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John White Geary was born in Mt. Pleasant in 1819.After leaving Jefferson College, he received an appointment on the Portage railroad. He was later a Lieutenant Colonel with the Second Pennsylvania Regiment during the Mexican War. When Mexico City was entered by American troops, General Quitman appointed him commander of the Citadel. President Polk named him postmaster of San Francisco in 1849. He later served as first alcade and then first mayor of San Francisco. He returned to Pennsylvania in 1852. President Pierce appointed him Governor of Kansas in 1856 and he served until 1857 when he again returned to Pennsylvania. When the Civil War broke out, he raised the Twenty-eighth Regiment Pennsylvania Volunteers. He commanded the upper Potomac District during the fall of 1861. The following winter, his regiment guarded all the fords of the Potomac from Harper's Ferry to Point of Rocks. His regiment led the advance of Banks' army crossing the Potomac at Harper's Ferry and had command of the movement along the Loudon Valley. By this time he had become a Brigadier General and later fought in the battle of Gettysburg. After the war ended, he entered politics, becoming Governor of Pennsylvania in 1866. He was re-elected in 1869 and a few days after completing his second term, he died in suddenly. It was 1873 and he was 54.
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