Learnard, Mary S., b. 1842 .

Mary S. Learnard was born in Massachusetts in January 1842 to Shalor Winchell and Mary R. (Norton) Eldridge. Her father, a railroad contractor, relocated to Kansas City in 1854, where he bought the American House, operated as a free state hotel. In 1856, he began operating the Free State Hotel at Lawrence, which was twice burned by pro-slavery factions and rebuilt by Eldridge. In 1862, Mary Eldridge married Oscar Eugene Learnard, a member of the first territorial legislature of Kansas and one of the first state senators.

From the guide to the Mary S. Learnard collection, 1871-1875, 1938, (University of Kansas Kenneth Spencer Research Library Kansas Collection)