Jesse James Dunn

Jesse James Dunn (1867-1926) was a judge on the Oklahoma Supreme Court.

Early life and education Dunn was born on October 2, 1867, at Channahon, Will County, Illinois to James McCann and Alta Fiorina (née Lewis) Dunn. In 1857, James McCann Dunn worked for a contractor delivering freight to the new Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, but in 1858, he returned to his parents' home and went into some unspecified business, until he enlisted in the Union Army, then was assigned to Company A, 97th Regiment Illinois Infantry, later transferred to Company D, 37th Regiment Illinois Infantry, and on detached service in the ambulance corps after October 16, 1864. He was honorably discharged August 15, 1865, at New Orleans, Louisiana.

He had begun reading law in 1889 in the Garden City, Kansas office of George Lynn Miller. In 1892, Jesse enrolled in the University of Kansas Law School, and graduated with a Bachelor of Laws Degree on June 7, 1893.

On September 16, 1893, Jesse made the run and was successful in finding a site in the new community of Alva, Oklahoma Territory where he settled down and opened a law partnership with George Lynn Miller, who later married Jesse's eldest sister. He returned to practice law in Alva, where he now formed a partnership with Francis Marion Cowgill. Meanwhile, the Populist Party continued to decline, so Dunn affiliated with the Democratic Party under William Jennings Bryan's leadership.

Move to California Dunn resigned his seat, effective September 1, 1913 and announced that he planned to move to Oakland, California, where he and Judge John Yule, an uncle of Mrs. Dunn, had formed a partnership to practice law. Their firm was known as Dunn, White and Aiken from March 1, 1914 until it was dissolved by the surviving partners on December 31, 1938.

Electoral history