My Genealogy Hound

J. L. PARROTTE. There are many men in Kearney who have lived here longer than the subject of this sketch; there are many who have figured more conspicuously in public life; many who have made more money; but there are not many who have attained better success — who have achieved more solid results, in accordance with their means and opportunities, than he has, and who in so doing have better illustrated those sterling qualities of the successful business man: intelligence, industry, perseverence and upright, honorable dealing, on which all true and lasting success must be based. This sketch is not written to commemorate any special personal achievements of the subject; it is not written to flatter any supposed vanity he may have touching his record; it is simply written to place him in the category of Kearney’s representative business men where he properly belongs, and to teach incidentally, as all such biographies must, the great value of self-help and the indispensable necessity of personal character in business as in all other things. Whatever of character Mr. Parrotte has established, like that of all others, has been the result of growth and development, he being indebted for the germs of it to heredity. “The child is father to the man.” Fortunately he comes of stock noted for their strong qualities, fixed habits and settled convictions. He is of Welch, French and English extraction, French and Welch on his father’s side, and English on his mother’s. To his father’s line he is indebted for his chief characteristics. On that side he is of Huguenot stock. The name indicates the nationality, family tradition, and the history of the church settled the question of faith. There is a marked similarity between the name Parrotte and those of Garrotte and Tourette, names of honorable distinction among many of greater luster in French Protestantism, such as LeFever, DuBois, LaFountaine and others. It is not known when his first ancestors immigrated to this country or exactly where they settled. But inasmuch as the family has been traced back to Maryland, it is believed that his first ancestors on American soil came with the large tide of Huguenot immigration which poured into this country by way of Holland after the revocation of the edict of Nantes and settled in Maryland, Virginia and the Carolinas. His father, Josiah Parrotte, was a native of Maryland, born in the year 1800. He emigrated when a young man to Tennessee and Kentucky, and thence to Illinois, and settled in 1825 at Rushville, then the third town in size and commercial importance in the state. He was an honored citizen of that place for more than a half-century. He was a merchant of large means and extensive interests, owning at one time as many as six stores in Tennessee and Kentucky. He also had considerable farming interests, and altogether led an active, energetic and unusually successful life. He died in 1882. He was a type of his race, modified by local surroundings. The persevering industry and careful husbanding of resources that made the wild lands and waste places where the French Huguenots settled in this country “blossom as the rose,” characterized, though in a different direction, all his life, and made a success of all his undertakings. He had the same love of home, the same conception of men’s duties to one another, the same attachment to country and the same devout recognition of his Creator. He believed in the freest liberty of conscience, the largest independence of thought and action consistent with public good. He bore arms in the public defense during the early Indian and Mormon troubles in Illinois. But he never aspired to office, he had a proper appreciation for the lighter pleasures of life, and it is an admirable tribute to the qualities of his head and heart that his declining years were solaced with those genuine friendships and garnished with those ardent home-loves which should and do come to all who live uprighlly, who maintain an abiding faith in their kind and who preserve the evenness of their temper to a serene old age.

J. L. Parrotte’s mother bore the maiden name of Katherine A. Scripps. She was a daughter of George Scripps, and was born in Cape Girardeau, Mo. Her father was a pioneer of Missouri from England, moving to Cape Girardeau in the early Indian days. He afterward moved to and settled at Rushville, Ill., where his daughter met and was married to Josiah Parrotte. She bore him twelve children, the subject of this sketch being next to the oldest son. She is still living and enjoys all her mental faculties. She is a devoted mother, and noted and beloved for her charity to the poor and afflicted.

One fact further in Mr. Parrotte’s ancestral history is noteworthy: Both branches of his family had their origin in this country in the South, and left that section on account of slavery. His father and maternal grandfather were both slave-owners, actual and prospective. Yet such were their instinctive feelings of justice and their strong sense of personal liberty that they gave up all benefits they were entitled to under the institution, and rather than stay where they would be annoyed by its iniquities sought the far West.

J. L. Parrotte was born in Rushville, Ill., in November, 1844, and was reared and educated there. He was brought up to mercantile pursuits mainly. He enlisted in the Union army in May, 1864, as a member of Company K, One Hundred and Thirty-seventh Illinois volunteer infantry, and served in the Army of the Tennessee under Gen. A. J. Smith. He was commisary sergeant and was in the service till the general surrender. He married, December 12, 1866, Mary L., daughter of Dr. R. M. Worthington, a native of Kentucky who left that state on account of slavery and moved into the Illinois territory at an early date. Mrs. Parrotte was born and reared in Rushville, and is a descendent of President James Madison on the paternal side. Mr. Parrotte was engaged in business in Rushville from the close of the war till 1882, when, on account of a failure of health, he moved to New Mexico, near Las Vegas, residing there some time, coming thence in 1883 to Nebraska and locating in Kearney on the 31st day of July, that year. He was engaged for two years with Andrews & Grable in the law and collecting business. A stock company was then formed, of which he became a member, and he went into the hardware business, following this two years. Kearney having started on its career of prosperity in the meantime and the rise in real estate values having made the handling of real estate profitable, he embarked in that business. From his own investments and sales and exchanges made for others, he made considerable money. He is still interested in this line, but does not handle the volume of business he formerly did, owing to the increase of his other business. In April, 1889, he, with others, organized the Midway Loan and Trust Company of Kearney, with a capital stock of $100,000. He assisted also in the organizing of the Kearney Savings Bank, which was started in April, 1889, with a capital of $100,000, being organized under the state banking laws. He is assistant cashier and director of the savings bank, a member of the exchange committee of the Midway Loan and Trust Company, and also a director and a stock-holder in the Buffalo County National Bank, member of the board of directors and secretary of the board. He is also secretary and treasurer of the National Building and Loan Association, which has its home office at Minneapolis, Minn., and a branch office at Kearney. These institutions are among the heaviest of the kind in Kearney and are doing a large part of the legitimate banking and loan business of the city, of Buffalo county and of central Nebraska. They have good financial backing and are in the hands of men who are distinguished for their discriminating judgment, conservative business methods and unyielding integrity.

Mr. Parrotte’s rise to the position he occupies with reference to the business interests of Kearney has been rapid and deserved. It has not come by accident nor by the aid of others. It is due to his own personal efforts. Fortunate by circumstances, he has been blessed with the insight to see and the energy to act. His success has not been phenomenal, but it been exceptional. It is deserving of this special recognition by reason of the fact that it has been reached by patience, by perseverance, by industry and by the exercise of good judgment. It shows what men can do by using their hands and brains. To the man of average attainments and limited means it will give encouragement, it will be eminently helpful.

Mr. Parrotte is a zealous Mason, and he has been for some years. He is an active and consistent member of the Methodist church, and has been on the official board of this church twenty-seven years; was a delegate to the general conference in New York City, May, 1888. He is a liberal contributor to all charitable purposes. He and his family are leaders in the best society of Kearney. In all these respects he has developed to their full measure the inherited tendencies of his people. The fact of his Huguenot origin has almost passed out of the traditions of the family, yet he has preserved in his mental and moral make-up much of the distinguishing traits of his ancestors — their persevering industry, their tastes for the quiet pursuits of life, their attachment to home, their love of liberty, their broad humanity, their deep sense of religion; and these several traits, with their imperceptible shadings into one and another, have entered into his daily life, have shaped his career, and have made him what he is. Mr. and Mrs. Parotte have one daughter — Miss Anna Katherine P. She is a most estimable young lady and a great worker in the Sunday-school, and a general favorite with old and young in society.