Biography

03/21/1815 - 05/01/1904

SHONK, John Jenks, a Representative from Luzerne County; born, March 21, 1815 in Hope, Sussex County (now Warren County), NJ; sergeant, Company G, 30th Regiment, Pennsylvania Emergency Militia (1863, Civil War); miner; engaged, lumber business; coal operator; elected, school board, Plymouth; elected as a Prohibitionist to the Pennsylvania House of Representatives in 1874 and 1875; reelected to the House as a Republican in 1876 and 1877; unsuccessful campaign for reelection to the House (1878); president, Williams’ Coal Company; president, Cabin Creek Kanawha Coal Company; stakeholder, Kanawha Railroad Company of West Virginia; died, May 1, 1904 in Plymouth, Luzerne County, Pennsylvania; interred, Shawnee Cemetery, Plymouth, Luzerne County, Pennsylvania.