Biography of John Wilson Lauk, M. D.

John Wilson Lauck, M. D. Since 1903 Doctor Lauck had been engaged in his work as a physician and surgeon at Olsburg in Pottawatomie County. During that time Doctor Lauck had become a citizen of prominence in that community. He had done something toward the development of modern farming in that locality and is also a factor in the commercial enterprise of the village.

Doctor Lauck is a native of Kansas, having been born in the City of Atchison October 28, 1875. He is of Scotch ancestry and his forefathers came from that country to Maryland in early days. His father, the late I. S. Lauck, was for many years one of the trusted officials of the Santa Fe Railway Company at Topeka. I. S. Lauck was born at Washington, D. C., in 1845. He was reared and married in his native city and in 1872 came to Kansas, locating at Atchison, where he was cashier of a bank for a time, but soon removed to Topeka and for over thirty years was anditor of the Santa Fe Bailway Company. His residence all that time was in Topeka, but he died in Chicago in 1903, while on a pleasure trip to his native City of Washington. Politically he was a democrat. I. S. Lauck married Amanda Lyons, who was born in Virginia March 15, 1847, and is living at her home, 205 Western Avenue, in Topeka. There were three children, Doctor Lauck being the oldest. Allen A. is a traveling anditor for the Santa Fe, with home at 201 Western Avenue in Topeka. I. S. Lauck is in the hardware and lumber business at Willard, Kansas.

Doctor Lanck grew up in Topeka, attended the grammar and high schools of that city, and prepared himself for his profession in the Kansas Medical College at Topeka, from which he gradusted in 1898, with the degree M. D. He had had unusual opportunities and experience to fit him for the work of his carear. In 1904 he took post-graduate work in Rush Medical College of Chicago and in 1911 pursued a course in the Harvard Medical School of Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Doctor Lauck in 1898 practised for six mouths at Maple Hill, Kansas. During the Spanish-American war he entered the Government service as assistant surgeon with the rank of first lieutenant, and was stationed at the National Military Home at Leavenworth from November, 1898, until the fall of 1901. The two following years he spent at El Reno, Oklahoma, and in September, 1903, returning to Kansas, located at Olsburg, where he had been busy with a large private practice as a physician and surgeon. Doctor Lauck also owned and operates the only drng store at Olsburg, and his interest in farming had led him to acquire a place of eighty acres two miles east of town and he also rents 284 acres adjoining his own place. His home is on Second Street in Olsburg.

Doctor Lauck had served as clerk of the school board, and in 1913 was health officer for Pottawatomie County. He is affiliated with Fostoria Lodge No. 392, Aneient Free and Accepted Masons, and with Topeka Consistory No. 1 of the Scottish Rite. He also belongs to Olsburg Camp of the Modern Woodmen of America and is a charter member of Leavenworth Lodge of Elks. Politically he is a republican. Doctor Lauck married at Topeka January 27, 1904, Miss Helen Goddard, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. J. H. Goddard. Mrs. Lauck’s parents live on a farm near the City of Boston, Massachusetts. Doctor and Mrs. Lauck have three children: Engenia, born November 21, 1905; Helen, born June 28, 1910; and Edith, born February 9, 1912.