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A native of Marion County, Kansas, Lou Richter
attended Kansas State Agricultural College and graduated from
Dougherty’s Business College in Topeka. The only KBI director to have
served in World War I, he was a long-time sheriff of Marion County and
later a deputy U.S. Marshal and also a special agent for Rock Island
Railroad, prior to appointment by Attorney General Jay Parker as the
first KBI director. Ironically, he had served as president of the
Kansas Peace Officers’ Association in 1936, as sheriff of Marion
County, and had been deeply involved in the campaign to create the
KBI. Serving Attorneys General Parker, A.B. Mitchell, Edward F. Arn,
Harold R. Fatzer and John Anderson, Jr., Director Richter was the
longest-serving KBI director (17 years) and the only one to die in
office. He died of cancer, September 13,1956, at Topeka, at the age of
63. |
