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JOHN F. KROUTIL
Vol. 5, p. 1842

A Lad of about ten years at the time when he accompanied his parents
on their immigration from Austria to the United States, the career of
Mr. Kroutil has shown in a most significant and emphatic way how
great are the opportunities afforded in our great republic for the
achievement of large and worthy success on the part of a young man
who has the will to dare and to do, and who, dependent upon his own
exertions, has the energy and self-reliance that make for personal
independence and prosperity. Far from the Fatherland, now involved in
the most horrible warfare the even tenor of his way under the
benignant conditions of peace, and has secure status as one of the
influential and representative business men of Oklahoma, he and his
elder brother, Frank L., having been residents at Oklahoma since the
year the territory was organized and having kept pace with the
marvelous advancement that has here been made under the territorial
and state regimes. They are now interested principals in what is
undoubtedly the most extensive and important enterprise of its kind
in the State of Oklahoma, the subject of this sketch being president
and his brother secretary and treasurer of the Yukon Mill & Grain
Company, at Yukon, Canadian County.

From the status of a young man without more than nominal financial
resources, Mr. Kroutil has risen to that of executive head of the
largest and most modern flour mills in Oklahoma, the products of
which are shipped to many distant states of the Union, as well as
into Cuba, and in connection with which has been developed a grain
business of extensive volume. The Yukon Mill & Grain Company dates
its organization back to the year 1902, and within the intervening
period its business has had an almost phenomenal expansion in scope
and importance. The original mill purchased by the Kroutil brothers
at Yukon was a modest establishment with a daily capacity for the
output of only seventy-five barrels, or one carload of flour a day.
At the present time the splendid plant, with the best of modern
equipment and facilities, has an output capacity of 1,200 barrels and
day, the equivalent of twenty carloads. The average daily business
has attained to the noteworthy aggregate of nearly $10,000, and the
flour and other mill products are of the highest grad. The mill is a
substantial brick structure of four stories and of modern design
architecturally as well as in the matter of providing the best
facilities for the purpose for which it was erected. The mill
elevators are of large capacity and the facilities for storage are
adequate to meet the demands of the enormous business controlled.
From this fine milling plant products are shipped throughout Oklahoma
and also into the states of Texas, Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi,
Alabama, Georgia, North and South Carolina, Tennessee, New York and
Connecticut, the substantial and widely disseminated trade affording
the most effective voucher for the specially high grade of the
products. By the way of the City of New Orleans the company ships
flour to Cuba, and this export trade is constantly increasing.

In addition to the central elevator at Yukon the company maintains
also and owns well-equipped elevators at Union, Oklahoma, and other
points in the state. The officers of the company are as here noted:
John F. Kroutil, president and general manager; Anton F. DOBEY, vice
president; and Frank L. Kroutil, secretary and treasurer. The Kroutil
brothers became residents of Oklahoma in 1890, and they have been
closely associated in their business activities during the
intervening years. The subject of this review acquired at Ponca City,
Kay County, this state, his initial experience as a buyer of grain,
and there he was soon joined by his elder brother, Frank K., their
residence and business operations having there continued for six
years. In 1902 they purchased a sawmill at Yukon, and from this
nucleus has been developed the fine milling plant of which mention
has already been made. In the earlier period of their residence in
Canadian County the brothers were associated in the development and
management of a farm, but their ambition & progressiveness soon led
them into broader fields of industrial enterprise.

They came to Oklahoma territory from David City, Nebraska, in which
state they had previously been engaged in agricultural pursuits. They
were born near the city of Prague, Austria,---Frank L. in 1872, and
John F. on the 16th of May, 1875, --and thus both were boys at the
time of the family immigration to America in 1882, the father
establishing a home on a farm near David City, Nebraska, where the
sons were reared to adult age and were afforded the advantages of the
public schools. The parents, Frank and Katherine (VICE) Kroutil, are
still living and maintain their residence in Oklahoma, as do also
their four sons and one daughter, the latter being the wife of Anton
F. DOBEY, vice president of the Yukon Mill & Grain Company.

He whose name introduces this article has become one of the
substantial capitalists of Oklahoma and in addition to being
president of the Yukon Mill & Grain Company he is president of the
Yukon National Bank. While he has been unflagging in his application
to business and has achieved large success, he has had appreciation
of the responsibility imposed by such success and is most loyal,
liberal and public-spirited in his civic attitude. Though a strong
supporter of the cause of the democratic of ambition for the honors
or emoluments of public office. He and his family are communicants of
the Catholic Church, and he is a life member of the Oklahoma City
Lodge of the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks.

As a man of large business activities, Mr. Kroutil has formed a wide
acquaintanceship in the state of his adoption, is liberal in the
support of measures and enterprises advanced for the general good of
the community at large, and his honorable, straightforward course, as
combined with a genial and buoyant nature, has gained to him hosts of
staunch friend.

The maiden name of the first wife of Mr. Kroutil was Leonara BOREK,
and she is survived by one child, Bernice. A few years after the
death of his first wife Mr. Kroutil wedded Miss Mary FISHER, and they
have one daughter, Margarette, the family home being one of the most
attractive in Yukon and a center of most gracious hospitality.

Typed for OKGenWeb by Allison Sheldon July 27, 1999.

SOURCE: Thoburn, Joseph B., A Standard History of Oklahoma, An
Authentic Narrative of its Development, 5 v. (Chicago, New York: The
American Historical Society, 1916).