeavored to be fair and treat all with due respect.” Six children were born to him and Margaret: Larkin Neanian Akers (called Nean) (1862-1932), an infant (died at birth, 1864), Arther Bevier Akers (1866-1955), Thomas Marion Akers (1870-1871), Lillian Demaris Akers Griffith (1873-1927), and Earl Brown Akers (1876-1935). In 1923, Margaret (Steele) Akers died after three years of illness, during which her husband had “left the store, abandoning all business to care for her.” During the two years that followed, Rev. Akers wrote a little book for the use of his children and descendants, describing the family history up until that time. (A copy of this small volume is available in this collection.) Signing his work “Dr. Geo. W. Akers,” he recommended his readers to “live right and die happy.” Rev. Akers died on October 1, 1925, at the age of 86.

Note written by Sarah St. John