BIOGRAPHIES

JOHN A. LOWRY

JOHN A. LOWRY, mayor of Big Timber and president of the board of trustees of the Big Timber Carnegie Library, is a prominent business man of that city and has been in Montana for over twenty years.

He was born at Chambersburg, Pennsylvania, December 24, 1871.  His maternal ancestors were Scotch-Irish and settled in Pennsylvania in colonial times.  His father Albert S. Lowry was born at Chambersburg in 1843, was reared in his native state, was married in Franklin County, and in 1878 moved to Dickinson County, Kansas, where he was an early settler and farmer.  He died there in 1912.  He was a republican and a member of the Lutheran Church and for a number of years was a trustee of the Dickinson County High School and held other township offices.  He was affiliated with the Ancient Order of United Workmen and the Sons and Daughters of Justice.  Albert S. Lowry married Amanda Snyder, who was born near Chambersburg, Pennsylvania, in 1846 and died in Dickinson County, Kansas, in 1914.  Of their children John A. was the third.  Anna L., the oldest, lives at Waverly, Massachusetts, wife of Martin L. Baughey.  Carrie L. is the wife of Ira J. Miller, bookkeeper and timekeeper for the Government in the Bremerton Navy Yards at Washington and a resident of Seattle.  Curtis M. is a salesman living at Enid, Oklahoma; Maude is the wife of Guy Hall, county surveyor, living at Chapman, Kansas; Elsie F. is unmarried and is a stenographer and bookkeeper at Seattle, Washington; William L. is  mail clerk living in Kansas City, Kansas; Lesta B., the youngest of the family, is the wife of J. B. Gleason, auditor for the Northern Pacific Railway at Billings.

John A. Lowry attended the rural schools of Dickinson County, Kansas, from the time he was seven years of age and graduated from the County High School there in 1892.  He became a teacher and it was in that capacity that he was first known in Montana.  For many years he taught in Dickinson County and in 1896 graduated from the State Normal School at Emporia, Kansas.  He then taught another period of two years in Dickinson County and in April, 1898, came to Lewis and Clark County, Montana where he taught for four years.  The fourth year he was principal of the East Helena school.  In 1902 he came to Big Timber and was principal of schools for three years.  In 1905 Mr. Lowry engaged in the real estate, loans, abstract, bonds and insurance business, and has perfected an organization immediately directed under his personal supervision that is one of the most complete and adequate of its kind in Southern Montana.  In 1908 he bought out the undertaking business of James A. Mulkern, and is owner of that establishment.  He owns the office building and a lot on the north side of the Grand Hotel at Big Timber and has a modern home at 7th Avenue and Anderson Street.  His undertaking parlors are at the corner of Anderson and Third Avenue.

An evidence of his prosperity since becoming a Montana resident is found in the fact that he owns a ranch of 305 acres twenty miles north of Big Timber in Sweetgrass County.

Mr. Lowry is county coroner, having been appointed in the fall of 1918 and regularly elected to the office in April, 1919.  For six years he also served as a trustee of the public schools and is now president of the Sweetgrass High School Board as well as president of the Carnegie Library Board.  Mr. Lowry is a republican, a member of the Lutheran Church, is clerk of Big Timber Camp No. 10610, Modern Woodmen of America, is chancellor commander of Big Timber Lodge No. 25, Knights of Pythias, and a member of the Big Timber Chamber of Commerce and the Sweetgrass County Good Roads Association.  He is a director and treasurer of the Big Timber Building & Loan Association.

In 1910 at Billings Mr. Lowry married Miss Addie L. Dean.  Her mother is deceased.  Her father George Dean is a retired farmer at Groton, South Dakota.  Mrs. Lowry is a graduate of the high school at Grand Meadow, Minnesota, and received her Bachelor of Science degree from the Wesleyan University at Indianapolis, Indiana.  Mr. and Mrs. Lowry have one son, Curtis Dean, born April 11, 1911.

Source: Transcription from the book, Montana, Its Story and Biography, volume III, edited by Tom Stout, published in 1921, page 1441, located on the website, Hathitrust Digital Library (http://www.hathitrust.org), accessed 22 February 2023.

 BACK TO TOP