My Genealogy Hound

John S. Harris has attained to substantial success as a planter and stockman of Perry County. Born in Woodford County, Ky., on April 11, 1866, he is the son of John W. and Florida Ann (Neet) Harris. His education was obtained at the public schools of his native county, and principally in the town of Versailles. At the age of fourteen years he left school and went to work with his father upon the farm, and in 1881 removed with his parents to Perry County, Ark., where the elder Harris purchased 320 acres of wild land, and the following year homesteaded 160 acres more, upon which he cleared fifty acres, built houses, barns, and made a great many improvements. During the same year he erected a substantial dwelling on the first purchase, and by 1885 he had cleared off and put under cultivation thirty acres more. He became a well-known and popular citizen of Perry County, and on the occasion of his death, in September, 1886, left a large circle of friends and acquaintances, as well as a wife and six children to mourn him. His son, John S., commenced farming for himself at the age of twenty years, on land rented from his father’s estate, and in the first year put in a crop of forty five acres, consisting of cotton and corn, with the first named predominating. His crop has increased from year to year, and he now has sixty acres of cotton and twenty acres of corn under cultivation, the former averaging a bale to the acre, and corn going largely over. Mr. Harris is a steady-going, shrewd business man, and an experienced farmer, and his work thus far has given the older farmers of that section to understand that they must look well to their laurels, or else be surpassed by their energetic young neighbor. He became familiar with the breeding and raising of stock on the home farm in Kentucky, and he is now thinking seriously of entering into that business, which, in his judgment, is much more profitable than his present occupation. In politics he is a Democrat, and in religious and social matters he takes an active part. Mr. Harris is still a young man, and his future is a bright one. His intention is to make Perry County his permanent home, and the citizens of that place can congratulate themselves upon having him in their midst.