High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! Colonel Cyrus Kurtz Holliday (April 3, 1826 – March 29, 1900) was one of the founders of the township of Topeka, Kansas, in the mid 19th century; and was Adjutant General of Kansas during the American Civil War. The title Colonel, however, was honorary. He was the first president of the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway, as well as one of the railroad`s directors for nearly 40 years, up to 1900. A number of railway locomotives have been named after him.