John Andrew Creighton was born in Licking County, Ohio, youngest of nine children. His parents, James and Bridget (Hughes) Creighton, both natives of Ireland, emigrated to the United States in the years 1805 and 1808, respectively, and were married in 1811. James Creighton was employed for a time in a Pittsburgh foundry, but in 1813 he moved to Ohio, where he became a farmer.
John received his formal education at the local district school, and at St. Joseph’s, a Dominican college at Somerset, Ohio.
Creighton hoped to fit himself for the profession of civil engineering, but in 1854, after only two years of college, he entered the employ of his elder brother, Edward, who built telegraph lines and took grading contracts. In 1856 the latter met with some reverses in Missouri and Iowa, after which the two brothers and several of their relatives settled in Omaha. Here John secured temporary employment in a store. It soon developed that the road to fortune lay still farther to the West.
In 1860 he took two train-loads of merchandise by ox-team to Denver, where he remained until 1861. On July 4 of that year the construction of a telegraph line to the Pacific was begun. Edward Creighton had contracted to build the section from Julesburg, Colorado, to Salt Lake, and John was put in charge of the work. Thereafter for many years the interests of the two men centered in the Far West, where as freighters, traders, contractors, and stockmen they amassed great wealth.
John Creighton was active in starting the packing industry in South Omaha. For five years he was located at Virginia City, Montana, and at one time he figured prominently as a member of the famous Vigilantes. In 1868, however, he left the rough life of the western mining camp and established himself in Omaha. In 1874, Edward, by this time reputed to be Omaha’s wealthiest citizen, died, and John succeeded to much of his brother’s property, including Wyoming cattle interests which sold in 1875 for $700, 000.
Wisely invested in numerous enterprises both in Omaha and in the West, the Creighton fortune compounded rapidly in spite of the numerous benevolences that were charged against it. Childless, and after 1888 a widower, Creighton took great pleasure in giving liberally, especially to the Catholic Church and to Catholic institutions. To Creighton University, which his brother Edward’s widow had endowed in accordance with a plan of her husband to establish a free Catholic school of higher education, he gave most liberally, and the day of John Creighton’s death has been adopted as the University’s Founder’s Day. It is said that the total gifts to the institution from John Creighton and his estate reached nearly a million and a quarter dollars.
Creighton’s imposing figure, made almost patriarchal in his later years by silvery hair and a flowing beard, was well-known in Omaha and indeed throughout the entire West. He remained to his dying day, in spite of his riches, distinctly the Westerner, always fully alive to the interests of the West, and always sympathetic with its point of view.
John Andrew Creighton became known for his business connections, his philanthropy, his marked devotion to his church, and his political enthusiasms. Along with his brother, he was instrumental in the foundation of Creighton University. For his contribution to this University and the Catholic community in Omaha, Pope Leo XIII made him a knight of the Order of St. Gregory, and in 1895 conferred upon him the title of Count of the Papal Court. In 1900 Notre Dame University gave him its Laetare Medal.
Creighton was a devout member of the Catholic Church.
In politics John was an ardent Democrat, and he voted for Bryan in 1896 when most men of wealth, regardless of party, supported the Republican candidate.
In 1868 Creighton married Sarah Emily Wareham, the sister of Mary Lucretia Creighton, who was married to John's brother Edward. John's wife Sarah died September 3, 1888; before her death she bequeathed a business block near Downtown Omaha to the yet-to-be-established Creighton College.
