Abner Kirby, Jr., was born in the town of Starks, Maine, when that area was still part of the state of Massachusetts.

He arrived in Milwaukee on May 18, 1844, and quickly bought all the land on the northeast corner of the intersection of Wisconsin and East Water Street.

He built a sturdy brick building on this corner and operated a jewelry store out of the ground floor for the next ten years.

After exiting the lumber business in 1880, he became heavily invested in manufacturing threshing machines and other farm machinery in a firm known as Kirby, Langworthy, & Company.

[1] In 1856, amidst his other ventures, he became part owner of a hotel in partnership with Daniel Wells, Jr., who had started the business in 1844.

[1] The Kirby House eventually became the center of his business empire and one of the most popular hotels in the western states.

"—an old theater joke referring to the dramatic death scenes of actor J. Hudson Kirby—and had the slogan painted in large gold letters behind the hotel welcome desk.

[1][2] Word of Lincoln's assassination arrived in Milwaukee on the last day of Kirby's term as mayor, at which he issued the proclamation:[5] The joy of the nation is turned into mourning!

The Chief Magistrate of our country is reported to have been slain at the hands of an assassin, and the life of our Secretary of Slate taken by a still more infamous hind.

Therefore, I, Abner Kirby, Mayor of Milwaukee, do hereby recommend that all the dwellings and business places of our city forthwith be clad in mourning, as a token of the deep and common sorrow that prevails; and that the people, abstaining from all excitement improper for such solemn occasion, postpone their ordinary business duties today, and that in all the churches, tomorrow, such services be performed as will duly express the great and general grief.Abner Kirby, Jr., was a son of Abner Kirby of Westport, Massachusetts, and his second wife Nancy Crosby (née Hume).

[3] In 1854, Kirby married his third and final wife, Letitia Ramolina Chase, of Amsterdam, New York, possibly a cousin of his previous wives.