Biography

Adna Girard Clarke was born May 27, 1874 in Kansas City, Missouri. In 1897 he both graduated from the University of Kansas and married Birdie Baxter (1874-1958), also known by her penname Jane Comstock. They had three children, and Mrs. Clarke became a well-known poet, as well as serving as territorial vice president of Hawaii.

Clarke briefly served as a deputy clerk in the Douglas County District Court in Lawrence, Kansas after graduation in 1897. In 1898, however, he was sent to Manila Bay to serve as captain of Company H in the 20th Kansas Volunteers, under the command of Colonel Fred Funston. While in the Philippines, Clarke was shot in the shoulder and badly wounded. His service earned him one of the first University of Kansas' alumni citations for distinguished service, in 1947.

In World War I, Clarke held roles as second in command at a prisoner of war camp in Georgia and overseeing the pictorial section of the historical branch of the war plans division for the Army general staff in Washington, D.C. By the time of his retirement from military service, he held the rank of colonel.

Clarke and his family eventually settled in Hawaii, where Clarke worked as a lawyer and taught military science and tactics, receiving emeritus status from the University of Hawaii. In 1937 he served as a member of Hawaii's House of Representatives, and he also served several years on the traffic commission. Clarke remained an active alumni of KU, establishing the Kansas Club of Hawaii.

Adna G. Clarke died in September 1953, his wife in 1958. They were both buried in the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific in Honolulu, which they helped establish.

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