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JOHN T. OWSLEY
Vol. 3, p. 1129-1130
Book has photo

The general insurance agency of Mr. OWSLEY, who is an underwriter of
virtually all lines of insurance except that of life, has gained
prestige as one of the most successful and important in the State of
Oklahoma, and it is doubtful if there is another agency of the kind
in this vigorous young commonwealth that has developed and controls
as great a volume of business as does this representative
institution, the headquarters of which are in Suite 412-13 First
National Bank Building in the thriving City of Chickasha, the
metropolis and judicial center of Grady County. The career of Mr.
Owsley has been one distinguished by remarkable initiative and
executive ability and he has proved himself a veritable captain of
industry, the while his advancement has been achieved entirely
through his own efforts. The City of Chickasha can claim no more
reputable, straightforward and popular business man and no citizen of
greater civic loyalty and public spirit, so that consistency is
observed in according, in this history, due recognition to Mr. Owsley.

John T. Owsley was born at Magnolia, Columbia County, Arkansas, in
the year 1867, and is a scion of a colonial American family of
distinguished lineage, the genealogical line tracing back to Sir
Thomas Owsley, who bore also the title of captain and who evidently
was of English birth and ancestry. This distinguished ancestor came
from the West Indies to America prior to the War of the Revolution
and the supposition is that he acquired his military title through
service as an officer in the Continental line in the great war for
national independence. In a later generation another specially
distinguished representative of this family was Hon. William Owsley,
who served as governor of Kentucky and who was a member of the
Supreme Court of that state at the time of his death.

James R. and Jane Antoinette (FURLOW) Owsley, parents of him whose
name introduces this review, were both born and reared in Alabama,
where their marriage was solemnized. James R. Owsley removed to
Arkansas at the time of the Civil war and there enlisted in the
Confederate service, as a member of a gallant Arkansas regiment that
took part in many engagements and made an admirable record. Mr.
Owsley continued his service as a loyal soldier of the Confederacy
until the close of the war and then turned his attention to
agricultural pursuits. He later engaged in the merchandise business
in Arkansas, in which state he continued his residence until 1901,
when he came to Chickasha, Oklahoma, where he has since been actively
engaged in the marble business and where he is still alert and
vigorous as a man of affairs, though both he and his wife are now
venerable in years.

The early educational discipline of John T. Owsley was acquired in
the schools of his native state and was effectively supplemented by a
course of higher study in Bethel College, a well ordered institution
in the State of Kentucky. When but ten years of age he initiated his
association with practical business by assisting in the general store
of his father, and during this period of service as a clerk he
attended school only three months of each year. Prior to attaining to
his legal majority Mr. Owsley was appointed deputy circuit clerk of
Columbia County, Arkansas, and of this position he continued the
incumbent five years. He then, in 1890, assumed an executive position
in the Gate City National Bank of Texarkana, Miller County, Arkansas,
where he continued his services until 1892, when he resigned to
accept the position of general utility clerk in the Texarkana
National Bank, with which institution he remained seven years and
rose through the various grades of promotion until he became its
chief clerk. In 1899 he resigned his position and engaged in the fire-
insurance business at Texarkana, where he continued his association
with this enterprise for three years. Within this period he became
interested also in the wholesale grocery business, as vice president
of the Texas Produce Company, his home city in Arkansas lying near
the line between that state and Texas and thus gaining its title of
Gate City. In 1902 Mr. Owsley sold his insurance business and assumed
the active management of the business of the Texas Produce Company,
which he served in this capacity, as well as its vice president, for
the period of seven years. Within this time he effected the
organization of the Clay Products Company, of which he become
president, and this corporation is still actively and successfully
engaged in the manufacturing of pottery and other like products, with
headquarters at Texarkana, Arkansas. In 1909 he organized the Mexican
Tropical Fruit Company, of which he became president. This company
placed in commission a line of steamships between Port Arthur, Texas,
and the State of Tabasco, Mexico, for the purpose of transporting
bananas and other tropical fruits from that section of Mexico to the
markets of the United States. The company leased a number of large
banana plantations in Tabasco, the same lying along the Griholm and
affluent rivers, and after operations had been carried forward about
eighteen months the company was forced to abandon its business, owing
to disastrous floods, which destroyed all the banana plantation and
practically inundated the extensive area of land through which the
company was operating.

In January, 1911, after disposing of the most of his business
interests in Arkansas and Texas, Mr. Owsley came to Oklahoma and
established his residence at Chickasha, where he purchased a half
interest in the Price Insurance Agency. A few months later he
acquired the entire control of the business and the agency has since
been conducted under his name and able management, the while he has
shown great discrimination, energy and progressiveness and placed the
enterprise upon a most substantial basis, with a business that is
constantly expanding and is excelled in scope by that of few, if any,
similar agencies in the state. As a practical insurance man of fine
conceptions of the functions and benefits of fire and other material
indemnities aside from the domain of life insurance. Mr. Owsley has a
high reputation and this, with his careful and honorable methods and
policies, constitutes his best business asset, his agency being
representative of an appreciable number of the strongest and best
fire insurance companies operating in Oklahoma, and his facilities
also being unexcelled in the underwriting of reliable insurance
against tornadoes, floods and other material forces that may cause
loss or destruction of property. Mr. Owsley is a member of the
National Association of Local Insurance Agents and is specially
active and influential in the affairs of the Oklahoma State
Association of Local Insurance Agents, in which he is chairman of the
executive committee.

As may naturally be inferred, Mr. Owsley is found aligned as a
staunch supporter of the cause of the democratic party and is
emphatically loyal and progressive in his civic attitude. In the time-
honored Masonic fraternity he has received the thirty-second degree
of the Ancient Accepted Scottish Rite, his affiliation being still
with Arkansas Consistory, No. 1, in the City of Little Rock, the
while he still retains membership also in Sahara Temple, Ancient
Arabic Order of the Nobles of the Mystic Shrine, at Paine Bluff, that
State. His basis York Rite affiliation is with Texarkana Lodge, No.
341, at Texarkana, Arkansas, where he is affiliated also with
Texarkana Lodge, No. 399, Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks,
which he served two terms as exalted ruler. In his native City of
Magnolia, that state, he has held all of the official chairs in the
lodge of the Knights of Pythias, of which he is past chancellor, and
he is identified also with the Sigma Nu college fraternity. He is a
charter member of the Chickasha Country Club and was chairman of its
golf committee in 1915.

In December, 1891, was solemnized the marriage of Mr. Owsley to Miss
Elizabeth SHARMAN, daughter of Robert R. Sharman, who was a pioneer
at Magnolia, Arkansas, and who owned and conducted the largest and
most important mercantile business at that place. Mrs. Owsley was
summoned to the life eternal in 1897, and is survived by two
children, Sharman and Hazel.
Typed for OKGenWeb by: Dorothy Marie Tenaza on October 31, 1998.