Frederick Chouteau
Frederick Chouteau, one of the first white men to settle in Kansas, was born into a prominent family of settlers and traders. His grandfather, Auguste Chouteau, is credited with being one of the founders of the city of St. Louis. His father, Jean Pierre, continued the family’s fur trading business, establishing several posts in what is now south-western Missouri. Frederick, along with his brother, received a license to trade with certain Indian tribes, including the Shawnee and the Kaw, around 1825. The two men began establishing trading posts along the Kansas River and transporting goods on pack horses. Soon, Frederick opened a trading house ten miles from the present location of Topeka, and then a second one on Mill Creek in Johnson County.
Chouteau married a Shawnee woman, the first of four wives, and enjoyed a successful trading career. However, in 1844, floods on Mill Creek destroyed almost everything he owned, and he left Johnson County for higher ground. In 1852 or 1853, he moved back to Johnson County. From Henry Bluejacket, he purchased a log house on the military road from the old Fort Leavenworth to Fort Gibson (now McAnany Drive in Shawnee). Quantrill’s raiders burned him out in 1862, but he rebuilt his home. He lived the rest of his life in Johnson County.
--ALBUM vol. 11, no. 4 (fall 1998)