Joshua Fry Speed
American politician and farmer (1814–1882)
Joshua Fry Speed (November 14, 1814 – May 29, 1882) was an American planter and businessman. He was a close friend of then-future President Abraham Lincoln from his days in Springfield, Illinois, where Speed was a partner in a general store. He first met Lincoln in 1837. Later, Speed returned to Kentucky where he farmed and invested in real estate. He also served one term in the Kentucky House of Representatives in 1848.
Life
Ancestors, family and early life
Joshua Fry Speed was born at Farmington, Louisville, Kentucky, to Judge John Speed and Lucy Gilmer Speed (née Fry) on November 14, 1814. On his father's side, Speed's ancestry can be traced back to 17th-century cartographer and historian John Speed. John Speed's great-grandfather (James Speed) emigrated to Virginia in 1695. James Speed's grandson, Captain James Speed, fought in the American Revolution and was seriously wounded in 1781, resulting in the Continental Congress awarding him 7,500 acres in the territory of Kentucky. He settled there in 1782 and became a judge and land speculator, eventually accumulating 45,000 acres in central Kentucky and joining the territorial conventions by which Kentucky became separated from Virginia.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Joshua Fry Speed” is american politician and farmer (1814–1882). The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Joshua, Speed and American, not as a finished interpretation.
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The entry’s evidential value lies in the named roles, institutions and publications that can be tested against primary documentation. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 20, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q3278063. VIAF identifies the subject as 54017483. The Library of Congress control number is nr93004624. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1814, 1882, 1837 and 1848.
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This entry incorporates text from “Joshua Fry Speed” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.