Resourcefulness is at the core of the African American narrative. For centuries, Black people have had to work with inadequate resources, limited opportunities and under oppressive environments. They have thrived, regardless. A former slave, Junius G. Groves taught himself how to farm, became a sharecropper and a landowner and produced potatoes at a record-breaking rate. He possessed more than 500 acres of land at the peak of his career and was crowned “Potato King of the World” for his agricultural exploits.
Groves was born a slave on April 12, 1859 in Kentucky, a few years before the Emancipation Proclamation. Despite being able to attend school for a few months each year, he developed a lifelong thirst for knowledge. He joined other freedmen in the Great Exodus and moved to Kansas in 1879 with only 90¢ in his pocket. Groves worked at meat packing houses before finding work as a farmhand. His strong ethic and production impressed his employer who made him foreman and offered him nine acres of land to farm on shares.
Groves was a step closer to achieving his dream of owning his own farm.
He planted both sweet and Irish potatoes on the first farm, earning 40 cents a day. His pay was soon increased to 75 cents and later one-third of the crops farmed on the nine acres. With the $125 from his first year of sharecropping, Groves bought land of his own, a milk cow, and invested in his next crop. He had 20 acres in his second year and bought ten more acres and a cabin in his third year. With his savings, Groves purchased 80 acres from a Native American for $500.
Working alongside his wife and twelve children, Groves was able to successfully grow the farm and family holdings. He was recorded as owning 400 acres of potatoes, 170 acres of apple trees, 160 acres of corn, and 50 acres of cherry trees in the 1895 Kansas State Agricultural Census. He also owned 21 cows, nine horses, and 24 hogs. Groves’ dedication to the science of agriculture optimized potato growth, producing 721,500 bushels in a single year. The U.S. Dept of Agriculture crowned him the “Potato King of the World” in 1902 for this remarkable feat.
In addition to producing potatoes on his own farms, Groves bought and shipped potatoes, fruits and vegetables extensively throughout the United States, Mexico, and Canada. He also owned and operated a general merchandise store, possessed stock in mines and Kansas banks, and majority interest in the Kansas City Casket and Embalming Company. A civic leader, he co-founded the State Negro Business League where he later served as president.
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He founded the Pleasant Hill Baptist Church Society in 1886, was secretary of the Kaw Valley Potato Association in 1890 and vice president of the Sunflower State Agricultural Association in 1910.
Groves was one of the wealthiest African Americans in the nation in the early 20th Century. His family mansion, a 22-room brick home with two telephones, electric lights, and hot and cold running water in all of the bedrooms, was the largest in the area and had its own railroad spur. By 1915, his holdings were estimated to be worth $300,000. His vast financial success was used to combat racism and opened up economic opportunities for other Black Americans. Booker T. Washington analyzed Groves in The Negro in Business in 1907, describing him as “our most successful Negro farmer.”
On August 17, 1925, Groves died of a heart attack at the age of 66. A local newspaper reported his funeral was the “largest ever” in the area with over 3,000 people attending. Groves was inducted into the Bruce W. Watkins Cultural Heritage Center Hall of Fame and honored by his descendants, the Votow Colony Museum in 2007. His legacy is an inspiration to all Black people about the heights they can achieve.
