Former Ft. Scott publisher, KU alumnus dies at 70

? Dr. Frank Emery, who became owner and publisher of The Fort Scott Tribune following a career as an orthopedic surgeon, has died. He was 70.

Emery had cancer and died Sunday at his home in Springfield, Mo., from which he had regularly traveled about 100 miles to Fort Scott.

A native of Wichita, Emery practiced and taught orthopedic medicine for more than 20 years before becoming part-owner of The Tribune in 1972. He became sole owner and publisher in 1988 and held those titles until August of this year, when the newspaper was acquired by Rust Communications Inc., of Cape Girardeau, Mo.

Emery was active in numerous civic and business organizations in Fort Scott and Bourbon County. His belief in a newspaper’s role as a service to the community reflected the philosophies of The Tribune’s founder, G.W. Marble, and Marble’s son and successor, George Watson Marble Jr., who was Emery’s father-in-law.

“You can’t just tell a community what it must have,” Emery wrote in a special edition commemorating The Tribune’s 100th anniversary in December 1984. “You have to learn to listen a lot. Don’t focus on the bumps. Focus on progress and willingness to work on goals for the future.”

Emery received his bachelor’s degree in 1955 and his medical degree in 1959, both from Kansas University. During the following decades he worked as a public health official, practiced privately in Springfield, taught at the University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston and spent a year as a research fellow at the University of Edinburgh in Scotland.

Survivors include his wife, Sandy, four sons, three stepdaughters, two brothers and 22 grandchildren.

Funeral services were scheduled at 2 p.m. today at Gorman Scharpf Funeral Home in Springfield, preceded by an hour of visitation.