Scripps, John L.

Born: 1818-02-27 Cape Girardeau, Missouri

Died: 1866-09-21 Minneapolis, Minnesota

Flourished: Chicago, Illinois

Though born in Missouri, John L. Scripps, a lawyer and journalist, spent most of his life in Illinois. He attended McKendrie College, a Methodist school, graduating with honors and becoming a professor there soon after while studying the law. Scripps moved to Chicago in 1847 to practice law and in 1848 he bought one-third interest in the Chicago Tribune, where he acted as the principal writer and editorial manager. However, he sold out his interest in 1852 when the Whigs took controlling interest of the Tribune, Scripps being a Freesoiler. He then started a newspaper under the name Democratic Press, which remained a Free Soil paper until 1856 when it became a Republican paper. Soon after, in 1858, the Democratic Press and Chicago Tribune merged to become the Press & Tribune under the co-leadership of Scripps. In 1860, Scripps wrote a biography of Abraham Lincoln that appeared in the Press & Tribune the day after the 1860 Republican National Convention closed. Lincoln agreed shortly thereafter to allow Scripps to write a complete biography of him, which became the first biography published of Lincoln. After Lincoln was elected president, he named Scripps postmaster of Chicago in 1861, a position he held for five years. In addition, with his own money, Scripps organized, equipped, and sent to war a company of the Seventy-Second Illinois Regiment, known as the Scripps' Guards.

Scripps married Mary Elizabeth Blanchard in October 1848 in Bond, Illinois, and the couple had three children.

Chicago Tribune (IL), 24 September 1866, 2:1; Joseph R. Nightingale, "Joseph H. Bartlett and John Locke Scripps, Shapers of Lincoln's Religious Image," Journal of the Illinois State Historical Society 92 (Autumn 1999), 249; Record of Appointment of Postmasters, 1832-1971, NARA Microfilm Publication, M841, 145 rolls, Records of the Post Office Department, RG 28, 1855-1865, Volume 20a:23, National Archives Building, Washington, DC; James E. Scripps, A Genealogical History of the Scripps Family and its Various Alliances (Detroit: R. L. Polk, 1903), 31; Illinois Statewide Marriage Index, Bond County, 25 October 1848, Illinois State Archives, Springfield, IL; U.S. Census Office, Seventh Census of the United States (1850), Ward 8, Chicago, Cook County, IL, 390.