Nathan Scarritt

Rev. Nathan Scarritt (1821-1890) = Methodist Preacher and Teacher. Missionary. Nathan was born in Edwardsville, Illinois on April 14 and was educated at McKendree College, in Lebanon, Illinois.

He arrived in the Kansas City area in September of 1848 to teach the classics at Rev. Thomas Johnson’s Shawnee Methodist Indian Manual Labor School. He also taught at early grammar schools in Westport, at a seminary for young women and at a Bible training school for missionaries.

Rev. Scarritt preached at the Delaware Indian Methodist Mission White Church organized by Rev. Thomas Johnson for a time. In 1852, the Independence Methodist circuit was dropped and a new Kansas and Westport circuit filled, with Rev. Scarritt appointed as preacher. He attended the St. Louis Methodist Conference at Springfield, MO. on Wednesday, October 24, 1855. Nathan was presiding elder over the Lecompton district in the fourth session of the Kansas Methodist Mission Conference held in Tecumseh on September 23, 1859.  In 1858-59, he was appointed to the Shawnee Reserve, and for the next two years he was the presiding elder of the Lecompton district. Later he preached at the Washington Street Methodist Episcopal Church, a preaching point begun by a Methodist layman, W.B. Barber in 1877.

Nathan married Martha Matilda Chick, daughter of Col. William Miles (1794-1847) and Ann Eliza Smith Chick (1796-1876) and produced nine children. Originally, Nathan and Martha lived in Westport, in a tidy two-story frame house, but moved to a farm in 1862, close to today’s Cliff Drive and Gladstone Blvd in Kansas City. Still standing is his eldest son’s 1898 Scarritt-Royster home.  In October of 1874, he married Mrs. Ruth E. Scarritt, the widow of his brother Isaac.

Nathan died on May 22 and is buried in the Mt. Washington Cemetery in Independence, MO. 

More to Read:

1. Kansas City Then & Now 3. By Monroe Dodd, Kansas City Star Books, 2007.

2. Here Lies Kansas City: A Collection of Our City’s Notables and Their Final Resting Places. Wilda Sandy. 1984.

3. He Came To Pray: History of White Church Christian Church: 1832-1996.

4. Lecompton Methodist Church" By Iona Spencer. Bald Eagle. Lecompton Historical Society, Lecompton, KS. Summer, 1998.

5. Methodist Episcopal Church, South History. By Rev. Joab Spencer.

6. Postcards from Old Kansas City. By Mrs. Sam Ray. 1980.

7. Westport: Missouri's Port of Many Returns. By Patricia Cleary Miller. Lowell Press, Kansas City, Mo. 1983. Repository: Mid-Continent PublicLibrary, Raytown Branch, 10016 E. 62st, Raytown, MO.
8. Findagrave #6870909

Places to Visit in KS. & MO.

1. Shawnee Indian Mission Historic Site & Museum, 3403 W. 53^rd, Fairway, KS

2. White Christian Church/Delaware Indian Mission (see stained glass window), 2200 N. 85th St., Kansas City, Wyandotte County, KS.

3. Lecompton & Tecumseh, KS.

4. Former home stood at 4038 Central street, Kansas City, MO.

5. Scarritt Point Memorial, (first home site), West side of Walrond Street and Norledge Ave, at Kessler Park, Scarritt Spring, Kansas City, MO. (section 34 shows Nathan Scarritt's name on this 1877 Jackson County, MO. historic map)

6. Scarritt Building, 9^th & Walnut, Kansas City, MO. (completed in 1907)

7. Scarritt-Royster home, 3500 Gladstone Blvd, Kansas City, MO.
8. Scarritt Avenue in Kansas City, Missouri
9. Westport Historical Society, 4000 Baltimore Ave, Kansas City

9. Mt. Washington Cemetery, 614 Brookside Drive, Independence, MO.

Biography written by Dolores J. Rush. Updated: 1/17/2020.