Kansas: A Cyclopedia of State History/Ernest L. Ackley

Ackley, Ernest L., lawyer and regent of the Kansas State University, was born at North Ridgeville, Ohio, Nov. 30, 1863, a son of Chauncey and Jerusa (McNeal) Ackley. About 1875 the family removed to Kansas and settled on a farm in Ottawa county, where Ernest attended the public schools until he was eighteen years of age, when he obtained a position in a bank at Minneapolis. After working in the bank for about two years, he entered the state university, and graduated in the law department with the class of 1890. For a time he was employed on the Salina Republican with Joseph L. Bristow, now United States senator, and was also employed by Charles F. Scott on the Lawrence Journal. In July, 1890, he became associated with A. L. Wilmoth, a classmate, in the practice of law at Concordia. W. W. Caldwell entered the firm in 1897, when Mr. Ackley withdrew, and in Feb., 1901, he formed a partnership with P. B. Pulsifer, which lasted until his death the following August. About the same time he was appointed by Gov. Stanley one of the regents of the university. Mr. Ackley was an active member of the State Historical Society; a member of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows and the Modern Woodmen of America, and belonged to the Phi Gamma Delta college fraternity. In Nov., 1893, he married Miss Ada B. Fry, at one time a teacher in the Concordia schools. Mr. Ackley died at Concordia on Aug. 27, 1901.