When William T. Kerr was born on 13 May 1849, in Nokomis, Montgomery, Illinois, United States, his father, James Kerr, was 39 and his mother, Rebecca Jouett, was 40. He married Annie Eliza Lipe on 3 June 1874, in Montgomery, Illinois, United States. They were the parents of at least 2 sons and 1 daughter. He lived in Illinois, United States in 1870 and Falls Township, Sumner, Kansas, United States in 1880. He died on 16 November 1891, in Caldwell, Sumner, Kansas, United States, at the age of 42.
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Bleeding Kansas was a time period between the years 1854 and 1861 with a series of violent confrontations over whether slavery would be legal in Kansas Territory.
William Rand opened a small printing shop in Chicago. Doing most of the work himself for the first two years he decided to hire some help. Rand Hired Andrew McNally, an Irish Immigrant, to work in his shop. After doing business with the Chicago Tribune, Rand and McNally were hired to run the Tribune's entire printing operation. Years later, Rand and McNally established Rand McNally & Co after purchasing the Tribune's printing business. They focused mainly on printing tickets, complete railroad guides and timetables for the booming railroad industry around the city. What made the company successful was the detailed maps of roadways, along with directions to certain places. Rand McNally was the first major map publisher to embrace a system of numbered highways and erected many of the roadside highway signs that have been adopted by state and federal highway authorities. The company is still making and updating the world maps that are looked at every day.
Illinois contributed 250,000 soldiers to the Union Army, ranking it fourth in terms of the total men fighting for a single state. Troops mainly fought in the Western side of the Appalachian Mountains, but a few regiments played important roles in the East side. Several thousand Illinoisians died during the war. No major battles were fought in the state, although several towns became sites for important supply depots and navy yards. Not everyone in the state supported the war and there were calls for secession in Southern Illinois several residents. However, the movement for secession soon died after the proposal was blocked.
English and Scottish: topographic name for someone who lived by a marsh or swampy woodland, Middle English kerr ‘brushwood, wet ground’ (Old Norse kjarr). A legend grew up that the Kerrs were left-handed, on theory that the name is derived from Gaelic cearr ‘wrong-handed, left-handed’.
Irish: variant of Carr .
Americanized form of German Kehr or of some other similar (like-sounding) surname.
Dictionary of American Family Names © Patrick Hanks 2003, 2006.
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