NYPL RESEARCH LIBRARIES
3 3433 08254389 7
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•A.
THE
NEW YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY
PRESENTED BY
E.dwin Ch ar 1 e_s Hill
March 28,1921.
HISTORICAL
REGISTER
Edited by
Edwin Cliarles Hill
Historical Register
A RECORD OF PEOPLE
PLACES AND EVENTS
IN AMERICAN HISTORY
Illustrated with Portrait Plates
NEW YORK
EDWIN C. HILL
1920
Copyright, 1921, By
EDWIN C. HILL
composition and presswork under
the direction of ARTHUR HILL, with
illustrations by JOHN ANDERSEN
Foreword
HE HISTORICAL REGISTER is the first attempt
to present, in a dignified and appealing form,
the lives of those American citizens of our own
generation, who have contributed to the mak-
ing of America as a nation.
Its successive volumes have been planned to
contain the relations of the deeds and enter-
prises of these men, while yet their memories are still fresh in our
minds, and while we are still under the influence of their inspir-
ing examples. By these tributes we shall not only acknowledge
the debt we owe them, but we shall give to future generations
the record of the best we produced as our contribution to their
happiness and well-being.
In the truest and widest sense the history of any country is
but the biographies of its leaders in enterprise and thought. For
after all is said, History is life in story, and what is life in story if
it be not Biography?
The story of the founding of our great American Republic
is to be read in the lives of George Washington and Benjamin
Franklin. The tale of our Civil War is to be found in the life of
Abraham Lincoln, as the tale of England's emancipation from
kingly tyranny is to be found in the life of Oliver Cromwell.
Julius Caesar created the grandeur of the Roman Empire; Na-
poleon the splendor of a dying feudal France. Cyrus and Alex-
ander, Augustus and Charlemagne, Moses and Mahomet focus
in themselves the triumphal marches of nations. Paul and Sav-
onarola, Luther and Calvin, Loyola and Wesley are the people's
pilots over the great oceans of thought. Always it has been the
single men who have highly resolved and highly achieved, who,
by the power of their creative and conquering spirits, have in-
spired their fellow-men to a communal realization of the finest
expression of the human soul — of justice and honor and well
being in freedom. For without leaders we should not know
where to go, and fulfillingly. That is why it is so helpful and so
ii HISTORICAL REGISTER
encouraging to read the lives of men who have dared and done
greatly. Everywhere and always it is the life lived that counts,
that brings the right response from us, and that sets the old world
marching onward again, refreshed, to the music of a new
processional.
The American Republic is still a nation in the making. A
century and a half ago it was a colony of settlers seeking to live
their lives in freedom from tyranny. During that period the
people lived intensely, yet bravely, under the most adverse condi-
tions. As pioneers in a primitive land they had to contend with
nature in her hardest moods. From their loins sprang the farm-
ers, the prospectors, the engineers and the captains of industry
who have succeeded in harnessing the forces of nature to do their
will, and have changed the country into a land flowing with milk
and honey. To-day, America has taken her place among the
nations of the world as their leader in all that makes for achieve-
ment in enterprise and invention. History records no like re-
markable development of a people in so short a time. It stands
alone, a splendid example of human courage and a magnificent
demonstration of democracy. It is but just and proper that the
men who brought this about should receive their due merit of
appreciation. And this the HISTORIAL REGISTER gives.
Of necessity, the lives of such men must, in the main, tell of
material successes. They were the builders of their nation and
dealt with the concrete matters of the establishment of homes
and government and communal prosperity. The men who have
succeeded them are deeply interested in such matters. The
HISTORICAL REGISTER therefore, must, for the time being,
embrace the doings of men of action rather than of men of
thought. But all action springs from thought, and the thought
behind the actions of American men has always been fed and
nursed by high ideals of justice and honor. Soon there must
arise the thinkers and teachers who will keep the lamp of en-
lightenment burning. These will be the more helped in their
task by seeing how the spirit of our commonwealth never flagged
despite personal aims and desires.
The HISTORICAL REGISTER will thus be:
First and foremost, a biographical history of the American
nation of our time.
FOREWORD iii
Second, a record of the lives of those of our day and genera-
tion whose careers were in line with their country's progress and
development.
Third, it offers the great examples for the coming genera-
tions to follow.
Fourth, it preserves living in our memory the characters
and personalities of those with whom it was our privilege to live
and delight to honor, and
Fifth, it is a National Portrait Gallery of the best of our
citizenship.
The portraits included in each volume are faithful and life-
like presentations, reproduced by the best modern photographic
processes. They have been furnished by relatives as being the
best for the record, and the utmost care has been taken to make
them as perfect as art can make them.
These are the appeals which this notable work makes. They
are so evidently worthy and desirable that there can be no ques-
tion about their value. The Editorial Board is confident that the
hearty co-operation of those appealed to will be obtained, so
that the work may become an established institution with the
passing of the years. "People will not look forward to poster-
ity," said Burke, "who never look backward to their ancestors."
BAYARD THAVER
Bayard Thayer
AYARD THAYER was born in Boston, Massa-
chusetts, April 3rd, 1 862 ; son of Nathaniel and
Cornelia Van Rensselaer Thayer; grandson of
the Reverend Doctor Nathaniel and Sarah Top-
pan Thayer; great grandson of the Reverend Ebenezer
and Martha Cotton Thayer, and of the Honorable
Christopher Toppan, of Hampton, Massachusetts, and a
descendant of John Cotton and Richard Thayer, who
came to America in 1 640. Thomas and Margery Thayer
came from Gloucestershire, England, and settled in Old
Braintree about 1 630.
His father, Nathaniel Thayer, was greatly interested
in Harvard, contributing toward Thayer Commons, the
dining hall before Memorial Hall, and to the Thayer
Herbarium, and at his personal expense the so-called
Thayer Expedition to Brazil was undertaken by Professor
Agassiz, resulting in extensive and important additions to
the college museum of comparative zoology. In 1 870 he
erected Thayer Hall at Harvard as a memorial to his father
and to his brother, John Eliot Thayer. It was also largely
through his munificence that the First Church (Unitarian)
was built on the corner of Marlborough and Berkeley
Streets, Boston, Massachusetts. He was an Overseer of
Harvard, 1866-68, and a Fellow, 1868-75, receiving the
honorary degree of A. M. from the college in 1866; a
member of the Massachusetts Historical Society, and a
Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
Bayard Thayer was educated in private schools and
then traveled abroad for a year by way of rounding out
6 HISTORICAL REGISTER
his education and seeing a little of the world. As a young
man he was much interested in all outdoor sports, was
especially devoted to horse racing, yachting, and dogs
(setters and pointers.) For a number of years he led the
quiet but useful life of a country squire, and spent con-
siderable time developing his place in the country.
Mr. Thayer was an expert yachtsman. He owned
three sailing yachts, the Constellation, Sayonara and
Papoose. The Constellation won the golden galleon given
by J. P. Morgan, in 1 894, and the Papoose won thirty-one
races.
Mr. Thayer was always very fond of travel, even as
a youngster, and as he grew to manhood his avidity for
it increased. To an observant and thoughtful individual,
the invariable effect of travel is to teach respect for the
opinions, the faith, or the worth of others, and to convince
him that other civilizations than his own are worthy of
consideration. At the same time he will find his love for
his own institutions as strong as ever, and his admiration
for his native land as warm as on the day of his departure.
As Mr. Thayer once remarked, with considerable truth:
"I have found good among every people, and even where
there was much to condemn there was much to admire.
I have never returned from a journey without an increased
respect for the countries I have visited, and a greater
regard for my own land."
Mr. Thayer's great hobby was pheasants. He raised
two thousand English pheasants yearly on his preserves,
using two hundred selected breeding hens and cocks im-
ported each year from the best English flocks. Mr. Thayer
was a generous philanthropist to his fellow sportsmen,
more than five thousand pheasants were liberated from his
place during a period of five years. Hunting parties were
BAYARD THAYER
invited during the shooting season, which begins in Octo-
ber and continues till December, and a succession of house
parties ensued. The preserve is located in a circle of chest-
nuts, elms, maples and scrub pines, which gives the local-
ity a forest primeval appearance, in the most important
pheasant section of the United States.
Mr. Thayer had a real love of trees, and at the age
of thirty-eight he began to plant trees on a large scale, se-
lecting for his principal plantations white pine and hem-
lock, the two conifers best suited to New England. Each
year these plantations were extended, and now contain
several hundred thousand trees. As an object lesson for
future generations of lovers and students of trees he made
^j
a pinetum, which contains representatives of every co-
niferous plant which can grow in Massachusetts. Mr.
Thayer's pinetum occupies a picturesque position, pro-
tected by natural woods. Generous space has been al-
lowed for the full and free development of the different
trees, and no collection of conifers in the United States
has such great promise of beauty and interest. This great
plantation of pines will long keep green the memory of
Bayard Thayer as an intelligent lover and industrious
planter of trees.
In his nurseries are contained seedlings of all the new
Chinese and Japanese conifers raised on his estate from
seeds distributed by the Arnold Arboretum, and many of
the best of Wilson's deciduous-leaved Chinese trees and
shrubs. The native laurel grows naturally and in great
beauty in Lancaster, and it was his intention to make the
laurel the great decorative feature of his property. For
further decoration of his domain he raised all the hand-
somest species of American and Japanese azaleas, the
flowering dogwood and other handsome flowering native
8 HISTORICAL REGISTER
trees and shrubs. The terrace garden, with its unsur-
passed Japanese yews; the crab apple and lilac gardens,
and the Dutch garden, with its brilliant display of tulips,
were enjoyed by thousands of visitors from all parts of
the country. It is doubtful if any American has displayed
more good taste and imagination than Mr. Thayer, or has
accomplished more for the uplift of American horticulture
in so short a space of time.
He v/as a member of the A. D. Club and Harvard
'Varsity Club, Cambridge; the Somerset and Algonquin
of Boston; the Racquet and Tennis and Union Clubs of
New York City; Eastern Yacht, the Country Club, New
Riding and Myopia Hunt Club in Hamilton.
He married, September 1 st, 1 896, Ruth Simpkins,
daughter of John and Ruth Sears Simpkins, of "May-
flower" ancestry, and sister of Congressman John Simp-
kins, of Yarmouth. Her father was one of the founders
of the Calumet and Hecla Mining Company. Mr. and
Mrs. Thayer had four children: Ruth, Constance Van
Rensselaer, Mabel Bayard, and Nathaniel. Mrs. Thayer
is an officer of the Society of Colonial Dames.
Mr. Thayer died in Lancaster, Massachusetts, Novem-
ber 29th, 1916. He was a man of the noblest quality and
extraordinary combination of ability, intellectual power,
unforgettable originality and individuality, with a depth
of humor and the highest ideals. He was an ardent sports-
man and a lover of trees and flowers, with an ever-increas-
ing interest in State and National aflairs. He had the
frankness and openness that goes with courage and a great
capacity for friendship and warmth of heart. In his social
life he was delightful, and in his home life no man was
more fortunate. He enjoyed that mutual confidence, love
and affection which make the marriage relation ideal.
ELISHA DYER
Elisha Dyer
LISHA DYER was born in Providence, Rhode
Island, October 23rd, 1862; son of General
Elisha Dyer and Nancy Anthony Viall Dyer.
The progenitor of the family in America, Will-
iam Dyer, was a Freeman of Boston in 1635, and one of
the company of seventeen persons who, in 1638, pur-
chased from the Narragansett Indians the territory that
afterwards became the Colony of Rhode Island. At the
first general court of elections held at Newport, in 1 640,
he was chosen Secretary of the Colony. Seven years later
he was recorder of the General Assembly, and in the con-
test between the Dutch of New Amsterdam and the New
Englanders, was in command of a privateer. His wife,
Mary Dyer, was one of the religious martyrs of New Eng-
land. She became a follower of Ann Hutchinson, and
was among those who were ordered to depart from
Massachusetts in 1659. Subsequently returning to the
Colony, she was imprisoned as a Quaker and finally
executed upon Boston Common.
John Dyer, a grandson of William and Mary Dyer,
married Freelove Williams, a great-granddaughter of Roger
Williams. Their grandson, Elisha Dyer, married Frances
Jones, a descendant of Gabriel Vernon, of an ancient
Huguenot family from La Rochelle, France. Their son,
Elisha Dyer, was Adjutant-General of Rhode Island for
five successive terms, and in 1857 was elected Gover-
nor of the State. He was re-elected in 1 858, but declined
to accept the second term.
General Elisha Dyer, son of the Honorable Elisha
10 HISTORICAL REGISTER
Dyer, was born in Providence in 1 839. During the Civil
War he served in the Rhode Island Light Artillery as Lieu-
tenant, and was wounded and promoted to Major. In
1863 Governor James Y. Smith appointed him on his
military staff with the rank of Colonel, and after the war
he commanded the artillery of the State of Rhode Island.
In 1877 he was elected to the State Senate, and in 1881
was a member of the General Assembly, and in 1896 he
was elected Governor of the State.
Elisha Dyer was educated in St. Paul's School, Con-
cord, New Hampshire, and was graduated from Brown
University in 1883, the third of that name to graduate at
the University. He studied law at the Columbia Law
School, where he received the degree of Bachelor of Laws
in 1885. Admitted to the Bar in Rhode Island, he prac-
tised law only a short time.
Afterward Mr. Dyer engaged in the banking business,
and was associated with the firms of Ulman & Company
and Cutting & Company. He was for many years presi-
dent and director of the Hopp Compressed Air and Electric
Power Company, and a director of the Sea Side and Brook-
lyn Bridge Elevated Railway Company. He was a mem-
ber of the Newport Reading Room, the Newport Country
Club, the Union Club, the Sleepy Hollow Country Club,
the Brook, the Knickerbocker Club, the Turf and Field
Club, the Casino Club, the New York Yacht Club, the
Automobile Club of America and the Manhattan Club.
Mr. Dyer was a skilful yachtsman, and was not only
regarded as the best dancer in Newport society, but was
an expert in the choice of favors for social functions. De-
spite his popularity in society, Mr. Dyer was extremely
democratic, and interested himself in private charities.
Newsboys and civil service employees were his friends,
ELISHA DYER 1 1
and he was known to have aided many youths in their
chosen careers.
He married, in 1 89 1 , Sidney Turner, daughter of
William Fontelroy and Sidney Patterson Turner, of Balti-
more, Maryland, a descendant of Sir Edward Turner, who
came to America in 1614 and settled near Charleston,
West Virginia. Her grandfather was a brother of
Madame Jerome Bonaparte.
Mr. Dyer died June 2nd, 1917. He was pre-eminent-
ly a high-minded, loyal citizen, possessed of clear vision
and those humane and kindly qualities which endeared
him to all who came in contact with him.
William Emerson Barrett
WILLIAM EMERSON BARRETT was bom in
Melrose, Massachusetts, December 29th,
1858; son of Augustus and Sarah (Emerson)
Barrett. He was a direct descendant of Baret,
a Norman knight, who came to England in 1 066, as may
be seen in the Roll of Battle Abbey. The first ancestor in
America was James Barrett, who came to this country in
1643, landed at Charlestown, and later settled at Maiden,
Massachusetts. James Barrett, 2nd, was in a troop of
horse in King Philip's War. Jonathan Barrett was a dea-
con at Maiden, a selectman and moderator of the town
meetings, and Josef Barrett, Jr., was in the Lexington
Alarm, in 1 775.
Mr. Barrett, on his maternal side, was descended from
Thomas Emerson, who came over from England in the
ship "Elizabeth Ann," and located at Ipswich, Massachu-
setts, in 1 638.
William Emerson Barrett was educated at Melrose,
Claremont, New Hampshire, and was graduated from
Dartmouth College with the A. B. degree in 1 880. After
leaving college he began the study of law in the office of
R. M. Morse at Boston, but was drawn into the more con-
genial vocation of newspaper work. He was for two years
with the "Messenger," at St. Albans, Vermont, and then
became connected with the "Boston Daily Advertiser."
Within a few months he was appointed Washington corre-
spondent of the paper, and made such a remarkable record
that he was recalled to Boston to become managing editor.
He was one of the founders of the "Evening Record," an
12
WILLIAM EMERSON BARRETT 13
afternoon edition of the "Daily Advertiser," and, in 1 886,
he became the managing editor of both papers. In 1888
he organized the Advertisers' Newspaper Company, which
took over both publications. The "Evening Record" was
the first successful one-cent newspaper published in Boston.
While in Washington he was clerk of the committee
to investigate the Southern outrages; his journalistic abil-
ity and tact assisted very materially in analyzing the facts,
and the success of the work was largely due to his efforts.
In 1 887 he was elected to the Lower House of the
Massachusetts Legislature and served for six years with dis-
tinguished ability. For five years he was Speaker of the
House. He declined a seventh term in the Legislature, and
was elected, in 1894, to the United States Congress from
the Seventh District. In 1 896 he was re-elected, receiving
the largest majority ever given a candidate in that district.
He served in the National House with eminent apti-
tude, his most outstanding service to his constituents being
the securing of appropriations for vast improvements in
Boston Harbor and the dry dock at the Navy Yard. He
was one of the leading debaters and was frequently men-
tioned as the probable successor of Thomas B. Reed as
Speaker of the House. He declined the nomination for a
third term to devote his energies to his newspapers and
to the many enterprises in which he had become engaged.
He was actively interested in banking, manufacturing and
railroad development.
He was a member of the Algonquin and University
Clubs, and numerous other clubs and fraternal societies.
He married, December 28th, 1887, Annie Louise,
daughter of Herbert and Alice Lucy Sulloway Bailey, of
Claremont, New Hampshire. Mr. and Mrs. Barrett had
four children: Florence, William Emerson, Ruth, wife of
14 HISTORICAL REGISTER
Edwin Allen Walten, of Baltimore, Maryland; and Con-
stance Barrett.
Mr. Barrett died February 1 2th, 1 906. His career
was a record of extraordinary achievement in large enter-
prises. Proprietor of two important daily newspapers,
founder of one of them, and the originator of undertakings
in the fields of finance and industry that marked him as a
man of advanced ideas, he made for himself a commanding
position in the vanguard of banking and journalism. In
the legislative halls his public services were of the most
distinguished character and won for him a high place in
his party and in the nation. He was an ardent yachtsman,
and an admirer of all forms of wholesome outdoor sports.
He was one of the most progressive men of his time.
Edward Holbrook
DWARD HOLBROOK was born in Bellingham,
Massachusetts, June 7th, 1849; son of Eliab
and Julia F. (Morse) Holbrook. He was edu-
cated in his native town, and at the age of seven-
teen started in the silverware and jewelry business. His
first position was with the house of Bigelow Brothers &
Kennard, the largest retail jewelers in Boston. Here he
learned both the jewelry and silver trade, and, four years
later, in 1870, he accepted a sales position with the Gor-
ham Company. He entered upon his duties full heartedly
and his inherent business and executive ability soon lifted
him out of his position of salesman and made him a great
factor in the development of the business.
He traveled for his employers for a few years, be-
coming personally acquainted with the leading firms in
the jewelry and silver trade throughout the country. It is
said that he obtained his first great advantage as a result
of able salesmanship in selling the silverware for the old
Palace Hotel in San Francisco when the original hotel
first opened. It was considered a great event in those days
of the silverware business. His business associates of later
years do not hesitate to say that, had it not been for him,
the Gorham Company would not have advanced to its
present position of prominence in the silver manufactur-
ing trade. Later he succeeded Caleb Cushing Adams as
the manager of the New York branch of the concern; in
1 888 he was elected treasurer, and in 1 894 succeeded Will-
iam H. Crins as president of the corporation, retaining
that office until his death. His only other predecessor in
this office was John Gorham.
15
16 HISTORICAL REGISTER
As the business of the Gorham Manufacturing Com-
pany grew, the capital was increased from time to time,
and Mr. Holbrook later organized the Silversmiths Com-
pany, which bought out, one by one, many of the leading
concerns of the country, including the Whiting Manufac-
turing Company, the William B. Durgin Company, Good-
now & Jenks, the William B. Kerr Company, the Mauser
Manufacturing Company, and others, Mr. Holbrook re-
maining throughout the dominating influence in all this
work. This organization has resulted in stabilizing the
silverware manufacturing business all over the country.
Mr. Holbrook's interest along the artistic side of the
work of the Gorham Manufacturing Company was so great
that, in 1905, the members of the designing department
presented him a most beautifully illuminated set of reso-
lutions in honor of his devotion to the silversmiths' art
in general, his lifelong appreciation and love for the beau-
tiful in silverware, and the encouragement they had re-
ceived at his hands. The Gorham Manufacturing Com-
pany's building in Fifth Avenue, New York, is really a
monument to Edward Holbrook. His genius determined
the site and selected the architect, and he was interested
and very active all through the building of the establish-
ment, and practically directed every detail of the con-
struction.
The Gorham Manufacturing Company was always
a prominent representative at the World's Fairs. During
Mr. Holbrook's administration these exhibits have been
enlarged and intensified, so that they easily have been the
most elaborate and beautiful in the silversmiths depart-
ment. The Gorham Manufacturing Company exhibited
at the Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia in 1876 for
the first time, receiving a gold medal and other awards.
EDWARD HOLBROOK 17
In 1889 exhibited in Paris; in 1893 at Chicago; Paris, in
1 900, and at various other expositions, notably Buffalo,
Charleston, St. Louis, Alaska- Yukon, and the Panama-
Pacific.
The Gorham Manufacturing Company won the
Grand Prize at the Panama Pacific International Exposi-
tion at San Francisco. At the Paris Exposition in 1 900,
the French Government bestowed upon Mr. Holbrook the
decoration of the Legion of Honor in token of his dis-
tinguished services to the cause of Art.
At the outbreak of the World War Mr. Holbrook's
sympathies were with the Allies, and under his leadership
and direction the Gorham Manufacturing Company be-
came interested in war work in 1915, starting with a small
contract for the Government of Servia, and following this
by building a plant for the manufacture of brass cases for
the French 75 MM. gun. This plant was developed to
manufacture, in addition, Russian and Swiss cases. When
America entered the war the facilities of this plant were
turned over to the United States Government to manu-
facture the 3-inch Navy Landing gun case, the 3-inch
Army Field gun case, and upon the adoption by the United
States Army of the 75 MM. gun the plant was pushed to
the limits of production for the French 75 MM. cases. In
addition, under the impetus of the United States entering
the war, Mr. Holbrook directed the purchase of another
plant in Providence for the manufacture of the 4-inch 50-
calibre Navy gun case and the Stokes 3-inch French mortar
bombs. Moreover, property was acquired in East Provi-
dence, R. I., for the manufacture and loading of hand
grenades, loading of the Stokes bombs, and a large part
of the silver plant was turned into the manufacture of
munitions of war. The patriotic spirit of Mr. Holbrook
18 HISTORICAL REGISTER
inspired him to take active participation in these extensive
preparations, and the additional duties and responsibilities
connected therewith were in a large measure responsible
for his death.
Mr. Holbrook was the first and only president of the
Silversmiths Company, and was a director of all its sub-
sidiaries. He was a director of the American Brass Com-
pany, the Hanover National Bank, of New York, the
Massachusetts Mutual Life Insurance Company, Spauld-
ing & Company, of Chicago; president and director of
the Maiden Lane Realty Company; director of the Rhode
Island Hospital Trust Company, the General Fire Ex-
tinguisher Company, the Beau-Site Company and the Bow-
man Hotel Corporation of New York. He was also a
trustee of the Garfield Safe Deposit Company. He was a
member of the Union and Union League Clubs of New
York, the Hope Club, of Providence; the New England
Society of New York, and the Metropolitan Museum of
Art.
He married, February 1 8th, 1 874, Frances, daughter
of John J. and Mary A. Swift, of Boston, and had two
children: John Swift Holbrook, a skilled landscape archi-
tect, and now president of the Gorham Manufacturing
Company, and Madame Guillaume de Balincourt, of Paris,
France.
Mr. Holbrook died May 19th, 1919. His was a life
of lofty aspiration and noble purpose, full of well directed
energy and splendid achievement. He was a man of large
vision, which took in great plans, and there was nothing
too vast for him to grasp and undertake to perform. His
commanding presence and intellectual grasp of details
necessary for the promotion of great business enterprises
EDWARD HOLBROOK 19
gained the attention and won the esteem of men of
prominence and influence everywhere.
He had the happy faculty of making friends among
men of all classes wherever he went. His ready comrade-
ship made him popular with those in his employ. He was
generous, liberal minded, and his sympathetic heart found
interest in every movement for the good of humanity. The
call of the public and charitable enterprises never found
him lacking in response. He was dignified, without sug-
gestion of pride or ostentation; his many sterling qualities
of mind and heart will ever remain an abiding inspiration.
Cyrus Jay Lawrence
|YRUS JAY LAWRENCE was born in Salem,
New York, in 1832; son of Joel and Hannah
Bouton Lawrence. He was educated in his
native town, and at the age of seventeen he
came to New York City. In 1 854 he established himself
in a mercantile business, and in 1 864 became a banker,
later entering into partnership with his two sons. He was
one of the oldest, most conservative, and most respected
members of the Stock Exchange, of the Board of Gov-
ernors, of which he was for some years a member. He
was active in the directorate of the Wabash and of the
Toledo, Ann Arbor and Michigan systems, to the sound
reorganization of which he contributed important service.
His last considerable business interest was with the Bush
Terminal Company, of which he was vice-president.
Throughout his business career he was recognized as able,
upright, and sagacious, with a rare combination of courage
and energy, with sound judgment and inflexible integrity.
In middle life he developed the taste and gift for aes-
thetic appreciation, which became more marked with ex-
perience until it attained an unusual degree of certainty
and refinement. During the years 1872 to 1876, which
he spent abroad, he became intensely interested in the
work of the sculptor, A. L. Barye, and from that time he
collected examples of that artist's beautiful productions
until his possessions were second to none, with the pos-
sible exception of the Walters' collection in Baltimore. It
was through the active efforts of Mr. Lawrence that the
American fund was raised to supplement that contributed
20
CYRUS JAY LAWRENCE
CYRUS JAY LAWRENCE 21
in France for the erection of the memorial to Barye now
standing in the little circle of green at the north end of
the Isle St. Louis. At this time, also, Mr. Lawrence formed
his liking for the impressionist painters of France, and
began the collection of works by Monet, Degas, Sisley,
Boudin and Raffaeli, which embraced some of the best
examples of these artists. In quite a different direction,
he was attracted by the work, lithographic and in oils and
water colors, of Honore Daumier, and of these, also, he
had an excellent variety. The single artist, however, most
and best represented in his collection was Miss Mary Cas-
satt, whose noteworthy development he followed with ad-
miration and sympathy from the first. To these varied
treasures he added a choice collection of Chinese porcelains
and Phoenician glass. His interest in art affairs was gen-
erous in many directions, and was based on independent
judgment and intelligent study, the more remarkable since
he had not enjoyed the advantages of a liberal education.
He was a member of the Metropolitan Museum of Art,
American Museum of Natural History, American Arch-
aeological Society, the Municipal Art Leagues of New
York and Baltimore, and the Union League and Grolier
Clubs of New York.
The character of Mr. Lawrence was as winning as
it was admirable. He was the soul of kindness, despite
his great firmness; in social intercourse he had the gifts
of quaint humor, quick sympathy and an abounding in-
terest in everything human.
He married Emily Amelia Hoe, granddaughter of
Richard M. Hoe, the famous inventor of the Hoe printing
press, and had five children: Richard Hoe Lawrence, Henry
Corbin Lawrence, Mrs. Ralph Oakley, Mrs. W. Scott Day,
and Mrs. Albert Webster.
Mr. Lawrence died January 9th, 1 908.
Henry Corbin Lawrence
ENRY CORBIN LAWRENCE was born in New
York City, June 13th, 1859; son of Cyrus Jay
and Emily Amelia Hoe Lawrence, a descendant
of a New York family notable for its numbers,
activity, influence and achievement. Its name has been
written upon the annals of New York, Connecticut, New
Jersey, Rhode Island, and Massachusetts. It has a long
and distinguished pedigree, the first of the race having
been Robert, a daring and doughty Crusader, who accom-
panied Richard the Lion-Hearted to the Holy Land. Here
by his desperate courage at the beleaguerment of St. John
D' Acre in 1191, where he was the first to plant the banner
of the Cross on the battlements of the city, he won the
love of his reckless monarch, who made him Sir Robert
Lawrence of Ashton Hall, Lancashire, England. From
this time the family records are quite complete.
In the Thirteenth Century there was at least one union
between the Lawrence and Washington families, when
Sir James Lawrence wedded Matilda Washington, sister
of the direct ancestor of the first President of the Republic.
The Lawrences have been remarkable for their energy and
industry. Few families can begin to compare with them
either in regard to these qualities or what is equally im-
portant so far as state is concerned. The records of the
Register's and County Clerk's offices, the Civil list of the
United States, the triennial catalogues of Columbia, Har-
vard, Yale, and other institutions of learning, the Red Book
of New York State, the records of the exchanges and "The
Old Merchants of New York" fairly bristle with the name.
22
HENRY CORBIN LAWRENCE 23
On account of their numbers, their connections by mar-
riage would fill a volume.
Mr. Lawrence was educated in France. Returning to
New York in 1877, he entered the employment of his
father's firm, Lawrence Brothers & Company, bankers and
brokers, which had been formed by his father and uncle in
1864.
In 1 888 Mr. Lawrence became a partner with his
father and brother in the firm of Cyrus J. Lawrence &
Sons, where he remained until his death. He was a mem-
ber of the New York Stock Exchange, and since 1 890 had
been a member of the Board of Governors.
A collector and student of Gothic art in this country
and Europe, his home contained one of the choicest col-
lections of early painted glass, tapestries and wood carvings
in America. His opinion on matters connected with peri-
ods to which he had devoted special study was eagerly
sought by artists and students of art.
Mr. Lawrence was a member of the Century Asso-
ciation, being a member of the Committee of Admissions;
the National Art Club and the City Club. He was also a
member of the Municipal Art Commission of the City of
New York, to the work of which he had devoted a great
deal of time and attention.
He married, in 1882, Lucy Ryerson, daughter of
William Tunis and Julia Newton Ryerson, a descendant
of Martin Ryerson, who came to America in 1 646, and
Annetje Rapelje, daughter of Joris Jansen de Rapelje, who
came from Rochelle, France, in the ship "New Nether-
lands," the first ship sent out by the West India Company.
Sarah Rapelje was the first white child born in the colony,
at Fort Orange, June 9th, 1 625. This circumstance identi-
fies the family with the very foundation of Christian civili-
zation in America.
24 HISTORICAL REGISTER
Mr. and Mrs. Lawrence had two children: Mrs.
Gladys Lawrence Hubbard and Mrs. Lucy Lawrence
Hutchinson.
Mr. Lawrence died September 1 5th, 1919. His circle
of acquaintances was large. His ideals and examples were
thoroughly consistent, and his character, honesty and
strength of mind will ever remain an inspiration to those
who were affiliated with him. The devotion he displayed
in his family life was exemplified in his commercial life
and endeared him to all who came in contact with him.
Edwin Babcock Holden
DWIN BABCOCK HOLDEN was born at Syra-
cuse, New York, November 19th, 1861 ; son of
Edwin Ruthven and Emeline Theodosia Fore-
man Holden. The first of the family in this
country was Richard Holden, who came from Ipswich,
England, in 1 634, and settled at Watertown, Massachu-
setts. He married Martha Fosdick. His great-grandson,
Richard Holden, born at Groton, Massachusetts, in 1734,
and later removed to Charlestown, New Hampshire, was a
Revolutionary soldier and died on board the British prison
ship while anchored in the North River.
Mis maternal ancestor, William Foreman, arrived in
Maryland in 1675. He became a planter and settled in
St. Margaret- Westminster Parish, in Anne Arundel
County, Maryland.
Edwin B. Holden was educated at Charlier Institute,
and was graduated with high honors from Columbia Uni-
versity. After leaving college he was associated with
Meeker & Company, coal merchants, and later on formed
the firm of William Horre & Company, wholesale and
retail coal dealers.
Mr. Holden occupied a prominent position among
American bibliophiles. His collection of books, in fine
bindings, first editions of early English and American
authors, historical pamphlets, and Americana was the
library of a real book lover and discriminating collector.
His collection of rare prints, and the portraits of Washing-
ton and Franklin, and old Revolutionary engravings was
considered, at the time, one of the finest in existence.
Mr. Holden was one of the oldest members of the
25
26 HISTORICAL REGISTER
Grolier Club, and at one time its president. He assisted
in the making of its catalogues, and it was largely through
his efforts in assisting in the preparation of the many not-
able exhibitions of books, manuscripts, prints, etcetera,
which have made this unique and highly interesting organ-
ization famous among the book collectors of the world.
Mr. Holden was not only a great collector, but he was in
its truest sense a savior of history. He was active in the
Society of Iconophiles, the object of which was the preser-
vation, by engraving, of the historic buildings of New
York City. Mr. Holden rendered financial assistance to
many struggling young artists.
He was a member of the University, Century and
Players' Clubs, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the
Museum of Natural History, the New York Historical So-
ciety and the Genealogical and Biographical Society. The
"Club Bindery," noted for its artistic productions, was
founded by Mr. Robert Hoe and Mr. Holden.
Mr. Holden married, April 17th, 1889, Alice Cort,
daughter of Nicholas Leonard and Amanda Hall Peckham
Cort, of New York City, a descendant of John Peckham,
who married Mary Clark and settled in Rhode Island. Mr.
and Mrs. Holden had four children: Arthur Cort Holden,
who married Miriam Young, of Boston, and have two
children : Edwin Arthur and Jane Holden ; Marian Holden,
Raymond Peckham Holden, who married Grace Ansley
Badger, of Cambridge, Massachusetts, and have one son:
Richard Cort Holden; and Frances Holden.
Mr. Holden died June 8th, 1 906. He was a genuine
book-lover, free from mercenary or speculative motives.
His whole career was one of steady devotion to the dif-
fusion of knowledge. He was interested in all movements
for the educational and moral advancement of the com-
munity; a true gentleman.
John Griffith McCullough
OHN GRIFFITH McCULLOUGH was born at
Newark, Del., September 16th, 1835; son of
Alexander and Rebecca (Griffith) McCullough;
of Scotch-Irish descent on his father's side, and
on his mother's side from Rhydercks, Morgan and Rhys of
Wales, the latter of whom fought as an officer in Crom-
well's army. He was graduated with honors at Delaware
College in his twentieth year, and entered the law office
of St. George Tucker Campbell, of Philadelphia, at the
same time attending the law school of the University of
Pennsylvania, receiving the degree of LL.B. in 1858. He
entered upon the practice of his profession, but a pulmo-
nary attack necessitated a radical change of climate, and
he at once sailed for California. He was admitted to the
Bar of the Supreme Court of California, and opened an
office at Mariposa. California was at that time passing
through her trying pioneer period. McCullough at once
obtained marked professional success, and was soon swept
by force of circumstances into the thickest of the fight for
the preservation of the Autonomy of the Union.
The flood of population from the Eastern states was
composed of bitter and conflicting elements; Secessionists
from the South and Unionists from New England lived in
close proximity, and feuds were constantly engendering
riots. At this crisis General E. V. Sumner arrived on the
scene, and by a brilliant coup d'etat superseded General
Albert Sidney Johnston in command of Fort Alcatraz,
thereby frustrating the scheme of the Southern sympa-
thizers to separate California from the Union.
27
28 HISTORICAL REGISTER
Young McCullough, whose delicate health prevented
camp service, set about to show his loyalty for the Union
by a series of speeches, which immediately commanded
the admiration and confidence of the Union element. He
was soon sent to the Legislature, and in the following year,
1862, was returned to the State Senate, and in 1863, not-
withstanding his youth, elected Attorney-General of the
State. After four years of service in this trying position,
in 1867, he was re-nominated by his party, but failed of
an election. His unusually successful official career hav-
ing been brought to a close, he devoted the next five years
to a highly remunerative legal practice in San Francisco.
He next visited the Eastern states, and after a trip to
Europe, finally, in 1873, settled in southern Vermont,
where his talents and energy were now turned into a new
channel. He did not resume the general practice of law,
but devoted his abilities to commercial, financial, and rail-
road interests, with which he became prominently identi-
fied. During 1873-83 he was vice-president and general
manager of the Panama Railway, of which his father-in-
law, Trenor W. Park, was president, and after the latter' s
death in 1882, at the earnest desire of M. de Lesseps, he
assumed the presidency. He was an important factor and
leading spirit in the reorganization of the Erie railroad
after the depressions of 1884 and 1893. He was chair-
man of its executive committee in 1 888, and was one of
its two receivers after 1 893, a trust administered with such
fidelity and skill that in less than four years the property
was delivered in improved condition, with no floating debt
and accompanied with cash securities of more than
$8,000,000. He was also president of the Bennington &
Rutland Railway during 1883-1900, during which his ad-
ministration of the road's affairs was just and liberal to its
patrons and employees. In 1890, he was elected the first
JOHN GRIFFITH McCULLOUGH 29
president of the Chicago & Erie Railroad, a position he
held for ten years.
He represented Vermont as one of the delegates to
the Republican National Conventions of 1 880, 1 888 and
1 900, being chairman of the delegation in the latter year.
In 1 898 he was elected State Senator from Bennington
County, serving as president pro tern, of the Senate. In
1902 he was elected Governor of the State of Vermont,
succeeding Governor William W. Stickney, and he admin-
istered for two years the affairs of the state with wisdom,
tact, and unusual executive ability, winning the admiration
of not only those of his own political faith but of every
man who had the good fortune to come in contact with
him. During his administration, Vermont reversed her
position on the liquor question, from prohibition (which
had been the law for fifty years) to high license and local
option.
Governor McCullough was president of the First
National Bank of North Bennington, and a director of the
Bank of New York, the Fidelity and Casualty Co., the
National Life Insurance Co. of Vermont, the American
Trading Co. of New York, the Hudson & Manhattan Rail-
road Co., the Central Vermont Railroad Co., the Atchi-
son, Topeka & Santa Fe' Railroad Co., the Erie Rail-
way Co., and the Lackawanna Steel Co. He received the
degree of LL. D. from Middlebury College in 1 900, the
University of Vermont in 1904, and Norwich University
in 1905.
Governor McCullough married, August 30th, 1871,
Eliza Hall, eldest daughter of Trenor W. Park, a dis-
tinguished lawyer of San Francisco and Bennington, Vt.,
and had four children: Hall Park McCullough, Elizabeth
Laura, Ella Sarah and Esther Morgan McCullough. Gov-
ernor McCullough died May 29th, 1915.
Francis Whiting Halsey
IRANCIS WHITING HALSEY was bom in
Unadilla, New York, October 15th, 1851; son
of Dr. Gaius Leonard Halsey, a prominent
physician and a surgeon of the Civil War, and
Juliet Carrington Halsey. He was a descendant of the
Pilgrim, Thomas Halsey, one of the founders of South-
ampton, Long Island. His great-great-grandfather, Mat-
thew, and his great-grandfather Matthew Jr., were both
soldiers of the Revolutionary War, the latter serving with
distinction under General Israel Putnam.
Francis W. Halsey was prepared for college in his
native town and was graduated from Cornell University
in 1873. Shortly after his graduation he became a mem-
ber of the editorial staff of the Binghamton Times. He
remained there two years and then obtained a position on
the New York Tribune, where he prepared obituaries of
famous men, wrote letters from the World's Fair in Paris,
and contributed book reviews and news articles to the
literary department. In 1 880 he became a member of
the staff of the New York Times, and for the next twenty-
two years he was continuously connected with that paper.
He was for several years foreign editor and writer of book
reviews and was later made literary editor, succeeding
Charles de Kay, whom President Cleveland appointed Con-
sul-General to Berlin.
The Times Review of Books was established by Mr.
Halsey in 1 896 and remained under his editorship until
June, 1902, when he became literary advisor to D. Apple-
ton & Co. In 1 905 he was attached to the firm of Funk
30
*
/
FRANCIS WHITING HALSEY 31
& Wagnalls in a similar capacity, but with a larger field
for editorial work and authorship. And here he died in
harness, at work on a voluminous history of the Great War.
He was a modest, yet powerful, influence with the Times
Review of Books in guiding the writing and publication
of books during one of the most turbulent and prolific
periods of American authorship. As for the rest, his in-
spiring notes, although never very loud, were the thought-
ful products of a thoughtful man. He had the gift of
being wholesome without being prudish, well-read without
being priggish. He loved his friends as he did the best
books, and his love for both endured.
Mr. Halsey was well known as a lecturer, having
lectured before New York and New Jersey historical so-
cieties, before students of Columbia and Princeton Uni-
versities, on the Chautauqua platform and before many
other bodies. The same rational characteristics which
marked his editorship of the Times Review of Books were
present in his work outside, and nearly every achievement,
both journalistic and literary, can be traced to the form-
ative influence of his boyhood reading.
He was the author of a number of books, of which
the first, Two Months Abroad," appeared in 1878. In
1 895 he wrote an extended introduction for a volume of
family history entitled "Thomas Halsey of Hertfordshire,
England and Southampton, Long Island, with His Ameri-
can Descendants." He later wrote "The Old New York
Frontier," which was an account of the early history of
the headwaters of the Susquehanna River from Otsego
Lake to the Pennsylvania line. Other works included
"Our Literary Deluge," 'The Pioneers of Unadilla Vil-
lage," an historical and biographical introduction and foot-
notes to Mrs. Rowison's "Charlotte Temple," and an
32 HISTORICAL REGISTER
historical introduction with footnotes to Richard Smith's
'Tour of Four Great Rivers."
As editor, Mr. Halsey's works included "American
Authors and Their Homes," "Authors of Our Day in
Their Homes," 'Women Authors of Our Day in Their
Homes," "Of the Making of a Book," "Great Epochs in
American History Described by Famous Writers," "See-
ing Europe with Famous Authors," "Balfour, Viviani and
Joffre, Their Speeches in America." He was associated
with William Jennings Bryan in editing, in 1 906, 'The
World's Famous Orations," and in 1907 he was associated
with Senator Henry Cabot Lodge in editing "The Best of
the World's Classics," in ten volumes. In 1912 he wrote
the introduction and bibliographies for Pryde's "What
Books to Read and How to Read Them."
He was a trustee of the New York State Historical
Association and of the American Scenic and Historic
Preservation Society and a member of the American His-
torical Association, New York State Library Association,
Century, Authors, National Arts and Cornell University
Clubs, being president of the latter in 1882.
He married, December 18th, 1883, Virginia Isabel,
daughter of Alexander S. and Sarah Kingsland Forbes, of
New York. In 1900, after her death, he wrote a memoir
of his wife under the title of her maiden name, "Virginia
Isabel Forbes." Mr. Halsey died November 24th, 1919.
He was an extensive traveler and a writer of great
charm and versatility. Of his mental qualities should be
mentioned a marvelous memory which, combined with his
grasp of fundamentals, with his capacity for generalization
and with his tireless industry, made possible his achieve-
ments. At once a man of gracious manner, of dis-
tinguished presence and a democrat, he was at ease in all
places and under all circumstances, — in short, a gentleman.
William V. S. Thome
WILLIAM v. s. THORNE was bom in Miii-
brook, New York, March 22nd, 1 865 ; son of
Samuel and Phoebe Van Schoonhoven
Thorne. He was descended from William
Thome, who came from Dorsetshire, England, and was
made a freeman at Lynn, Massachusetts, May 2nd, 1 638.
His father was president of the Pennsylvania Coal Com-
pany for many years, and his grandfather, Jonathan
Thorne, was one of the chief developers of the coal and
leather industries in this country.
He was graduated from the Yale Sheffield Scientific
School in 1 885 and the following year started his career
as assistant engineer with the Great Northern Railroad.
He displayed remarkable executive and constructive ability
and in a short time became an important factor in West-
ern railroading. He was associated with E. H. Harriman
in the Southern Pacific Railroads, from 1902 until Mr.
Flarrirnan's death. Fie was a director of the Union Pacific
Railroad Company, Oregon Short Line Railroad Com-
pany, Oregon- Washington Railroad and Navigation Com-
pany, Railroad Securities Company, Lackawanna Steel
Company, Wells-Fargo Express Company, Hanover Na-
tional Bank, Fidelity Bank and Morristown Trust Com-
pany.
He was treasurer and a member of the Board of Man-
agers of the Presbyterian Hospital; chairman of the Execu-
tive Committee and a member of the Board of Governors
of the Woman's Hospital; a member of the Board of Di-
rectors of the Manhattan Maternity Hospital and Dis-
33
34 HISTORICAL REGISTER
pensary; and trustee of the Society for the Relief of Half
Orphan and Destitute Children. He was the author of
several books on hospital accounting. He was a member
of the Metropolitan, University, Riding Clubs, the Down-
town Association, Morris County Golf Club and the Tux-
edo Club.
He married, November 16th, 1905, Julia Therese
Keyser, daughter of Samuel and Julia Therese Thompson
Keyser, of Baltimore, Maryland. She was a descendant
of Dirch Keyser, of Amsterdam, who came to this country
in 1 688 and was one of the first settlers of Germantown,
Pennsylvania. Mr. and Mrs. Thome had two children:
S. Keyser and Therese Thorne.
Mr. Thorne died February 6th, 1920. He was a
gentleman of the old school; modest, unobtrusive, pro-
gressive, alert and convincing. He was a constructive
force, too big in mind and in purpose to trifle and be an-
noyed by small things, and too confident of his own
strength ever to permit precedents or opposing opinions to
guide him. He had imagination, originality and a liberal
purse. A philanthropic vein animated and dominated his
whole life. He gave to the charitable institutions with
which he was connected the greater part of his time. He
rarely missed a board meeting, and there was no question
of hospital policy that did not receive his personal con-
sideration. Liberal giving was to him a solemn duty. His
name will ever remain in the affectionate recollection of
all who knew him.
Joseph Raphael De Lamar
OSEPH RAPHAEL DE LAMAR was born in
Amsterdam, Holland, September 2nd, 1843.
His father, a banker in Amsterdam, died when
he was six years of age, and the lad in love of
adventure went aboard a Dutch vessel that plied to the
West Indies. When the young stowaway was discovered,
he was put to work as assistant to the cook without wages.
He worked as a seaman until he was twenty, when he be-
came master of a ship, and three years later received a
captain's command. He visited almost every port in the
world and acquired a wonderful education through his ob-
servations in foreign countries. His alert mind was at-
tracted to submarine work, which was profitable, owing
to the Civil War, and, with characteristic energy, he aban-
doned the merchant service and became a submarine con-
tractor, with headquarters at Vineyard Haven, Massachu-
setts, operating along the entire coast to the West Indies.
He received several contracts for raising sunken ships, and
was very successful. In 1872 he raised the "Charlotte,"
a transatlantic steamship loaded with Italian marble that
had foundered off the Bermudas, and which had baffled
the attempts of three previous wrecking companies. His
experience, which nearly cost him his life, at Martha's
Vineyard, going down in his diving suit to examine per-
sonally the damage to the Steamer "William Tibbitts," in
which he was imprisoned for thirty-six hours, led Captain
De Lamar to relinquish submarine work.
He then studied the opportunities of trade with
Africa; trading companies had confined their operations to
the Coast, the natives from the interior bringing their goods
35
36 HISTORICAL REGISTER
to the Coast on the shoulders of negroes at considerable
expense. Captain De Lamar decided to do trading in the
interior. He equipped a small vessel, capable of navigat-
ing the African rivers, stocked with goods and armed with
four small cannon, a dozen blunderbusses, rifles and am-
munition. He pushed on to the interior, exercising con-
stant vigilance to prevent attacks from hostile tribes. His
venture was crowned with complete success. He traded
principally on the Gambia and Great Jeba Rivers. After
three successful years he gave up this trade on account
of the climate — so many of his crew died every year of
African fever. He sold his outfit to an English company.
In 1878 he came to New York, and when the gold
fever struck Leadville, Colorado, he went West and bought
several claims, and the same year took a private course in
chemistry and metallurgy under a professor from Chicago
University. He returned to the mining fields and pur-
chased the Terrible lead mine in Custer Count}-, Colorado,
which he sold to the Omaha & Grant Smelting and Refin-
ing Company at a handsome profit. He then obtained con-
trol of a mountain six miles west of Silver City, Idaho.
Many large veins of gold and silver were discovered on
the property and he sold a half interest, after he had taken
$1 ,500,000 from the mine to the De Lamar Mining Com-
pany of England for $2,000,000.
He was the sole owner of the Utah Mines and Smelt-
ing Company, of Colorado. He was one of the most
noted traders in Wall Street for over twenty years, and
one of the leading financiers of the country. He was
president of the Dome Mine Company, Porcupine, Can-
ada; president of the Delta Beet Sugar Company; vice-
president of the International Nickel Company; a director
of the American Bank Note Company, Coronate Phos-
phate Company, the Canadian Mining and Exploration
JOSEPH RAPHAEL DE LAMAR 37
Company, American Sumatra Tobacco Company, Man-
hattan Sugar Company, the National Conduit and Cable
Company and the Western Power Company.
In 1 89 1 he served as State Senator in the first Legis-
lature of Idaho, and occupied the Chairmanship on Finance,
Railroads and Constitutional Amendments. He was
offered the highest honors in the gift of the State, but de-
clined to continue in politics and removed to New York.
He was known in Wall Street as "the man of mys-
tery." He never talked much, his intimate friends say,
but was uniformly successful in his transactions. He made
millions out of his deal in the Nipissing Gold Mine in 1 906.
He married, May 8th, 1893, Nellie Virginia Sands, a
direct descendant of John Quincy Adams, and had one
daughter, Alice A. De Lamar. Captain De Lamar was a
member of the Lotus, and the New York Yacht, Larch-
mont and Columbia Yacht Clubs. He was the owner of
the yacht "May" and "Sagitta," the fastest power boat on
the Sound. He was a great believer in aerial navigation
and devoted considerable time to the study of the subject.
He was also an art connoisseur, a collector of fine paint-
ings, statuary and other art objects. He was also a great
lover of music, but his greatest delight was in the gathering
of rare plants and flowers, of which he possessed a won-
derful collection. He left a large sum to the Harvard
University Medical School, Johns Hopkins University, and
the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Columbia Uni-
versity for research into the causes of disease and for the
promulgation through lectures, publications, and other-
wise of the principles of correct living.
He died December 1st, 1918. His life was full of
well directed energy and splendid achievement. A man
of large vision, nothing was too vast for him to undertake
to perform.
Andrew Carnegie
NDREW CARNEGIE was born in Dunferm-
line, Fifeshire, Scotland, November 25th, 1835.
His father was a master weaver of that city.
With the introduction of steam machinery,
which supplanted the hand looms of those days, the elder
Carnegie found his livelihood endangered. His mother, a
patient, loving, motherly woman, whom young Carnegie
always revered, aided at the looms. The family finally
decided to emigrate to the United States.
Andrew had attended school for five years at Dun-
fermline, Scotland, before coming to this country. The
family settled in Pittsburgh, which, more through Andrew
Carnegie than any other man, became a celebrated city
in the United States. Through his wonderful genius for
organizing and developing he made Pittsburgh the iron and
steel centre of the United States, if not of the world.
When he was thirteen years old he secured a position
as a bobbin boy in a cotton factory at Allegheny City at
$1.20 a week. Mr. Carnegie, in reminiscent moments,
often referred to his first position, which, he said, filled
his mind with ideas of organization and the value of money
in industrial enterprises. He worked less than a year as
a bobbin boy without any increase in salary, when he se-
cured another position — that of running an engine in the
cellar of a factory. With the change came a slight in-
crease in wages. From morning till night Carnegie worked
in the darkness of the cellar, his only light being the glare
from the furnace and the lamp light. While he held that
position he studied arithmetic and penmanship, and at the
38
ANDREW CARNEGIE
ANDREW CARNEGIE 39
age of fourteen was deeply interested in economics and
history.
His next position was as a messenger boy in the
Office of the Ohio Telegraph Company.
Almost from the day that Andrew Carnegie entered
the telegraph office he studied telegraphy. He was for-
ever practising at the key. In a remarkably short time
he became an expert telegrapher, and was one of the first
to take messages by sound. He began to "sub" for the
regular operators and soon supplanted one of them be-
cause of his skill. His wages were increased to $25.00 a
month, which to him was princely. He made an additional
dollar a week by copying telegraph news for Pittsburgh
papers.
When the Pennsylvania Railroad needed an expert
telegraph operator he was chosen. Colonel Thomas A.
Scott, the superintendent of a division of the Pennsylvania
system, took a fancy to Carnegie, and it was through Col-
onel Scott that "Andy" made his first investment. Col-
onel Scott asked Carnegie if he could get together $500
to buy ten shares in the Adams Express Company. The
Carnegie home was mortgaged, in which the Carnegies
then had an equity of only $800, to raise the money. The
stock paid monthly dividends of one per cent.
Carnegie became Scott's secretary. When Colonel
Scott became vice-president of the road Mr. Carnegie was
made the superintendent of the Western division. Thomas
T. Woodruff, the inventor of the sleeping car, was seek-
ing a railroad official willing to inspect his discovery. Car-
negie listened attentively. He took Mr. Woodruff to Col-
onel Scott and insisted that the invention be adopted. A
company was formed and Carnegie was given an interest,
40 HISTORICAL REGISTER
for which he paid $217.50. He borrowed the money from
a local banker who had taken a fancy to him.
'Thus did I get my foot upon fortune's ladder," said
Carnegie. 'The climb was easy after that."
When the Civil War broke out Carnegie was put in
charge of the military railroads and telegraph lines by Col-
onel Scott, who had become Assistant Secretary of War.
The records of the War Department show that Andrew
Carnegie was the third man wounded on the Union side
in the Civil War. He was trying to free a track into Wash-
ington from obstructing wires that the Confederates had
installed when a wire snapped, cutting his face. He
worked so hard in his new position that his health gave
way, forcing him to go abroad. Upon his return Carnegie
conceived from observations of experiments being made
with the construction of a cast iron bridge the wonderful
possibilities of the use of steel and iron instead of wood in
the construction of buildings and bridges. When he saw
the Pennsylvania Road experimenting with a cast iron
bridge the fact dawned on him that the unstable, danger-
ous wooden bridge was obsolete and that iron or steel
structures must take their place.
Through a Pittsburgh banker he obtained a loan of
$1 ,250. With this modest sum he organized the Keystone
Bridge Works, the foundation of the wonderful organiza-
tion now commonly referred to as the "billion dollar steel
trust." With Carnegie as the directing genius, bubbling
over with energy and ambition, the Keystone Company
secured innumerable contracts for the construction of
bridges. The company built the first great bridge over the
Ohio River, and then a number of buildings of iron con-
struction. The Union Mills developed from the Keystone
Company.
ANDREW CARNEGIE 41
The iron and steel industry, under the impetus given
it by Carnegie in this country, was becoming the foremost
industry in the world. The Bessemer process of making
steel rails had been perfected. The railways in England
replaced the iron rails with steel ones. Carnegie slipped
over to England and inspected some of the plants and upon
his return to Pittsburgh established the manufacture of
steel on a scale never before known. He introduced the
Bessemer process in this country.
Other plants had sprung up in and around Pittsburgh
and in other parts of the country. The industry v/as de-
veloping marvelously and Carnegie was a power. The
Homestead Works, his most formidable rival, was vying
with him for contracts, and he absorbed them. In seven
years he had the seven huge steel plants within the confines
of Pittsburgh under his control amalgamated into what
he called the Carnegie Steel Company. The world mar-
velled then at his genius of organization. Even at that
early period he had fifty thousand men under his direction.
He had every conceivable new invention for the manufac-
ture and handling of steel. The company branched out.
It bought up coal fields, mines. It built miles of docks,
ships, developed gas fields. It was the first to introduce
electric cranes to move about the tons and tons of steel
rails in the plants. The Carnegie plant, then as now, was
the largest enterprise of its kind in the world. It even
eclipsed the monster works of Herr Krupp in Germany.
Carnegie was almost exclusively the directing genius of
this monster concern. It was often said of him in those
days that he "ruled with an iron hand." He knew what
he wanted, and he had to have it. He had an aptitude for
the iron and steel business, which gave him a process of
reasoning in the conduct of the business that none of his
42 HISTORICAL REGISTER
associates seemed to ever attain. He knew the industry
from the very beginning to the end. There was nothing
about the manufacture or the cost of steel, or the main-
tenance of the plants, that he could not describe minutely.
He was the sun of the business around which a number
of men, now celebrated in the business, revolved, and from
whom they got their inspiration and much of the business
acumen which have made them factors in the steel world
today.
Carnegie was regarded as one of the keenest judges
of human nature and of the business ability of men that
ever became a millionaire. This keenness was of incal-
culable aid to him in organizing a force of assistants and
associates that was perhaps the greatest ever comprised
into the management of a business in the United States
He surrounded himself with such men as Henry Phipps,
and about forty young partners who had grown up in the
works became wealthy when the Carnegie Steel Company
was sold to the United States Steel Corporation.
Whenever Carnegie found an employee who showed
a natural aptitude for the steel business and latent executive
ability he immediately put him in a position of trust and
studied him closely. He seldom was mistaken, and many
an ordinary workman in his plant became wealthy in po-
sitions of responsibility and trust into which Mr. Carnegie
thrust him because of his discovery of his abilities.
Mr. Carnegie retired from the business in 1 90 1 , when
the Carnegie Steel Company was merged into the United
States Steel Corporation. "I sold in pursuance of a policy
determined upon long since, not to spend my old age in
business struggling after more dollars. I believe in de-
veloping a dignified and unselfish life after sixty," he said
at that time. When he retired he made known to the
ANDREW CARNEGIE 43
world that he intended to distribute his millions. His bene-
factions up to 1899 exceeded $17,000,000. They were
not confined to this country, though Pittsburgh received
more of that amount than any other section of the globe.
From 1901 up to the day of his death Mr. Carnegie gave
with a generosity that startled the world. Each succeeding
gift, in most cases, was greater than the preceding one.
He set aside funds of $10,000,000, $22,000,000, $24,-
000,000 and $125,000,000 for philanthropic purposes.
His retirement from business did not eliminate him en-
tirely from it. His counsel was sought frequently by the
officials of the billion dollar combine. In his frequent
travels to Europe he was constantly in communication
with the Company by cable.
When he was the active head of the steel works he
was good and generous to his workmen, but there were
occasions when he clashed with the labor unions of which
the workmen were members. In after years Carnegie
showed a feeling he entertained for his employees by
creating a savings bank for them, which paid six per cent,
interest; by establishing meeting rooms, libraries, gymnas-
iums, theatres, and other means of recreation that added
to the pleasures of their existence. He spent millions of
dollars on them. In Pittsburgh there are a number of build-
ings that are monuments to the generosity of Carnegie
to his men.
In creating a bank for the employees he did so in
order to insure a payment of six per cent., confident that
such large interest would induce them to save. It had a
most salutary effect. The deposits increased rapidly, and
in times of business depression and panics the rate of six
per cent, was maintained. Out of these deposits the bank
advanced money to the depositors to enable them to con-
44 HISTORICAL REGISTER
struct their homes, the bank taking a mortgage on the
property they purchased. By this arrangement thousands
of the employees of the Carnegie Steel Company purchased
their homes and eventually cleared them of all indebted-
ness. The men always felt secure with the Carnegie Trust
Company backing the institution. In 1 899 the deposits
in the bank amounted to more than $1,000,000.
At the time of his retirement the employees of the
Carnegie Steel Company were, perhaps, better paid than
the employees of any steel plant in the world; were better
provided for in the matter of safety appliances and recre-
ation centres, and with the luxuries of life that an em-
ployer can give through generosity. The fact that the
men in the plant were ideally provided for and that most
of them, through the bank which he had organized, had
large amounts of money saved, was a source of gratifica-
tion to him.
After his retirement Mr. Carnegie's activities were
confined almost exclusively to the distribution of his enor-
mous wealth. His benefactions exceeded $350,000,000.
Pittsburgh, where his wealth was created, has been remem-
bered more by him than any other municipality. He has
been generous with New York, but doubly generous with
Pittsburgh. The town of his birth, Dunfermline, Scotland,
has received millions from him. Through his generosity
millions of persons throughout the world have access to
books which they could not obtain except through his
gifts. Hundreds of teachers and professors are enjoying
a pension through his liberality, and thousands of young
men and women are getting educations because of the en-
dowments he made to institutions of learning.
Mr. Carnegie gave for libraries in the United States
about $70,000,000. Carnegie Corporation of New York,
ANDREW CARNEGIE 45
$125,000,000; Endowment for International Peace, $10,-
000,000; Church Peace Union, $2,000,000. To the Car-
negie Institute at Pittsburgh he gave $24,000,000; the Car-
negie Institution of Washington, $22,000,000; Scotch
Universities, $10,000,000; United Kingdom Trust, $10,-
000,000. He provided a pension fund for professors and
teachers in colleges and universities of $17,000,000. He
established a fund of $5,000,000 for the benefit of em-
ployees of the Carnegie Steel Company; a Carnegie Hero
Fund for the reward of heroism of $10,000,000, and en-
dowed Dunfermline with $5,000,000. He gave $1,750,-
000 to the Peace Temple at The Hague; $1,500,000 to
the Allied Engineers Societ}'. Nearly every university and
college in the United States and most of those in foreign
countries have received contributions.
He was the Lord Rector of St. Andrews University
from 1903 to 1907 and of Aberdeen University from 1912
to 1914, and held the honorary degree of Doctor of Laws
from the universities of Aberdeen, St. Andrews, Glasgow,
Edinburgh, Birmingham, Manchester, McGill, Brown,
Pennsylvania, Cornell and other colleges. Mr. Carnegie
was a member of numerous philosophical, civic and scien-
tific bodies, among them the American Institute of Archi-
tects, the American Society of Mechanical Engineers, the
American Institute of Mining Engineers, the National
Civic Federation, the American Philosophic Society, and
the New York Chamber of Commerce. He was a Com-
mander of the Legion of Honor of France, and had also
received the Grand Crosses, Order of Orange Nassau and
the Order of Dannebrog. He was a member of the Union
League, New York Yacht, Authors, Lotos, St. Andrews
Riding and Indian Harbor Yacht Clubs.
He was the author of "An American Four in Hand
46 HISTORICAL REGISTER
in Great Britain," written in 1883, and continued with
"Round the World" (1884); 'Triumphant Democracy"
(1886); 'The Gospel of Wealth" (1900); "The Empire
of Business" (1902), (this was translated into eight lan-
guages); 'The Life of James Watt" (1906), and "Prob-
lems of Today" (1909).
He married, in 1887, Louise Whitfield, and had one
daughter, Mrs. Roswell Miller, born March 30th, 1897.
Mr. Carnegie died August 1 1 th, 1919. His love for
individuals was the expression of his love for all men.
Out of this love sprang his great benefactions. One great
mark of his character and career was his wisdom in select-
ing his associates. The remark which he probably made,
that he wished put on his tombstone, the words: "Here
lies a man so wise that he surrounded himself with men
wiser than himself," is characteristic.
HARRY C. FR1CK
Henry Clay Frick
IENRY CLAY FRICK was born in West Over-
ton, Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania, De-
cember 19th, 1849. His father, John W. Frick,
whose ancestors were Swiss, had been a farmer,
but at the time of the boy's birth was an engineer in the
mill of his father-in-law, Abraham Overholt, descendant
of a Swiss family that settled in Pennsylvania in 1 749.
Overholt was a large mill owner and distiller. Young
Frick attended the public schools in West Overton, and
for a short time the Chester Military Academy and Otter-
bein University, Ohio. At the age of sixteen he became
a clerk in the store of White, Orr & Company, and later
a bookkeeper in his grandfather's distillery at Broad Ford.
The great Connellsville coke industry was in its in-
fancy, and while young Frick worked at his books he
watched the small beginnings of the coke makers, studied
the country, and in his mind were developed the possibili-
ties of coke as a factor in steel manufacture. Late in the
sixties he began to acquire small tracts of land in the Con-
nellsville region and to attempt coke making. In 1871 he
organized the firm of Frick & Company, with Abraham
O. Tintsman, one of his grandfather's partners, and Joseph
Rist. They had three hundred acres of coal lands and fifty
ovens, and the next year they built one hundred and fifty
ovens. Then came the panic of 1873, and the small coke
men sold their holdings for a song. Frick's partners caught
the contagion of failure and he bought them out.
Lacking the capital to acquire all the interests that
were offered to him, and having faith in the ultimate value
47
48 HISTORICAL REGISTER
of the property, Mr. Frick sought the aid of capitalists.
Among those to whom he went for assistance was the
Pittsburgh banking house of Mellon, of which he was later
a director. When the panic was over the price of coke
increased from 90 cents to $4.00 and $5.00 a ton, and
Mr. Frick was the head of the industry.
In 1882, when Carnegie Brothers & Company be-
came large stockholders in the H. C. Frick Coke Com-
pany, it was the largest coke producer in the world, with
$3,000,000 capital. Mr. Frick's holdings made him indis-
pensable to the Carnegies, and he was admitted to their
firm. They ultimately acquired a controlling interest in
the Frick Company through the retirement of two of Mr.
Frick's partners, and so antagonized him that he retired
from the presidency. He retained, however, his interests
in both companies, and in 1 889 he was made chairman
of Carnegie Brothers & Company. His selection for this
position was dictated by the necessity of finding a man
strong enough to cope with the serious labor troubles by
which the Carnegie Company was threatened and which
culminated in the Homestead strike. Thomas M. Carnegie
had died in 1 886, leaving his brother Andrew in control.
Through the Homestead strike of 1 892 Mr. Frick
came into national prominence. Differences had arisen
between the Carnegie Steel Company and a small minority
of its employees over a wage scale; the strike which ensued
involved thousands of men who were not affected by the
dispute, and brought on an armed conflict which necessi-
tated the calling out of the National Guard and the procla-
mation of martial law. It was at this time, July 22nd.
1892, that Alexander Berkman, a Russian anarchist, but
recently arrived in America, tried to assassinate Mr. Frick.
Berkman walked into Frick's office, drew a revolver and
HENRY CLAY FRICK 49
fired, the bullet lodging in Mr. Prick's neck. Mr. Frick
was shot a second time and then he grappled with Berk-
man. During the encounter Mr. Frick was stabbed three
times, but he downed his assailant and held him until aid
arrived. Berkman was tried and sent to the Western Peni-
tentiary in Pittsburgh for twenty-one years. Thirteen days
after the attack Mr. Frick walked to his office unattended
and resumed the direction of the great strike, which con-
tinued until November 2 1 st of that year. While Mr. Frick
was unmoved by the violence of the strikers or the pro-
tests of the public, he quietly relieved the distress of the
families of the insurgent workmen. He won the fight
and never begrudged the price of the victory.
When Mr. Frick entered the Carnegie Steel Company
he decided to make it the most powerful concern in the
steel world. Two of his immediate ventures netted the
Carnegie concern many millions of dollars with but small
investment. Up to this time the switching charges be-
tween the various Carnegie plants had been very profit-
able to the railroads and expensive to the Carnegie Com-
pany. Mr. Frick built the Union Railroad to weld the
scattered Carnegie plants closer together. This eliminated
the switching charges and saved enormous sums for the
Carnegie Company.
It was Mr. Frick who later took over a large portion
of the Mesaba ore fields on Lake Superior in a big deal
that guaranteed the Carnegie Company for fifty years a
minimum annual supply of 1 ,200,000 tons of ore, driving
a shrewd bargain with the Rockefellers, who owned ore
lands and lake steamers. Later Mr. Frick conceived the
idea of buying out Mr. Carnegie entirely, and in asso-
ciation with Henry Phipps, the second largest owner of
stocks, and with the co-operation of E. H. Moore and
50 HISTORICAL REGISTER
others, Mr. Frick asked Mr. Carnegie for an option on his
interests. Mr. Carnegie demanded $ 1 ,000,000 for a ninety
day option and named $157,950,000 in cash and bonds
for his entire holding. This price, with the additional cost
of the stock of the other partners in the Carnegie Com-
pany, brought the cost of Mr. Frick's scheme close to
$250,000,000. The matter was taken to J. P. Morgan,
who was not impressed with the idea. The plan col-
lapsed, Mr. Frick's option expiring at a cost of a million
dollars, which Mr. Carnegie pocketed. This was the first
failure Mr. Frick had ever known, but it was also a blow
to Mr. Carnegie, for the failure of the Frick syndicate left
him in the position of having been on the market with
his holdings, which apparently could not be sold.
Mr. Carnegie became very bitter and tried to oust
Mr. Frick entirely from the steel business. They de-
veloped a quarrel with many ramifications. Mr. Carnegie
sought to have the board of managers declare Mr. Frick's
stock forfeited at par value. Mr. Frick replied with an
equity suit to prevent this confiscation of his stock, but
the case was finally settled out of court by the reorgani-
zation of the Carnegie Company, which made several Pitts-
burghers millionaires over night. It made Mr. Frick one
of the wealthiest men in the country. A year or two later,
Mr. Carnegie, with the aid of Mr. Charles H. Schwab, suc-
ceeded in interesting Mr. Morgan in the scheme he had
previously rejected, and out of this interest came the or-
ganization of the United States Steel Corporation in 1 90 1 .
By this again Mr. Frick's fortune was doubled. His $3 1 ,-
000,000 investment in the Carnegie Company was turned
into $61,300,000 in the United States Steel Corporation,
Mr. Schwab was made president of the Steel Corporation
and Mr. Carnegie's representative in that concern.
HENRY CLAY FRICK 5 1
The enlargement of his interests had brought Mr.
Frick into the turmoil of New York finance, and when
trouble arose in the Equitable Life Assurance Society, and
James W. Alexander and James Hazen Hyde made
charges against each other, Mr. Frick was named chair-
man of a committee to investigate. He recommended
that both men leave the Company, and when the report
was killed he left the board.
Allying himself with the late E. H. Harriman, Mr.
Frick became a director in the Union Pacific and a mem-
ber of the executive committee. His investments in rail-
roads increased rapidly until he was the largest individual
stockholder of the Pennsylvania and a director of many
other roads. When E. H. Harriman and H. H. Rogers
were alive, Frick, with them and William Rockefeller, Otto
Kahn and others, formed one of the most powerful groups
of railroad financiers in the United States.
Toward the latter part of his life Mr. Frick gradually
withdrew from some of the many enterprises in which he
was interested. He retained, however, directorships in the
Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railway Company, the
Chicago & Northwestern Railway Company, the Pennsyl-
vania Railroad Company, the Philadelphia and Reading
Coal and Iron Company, the Reading Company, the Mellon
National Bank of Pittsburgh, the National City Bank of
New York, the Union Trust Company of Pittsburgh and
the United States Steel Corporation.
His grasp on Pennsylvania politics was such that he
was generally credited with forcing to the front Philander
C. Knox, who became United States Senator and later At-
torney-General. Knox had been Frick' s personal attorney.
At one time Frick was mentioned as a successor to Senator
Boise Penrose. From the time of the formation of the
52 HISTORICAL REGISTER
United States Steel Corporation — and before — Henry
Clay Frick was one of the powers of almost the first magni-
tude in the group of men who control the industrial and
financial fabric of the country.
He was a student and lover of art, and by the use of
patience and thought, and large sums of money, he formed
one of the finest private collections of paintings, statuary,
bronzes, porcelains, enamels, furniture and other objects
of art, in existence, all of which, under the provision of
his testament, will in due time be permanently turned over
to the public use and enjoyment, together with his costly
home in New York, adequately endowed.
When the Pittsburgh Bank for Savings closed its
doors in 1915, over the failure of the Kuhn interests, whose
paper the bank carried, Mr. Frick, as a Christmas present
to the children, announced that he would pay in cash all
accounts of the children depositors in the school savings
fund of the defunct bank. More than five thousand chil-
dren were thus benefited by Mr. Frick's munificence, and
they did not lose a penny of their deposits. In fact, later,
when the receiver, Mr. Getty, was able to pay about sixty
per cent, back to the depositors, the children also received
checks for a portion of their savings, and thus were able
to make more than the expected four per cent, on their
original deposits.
Mr. Frick lived unostentatiously, and made no parade
of his great wealth. Fie was a lover of flowers, especially
of chrysanthemums, which attracted many visitors to his
conservatories. He was a member of the Union League,
Metropolitan, Engineers, Lawyers, New York, Riding,
Racquet and Tennis and many other clubs.
He married, December 15th, 1881, Adelaide Howard
Childs, daughter of Asa P. Childs, of Pittsburgh. They
HENRY CLAY FRICK 53
had four children, of whom two survive, Childs Frick and
Helen Clay Frick.
Mr. Frick died December 2nd, 1919. "In his death
this country lost one of its greatest citizens, a man whose
constructive ability and integrity of purpose was known
throughout the world," said one of his close associates.
"He stood for the very highest ideals in all the cor-
porations with which he was connected. His generous
contributions to philanthropic work were made without
publicity and covered a constant and wide range of activ-
ity. His love for this country and his unfailing patriotism
were constantly in evidence to those who were close to
him, and in his death this country has suffered an irrepar-
able loss.'
George Richard Fearing
lEORGE RICHARD FEARING was born in
New York City, June 2nd, 1839; son of Daniel
Butler and Harriet Richmond Fearing. The
founder of the family in this country was John
Fearing, who reached Massachusetts Colony from England
in 1 638. He and his descendants were among the pros-
perous Colonists who helped give commercial solidity to
Massachusetts.
George R. Fearing was graduated from Columbia
University in 1 860. After leaving college he traveled ex-
tensively in foreign countries, and at the outbreak of the
Civil War he returned to this country, and on November
22nd, 1861, volunteered and was at once ordered to re-
port as aide to Major-General Robert Burnside of Rhode
Island. He accompanied the headquarter staff to the Po-
tomac, and was in active service during the advance on
Richmond and the Battle of Fredericksburg, where his con-
duct under fire received high commendation from the
commanding general. On April 4th, 1862, he was made
Captain and additional aide-de-camp and transferred with
General Burnside to the Western front. He was present
in Tennessee during the trying days of 1863, and at the
siege of Knoxville. He resigned from the army February
1st, 1864, and on March 13th, 1865, he was brevetted
Major of Volunteers for faithful and meritorious service
during the war.
Upon his return from the war he entered the bank-
ing business with his brother, Henry S. Fearing. The in-
fluence of his business career has always been toward the
54
George Richard Fearing
GEORGE RICHARD FEARING 55
upbuilding of our institutions and the advancement of cor-
rect banking, and will long reflect honor upon his name.
Upon his retirement from active business he devoted
himself largely to the activities of the Knickerbocker Club
and the Union Racquet and Tennis and the South Side
Sportsmen's Clubs, in the expansion and modern develop-
ment of which he took a personal interest.
He married, September 1 st, 1 869, Harriet Travers,
daughter of William R. and Maria Louisa Johnson Trav-
ers, and had one son, George Richmond Fearing.
Mr. Fearing died January 24th, 1 920. He was a true
philanthropist, and a man of the broadest outlook on life,
and of the most generous and liberal views. Cast in a
large mould, he would have made a success of anything
he undertook, his energy, courage and determination were
such as to overcome any and all obstacles. His personal-
ity was modest and unassuming, notwithstanding the suc-
cess he had achieved by his own efforts. His intercourse
with his friends and associates was always marked with
esteem and consideration. He was kind and gentle, a model
of virtue, discriminating in judgment and fixed in princi-
ples. He was admired and respected by all who knew him.
Edward Hastings Ripley
DWARD HASTINGS RIPLEY was born at Cen-
ter Rutland, Vermont, November 1 1 th, 1 839 ;
son of William Young and Jane Warren Ripley,
both parents being of old Revolutionary stock.
At the outbreak of the Civil War he was a junior at Union
College, Schenectady, New York. When the call came
for 300,000 additional troops, in May, 1862, he at once
left college and enlisted as a private in the 9th Vermont
Infantry, and soon after was commissioned Captain of
Company B of that regiment, and with his Company saw
service in the Shenandoah Valley in the same year. He
was promoted Major, although one of the youngest line
officers.
He was taken prisoner at Harper's Ferry, September
15th, 1862, and following his exchange he participated in
the siege of Suffolk, Va., and on May 16th, 1863, was
promoted Lieutenant-Colonel and Colonel, May 22nd,
1863. He led the advance of the Pamunkey to West
Point, Va., to protect the right flank of the column ad-
vancing up the peninsula against Richmond. Prostrated
by the fevers of the peninsula, Colonel Ripley and his
regiment were sent to the swamps of North Carolina as a
sanitary relief from the malarial poisons of Yorktown. En
route to North Carolina, in an old freighter, they were
driven out into the Atlantic by a violent storm and given
up for lost. Colonel Ripley succeeded in landing his men
in North Carolina, where he was in command of the dis-
trict between Beaufort and New Berne, North Carolina.
He was brevetted Brigadier-General, U. S. Volunteers,
56
EDWARD HASTINGS RIPLEY 57
August 1st, 1864, "for gallant and meritorious services,"
and was assigned to command of First Brigade, Second
Division, 1 8th Army Corps, Army of the James, and later
to the command of the Second Brigade, which he led in
the Battle of Chapin's Bluff. At the head of this brigade
he participated in the heroic and successful assault on Fort
Harrison, where he was twice slightly wounded. On Oc-
tober 27th, 1864, his brigade led in the attempted surprise
of the Confederate lines over the Fair Oaks battlefield.
He was then assigned to command of the First Brigade,
Third Division, 24th Army Corps.
To this brigade was given the honor of leading the
Union column into Richmond after the surrender, and
General Ripley was given command of the city with orders
to subdue the mob, put out the fires and save as much of
the city as possible. That this important duty was well
performed is evidenced by the following dispatch from
Assistant Secretary of War Dana to Secretary Stanton:
'The city is perfectly quiet and the citizens are enjoying
greater security than for months." To quote Major
George A. Bruce: 'The execution of all orders and a
thousand details in restoring order and providing for the
peace and safety of the city fell upon General Ripley. No
one better fitted for such an important and delicate task
could have been found. He was one of the youngest offi-
cers of his rank — just arrived at the age of twenty-three.
He was a scholar, a gentleman in the true sense of the
word, and a soldier of much experience and proved cour-
age. He was tall, possessed of a fine figure, an open and
attractive countenance, with an eye that beamed with
kindness and inspired confidence. He possessed a matur-
ity of judgment far beyond his years. What seemed to
many recipients as favors, was to him not favors but re-
quests granted or acts done in the line of duty; firmness
58 HISTORICAL REGISTER
there was when firmness was required, but it was never
accompanied with harshness or rudeness, too often charac-
teristics of military commanders."
'The many appreciative letters from the leading citi-
zens of Richmond and the commendations of his superior
officers were the evidence of a just, firm, and kindly admin-
istration of a conquered city."
He remained in command of Richmond until the City
Government was re-established, and was mustered out of
service, June 13th, 1865.
Upon return to civil life General Ripley engaged in
the marble industry under the name of Ripley Brothers
until the firm was merged into the Vermont Marble Com-
pany. He built the Holland House on Fifth Avenue, New
York; the Raritan River Railroad in New Jersey; was a
founder and a director of the United States and Brazil
Steamship Line ; was the founder and first president of the
Rutland Marble Savings Bank, and for many years was
vice-president of the Rutland County National Bank. He
was a member of the Army and Navy Club, the University
Club, the Military Order of the Loyal Legion of the United
States, the George Washington Post, G. A. R., and the
Military Service Institute. He received the degree of A. B.
from Union College and A. M. from Norwich Military
University. General Ripley served in the Vermont Legis-
lature as a representative from Mendon.
He married, May 23rd, 1878, Amelia Dyckman Van
Doren, daughter of Dr. Matthew Dyckman and Mary Mott
Van Doren, and had two daughters: Mrs. Alexander
Ogden Jones and Mrs. Raphael Pumpelly.
General Ripley died September 1 4th, 1915. He filled,
with ability and efficiency, but always with modesty, the
highest positions in the community. A man of culture,
race and breeding; a rare gentleman.
Daniel Wilkin McWilliams
ANIEL WILKIN McWILLIAMS was born at
Hamptonburg, Orange County, New York, May
29th, 1 837 ; son of John A. and Susan A. (Wil-
kin) McWilliams. His earliest paternal Ameri-
can ancestor was John McWilliams, who came from Scot-
land and settled at Scotchtown, N. Y. He was an active
participant in the Revolutionary War, being a private in
Lieutenant-Colonel Marinus Willet's Fifth Regiment, New
York line, Captain Laurence Gross' Company.
On his maternal side he was a direct descendant of
John Wilkin, who received a grant of land from Queen
Anne on Long Island, and emigrated to this country in
1 720. He was a grandson of John Wilkin, Bishop of
London, who married Robina Cromwell, sister of Oliver
Cromwell, the Protector.
Daniel W. McWilliams received his education at the
Montgomery Academy, in Orange County, New York.
From the earliest days of his working years he showed a
remarkable aptitude for the business of railroad building.
At the age of eighteen he entered the service of the New
York & Erie Railroad Company, in the engineer corps,
engaged in straightening and double-tracking its line.
After two years of this work he turned his attention to
banking, and was connected with the Chemung Canal
Bank, at Elmira, N. Y., for the next five years.
In 1 86 1 he was elected secretary and treasurer of the
Toledo, Peoria & Warsaw Railroad Company, with head-
quarters at Peoria, Illinois, where he lived for five years.
After the successful reorganization of that railroad, he
59
60 HISTORICAL REGISTER
accepted a confidential position in the banking house of
Henry G. Marquand & Company. When Mr. Marquand
and his business ally, Thomas Allen, bought the St. Louis
& Iron Mountain Railroad Company from the State of
Missouri, they extended the line southward to the Missis-
sippi River, and built three other lines, all of which be-
came, when consolidated, the St. Louis, Iron Mountain
& Southern Railway. He was treasurer of this line for
fifteen years, until 1 88 1 , when he resigned and became
secretary and treasurer of the Manhattan Railway Com-
pany, which leased and operated the consolidated elevated
railroads of New York City. In 1 903 he became treasurer
of the Interborough Rapid Transit Company, which leased
the elevated roads and built the first subway in New York.
He continued four years in that capacity, but he mean-
while retained his position with the Manhattan Railway
Company, and held it at the time of his death.
When the Kings County Trust Company was incor-
porated in Brooklyn, in 1 889, he became a member of its
initial board of directors, and was elected one of its vice-
presidents, and so continued until his death. He was a
director of the Fulton Bank of Brooklyn when it consoli-
dated with the Mechanics' Bank, and the consolidated in-
stitution continued him as a director. He was also a di-
rector of the Standard Coupler Company and of the Un-
derwood Typewriter Company since its organization.
Mayor Wurster, the last chief magistrate of the City
of Brooklyn, appointed him, in 1896, one of the original
directors of the Brooklyn Public Library; he was elected
vice-president and continued in that capacity until the con-
solidation with the Brooklyn Library system. Andrew
Carnegie and the City of New York named him as one of
their representatives in the building of the Brooklyn
DANIEL WILKIN McWILLIAMS 6!
branches of the Carnegie public libraries, which have cost
over $2,000,000.
He had been a member of the First Presbyterian
Church of Elrnira, and of the Second Presbyterian Church
of Peoria. At the latter place he started a Sunday School
in a railway passenger car, from which evolved Grace
Presbyterian Church. In 1 866, on removing to Brooklyn,
N. Y., he united with the Lafayette Avenue Presbyterian
Church, Rev. Theodore L. Cuyler, pastor, and from 1 872
served as elder of that church. For over a quarter of a
century he was superintendent of its Sunday School, which
for many years had over one thousand scholars. He had
formerly been assistant superintendent of the Cumberland
Street Chapel Sunday School.
In 1858 he helped to organize the Elmira Young
Men's Christian Association, about the tenth Association
in this country. The interest thus displayed in early life
in the Association was only intensified with the passage
of the years. On taking up his residence in Brooklyn he
immediately connected himself with the struggling Brook-
lyn Association, and at critical times his counsel and help
were invaluable. When the Association needed a building
of its own to meet the needs of the young men of Brook-
lyn, he secured from Mr. Frederick Marquand, his wife's
uncle, the donation of the lots fronting on Fulton and
Bond Streets and Gallatin Place; and also the subsequent
gifts of money which made possible the erection of the
building thereon, one of the largest in the country at the
time — the corner-stone of which was laid by D. L. Moody.
Of the Brooklyn Association he was twice president,
a director, and secretary and treasurer of the Board of
Trustees, and in charge of the investment of its real estate
and endowment funds.
62 HISTORICAL REGISTER
For many years he was treasurer of the Brooklyn
Naval Branch of the Association; and also a member of
the Advisory Board of the International Committee.
Of his many philanthropies the Association was
among the first three — the Church, the Y. M. C. A., and
the Sunday School. During his lifetime he saw its mar-
velous expansion and increasing command of public in-
terest and support — its growth from a struggling ten or
eleven in number to the imposing proportions of the
present time — in Brooklyn from small leased quarters over
retail stores to the possession at the time of his death of
nearly a score of buildings, one of which cost nearly a
million dollars.
He was the intimate, lifelong friend of Dwight L.
Moody. He became a trustee of Northfield Seminary at
its organization, and out of his share as residuary legatee
under the will of Frederick Marquand, he erected Mar-
quand Hall, which has become so well known in connec-
tion with the seminary. He was also trustee and treas-
urer of the three Moody schools.
He was trustee of the Polytechnic Institute of Brook-
lyn; Young Women's Christian Association; member of
the Advisory Board of the Brooklyn Home for Consump-
tives; honorary vice-president of the American Sunday
School Union; trustee of the Foreign Sunday School
Union; member and vice-president of the Board of Foreign
Missions of the Presbyterian Church of the United States;
director and corresponding secretary of St. Paul's School,
of Tarsus, Asia Minor, from its inception until its transfer
to the American Board of Commissioners of Foreign Mis-
sions; member of the Advisory Board of Brooklyn City
Missions and Tract Society; trustee of the Bible Teachers'
Training School of New York City; a member of the
Brooklyn Chamber of Commerce, American Geographical
DANIEL WILKIN McWILLIAMS 63
Society, New York Zoological Society, Museum of Natural
History, and Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Mr. Me Williams was a devoted friend of Hampton
Institute and of its founder, General Armstrong. In 1 888,
when the old school house for children of refugees, built
by General Butler, had become a mere shell, he and Mrs.
McWilliams came to the aid of the institution by appro-
priating from the Marquand Estate money for a new train-
ing school, which was named for the poet Whittier. When
this building was later burned, it was immediately rebuilt,
with improvements, by the erstwhile donors, and it is
today the centre of a valuable part of Hampton's work.
Mr. and Mrs. McWilliams were also members of the Brook-
lyn Armstrong Association, contributing a scholarship for
nearly thirty-five years, as well as helping in various other
ways.
He found recreation in diversifying his mental inter-
ests and kept in close touch with affairs throughout the
world. His quiet and unostentatious demeanor did not
conceal from those who knew well the depth of his con-
victions and the positive force of his character. Blessed
with careful home training, a mother of great force and
strong character, with sensibilities deep and sympathies
of wide horizon, from early manhood he passed with un-
remitting, assiduous and patient effort to success.
His type of personality was distinctly constructive.
Identified with pioneer railroad interests in the Middle
West and later with transportation, banking and industrial
companies in New York, his counsel was invaluable for
sanity and foresight. But he was not content to be a
builder of commercial enterprises only. He recognized a
wider responsibility, and the most permanent of his ac-
complishments have been in the realm of religious, edu-
64 HISTORICAL REGISTER
cational and civic activities. Through the Young Men's
Christian Association he early saw the possibility of safe-
guarding the moral welfare and increasing the opportuni-
ties for developing the spiritual, physical and social re-
sources of young manhood. His generous gifts made pos-
sible the employment of the first paid secretaries of the
Student Volunteer Missionary Movement for Foreign
Missions, as a result of which over six thousand young
men and women have carried the Gospel to every corner
of the world. His statesmanlike view of the world led him
to see, more than thirty years prior to his death, the value
of the open door for missions in Korea, and his gifts helped
to send the first missions to that country.
Mr. Me Williams married in New York City, April
1 1th, 1860, Helen Frances Marquand, daughter of Josiah
Marquand, and niece of the late Henry G. and Frederick
Marquand ; she survives him with five children : Frederick
M., Susan V., now Mrs. Robert M. Blackburn, of Reading,
Pennsylvania; Howard, a lawyer of New York City; Clar-
ence A., a Major in the United States Army Medical Corps
(surgeon) ; and Helen M. Me Williams. Mr. Me Williams
died in Brooklyn, New York, January 7th, 1919. He was
a man of action and accomplishment, and belonged to that
type of citizenship whose sterling moral qualities and dis-
interested public spirit constitute the great silent forces in
the financial, civic and social progress of every community.
He was wisely conservative; tolerant of opinion however
divergent from his own; independent without self-asser-
tion; patriotic without boasting; simple in habit without
austerity; dignified in demeanor without stiffness or sever-
ity; courteous and deferential in manner without servility;
cordial and affable in all his relationship without affecta-
tion— a true "friend of all the world.'
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Charles Henry Adams
IHARLES HENRY ADAMS was bom in Con-
cord, Mass., March 13th, 1840; son of Sand-
ford and Martha (Fay) Adams. His first Amer-
ican ancestor was William Adams, who came
from Norwood, Wem, Shropshire, England, before 1 642
and settled in Ipswich. From William Adams the line of
descent is traced through his son, Nathaniel, who married
Mercy Dickinson; their son, Samuel, who married Mary
Burley; their son, Andrew, who married Elizabeth Hunt;
their son, Andrew, Jr., who married Lucy Merriam, and
their son, who married Jerusha Sibley. Sandford Adams
was an inventor of farm appliances, including a pump and
a grain separator, which came into general use. Charles
H. Adams received his early education in the public schools
of Concord and Winchester and at the Quincy School in
Boston. In 1857 he established himself in the retail gro-
cery business in Boston, and by devoting close attention to
business he became the proprietor of three retail stores in
Boston by the time he reached the age of twenty-one. In
1865 he formed a partnership with Jacob M. Haskell of
the firm of Jones, Haskell & Co., and the new business
under the name of Haskell & Adams conducted a whole-
sale trade exclusively. In 1 893-94 the firm name v/as
changed to Haskell, Adams & Co., and as such remained
until April 1 st, 1911, when it was incorporated as Haskell,
Adams Co. Under the able management of Mr. Adams
the business became one of the foremost wholesale grocery
houses in New England. Mr. Adams was vice-president
of the Bay State Mills at Winona, Minn., one of the largest
65
66 HISTORICAL REGISTER
flour milling plants in the United States, and of the Law-
renceburg Roller Mills Co., of Lawrenceburg, Ind. He
was a director of the Fourth Atlantic National Bank of
Boston, an active member and former vice-president of
the Boston Chamber of Commerce, member of the ex-
change and a charter member of the Boston City Club.
He was much interested in the development of residential
real estate around Jamaica Plain in the vicinity of his home,
where he lived for forty years and where he owned much
land and erected a large number of residences. One of
his associates said: "Mr. Adams was one of those sturdy,
substantial men of whom we are always sure, whose coun-
sel we solicit, in whose keeping we would freely place the
fortunes of our wives or children. From the faith he had
in himself, his judgments gathered strength and value. He
gloried in work for its own sake, sedulously shielding him-
self from any publicity. So he accepted no directorship,
no trust, no agency, if acceptance meant not personal care
or concern, or if it meant the abatement of the high qual-
ity of his zeal in other activities."
He married, November 26th, 1872, at Boston, Ella,
daughter of Asa Folsom Cochran, a merchant of New Or-
leans and Boston, and had four children: Ehetlind, Isabel
F. (wife of Frank S. Deland), Charles Q. and Winthrop C.
Adams. He died at his home in Jamaica Plain, Mass.,
November 1st, 1912.
His high character is well summed up in the follow-
ing tribute to his memory, published in the Boston "Ad-
vertiser" at the time of his death: "Mr. Adams was a
fine type of the old-time merchant of Boston, whose tradi-
tions he inherited, a man of the highest integrity, honor-
able in every relation, keen in foresight, ripe in judgment,
genial and unassuming strong in his friendships, unostenta-
tious in his benefactions."
V^v_>— U U ON-J"X-A—A^«_t
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Woodbury Gersdorf Langdon
?/?OODBURY GERSDORF LANGDON was
born in New York City, April 9th, 1 849 ; son
of Woodbury Langdon, who achieved success
as an artist and exhibited several times in the
Paris "Salon" prior to his death in 1867, and Helen Col-
ford Jones Langdon. He was a great-grandson of Hon.
Woodbury Langdon, an eminent judge of New Hamp-
shire, who represented that State in the U. S. Senate im-
mediately after the Revolutionary War; and great-grand-
nephew of John Langdon, who was the first Governor of
the State of New Hampshire, and the first presiding officer
of the U. S. Senate, and who, as such, notified George
Washington of his election to the Chief Magistracy. Walter
Langdon, the grandfather of Woodbury G. Langdon, mar-
ried Dorothea Astor, and his mother was a daughter of
Isaac Jones, of New York, and a granddaughter of John
Mason, president of the Chemical Bank.
Mr. Langdon was educated in France and Switzer-
land, and it was his intention to follow his father's occu-
pation as an artist. But on his return home he became
interested in various philanthropic enterprises, to which he
devoted his whole time and energies, with the exception
of that required in the management of his mother's estate.
He was elected a trustee of the Sheltering Arms in
1872, and was its treasurer for more than fifteen years.
He was elected trustee of the Hospital and House of Rest
for the Consumptive in 1871, and had been for many
years first vice-president and then president of the Insti-
tution. He was made trustee of the General Theological
67
68 HISTORICAL REGISTER
Seminary in 1 880, and was for three years its treasurer.
With Dean Hoffman he became interested in the Assyrian
Mission work in connection with the Archbishop of Canter-
bury's Mission to the Nestorians, became the treasurer and
secretary of that committee for many years, and supported
liberally its activities. During the Great War became the
treasurer and secretary of Assyrian and Armenian Relief
Committee and paid its entire expenses for two years. He
was also a member of the American Committee for Relief
in the Near East. He was a trustee of the Children's Fold,
Protestant Episcopal Society for the Promotion of Religion
and Learning in the State of New York, and had been at
various times a trustee of St. Luke's Hospital, the Samari-
tan Home for the Aged, the House of the Good Shepherd,
Rockland County. He was a member of the Church of
the Incarnation, of the Church Club, of the Young Men's
Christian Association, American Geographical Society,
New York Historical Society, Archaeological Society of
America, and American Numismatic and Archaeological
Society. He was an earnest Christian worker, and his
motto was "Work while it is day, for the night cometh
when no man can work."
Mr. Langdon married, in 1 882, Sophie Elizabeth,
daughter of the Rev. Henry E. Montgomery, for many
years rector of the Church of the Incarnation, New York,
and had six children: Mrs. Barrett P. Tyler, Mrs. Thomas
Ellis Brown, Montgomery, Dudley, Woodbury G., Jr., and
John Langdon.
He died April 20th, 1919. Mr. Langdon was a man
of great personal charm, a philanthropist, a lover of man-
kind, his sympathetic heart found interest in every move-
ment for the good of humanity. He was a true follower
of Christ and tried to live up to his precepts.
Jacob Godfrey Schmidlapp
ACOB GODFREY SCHMIDLAPP was born in
Piqua, Ohio, September 7th, 1849; son of Jacob
Adam and Sophia F. Haug Schmidlapp. After
receiving his education in the public schools of
Piqua he went to Memphis, Tennessee, as cashier for B.
Lowenstein & Brothers, and later on opened a cigar store,
which he conducted six years, when he became interested
in distilling enterprises.
In 1 874 he moved to Cincinnati and organized a large
malting concern, and shortly after entered the banking
business. He organized the Union Savings Bank and
Trust Company, in a modest way, as a side issue to the
Export Storage Company. The bank grew rapidly under
his presidency, and after ten years the bank's large re-
sources permitted it to build the first "skyscraper" in Cin-
cinnati, and today it is one of the great financial institu-
tions of the Middle West.
Mr. Schmidlapp was interested in many large enter-
prises. He was trustee of the American Surety Company,
director of the Equitable Life Assurance Society, the Balti-
more and Ohio Railroad Company, the Degnon Contract-
ing Company, the Degnon Realty and Improvement Com-
pany, the Queens Place Realty Company, the Electrical
Securities Corporation, the Montana Power Company, the
White Rock Mineral Springs Company, the Clifton Springs
Distilling Company, the Champion Fibre Company, the
Monitor Stove and Range Company, and chairman of the
Board of Directors of the Union Savings Bank and Trust
Company.
69
70 HISTORICAL REGISTER
Mr. Schmidlapp was much interested in educational
and philanthropic institutions in Cincinnati. He was a
trustee of the College of Music, the Cincinnati Law School,
the Art School, May Festival Association, and the McCall
Colored Industrial School. He was president of the Cin-
cinnati Model Homes for Wage Earners, and was formerly
treasurer of the Cincinnati Bureau of Municipal Research
and of the Red Cross Endowment Fund, Cincinnati
Branch. The cause of international peace and arbitration
was one for which Mr. Schmidlapp labored for years. He
was a director of the Carnegie Peace Fund and treasurer
of the American Society for the Judicial Settlement of
International Disputes.
His gifts to the public was a library and memorial
monument to his native city, Piqua, and three large bene-
factions to Cincinnati, the magnificent annex to the Art
Museum and the Schmidlapp Gallery in the Art Museum,
the dormitory of the College of Music and the Charlotte
R. Schmidlapp Bureau for Girls.
Mr. Schmidlapp was especially proud of Washington
Terrace, Walnut Hills, which consists of more than four
hundred model homes built by him for negroes, in whose
welfare he was deeply interested. His model homes form
the most outstanding effort along this line in the country.
His views were largely the same as those of Mr. Carnegie.
Mr. Schmidlapp was a member of the Commercial
Club, the Queen City Club, the Manufacturers' Club, and
the Business Men's Club, of Cincinnati; the Whitehall,
Railroad, Manhattan, Bankers' Clubs and the Ohio Society
of New York.
He married, in December 1877, Emelie Blake, of Cin-
cinnati, and had six children. Only two survive: William
Horace Schmidlapp, chairman of the Board of Directors
JACOB GODFREY SCHMIDLAPP 71
of the Monitor Stove and Range Company, and Carl J.
Schmidlapp, vice-president of the Chase National Bank.
Mr. Schmidlapp died December 18th, 1919. He was
one of the foremost citizens of his time. He was a true
philanthropist. While not endorsing fully the views of
Mr. Andrew Carnegie in his "gospel of wealth," he had
disposed of most of his property during his life for philan-
thropic purpose. One million dollars, almost his entire
estate at the time of his death, was left to a group of trus-
tees, who are at liberty to use the income for charity as
they see fit : To relieve distress and suffering ; to help those
who need help to "get on their feet." Mr. Schmidlapp
represented American manhood in the ideal — courage,
honesty of purpose, simplicity and the power of preserving
friendships. He has left a record after which the youth of
America might well pattern their lives.
Edwin Bradford Cragin
DWIN BRADFORD CRAGIN was born in Col-
chester, Connecticut, October 23d, 1859; son
of Edwin Timothy and Ardelia (Sparrow)
Cragin, a descendant of John Cragin, who came
to this country in 1652, and settled in Woburn, Massachu-
setts, and on his maternal side he was a direct descendant
of William Bradford, the first Governor of Plymouth. His
early education was obtained at Bacon Academy, in his
native town, and he was graduated from Yale University
in 1882, and from the College of Physicians and Surgeons,
New York City, in 1 886, where he received the first Harsen
prize for proficiency in examination. He served for eigh-
teen months on the house staff of the Roosevelt Hospital,
after which he began private practice in New York City,
making a specialty of gynecology. In July, 1 888, he was
appointed assistant gynecologist to the out-patient's de-
partment of Roosevelt Hospital, was made attending gyne-
cologist to that department the following November, and
assistant gynecologist to the hospital proper in June, 1 889.
He was assisant surgeon to the New York Cancer Hos-
pital from 1889-93, resigning the position in the latter
year, owing to pressure of work.
He became secretary of the College of Physicians and
Surgeons in 1 895, and held that office for four years, when
he became Professor of Obstetrics, and in 1904, Professor
of Gynecology. He was attending obstetrician and gyne-
cologist, Sloane Maternity Hospital, consulting obstetric
surgeon, City Maternity, Italian and New York Nursery
and Child's Hospital, and consulting gynecologist, Presby-
terian, Roosevelt, Lincoln of New York, and St. Luke's
72
EDWIN BRADFORD CRAGIN 73
Hospital of Newburgh, N. Y., and New York Infirmary
for Women and Children.
Dr. Cragin contributed numerous articles to medical
journals, and is the author of 'The Essenials of Gyne-
cology," "Practice of Obstetrics," and co-author of The
American Text Book of Gynecology." He was vice-presi-
dent of the New York Academy of Medicine, and a mem-
ber of the New York Obstetrical and American Gynecolo-
gical Societies, the New York Medical and Surgical Society,
the Medical Association of Greater New York, the Ameri-
can Medical Association, and the American College of
Surgeons; and a member of the University, Yale and Bar-
nard Clubs.
He married, May 23rd, 1889, Mary Randle Willard,
daughter of the Reverend Samuel G. Willard, a member
of the corporation of Yale College and trustee of the State
Hospital for the Insane at Middletown, and Cynthia Bar-
rows Willard, a descendant of Major Simon Willard, who
came to this country in 1 634 and settled at Concord. Col-
onel Daniel Willard, great-grandfather, served in the Revo-
lutionary War; and on her maternal side, from Robert
Barrows and Edmund Freeman, who came to this coun-
try in 1635, in the ship "Abigail." Frederick Freeman,
great-grandfather, served in the Revolutionary War at
Lexington. Dr. and Mrs. Cragin had three children : Mir-
iam Willard Cragin, Alice Gregory, wife of Dr. Raymond
W. Lewis, and Edwin Bradford Cragin, Jr.
Dr. Cragin died October 21st, 1918. He was highly
esteemed and respected by his medical associates for his
professional knowledge and ability. He was the dean of
New York's obstetricians. His mind, vigorous and active,
was dominated by a large intelligence, which recognized
the highest claims of professional duty and citizenship.
Harry Clay Hallenbeck
.RRY CLAY HALLENBECK was born at
Brooklyn, New York, April 8th, 1853; son of
John Johnson and Anna Kelley Hallenbeck.
He was educated at Claverick and Amherst.
After leaving college he became associated with his father
in the printing house of Wynkoop & Hallenbeck. In a
short time he not only mastered the printers' art but be-
came a builder of big business. Under his direction large
presses were installed; contracts for printing were made
with the Government, railroads and other large institu-
tions. Branch plants were established in Albany and
Lansing, Michigan. The firm soon became one of the
largest printing establishments in the country. The firm
was incorporated in 1895 under the name of Wynkoop,
Hallenbeck, Crawford, and Mr. Hallenbeck was made
president.
He displayed remarkable ability as an organizer and
business executive, with an astonishing capacity for affairs.
He organized the Hallenbeck Realty Corporation, and in
order to have better and more extensive facilities for his
rapidly increasing business, and to house new and addi-
tional equipment, a modern sixteen story building was
erected under his personal supervision. Mr. Hallenbeck
designed the structure to fit the needs of an up-to-date
printing plant, embodying every feature conducive to
modern methods. It is a memorial to Mr. Hallenbeck's
ingenuity.
He was State Printer at one time for the State of
New York, and at the time of his death was State Printer
74
HARRY CLAY HALLENBECK 75
for the State of Michigan, handling large Government con-
tracts with signal success.
He was a prominent real estate operator, and a mem-
ber of the Real Estate Board of New York. As an organ-
ist he possessed wonderful talent. He was at one time
organist of Henry Ward Beecher's Church in Brooklyn,
and at his Montclair residence he installed one of the finest
pipe organs in the country. He was also an expert bil-
liard player, and was at one time amateur champion of
the State.
Mr. Hallenbeck was the owner of "Adams Express."
No horse in the world surpasses this one in a consecutive
line of great winners and great winning sires. He was
bred from the male line of "Eclipse," foaled 1 764 through
"Waxey," "Whalebone" (who were Derby winners) and
"Sir Hercules," "Bird Catcher," The Baron," and "Stock-
well," the last two being winners of the St. Leger. All of
the sires above named were five Derby winners, and five
were St. Leger, the only exception being that of 'Whale-
bone," who got three Derby winners, and his two brothers,
"Whiskers" and "Woful," got the St. Leger, the latter
also getting two winners of the "Oaks" at Epsom. The
real features of his breeding are that he comes from the
best branch of "Stockwell" blood and through a grandsire
which headed the Sires' List in France at eight years old,
a condition without a parallel, and on his dam's side he
traces directly back to the only American horse that ever
won a Derby at Epsom or a St. Leger at Doncaster. Mr.
Hallenbeck's son, Mr. John J. Hallenbeck, presented this
marvelous horse to the United States Government at the
outbreak of the war for breeding purposes, and immedi-
ately after the gift this horse won the blue ribbon at the
Madison Square Garden Horse Show and Chicago Horse
Show.
76 HISTORICAL REGISTER
Among other famous horses in Mr. Hallenbeck's
stable was "The Finn," winner of nineteen races. Among
them the Belmont Handicap, Withers Stakes, Hamilton
Derby, Southampton, Huron, Manhattan (twice), Balti-
more, Elliott City, Dixey, Metropolitan, Champlain, Mer-
chant & Citizens, Chesterbrook and Havre de Grace Handi-
caps. The Finn" was the leading three-year-old of 1915,
and one of the best race horses produced in this country,
and raced during his two, three, four and five year old
form, winning each year and meeting and defeating the
fastest and best horses of these different years. Mr. Hallen-
beck built a private race track at his country estate, "Mead-
owbrook Farm," at Shrewsbury, New Jersey, which was
complete in every detail, and there his horses were trained
until the racing season. He also specialized in pure blood
Guernsey cattle, and the fame of the "Meadowbrook
Dairy" became state-wide.
Mr. Hallenbeck had been interested in politics, and
at one time was Councilman-at-Large for the Town of
Montclair, which corresponds to the present office of
Mayor. In his early days he was an enthusiastic yachts-
man and owned a handsome steam yacht, 'The Mont-
clair."
His clubs numbered among others the New York
Yacht Club, Atlantic Yacht Club, Shelter Island Club and
the Hardware Club. He was a director of the Lanston
Monotype Company, and numerous other corporations.
He married, April 18th, 1877, Elizabeth Clark,
daughter of Judson and Zilphia Neal Fassett Coleman, of
Bath, Maine. She was a descendant of Thomas Clark who
came over on the "Mayflower." Mr. and Mrs. Hallen-
beck had three children: Harry C., and Alene, deceased,
and John J. Hallenbeck.
HARRY CLAY HALLENBECK 77
Mr. Hallenbeck died April 1 1th, 1918. He was one
of the most prominent figures in the ranks of New York
printerdom; a progressive, alert, far-seeing business man
of remarkable executive ability, who was successful in all
of his undertakings. He was a versatile sportsman, a lover
of music, and a generous supporter of all worthy objects.
His personal characteristics commanded the respect of all
who came in contact with him.
George Elmer Blakeslee
EORGE ELMER BLAKESLEE was born at
Bridgeport, Connecticut, March 23rd, 1873;
son of John and Adelaide Howe Blakeslee. He
was educated in his native town, and in 1 893
moved to Jersey City. He engaged first in the bicycle
business, and when the automobile made its appearance
he was among the first to realize the future of the indus-
try. As the bicycle craze died out he swung his following
and business into the automobile field and rapidly became
a power in New Jersey automobile circles. He was the
oldest Cadillac distributor in point of service and president
of the Cadillac Old Guard. He was president of George
E. Blakeslee, Incorporated. As a merdhandizer of auto-
mobiles he was among the best in the country. He was
the father of the Good Roads project in New Jersey, and
initiated the movement that is now resulting in the estab-
lishment of a comprehensive State Highway system. He
laid out the route and posted the signs for the Lincoln
Highway from 42nd Street to Trenton.
He was one of the organizers of the Edward I. Ed-
wards boom for the Governorship, and contributed very
greatly to the victory of the Governor-elect in November,
1919, in the face of heavy odds. His conduct of the cam-
paign showed the depth of his originality. The finest
tribute to Mr. Blakeslee's talents came in the Fall of 1916,
when the electorate of New Jersey crowned his Good
Roads campaign with success by adopting by a majority of
eighty-seven thousand the Good Roads Act that he had
done so much to get through the Legislature. He v/as
78
GEORGE ELMER BLAKESLEE 79
Highway Commissioner, president of the Hudson County
Boulevard Commission, one of the founders of the Auto-
mobile Club of Jersey City, a director of the New Jersey
Automobile Trade Association and a member of the Auto-
mobile Club of America. He was president of the Cres-
cent Automobile Company of Jersey City and formerly
president of the Rotary Club of Jersey City. He was also
a member of the Jersey City Chamber of Commerce.
Mr. Blakeslee was active in club and fraternal circles.
He was a director of the Jersey City Club and the Car-
teret Club. He was a member of Bergen Lodge, F. & A.
M.; Salaam Temple, Mystic Shrine, the Scottish Rite
Masons, the Jersey City Lodge of Moose, and president of
an organization of newspapermen and political figures
known as The Slugs.
He was deeply interested in athletics, and was one
of the founders of the Detroit Athletic Club, Detroit,
Michigan. In 1894-95-96 he was the champion one-mile
bicycle rider of the State of New Jersey. His business
success enabled him to indulge in many quiet charities.
At Christmas time, although his condition was then con-
sidered serious, he was able to direct the arrangements for
the usual Christmas dinners to the poor of Jersey City.
He married, April 23rd, 1894, Louise, daughter of
Andrew and Hannah Downs, and had three children:
George Elmer Blakeslee, Jr., who died at the Officers'
Training Camp at Jacksonville, Florida, October 2nd,
1918, Louise and Franklin Blakeslee.
Mr. Blakeslee died January I Oth, 1920. His virile
temperament, his masterful will, his eager, energetic brain,
his independent imagination, made of him a unique per-
sonality, which exerted a striking and stimulating influ-
ence upon the political affairs of New Jersey. Mr. Blakes-
80 HISTORICAL REGISTER
lee believed and exemplified the Gospel. "Service, not
self. He profits most who serves best." He was a vigilant
and valiant defender of what he thought was for the pub-
lic good, and was entirely free from mercenary motives in
anything he advocated. His associates in business learned
to lean on him, having the highest regard for his judg-
ment. His career was a notable example of the "strenuous
life" rightly directed.
Charles Francis Donnelly
IHARLES FRANCIS DONNELLY was born in
Athlone County, Roscommon, Ireland, October
I 4th, 1 836; son of Hugh and Margaret Conway
Donnelly. In 1837 the family went to Canada
and settled in St. John, New Brunswick, where the boy
was educated in private schools and at the New Brunswick
Presbyterian Academy. In 1848 he removed with his
parents to Providence, Rhode Island. He studied law in
the office of Honorable Ambrose A. Ranney, of Boston,
and at the Harvard Law School, and was graduated with
the degree of LL.B. in 1859. He was admitted to the
Suffolk County Bar in September of the same year and
at once entered upon the practice of his profession.
During 1860-62 he lived in New York City, where
he came in contact with men eminent in law and letters.
He became known as a writer on educational topics, es-
pecially as these affected Catholic citizens. In New York
his literary work was published in the "Knickerbocker
Magazine," and other secular journals, over the pen name
of Schuyler Conway.
His law practice in Boston soon brought him into
prominence. In 1 888 he was engaged by the Catholics
to advocate and defend, before the Legislature, the right to
establish parochial schools, and the right of parents to
choose them for the training of their children. The result
was a victory for the Catholics of Massachusetts. Mr.
Donnelly had long been a member of the Charitable Irish
Society, and was for several terms its president. He was
one of the founders of the Home for Destitute Catholic
82 HISTORICAL REGISTER
Children, and was connected with the administration of
State charities for twenty-five years. Many important
bills were adopted during his administration, including the
subjecting of dipsomaniacs to the same restraint and treat-
ment as lunatics.
Mr. Donnelly was a student of the English classics
and of the early lore and history of Ireland, and was deeply
interested in the literary movement of the Irish renaissance.
He married, September 21st, 1893, Amy Frances,
daughter of James and Mary Donnelly Collins.
Mr. Donnelly died January 3 1 st, 1 909. He gave most
of his time, thought, and labor to the public welfare.
Joseph Peene
OSEPH PEENE was born in Yonkers, New
York, July 26th, 1 845 ; son of Joseph and Caro-
line Augusta Garrison Peene. He was educated
in a private school on Locust Hill Avenue,
Yonkers. His father had been established in navigation
projects on the Hudson River and in 1874, Joseph, with
his two brothers, George and John Peene, the latter one-
time Mayor of Yonkers, took over the transportation busi-
ness, which was founded by his father in 1857. Joseph
Peene, Sr., had been engaged in river transportation with
his brother-in-law, Hyatt L. Garrison. They owned sev-
eral boats, which made weekly trips between Yonkers and
New York. In 1864 Mr. Garrison withdrew from the
firm. Joseph Peene, Jr., and his brothers added new boats
to the line until it grew to be a small fleet of freighters.
In 1894 the firm was incorporated under the name
of the Ben Franklin Transportation Company, and Joseph
Peene became treasurer, and upon the death of John
Peene, in 1905, he became president and treasurer of the
corporation. He was a member of the Chamber of Com-
merce, the New York Athletic, Larchmont Yacht, Fleet-
wood Driving Pack and Suburban Riding and Driving
Clubs.
He married, November 25th, 1875, Elenore Jane,
daughter of John and Mary Matilda Lamb Brewer, and
had six children: Mrs. Ella Cunningham, Mrs. Mary Law-
rence, Grace, Chester Arthur, William Richard, and Frank
Peene.
Mr. Peene died December 20th, 1918.
83
John White Treadwell Nichols
OHN WHITE TREADWELL NICHOLS was
born in Brighton, Massachusetts, October 30th,
1 852 ; son of George Nichols, a publisher of
literary taste and ability, and Susan Farley
Treadwell Nichols. The founder of the family in this
country, Thomas Nichols, settled in Salem in 1635. Icha-
bod Nichols was one of the Committee of Salem, who built
the Constitution and presented it to the Government.
John W. T. Nichols spent his boyhood in Cambridge,
Massachusetts, and went to work in the woolen business
in Boston at the age of fourteen years, poor eyesight pre-
venting him continuing his studies. In 1884 he came to
New York and became a member of the cotton goods
commission house of Minot Hooper & Company, of
which he became the senior partner.
In 1906, when on board a steamship bound for
Europe, he first read the report of the San Francisco earth-
quake. He sent a post card back by the pilot urging his
firm to extend credit to all customers within the stricken
district. It was immediately done and the example was
largely followed by the trade, greatly helping financial
conditions.
He was the first one in his neighborhood to establish
a rest room for the women employees of his firm, and
was deeply interested in employment for the blind and
near-sighted. At one time he had installed in his office a
telephone switchboard, with bells instead of lights, en-
abling a girl who was nearly blind to operate it. He was
also interested in the advancement of his employees, fre-
84
JOHN WHITE TREADWELL NICHOLS 85
quently urging men to leave his company when there
seemed better opportunities for them elsewhere, and many
who had received their early training with him later be-
came prominent in the cotton goods trade.
He was an extensive traveler, and had made several
trips through Asia Minor and the Balkans. He was a
member of the Century Association, Merchants' Club and
Explorers' Club of New York and the Union Club of
Boston.
He married, in 1876, Mary Blake Slocum, of Jamaica
Plain, Massachusetts, and had six children: Mrs. Mansfield
Estabrook, Mrs. Edwin P. Taylor, Jr., Susan Farley Nich-
ols, George Nichols, John Treadwell Nichols and William
Blake Nichols.
Mr. Nichols died April 25th, 1920. He leaves a
record and example which any man of business may well
be proud to emulate.
Frederick Gilbert Bourne
IREDERICK GILBERT BOURNE was born in
Boston, Massachusetts, in 1851; son of the
Reverend George Washington and Harriett
Gilbert Bourne. He was educated in the pub-
lic schools of New York and early in life entered upon a
business career, his first position being with the Atlantic
Submarine Wrecking Company, in 1865. Later he be-
came secretary to Edward Clark, of the Singer Company,
and in 1 882 he became manager of the Clark estate. In
1 885 he was elected secretary of the Singer Manufactur-
ing Company, and in a few years was advanced to the
presidency of the corporation. He was a director of the
Aeolian Company, the Atlas Portland Cement, Babcock
& Wilson, Bourne & Son, Limited, of New Jersey; City
and Suburban Homes, Knickerbocker Safe Deposit, Long
Island Motor Parkway, Long Island Railroad, Bank of
Manhattan Company, New York and Long Branch Rail-
road, the New Theatre, Safe Deposit Company of New
York, and the Central Railroad of New Jersey.
Despite his intense activity in commercial life Com-
modore Bourne found time to devote to sports. Always
an ardent lover of yachting, he purchased the steam vessel
"Maria" and later on the "Diana." Another noted yacht
of his was "The Little Sovereign." The Commodore trans-
ferred his affections to motor boating, and at various times
owned the "Dark Island," named for the island he owned
in the Thousand Isles; the "Express" and the "Stranger,"
with which he won the Frontenac Cup in 1907. In 1907
he cruised with Sir Thomas Lipton on board the latter's
86
Frederick Gilbert Bourne
FREDERICK GILBERT BOURNE 87
yacht "Erin," and was active in building cup defenders
to compete with the noted English yachtsman.
His princely home on Long Island represented the
last word in magnificent construction; situated in the cen-
ter of two thousand acres, surrounded by more than twelve
thousand especially placed trees, with a canal for pleasure
boating and docks for yachts and a lighthouse for their
guidance, little was left to be desired. Not content with
this architectural triumph, Commodore Bourne purchased
Dark Island in the Thousand Isles, and at immense cost
and with extreme labor, including the bringing of thou-
sands of tons of soil from Canada for filling, he con-
structed there what was locally known as "The Castle of
Mysteries." The name came from queer towers and mys-
terious passageways, secret tunnels to the two docks and
secret panels leading far beneath the surface of the earth.
He was a member of the New York Chamber of
Commerce, Metropolitan Museum of Art, Racquet and
Tennis, Metropolitan, New York Athletic, Automobile,
Jekyl Island, New York Yacht, Seawanhaka-Corinthian
Yacht, South Side Sportsman's, Westwood Golf, and
Robin's Island Clubs. He was Commodore of the New
York Yacht Club from 1903-6.
He married, February 9th, 1875, Emma Keeler,
daughter of James Rufus and Mary Louise Davidson
Keeler. Their surviving children are Arthur Keeler, Alfred
Severin, George Gait, Kenneth, Howard, Marion and Mar-
jorie Bourne and Mrs. Ralph Strassburger and Mrs. Anson
W. Hard.
Commodore Bourne died March 9th, 1919. He led
throughout almost his entire career a very active life, both
in the worlds of finance and sport. The last public men-
tion of his activities chronicled a gift of $500,000 to the
Choir School of the Cathedral of Saint John The Divine.
Frederick Michael Shepard
REDERICK MICHAEL SHEPARD was born in
New York City, June 6th, 1865; son of Fred-
erick Michael and Annie Clarissa Rockwell
Shepard, a descendant of Governor William
Bradford, of the "Mayflower." His son was William
Bradford, who married Alice Richards and had Meletiah
Bradford ; she married John Steele and had Bethiah Steele ;
she married Samuel Shepard, and their son was Deacon
John Shepard, who married Rebecca Seymour, and their
son was Colonel James Shepard; he married Abigail An-
drews Andrus, and had John Andrews Andrus Shepard,
who married Margaret Jane Mills, and their son was Fred-
erick Michael Shepard, who married Annie Clarissa Rock-
well.
Mr. Shepard was educated in his native town, and
entered business with his father. He became president of
the Goodyear Company, June 6th, 1913, shortly after the
death of his father, Frederick M. Shepard, who had helped
to organize the company in 1872 with Joseph A. Minott.
While supervising the affairs of this company the younger
Mr. Shepard took charge as president of several subsidiary
concerns, acting in that capacity for the Union India Rub-
ber Company, which was organized by his father in 1853;
the Rubber Clothing Company, Lambertville Rubber Com-
pany, Orange Water Company, and the East Orange Safe
Deposit and Trust Company.
Mr. Shepard was a member of the Aldine Club of
New York, and a communicant of the Christ Episcopal
Church of East Orange, New Jersey.
88
FREDERICK MICHAEL SHEPARD 89
He married, July 20th, 1882, Mary Isabel Condit,
daughter of General Joseph A. Condit, and Harriet Newell
Mooney Condit, and had four sons: Frederick M., Newell
C., Kenneth A., and Thomas R. Shepard. There are five
grandsons: Frederick M., Rogers Simms, Kenneth L.,
Joseph Condit, and Thomas R. Shepard.
Mr. Shepard died September 17th, 1919. He stood
as an example of successful, conscientious and unselfish
devotion to the best interests of the community in which
he lived. He shirked no duty and sought no material re-
ward save the consciousness of having done his part. He
was a practical philanthropist. In a quiet, unobtrusive
way he conducted his charitable works. A friend of edu-
cation and culture, and a pillar of religion and charity, he
fully exemplified the best ideals of manhood and Christian
character.
Richard Olney
ICHARD OLNEY was born in Oxford, Massa-
chusetts, September 15th, 1835; son of Wilson
Olney, a textile manufacturer and banker, and
Eliza Butler Olney. He was descended from
Thomas Olney, who came to this country in 1635 from
St. Albans, Hertfordshire, England, and settled in Salem.
He was an adherent of Roger Williams and was one of
the founders of the Rhode Island and Providence Planta-
tions, and was the founder of the Baptist Church in
America.
Richard Olney, on his maternal side, was a descend-
ant of Andrew Sigourney, a French Huguenot, who came
to America in 1687, upon the revocation of the Edict of
Nantes, and was one of the first settlers of Oxford, Massa-
chusetts. He was educated at Leicester Academy and was
graduated from Brown University, in 1856, with high
honors, being class orator. He then went to the Harvard
Law School, and two years later received his degree of
Bachelor of Laws. He was admitted to the Bar in 1859.
He became associated with Judge Benjamin Franklin
Thomas. He soon made a name for himself and won high
place as an authority on matters of probate, trust and cor-
poration law.
He became a power in politics, and was sometimes
referred to as the "Silent Statesman." His political life
began when he was elected to the Massachusetts House
of Representatives in 1 874. He served one term and
would not accept a renomination. In 1 876 he was the
Democratic candidate for Attorney-General of his State.
90
RICHARD OLNEY 91
He gave himself up to the private practice of law for the
next twenty years. He was more than once offered an
appointment as Supreme Court Justice of Massachusetts,
but he declined the honor, and the next public office he
held was Attorney-General of the United States under
President Cleveland.
Upon retiring from official life, in 1897, Mr. Olney
resumed the practice of the law in Boston. He occasion-
ally published articles and made addresses upon public
questions. In 1 898 he delivered a striking address at Har-
vard on "International Isolation of the United States," and
in 1900 he published a clear and strong article upon
"Growth of Our Foreign Policy." In the campaign of
1900 he advocated the election of Mr. Bryan. In 1906
Mr. Olney was the leader of the policyholders in their
fight against the New York and Mutual Life Insurance
Companies. He was the choice of the Democrats in the
Massachusetts Legislature for United States Senator in
1901. When, in 1904, he permitted the presentation of
his name to the Democratic National Convention as a can-
didate for the Presidential nomination he received thirty-
eight votes, including the solid support of the Massachu-
setts delegation.
President Wilson, in 1913, offered him the post of
Ambassador to the Court of St. James, but he refused it.
He was active in the repeal of the "free tolls" provision of
the Panama Canal Act, and took an active part in Mr.
Wilson's second campaign.
In May, 1914, President Wilson offered him the ap-
pointment of Governor of the Federal Reserve Board, but
he declined it. He did, however, accept appointment, in
1915, as American member of the International Commis-
sion under the treaty between the United States and
92 HISTORICAL REGISTER
France. His public utterances always commanded thought-
ful attention and attracted widespread comment. His
counsels were eagerly sought and listened to by the mem-
bers of the Democratic party.
Mr. Olney was one of the greatest Secretaries that
ever held the portfolio of the State Department. His
methods were those of a strong and well equipped lawyer
rather than of the politician, and he gained reputation in
his office by his intellectual strength and sturdy purpose.
Disregarding the warnings that a rigid maintenance
of the Monroe Doctrine might plunge the United States
into war with Great Britain, Secretary Olney and Presi-
dent Cleveland carried out their own ideas of diplomacy.
In the famous note he sent to Lord Salisbury, British Secre-
tary of State for Foreign Affairs, Mr. Olney insisted upon
the right of the United States to intervene in questions
affecting the territorial integrity of South American coun-
tries. As a result of his firmness Great Britain receded
from her position of refusing to arbitrate the dispute and
another strong precedent in support of the Monroe Doc-
trine had been established. Another act of Mr. Olney was
the settlement and collection from Spain of the Mora claim,
in which many administrations had been unsuccessful.
During the great Chicago railroad strike and the sub-
sequent riots he upheld the right and duty of the Federal
Government to employ troops to stamp out disorder and
move the mail trains. In refutation of the charges that
his attitude indicated his hostility to labor unions, Mr.
Olney, in a special brief, filed in United States Court in
Pennsylvania, upheld the right of labor to organize in the
case of a railroad trainmen's strike on the Reading Rail-
road, only five months after the end of the Chicago strike.
Mr. Olney at this time urged that all labor troubles be
arbitrated.
RICHARD OLNEY 93
In 1895 Mr. OIney, at the request of the Chairman
of the Committee of Labor of the House of Representa-
tives, examined into labor conditions, and he gave valu-
able suggestions, indorsing the principles of mediation and
arbitration, and he drafted the bill dealing with labor mat-
ters that was passed by the House.
Mr. Olney received the honorary degree of LL.D.
from Harvard and from Brown in 1893 and from Yale in
1 90 1 . He was a member of the Massachusetts Historical
Society, the American Philosophical Society, a former
regent of the Smithsonian Institute, a trustee of the Pea-
body Education Fund, and president of the Franklin
Foundation.
He married, in 1 86 1 , Agnes F. Thomas, daughter of
Benjamin F. and Mary Ann Thomas, and had two chil-
dren: Mrs. George R. Minot and Mrs. Charles H. Abbot.
Mr. Olney died April 8th, 1917. He possessed the
old Puritan irony, its resolution, doggedness, steady cour-
age, public spirit; its strength, tenacity, and the power to
hit, accompanied with a capacious and crystalline intellect.
He focussed his thought upon a law case, a constitutional
question, and international question. He made the mar-
row of the situation, the essence of the facts and the law,
absolutely clear. He stated the case plainly, luminously,
dynamically, without fat of rhetoric, but with a bony
structure visible to every eye. He reached his conclusions
carefully. Then he hammered them in; and the court,
the country, the world, as the case might be, was never in
doubt of his meaning. He was one of the most uncom-
promising characters in our history. He cared nothing for
consequences. He was above popularity or unpopularity.
What is the fact? What is the law? What is the right?
That was all he wanted to know.
Henry Parker Quincy
:NRY PARKER QUINCY was bom in Boston,
Massachusetts, October 28th, 1838; son of Ed-
mund and Lucilla Pinckney (Parker) Quincy, a
descendant of the Quincy family, which has
given to the country statesmen, jurists, and scholars whose
names are among the greatest in American biography. He
was educated at a public school in Dedham, Mass., and
Dixwell's private school in Boston, and was graduated at
Harvard College in 1 862. He began the study of medicine
with Professor Wyman, of Cambridge, Mass., and com-
pleted his course at the Harvard Medical School, where
he was graduated M. D. in 1 867. He spent the next four
years in Europe, studying at the leading medical schools
in Vienna, attending the leading European clinics. After
his return from Europe he was appointed professor of his-
tology at the Harvard Medical School, a position which
he held for twenty years. The teaching of histology con-
stituted the chief life work of Dr. Quincy. "At the be-
ginning of his long period of service," said Professor Minot,
of Harvard, "histology was barely recognized. The study
was not required, the only equipment was a few inferior
microscopes, and his only work-place was a corner allotted
to him in the physiological laboratory of the old building
on North Grove Street. When he retired in 1 898 he left
a large, well-equipped laboratory, giving a required course
in histology, attended by over two hundred students." The
value of his work to the cause of medical science is obvious.
Dr. Quincy was a man of independent means, but he chose
an exacting career, and devoted himself systematically and
94
Henry Parser Quincy
HENRY PARKER QUINCY 95
untiringly to a work for the advancement of his profes-
sion. He contributed liberally to educational, philanthropic
and religious institutions, and was actively interested in
every movement for the welfare of his fellow citizens. Dr.
Quincy was a member of the Massachusetts Medical So-
ciety and the Norfolk District Medical Society, the Massa-
chusetts Colonial Society, a warden of St. Paul's Episcopal
Church, of Dedham, Mass., and a trustee of the Dedham
Public Library. He was a member of the Parcellian, St.
Botolph, Country, Tavern, Hasty Pudding and New Rid-
ing Clubs, the Bunker Hill Monument Association, the
Boston Athletic Association and the Harvard Club of New
York City.
He was married in Quincy, Mass., June 20th, 1877,
to Mary, daughter of Charles Francis and Abigal Brooks
Adams, a descendant of John Adams, and had two daugh-
ters: Dorothy and Elinor Quincy. Dr. Quincy died in
Boston, Mass., March llth, 1899.
William Henry Baker
]?ILLIAM HENRY BAKER was born at Buffalo,
New York, April 13th, 1855; son of Horace
G. and Mary Frances (Conner) Baker. He
was of English descent; one of his ancestors
came from the Isle of Wight.
The family removed to Brooklyn, where he attended
the public schools. He was very ambitious and at the age
of thirteen he found employment in a law office in New
York, and afterwards entered the service of a commission
house. In July, 1870, he became office messenger for
General Eckert, the general superintendent of the Eastern
Division of the Western Union Telegraph Company. His
gentlemanly manners and quick intelligence, combined
with his capacity for work, soon advanced him to superin-
tendent's clerk, in which position he had charge of the
lines in Eastern New York and part of those in Vermont.
Colonel Albert B. Chandler was deeply interested in
the capabilities of Mr. Baker, and assisted him very ma-
terially in his endeavors. He continued in various capaci-
ties in the service of the company, and, when Jay Gould
secured control of the old Atlantic and Pacific Telegraph
Company, Mr. Baker became transfer clerk, cashier and
secretary of that company. In 1881 Gould secured con-
trol of the Western Union, and Mr. Baker returned to that
company at the time of the consolidation of the telegraph
interests, still retaining his position as secretary of the
Atlantic and Pacific. In 1 882 he was made secretary and
treasurer of the American Electric Manufacturing Com-
pany, and shortly afterwards became active in financial
96
WILLIAM HENRY BAKER 97
matters as a member of the New York Stock Exchange.
In 1 886 he became private secretary of Theodore N. Vail,
the general manager of the Bell Telephone Company,
and president of the Metropolitan Telephone Company,
and by whom he was highly esteemed, both for his busi-
ness qualifications and personal character.
In 1889 Mr. Baker was elected vice-president and
general manager of the Postal Telegraph-Cable Company,
in which position he served that company during the
period of its greatest development, and greatly helped it
to attain its present efficiency, resigning in May, 1907.
The late Mr. John W. Mackay had great confidence in the
ability of Mr. Baker, and valued him highly as a friend
and associate. After a short vacation he resumed business
relations with Mr. Theodore N. Vail, with the American
Telephone and Telegraph Company, and on November
8th, 1911, became secretary of the Western Union Tele-
graph Company, from which position he resigned Decem-
ber 1 st, 1916. During the years of 1910 ,/and 1911 he
was also vice-president of the American District Tele-
graph Companies of New York and New Jersey. For a
number of years he was vice-president of the New York
Quotation Company.
Mr. Baker was at one time president of the Magnetic
Club, treasurer of Telegraphers' Mutual Benefit Associ-
ation, and was one of the charter members of the Serial
Building Loan and Savings Institution. At the time of
his death, and for several years previous thereto, he was
president of the Telegraph and Telephone Life Insurance
Association. He was for many years a director of the
Otis Elevator Company and a member of the Old Time
Telegraphers' Association and associate member of the
14th Regiment of Brooklyn, Civil War Veteran Asso-
ciation.
98 HISTORICAL REGISTER
He married, in 1877, Emma A., daughter of General
Edward B. Fowler, who commanded Brooklyn's famous
"Fighting Fourteenth" Regiment during the Civil War,
and Annie (Cook) Fowler, and had one child: Ethel
Chandler Baker, wife of Leroy Moody.
Mr. Baker died January 1 6th, 1918. He was one of
the most popular men in the telegraph business, and was
recognized throughout the world of the telegraph as a
leader and stood in the first rank of the master minds of
his line. His genial personality and sympathetic nature,
his courteous manners, his natural fondness for electrical
science, his tact in handling men, and his judgment in ad-
ministering affairs intrusted to his care, were recognized
by all who came in personal contact with him. His ever-
ready open hand and appreciation of good service made
him widely loved and respected by those who served him.
He helped many to rise and was deeply interested in their
advancement. His memory will long be cherished by his
numerous friends and by those whose pathway he made
brighter by his generosity.
Benjamin Smith Harmon
Benjamin Smith Harmon
ENJAMIN SMITH HARMON was born at
Three Mile Bay, Jefferson County, New York,
December 15th, 1859; son of the Reverend
Gains N. Harmon, a Baptist clergyman, and
Orpha Smith Harmon. He was prepared for college at
Franklin Academy, Malone, New York, and was graduated
from Dartmouth College in the Class of 1882. He then
entered the Columbia Law School, graduating with the
degree of LL.B. in 1885. He was admitted to the Bar
the same year, and practiced alone and in association with
Mr. John Chapman until 1 89 1 . He then joined forces
with his former classmate and closest friend, Mr. Charles
F. Mathewson, and they remained together in the practice
of their profession for twenty-four years, and until death
separated them. Associated with them until 1898 was
Mr. Theron Strong, the firm being known as Strong, Har-
mon & Mathewson. From 1909 Mr. Louis C. Krauthoff
was a co-partner in the firm, it being known as Krauthoff,
Harmon & Mathewson. At all times Mr. Harmon and
the firm of which he was a part had an important and
lucrative practice, largely in the field of corporation law,
and ever increasing as time went on.
Among the clubs and societies with which he was
identified were: Phi Beta Kappa, Delta Kappa Epsilon
and Phi Delta Phi fraternities; the Bar Association of the
City of New York, the New England Society, the Sons
of the American Revolution and the Pilgrims of New York.
He also was a member of the Metropolitan Club, the
Union League Club, the Racquet and Tennis Club, the
99
BOA
100 HISTORICAL REGISTER
Automobile Club of America, the Westchester Country
Club, the New York Yacht Club, the City, the Midday
Club, the Rumson Country Club, the Sleepy Hollow
Country Club, and the Apawamis Club.
He married, in June, 1897, Helen Lockwood
Ketcham.
Mr. Harmon died October 1 4th, 1916. He possessed
a legal mind, and equipped as he was with generous learn-
ing, legal and otherwise, he gave shrewd, safe and wise
counsel in behalf of the many corporate and other interests
in his charge. On his more personal side, his gentleness
of disposition, combined with his firmness of conviction,
purity of character, and generosity of heart, made him a
charming counselor and friend.
James Brown Stephens
AMES BROWN STEPHENS was born in Brook-
lyn, New York, May 8th, 1 863 ; son of James
Pierson and Emma Brown Stephens. He was
educated in the public schools of Brooklyn, and
at the age of fourteen entered the office of his father, who
was the New York representative of Wood, Sherwood &
Company, wire manufacturers. At an early age he dis-
played unusual business and executive ability and great
directness of purpose. After a careful survey of the in-
dustrial field he finally decided to engage in the silk busi-
ness and became a partner, in 1890, in Kaltenbach &
Stephens, pioneers in the manufacture of exclusive nar-
row silk ribbons. When the firm was incorporated, in
1916, he was elected vice-president and treasurer. He was
also treasurer of the General Insulate Company of Brook-
lyn, and director in the Manufacturers' National Bank, Se-
curity Savings Bank, and the Washington Trust Company
of Newark, New Jersey.
Mr. Stephens was not only a builder of commercial
enterprises but took an active interest in religious, edu-
cational and civic activities. His philanthropies were car-
ried on in a quiet, unostentatious manner. His unselfish
devotion to the best interests of the community in which
he lived, and his sympathy with every cause for the better-
ment of his fellow man, marked him an exemplary gentle-
man. He was a book lover and an art connoisseur, and
enjoyed life to the last by retaining an interest in all the
real and good things of life.
He was a member of the Essex Club of Newark, the
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102 HISTORICAL REGISTER
Manhattan Club of New York, the Montclair County,
Montclair Athletic and the Blooming Grove Hunting and
Fishing Clubs.
He married, May 25th, 1898, Annie Ashley, daugh-
ter of Harvey Kelsey and Elizabeth Ashley Weeks, a de-
scendant of Leonard Weeks, who came to this country
from England in 1 639 and located in New England. Mr.
and Mrs. Stephens had two children: James Brown
Stephens and Mabel Elsie Stephens.
Mr. Stephens died October 28th, 1919. He repre-
sented the highest ideals of American citizenship. His
memory is held with reverence by all who came in con-
tact with him.
James McCutcheon
AMES McCUTCHEON was born at Ballywitty-
cock, near the town of Newtownards, County
Down, Ireland, March 29th, 1843; son of An-
drew McCutcheon and Jane Milliken. He re-
ceived his early education at Mountstewart near Newtown-
ards. He went into business about 1 858 with Mr. James
Jamison, woolen draper, in the town of Newtownards. He
came to the United States in 1860 and entered the linen
business with his uncle, John Milliken, who owned a small
shop at Astor Place and Broadway. Mr. Milliken retired
in 1862 and Mr. McCutcheon became proprietor. In
1864 the store was moved to No. 845 Broadway. The
firm then became James McCutcheon & Company, and
the store has since been best known as "The Linen Store."
In 1 880 a larger store was acquired at No. 1 0 East Four-
teenth Street, and in 1885 another move was made to
No. 64 West Twenty-third Street. In 1893 they went
further east, to No. 14 West Twenty-third Street, and
from there to No. 345 Fifth Avenue, in 1906.
In 1910 a dinner was given to Mr. McCutcheon by
his employees and associates to commemorate the com-
pletion of his fiftieth year in business in this country.
Upon that occasion a gold loving cup was presented to
him, and in his speech of acceptance he stated that his
great maxim had always been "Don't acquire personal
debts. If you cannot pay for a new suit of clothes, go
without it. It is better to be wearing a thin suit than a
heavy debt." He lived his life quietly, modestly and un-
ostentatiously, most of his leisure time being spent at his
103
104 HISTORICAL REGISTER
home in Greenwich, Connecticut. He was a member of
the Union League Club of New York, Greenwich Country
Club, Laurentian Club, and the Special Car Club of Stam-
ford. He was an enthusiastic golfer and fisherman, and
was a pioneer builder of homes in Belle Haven.
The following estimate of his character is taken from
the resolutions passed by the directors of the Garfield Bank
on July 22nd, 1914, and written by Judge Morgan J.
O'Brien:
(Mr. McCutcheon was for many years vice-president
and director of this bank.)
'To the community at large, and particularly in the
branch of business with which his name has been and will
always be inseparably connected as one of its pioneers,
his loss will indeed be heavy, but the record he has left
of splendid achievement will always be a stimulus to those
engaged in mercantile work, and, but for the untimely and
recent death of his only son, would have been a valued
heritage.
"In addition to a reference to his signal success and
standing in commercial affairs, it would be most consoling
were it permitted to set forth at length our estimate of
those sterling traits of heart and mind which made him
such an inestimable companion and devoted friend. We
knew him as an honest, sensible and lovable man. None
can forget his big, warm heart, overflowing with generous
emotions and susceptible to every appeal that made for
right. His strong, spiritual nature, which gave him an
abounding confidence in the wisdom and beneficence of
^j
the Creator, served to regulate his conduct, and created
and fostered in him those virtues that made him a true
man, a kind father, a faithful husband, and a splendid
citizen.
JAMES McCUTCHEON 105
"His record is a model of what a man can do and
be, howsoever absorbed in the activities of life, when in-
spired and impelled by honesty and integrity."
He married, October 10th, 1877, Frances Augusta
Nye, of Auburn, New York, daughter of Alonzo and Caro-
line Beardsley Nye. They had one son: Norman Lock-
wood McCutcheon, who died on September 30th, 1913,
and two daughters: Theodora Nye and Alice Booth Mc-
Cutcheon.
Mr. McCutcheon died on July 20th, 1914.
William Thomas Evans
WILLIAM THOMAS EVANS was bom at
Cloghjordan, Ireland, November 13th, 1843;
son of William and Maria Jane Williams
Evans. He was of Welch-Irish ancestry. In
1845 the family came to this country. William Thomas
Evans was educated in the public schools of New York
City and afterwards attended the New York Free Academy,
now the College of the City of New York. He then be-
came an employee of the old firm of E. S. Jaffray & Com-
pany. When Philo L. Mills and John Gibb founded their
dry goods store in New York they engaged Mr. Evans to
do all the financial work for them. Later he became a
partner in the firm of Mills & Gibb of New York, now the
Mills & Gibb Corporation, and in 1899 became secretary
and treasurer, and afterwards president.
Educated as he was for architecture (before entering
business), he became interested in art, and in later years
he was even better known as a collector of masterpieces
in oil paintings than he was in the commercial world. One
of his greatest interests was that of aiding young artists
to make their way in the world, and among the men who
remained his friends when they became famous, for the
help and encouragement he had given them early in life,
were Henry W. Ranger and F. S. Church. The first col-
lection of pictures gathered by Mr. Evans was composed
partly of foreign pictures, which he disposed of in 1890.
In return for his interest in art the Prince Regent of
Bavaria, in 1893, decorated him with the Cross of the Or-
der of St. Michael. A collection of American pictures
106
WILLIAM THOMAS EVANS 107
was sold by him in 1900. Some of the pictures which
brought small sums at the time are now valued at from
$10,000 to $15,000. Among them were Homer Martin's
"Newport Neck" and "Westchester Hills" and Inness's
"Georgia Pines." As soon as he had disposed of this
collection he began again to collect pictures from modern
American artists that struck his fancy. He gave one hun-
dred and sixty paintings to the National Gallery in Wash-
ington. Sixty others were given to start an art museum
in Montclair, New Jersey, with smaller numbers to
museums, including the Metropolitan and Brooklyn Insti-
tute. His last collection was sold in the Hotel Plaza in
1913.
He was honorary vice-president of the National Arts
Club, and honorary member of the Glen Ridge Country
Club and permanent member of the Brooklyn Institute
of Arts and Sciences. He was a fellow in perpetuity of
the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and a life member of
the Lotos Club of New York. He served as chairman of
the Art Committee of the latter organization for many
years and arranged many exhibitions. He was an honor-
ary member of the National Sculpture Club and a life
member of the Salmagundi Club and life member of the
New York Historical Society, and first president of the
Riding, Driving and Automobile Club of Montclair, and
many other clubs and societies. He was an official of St.
John's Church, Montclair, New Jersey. Mr. Evans gave
a nurses' home to Mountainside Hospital, Montclair, New
Jersey.
He married, January 8th, 1867, Mary, daughter of
John and Margery Pattison Hinman, of New York, and
had seven children.
Mr. Evans died November 25th, 1917.
Theodore G. Eger
HEODORE G. EGER was born in Leipzig, King-
dom Saxony, February 9th, 1 848 ; son of Moritz
W. and Leonia (Eger) Eger. His father was
general postmaster of Leipzig during the Revo-
lution of 1 848. He was educated in his native town, and
at the age of fourteen he left home and went aboard Bre-
men bark, the "Johanna Marie," arriving in New York
December 26th, 1862. He became purser in a transporta-
tion ship. After the war he entered the employ of Fred-
erick Goodrich as a tea taster, and later on became agent
for the Pacific Mail Line, New Orleans Steamship Line;
freight solicitor for the Black Star Line, and finally, in
1868, became associated with Quintard, Morgan &
Clyde, later known as the Clyde Line. Mr. Eger was one
of the best known and most skilled freight getters in the
coastwise trade. Through his knowledge and indomitable
energy much of the success of the Clyde Line in its earlier
years was due. As conditions demanded, up-to-date ships
were constructed under his direction for the line, and until
Charles W. Morse acquired this property, in 1906, Mr.
Eger was always consulted as to their freight and passenger
capacity by William P. and B. Frank Clyde, the principal
owners of the line.
When Mr. Eger was with the Black Star Line, Mr.
Robert G. Lowden chartered the steamship "Ashland," and
Mr. Eger secured the cargo for her at the big price of sixty
cents per cubic foot, being guaranteed a return cargo of
cotton at five cents per pound. The round trip to Savan-
nah was made in extraordinarily quick time for those days,
108
THEODORE G. EGER 109
and the Ashland's gross earnings were $25,000.00. Only
a short time before Mr. Clyde had purchased the ship, for-
merly used as a transport during the Civil War, from the
Government for $18,000.00. Mr. Eger received substan-
tial credit for this remarkable transaction and then became
traffic manager with William P. Clyde & Company. The
employees of the Clyde Steamship Company, in 1907,
presented him with a loving cup. Mr. Eger was really the
father of the Clyde Line. He was a firm believer in the
United States Merchant Marine, and gave much time to
its upbuilding. He was also greatly interested in the fu-
ture of the South, and devoted a large part of his time to
the development of good roads in the Southern States, and
was one of the pioneers in road construction throughout
this section of the country.
He was one of the oldest members of the Crescent
Athletic Club, and had long been a member of the Ezel
Lodge, F. and A. M.; the Union League, of Brooklyn,
Atlantic Yacht and Marine and Field Clubs; the Board of
Trade, Jacksonville, Florida; Port of New York and the
Produce Exchange. He was manager of the Georgia and
Southern Florida Railroad; interested Mr. Henry Flagler
in the good roads movement, and received a loving cup
from the Jacksonville Board of Trade for his efforts.
He married forty-nine years ago, October 23rd, 1 870,
Pauline Ruthardt, daughter of Frederick William Charles
and Pauline Ruthardt, of New York. Her maternal grand-
father was a paymaster in the Russian army, and later on
a mounted bodyguard to Napoleon. They had one daugh-
ter, Hattie Eger.
Mr. Eger died November 2nd, 1919. He was a man
of sterling probity and consistent American patriotism.
Dudley Gregory Gautier
IUDLEY GREGORY GAUTIER was bom in
Jersey City, February 2nd, 1 847 ; son of Dr.
Josiah Hornblower Gautier, a noted physician,
and Mary Louisa Gregory Gautier, a direct de-
scendant of Jacques Gautier, a Huguenot, who settled in
this country in 1716, and of Andrew Gautier, whose prop-
erty in Manhattan Island was confiscated by the British
during the Revolutionary War. He was educated in the
public and private schools of New York and New Jersey
and finished his studies in Germany. Upon his return to
this country, at the age of twenty-one, he entered the steel
business with the Cambria Steel Company and after thor-
oughly familiarizing himself with its details he founded
the firm of D. G. Gautier & Co., of which he was the active
head at the time of his death. Mr. Gautier was also a
director of the firm of J. H. Gautier & Co., manufacturers
of plumbago crucibles, which was founded by his father;
and president and director of the Tacony Steel Company.
He was a member of the Board of Education and
was active in the social and club life of this city for many
years, and numbered among his clubs the Union, Metro-
politan, Downtown and New York Yacht. He was also a
member of the Huguenot Society. Mr. Gautier was a
brother of Mrs. Oliver William Bird, of Hempstead, L. I.,
and Mrs. Walter Witherbee, of Port Henry, N. Y., and an
uncle of Lieutenant Oliver W. Bird, Captain Silas H.
Witherbee, Dudley Gautier Bird, Marie Louise Bird,
Charles Edward Gautier, Louise Gautier Witherbee, Mrs.
Reginald Minturn Lewis and Annie Elizabeth Witherbee.
110
DUDLEY GREGORY GAUTIER 1 1 1
Mr. Gautier died December 23rd, 1918. He held an
enviable position in commercial circles, and a warm place
in the hearts of his associates. A man in all that endears
men to men, of genial nature, alert mind, with an affable
manner and a ready appreciation of humor, he was a de-
lightful companion, admired and respected by all who
knew him.
Stuart Greenleaf Nelson
ITUART GREENLEAF NELSON was bom at
Tarrytown, New York, July 13th, 1853;
son of John Gill and Eunice Ripley Nel-
son. He was descended from William Nelson,
who served in King Philip's War, and was one of the first
settlers of Middleborough, Massachusetts. His grand-
father, the Reverend Stephen Smith Nelson, was the first
college graduate in the Baptist clergy in Connecticut.
Thomas Nelson served in the Revolutionary War as Major
and Colonel of his regiment. Stuart Nelson was educated
in private and public schools at Orange, New Jersey, and
in 1873 became a clerk in the banking house of Morris K.
Jessup, where he remained until 1876, when he accepted
a position in the Continental National Bank of New York
City. He had charge of financing the Burlington, Cedar
Rapids & Missouri River Railroad, now part of the Rock
Island System, and in 1 883 he was one of the organizers of
the Seaboard National Bank and became its first cashier.
In 1891 he was elected first vice-president of the institu-
tion and a member of the board of directors, offices which
he held until he retired in December, 1916.
He was a member of the Union League, Metropoli-
tan, Lotus and New York Athletic Clubs, and the Cham-
ber of Commerce.
He married, January 16th, 1879, Anna Cochrane
Van Home, daughter of Cornelius and Johanna C. (Mor-
ton) Van Home, and had one child, Mabel Stuart, widow
of Roger Lamson, Jr.
Mr. Nelson died December 1st, 1919. In the finan-
112
STUART GREENLEAF NELSON 1 1 3
cial world he was a conspicuous figure. His natural abil-
ity, wide experience and unfailing courage placed him in a
position of high standing and great influence among busi-
ness men. All his associates held towards him sentiments
of respect, admiration and affectionate regard.
Henry Pennington Tailer
ENRY PENNINGTON TAILER was born in
New York City, in 1 868 ; son of Henry Austin
Tailer, a prominent attorney-at-law, and Sophia
Clapham Pennington Tailer.
He was educated at the Canandaigua School for Boys,
and at the age of nineteen entered the banking business.
He was associated with Vermilye & Company for twenty
years, and in 1907 retired from active business.
He married, June 2nd, 1892, Clara Wright, of Balti-
more, daughter of Isaac Merritt and Mary Bedford Wright,
a descendant of Isaac Merritt Wright, the noted Quaker
merchant, and had two children: William Hallett Tailer,
who was killed in an air battle in France, and May Wright
Tailer.
Mr. Tailer died January 22nd, 1918. He was a
worthy representative of an honored family, patriotic in
his devotion to American interests and loyal in his support
of measures which he deemed beneficial to the Govern-
ment or nation. He was kind and gentle, a model of
virtue, discriminating in judgment, and fixed in principles.
114
William Hallett Tailer
>ILLIAM HALLETT TAILER was born in
New York City, February 3rd, 1 895 ; son of
Henry Pennington and Clara Wright Tailer.
He was educated at Newman School, Hacken-
sack, New Jersey. After leaving school he entered the em-
ploy of the Bankers Trust Company, where he remained
until July, 1917, when he entered the French Aviation
Corps. He had applied for a commission in the American
Aero Corps, but when he found there would be some de-
lay in receiving it he joined a French escadrille until his
commission should arrive. On February 5th, 1918, when
over the German trenches, he was attacked by German
airplanes, and his machine fell behind the enemy lines.
He was buried at Verdun, near the spot where he fell.
He was killed while his promotion to a lieutenancy was
on its way. He was a member of the Seventh Regiment,
National Guard, State of New York, and served with his
company in Mexico.
William Hallett Tailer was representative of the very
highest type of America's young manhood; upright and
fearless; he gave his life for democracy.
115
Arthur Middleton Hunter
RTHUR MIDDLETON HUNTER was born at
Annieswood, Eastchester Bay, Westchester
County, June 19th, 1856; son of John Hunter,
who in the sixties, raced a stable of horses in
partnership with W. R. Travers, and Ann Manigault Mid-
dleton Hunter. The first of the family in this country v/as
John Hunter, who came to America from Scotland with
his two sons, Robert and George, in 1 767. The two sons
became successful merchants in New York. Ruth Hunter,
widow of Robert, married John Broome, at one time Gov-
ernor of New York. The next in line, John Hunter, mar-
ried Elizabeth Desbrosses, and their son, Elias Desbrosses
Hunter, was the grandfather of Arthur Middleton Hunter.
Henry Middleton was president of the first Continen-
tal Congress, and his brother, Arthur Middleton, was one
of the signers of the Declaration of Independence.
Arthur Middleton Hunter was educated at Hanover
Academy. Shortly after graduation he entered Wall Street
as a stock broker, and became widely known as an ama-
teur sportsman. When races for amateur jockeys formed
a part of the Coney Islnd Jockey Club and Jerome Park
programmes, Mr. Arthur Hunter was considered the best
of the gentleman riders on the flat, and many of the ama-
teur fixtures of that period were credited to his skill in the
saddle. He was the first owner of the great race horse,
Eole. He was a member of the Union Club and the New
York Athletic Club.
He married, June 6th, 1883, Katharine Remsen,
daughter of Frederick Gebhard and Mary Ann Leverich
116
ARTHUR MIDDLETON HUNTER 1 1 7
Schuchardt, of New York. Henry Remsen, her great-
great-grandfather, was private secretary to Thomas Jeffer-
son, and was president of the Manhattan Bank in 1755.
Mr. and Mrs. Hunter had two sons : Arthur Middleton and
Frederick Heyward Hunter. Both sons served in the
United States Navy during the World War.
Mr. Hunter died April 25th, 1918. A man whose
love for his country, constructive ability and integrity of
purpose were constantly in evidence to those who were
close to him, and moreover his kindly qualities endeared
him to all his associates.
Julius Kayser
ULIUS KAYSER was born February 6th, 1838;
son of Henry and Elise Kayser, of Saxony, Ger-
many. His parents came to this country when
he was quite young. His father was a member
of the Seventh Regiment and paymaster of the Eleventh
Regiment, fourth brigade, first division of the National
Guard, State of New York.
Julius Kayser was educated in the public schools of
New York City. At the age of sixteen his father died,
and he was compelled to relinquish his studies. He en-
tered the wholesale jewelry concern established by Henry
Kayser, where he remained until the firm was liquidated.
He then organized the firm of M. Kayser & Company,
wholesale dealers in fancy goods, which he developed into
one of the largest concerns of its kind in the country.
He was a member of the Bridge Club, the Harmony
Club and the Automobile Club of America.
He married, October 14th, 1868, Henrietta, daughter
of Semon and Elizabeth Van Praag, of New York, and
had two children: Mrs. Edwin Stanton Boyer and Alice
Bache Kayser.
Mr. Kayser died March 9th, 1920. He was a man
of unusual ability and energy, that placed him in the front
rank of commercial and financial affairs. His lofty charac-
ter, kindness of heart, extraordinary intelligence and bril-
liant gifts rendered him a most distinguished personality.
He was a fine type of the man of affairs who devoted a
part of his time to art and literature and the educational
interests of the country. He was identified with many of
the charitable activities of New York City.
118
JULUIS KAV5ER
William Proctor Douglas
BLLIAM PROCTOR DOUGLAS was born in
New York City, October, 1 842 ; son of George
Douglas, one of the leading merchants of his
generation. He was identified with many
financial institutions and was a member of the first Ameri-
can polo team, and one of his sailing yachts helped make
American yachting history by keeping the America's Cup
on this side of the Atlantic. His home was the famous
Douglas mansion in West Fourteenth Street, where he
lived with his aunt, Mrs. Cruger. That house, known also
as the Cruger mansion, was one of the most pretentious
in the New York of its day, and was the scene of much
notable entertaining.
In 1873 Mr. Douglas leased the house to the Metro-
politan Museum of Art, and it thus became the predecessor
of the present museum in upper Fifth Avenue. Its spa-
cious rooms and wide corridors were well adapted to art
exhibits of the period. For eighteen years it was used by
the Salvation Army.
When James Gordon Bennett introduced polo into
America in 1 876 he found in Mr. Douglas a stanch sup-
porter of the sport. He and Mr. Douglas were members
of the first American polo team in that year.
The game was played in the spring of 1 876 on the
infield at Jerome Park. The other players in that historic
incident in the development of American sport were Lord
Mandeville, afterward the Duke of Manchester; Mr. How-
land Robbins, Mr. Winthrop Thome and Major Perry Bel-
mont. Mr. Bennett had brought the ponies from Europe.
119
120 HISTORICAL REGISTER
They played during the summer of that year at Newport.
An injury Mr. Douglas received later while playing polo
prevented him from participating in the sport afterward.
Mr. Douglas had previously established himself as
one of the leading American yachtsmen. His schooner,
the Sappho, was destined to defeat the British yacht Liv-
onia in the contest in 1871 for the America's Cup. The
Livonia was owned by James Ashbury, of Brighton, Eng-
land. For the opening race of that year, on October 1 6th,
the Regatta Committee of the New York Yacht Club
brought several yachts to the line, and the Columbia was
selected to sail against the British yacht. The Columbia
won the first two races. In the third meeting, however,
the Columbia lost some gear and the Livonia won easily.
It was then that Mr. Douglas' Sappho was selected to
meet the Livonia in the two remaining races, on October
21st and 23rd. She defeated the British yacht in the first
race by 33m. 2 1 s., and in the second by 25m. 27s., thereby
giving the New York Yacht Club added international
honors.
In yachting as well as in polo Mr. Douglas was allied
with Mr. Bennett. He was the vice-commodore of the
New York Yacht Club from 1871 to 1874, while Mr. Ben-
nett was the commodore. He had previously been rear
commodore, in 1869 and 1870.
He was a member of the New York Yacht, Racquet
and Tennis, Union, Tuxedo and Westminster Kennel
Clubs and of the St. Nicholas Society.
He married, in 1879, Adelaide L. Townsend, and
had two children: J. Gordon Douglas and Mrs. William
Fitzhugh Whitehouse.
Mr. Douglas died June 3rd, 1919.
Auguste Vatable
UGUSTE VATABLE was born at Basse Terre,
Guadaloupe, French West Indies, June 1 5th,
1837; son of Henry Auguste and Hortense
Lesneur Vatable. He was descended from
Franciscus Vatablus, Regius Professor of Hebrew at Paris,
France; translator of an edition of the Bible similar to the
Zurich edition, published in 1 564, which professed to give
the most literal version of the Bible made from the original
Hebrew and Greek. The family were Huguenots. Many
members held high military positions, and General Vatable
served under Napoleon in the Russian expedition. The
uncle of the subject, Baron Vatable, was Governor General
of the French West Indies under the reign of Louis
Phillipe.
Auguste Vatable came to New York with his parents
at the age of nine. He attended the city schools and was
graduated from Fordham University. He began business
as a broker and continued as such until he entered the
firm, established by his father, of H. A. Vatable & Son,
and later became head of the firm. He retired from busi-
ness in 1908 and devoted his time to travel abroad.
Mr. Vatable was a prominent member of New York's
French colony and was interested in French charities.
He married, December 1 2th, 1 866, Matilda Cecilia
Schwartzwalder, daughter of Christian and Rachael Buhler
Schwartz walder, of New York, and had two children:
Auguste Schwartzwalder Vatable, with Pease & Elliman;
and Jules Joseph Vatable, with J. N. Amory & Son.
Mr. Vatable died July 10th, 1918. His family have
always been citizens of prominence, worth and influence.
121
Isaac Frank Stone
SAAC FRANK STONE was born in Chicago,
Illinois, March 2nd, 1867; son of Theodore and
Mary Owen Stone. His father was a successful
merchant in Chicago. His ancestors were Eng-
lish people, of whom the first records in America date back
to the year 1650. John Stone was one of the founders
of Guilford, Connecticut, about that time.
Isaac F. Stone was educated in the public schools of
Chicago, and after practical early business training he es-
tablished the firm of I. F. Stone, in Chicago, when he was
twenty-one years of age. In 1890 the firm of Stone &
Ware was organized in Chicago, and in 1897 the Stone
& Ware Company started business in New York. In 1 900
Mr. Stone became vice-president of the Schoelkopf, Hart-
ford & Hanna Company, and in 1906, a director of the
Importers' and Traders' National Bank and president of the
National Aniline and Chemical Company. He was a
director of the Contact Process Company, and a director
and vice-president of the Schoelkopf Aniline and Chemical
Works, Inc.; a member of the Chamber of Commerce, the
Board of Trade and Transportation; a member of the
Advisory Committee of the Metropolitan Bank. He was
elected president of the Chemists' Club of New York for
1910, served as president of the Heights Club in 1 905, and
as a vice-president of the Drug and Chemical Club in 1 909.
He was a member of the Sons of the Revolution,
Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the Lotos, Union
League, New York Athletic and City Clubs and Green-
wich Country, St. Andrews Golf and Sea View Golf Clubs.
122
ISAAC FRANK STONE 123
He was a Mason, and had been for a number of years a
leading figure in all local and national movements in his
line. He was the author of "The Aniline Color, Dyestuffs
and Chemical Conditions." He gained a wide reputation
as a business man of sound principle, keen foresight and
thorough knowledge. All of his undertakings since his
earliest business venture were carried to successful issue
because Mr. Stone put the strength of his own personality
into the work and conducted his business affairs within
the limitations of his own conscience.
He married, June 5th, 1889, Mary Louise Peck,
daughter of James William and Harriet Butler Peck, of
New York and Chicago, and had two children: Grace Har-
riet, wife of Sidney Miller Lloyd; and Truman Peck Stone,
deceased.
Mr. Stone died May 5th, 1920. He was one of the
foremost manufacturing chemists in the United States. To
his associates the recollection of his character and work
will always be an inspiration.
John Pierpont Morgan
OHN PIERPONT MORGAN was born in Hart-
ford, Connecticut, April 17th, 1837; son of
Junius Spencer and Juliet Pierpont Morgan.
The first of the family in this country, Miles
Morgan, arrived in Boston in 1 636 and was one of the
founders of Springfield, Massachusetts. In 1 643 he mar-
ried, first, Prudence Gilbert; second, Elizabeth Bliss. The
only son of this union, Nathaniel Morgan, married Han-
nah Bird, and their son, Joseph Morgan, married Mary
Stebbins. The next in line, Captain Joseph Morgan, mar-
ried Experience Smith, and their son, Joseph Morgan, mar-
ried Sarah Spencer.
Junius Spencer Morgan, their son, was born at Hoi-
yoke, Massachusetts, in 1813. He began his eminently
successful career at an early age, becoming a merchant in
Hartford and later in Boston. In 1854 he removed to
London, and was a partner of George Peabody. When
Mr. Peabody retired in 1864 he founded the banking
house of J. S. Morgan & Company. He died in Nice,
France, in 1 890. His wife, Juliet Pierpont, was descended
from Sir Robert de Pierrepont, a commander in the Army
of William the Conqueror, who became the first Lord of
the Manor of Hurst Pierrepont, in Yorkshire, his lineal
representatives in successive generations holding a dis-
tinguished place in the landed aristocracy of England.
Robert Pierrepont, the grandson of Sir George Pierrepont,
in the Seventeenth Century, became the first Earl of King-
ston-upon-Hull, the title being subsequently merged in
that of the Dukes of Kingston, which was extinguished in
124
^""
J. P. MORGAN
JOHN PIERPONT MORGAN 125
the death, without issue, of Evelyn Pierrepont, the second
Duke, in 1773. William Pierrepont, a younger son of
Sir George Pierrepont, was the father of James Pierrepont,
who died in Ipswich, Massachusetts, in 1648, and grand-
father of the Honorable John Pierrepont of Roxbury,
Massachusetts. The latter's son, the Reverend James Pier-
pont, was pastor of the church in New Haven, and was
one of the three clergymen to whom the foundation of
Yale College was due. His third wife, Mary Hooker, was
the granddaughter of the Reverend Thomas Hooker, who
led the migration of his flock from Newton, Massachu-
setts, to Hartford, in 1636. Their son, James Pierpont,
married Anna Sherman, and their son, another James
Pierpont, married Elizabeth Collins.
The Reverend John Pierpont, the next in line, was
born in Litchfield, Connecticut, in 1785. He was gradu-
ated at Yale College in 1804 and became a lawyer, but
in 1819 was ordained a clergyman. He was a noted orator
and also took high rank among American poets of the
past generation. He married, in 1810, Mary Sheldon
Lord, their daughter being Juliet Pierpont.
John Pierpont Morgan was educated at Boston and
Gottingen, Germany. He returned to America in 1857
and entered the banking house with Duncan, Sherman &
Company, of New York. In 1 860 he became attorney in
America for George Peabody & Company, of London,
and in 1 864 was partner in Dabney, Morgan & Company.
In 1871 the famous banking house of Drexel, Morgan &
Company was formed, which in 1895 was changed to
J. P. Morgan & Company. Upon the death of his father,
Mr. Morgan also became the head of the firm of J. S. Mor-
gan & Company, of London. His eminence as a banker
and financier was world wide.
126 HISTORICAL REGISTER
For many years he had been a warden of St. George's
Church, to which he gave a large memorial edifice, and
for over twenty years a deputy from this diocese to the
general convention of the Episcopal Church, and he do-
nated half a million dollars to the Cathedral.
There is hardly a human interest of which Mr. Mor-
gan was not a benefactor. Railroads, industrial corpora-
tions, hospitals, colleges, trade schools, parks, art, litera-
ture, museums, yachting — all have profited by his lavish
liberality. He gave collections of minerals, gems and
pearls to the Museum of Natural History, rare books and
manuscripts to the Public Library, priceless paintings and
objets d'art to the Metropolitan Museum, and he built for
the New York Yacht Club, of which he was commodore,
the swift "Columbia," which successfully defended the
America's Cup.
During the intervals of these benevolences Mr. Mor-
gan financed the Cleveland gold bonds that saved us from
the free silver heresy, and the War Loan for Great Britain
— the largest subscription of foreign bonds ever known in
America — and the billion dollar United States Steel Cor-
poration, and the new subways that are to regenerate New
York, and numberless railroad and industrial corporations;
thus, through regular banking commissions, money poured
in faster than he could spend it or give it away.
But, until his testimony before the Pujo Committee
and his subsequent essay upon the Money Trust, to most
people he was a man of money and of mystery. They
forgot that he had been educated in the German Universi-
ties and did not appreciate his philosophy and his altruism.
Frankly answering every question he dissipated the myth
that wealthy men could organize a Money Trust to con-
trol the finances of any country. He demonstrated that
JOHN PIERPONT MORGAN 127
confidence, not mere money, is the basis of financial suc-
cess. Intrinsically a banknote is worth only a few cents,
but, when backed by public confidence in the banker, it
is worth its face value. He declared emphatically that he
would rather loan millions to a poor man in whom he had
confidence than to a rich man whose integrity he dis-
trusted.
He was a member of the leading clubs, and was one
of the founders and president of the Metropolitan Club.
Mr. Morgan married, first, Amelia Sturges, daughter
of Jonathan and Mary Cady Sturges, of New York; sec-
ond, Frances Louisa, daughter of Charles Tracy, a leading
member of the New York Bar, and Louisa Kirkland.
daughter of General Joseph Kirkland, of Utica, New York.
Mrs. Morgan's grandfather, William Gedney Tracy, was
born at Norwich, Connecticut, in 1 768. He married
Rachel Huntington and settled in Whitesborough, New
York. His grandfather, Joseph Tracy, was the son of
Captain Joseph Tracy, of Norwich, which town he fre-
quently represented in the Connecticut Legislature. He
was the son of Captain John Tracy, one of the original
proprietors of Norwich, who, in 1670, married Mary Win-
slow, daughter of Josiah Winslow and niece of Governor
Edward Winslow, one of the "Mayflower" emigrants. His
father, Lieutenant Tracy, came to Salem, Massachusetts,
about 1636. He was the son of Nathaniel Tracy, of
Tewksbury, England, and grandson of Richard Tracy,
High Sheriff of Gloucestershire, and a cadet of the Tracy,
or de Traci family, of Lodington.
Mr. and Mrs. Morgan had four children: John Pier-
pont Morgan, Louisa Pierpont Morgan, Juliet Pierpont, the
wife of W. Pierson Hamilton, and Anne Tracy Morgan.
Mr. Morgan died March 31st, 1913.
Percival Lowell
IERCIVAL LOWELL was bom in Boston,
Massachusetts, March 13th, 1855; son of
Augustus Lowell, who was closely identified
with the education, art and science of Boston,
and Katharine Bigelow Lawrence, daughter of Abbott
Lawrence, United States Minister to Great Britain in 1851.
The cities of Lawrence and Lowell attest that both families
were prominent founders of the textile manufactures of
New England.
He prepared for college at "Noble's" School and
graduated from Harvard in 1 876. He was given the de-
gree cum laude, and received second-year honors in mathe-
matics, and obtained the degree of Doctor of Laws from
Amherst in 1 907, and from Clark University two years
later. After a year spent in travel in Europe and the
East, he returned to Boston, and became a force in the
business world, where at various times he held the offices
of treasurer of cotton mills and director of trust and electric
companies. He was one of the few men who combined
scientific abilities of the first order with a marked instinct
and gift for matters of finance. He was one of the found-
ers of the Mathematical and Physical Club of Boston, and
from 1883 to 1893 his energies were chiefly devoted to
literature and travel. In the spring of 1 883 he settled in
Tokio, where he was appointed counsellor and foreign
secretary to the Special Mission from Korea, then on its
way to the United States. This resulted in his return to
this country in charge of the travels of the party through
America. It was the first embassy ever sent by Korea to
128
PERCIVAL LOWELL 129
a Western power. On the return of the Mission to Korea,
he remained in the country for a time as the guest of the
government. An account of his travels there he published
under the title "Choson — The Land of the Morning
Calm." The volume is full of imagination and charm, and
gives evidence of a light touch and a true literary gift.
Until 1893 much of his time was spent in the Far
East, chiefly in Japan. In 1 888 he published his "Soul of
the Far East," which Janet, the French psychologist, has
characterized as a valuable contribution to the psychology
of the Orient, and as showing a remarkable insight into
the Eastern mind. "Noto," a delightful account of his
rambles in an out-of-the-way corner of Japan, followed
in 1891.
When in the interior of Japan, in the summer of
1 89 1 , chance took him up the sacred mountain of Ontaki.
His interest in the curious rites of the Shinto pilgrims dur-
ing their ascent of this Mecca led him to get in touch with
the high-priests on his return to Tokio. The result was
a book on some hitherto but little known aspects of Shinto-
ism. He was a member of the Asiatic Society of Japan.
All this illustrates the versatility of the man, for the
real work of his life was the astronomical research of his
later years. In 1877 the Italian astronomer, Schiaparelli,
began a systematic study of the planet Mars, which led to
his discovery of a remarkable series of markings which he
called canali, a word which has been incorrectly translated
into canals, and has proved a source of much subsequent
confusion.
Dr. Lowell followed with deep interest the discover-
ies of the Italian savant, for the character of the work was
calculated to fire the enthusiasm of a man of imagination,
of scientific proclivities. And he determined to give his
130 HISTORICAL REGISTER
energies and his fortune to continuing the work. Before
founding an observatory to be devoted chiefly to the study
of the planets, with characteristic intelligence he and his
assistants spent many months in a systematic series of
explorations and tests to discover the most suitable spot.
In order to obtain the best "seeing" it is necessary that the
air should be quiet and rarefied. It is a singular fact that
most observatories have been placed with a view of being
seen rather than seeing, in the neighborhood of great cities
or institutions of learning; while the few observatories that
are more intelligently placed have not profited by Dr.
Lowell's discovery that the currents of air swirling about
a mountain top make it a far less ideal locality than a
plateau. Dr. Lowell visited France and Algiers as well
as sites in America, finally deciding upon the great plateau
of northern Arizona, where, not far from the San Fran-
cisco peaks, he finally built his observatory at a height
approximately seven thousand three hundred feet. An ex-
pedition was made to the Mexican plateau, and one was
sent to the Andes of South America, but no place has as
yet been found equal to Flagstaff at its best.
Here for many years Dr. Lowell and his staff have
accomplished a mass of spectroscopic, photographic, vis-
ual and mathematical work of the highest class, which en-
titles him to a distinguished place in the history of astron-
omy. And these priceless records have not, as is so often
the case, been buried in a scientific mausoleum. Photo-
graphic transparencies of planets, comets, nebulae, star
groups and unique spectograms which show the nature
of the planetar}' atmospheres, their speeds of rotation,
etc., have been most generously exhibited; whereby a host
of people will forever have a living conception of this
mighty universe of which we are a part. It was Dr.
PERCIVAL LOWELL 131
Lowell's heart's desire that the work of the observatory be
forever continued. Most befitting, it seems, that he chose
as his trustee a man of art and science, his cousin, Guy
Lowell.
One of the chief ends in view in the establishment
of the Lowell Observatory was for the observation of the
delicate markings on Mars. No one of good eyesight and
open mind, who has enjoyed the privileges of a protracted
study of the planet, under the unique advantages enjoyed
at Flagstaff, can doubt the correctness of the essential facts;
it is purely a question of their interpretation. The sur-
face of Mars is covered with an extraordinary network of
singularly artificial looking lines. The intensity of these
lines waxes and wanes in periods that show a remarkable
relation to the melting of the winter polar snow caps. The
atmosphere of Mars is rarefied, but we cannot say that it
is insufficient to support some sort of intelligent life. The
planet appears to have but little water on its surface. If
we adopt Lowell's theory that the intelligent inhabitants
of a dying Mars are struggling to keep alive by a planet-
wide system of irrigation, from the water of the melting
polar snow caps, we shall find that the theory accounts
for all the observed facts. He supposes that the so-called
"canals" are bands of cultivated vegetation dependent on
some system of irrigation forced down their centres. It
is these bands of vegetation which we see, and not the
water irrigating them. Just as an observer at a distance
from our earth would see the fertile strip of the valley
of the Nile stand out against the desert long before he could
distinguish the river. Moreover, it is found that the in-
tensification of the markings on any part of the planet's
surface takes place a sufficient time after the beginning of
the melting of the adjacent polar snow cap to allow for
the water to reach that point and the crops to grow.
132 HISTORICAL REGISTER
Much of the published work of the observatory is to
be found in the "Annals of the Lowell Observatory," Vol-
ume I., 1896; Volume II., 1900; Volume III., 1905; the
"Bulletins"; and two memoirs: No. I., 1915, "Memoir
on a Trans-Neptunian Planet;" and No. II., 1915, "Memoir
on Saturn's Rings." Besides these strictly scientific pub-
lications, there have been many in which Dr. Lowell has
clothed the dry bones of scientific specification with flesh
and made them live in works whose brilliancy and charm
can hardly be excelled. Among these are "Mars" ( 1 895) ;
'The Solar System" (1903); "Mars and its Canals"
(1906); "Mars as the Abode of Life" (1909); "The
Evolution of Worlds" (1910); 'The Genesis of the
Planets" (1916).
In 1 904 he received the Janssen Medal of the French
Astronomical Society for researches on Mars, and four
years later a gold medal for similar work on Mars was
awarded to him by the Sociedad Astronomica de Mexico.
Besides his extensive studies on Mars Dr. Lowell made
many notable discoveries on the planets Mercury, Venus
and Saturn. In 1 902 he was appointed non-resident pro-
fessor of astronomy at Massachusetts Institute of Tech-
nology. He was a fellow of the American Academy of
Arts and Sciences, a member of the Royal Asiatic Society
of Great Britain and Ireland, the American Philosophical
Society, the Societe Astronomique de France, Astrono-
mische Gesellschaft, honorary member of the Sociedad As-
tronomica de Mexico, and a member of the National and
American Geographic Societies.
He married, in 1 898, Constance Savage, daughter of
Bezer Richmond and Emma Chase Keith, of Boston.
Dr. Lowell died November 12th, 1916.
James Gordon Bennett
James Gordon Bennett
AMES GORDON BENNETT was born in New
York City, May 10th, 1841 ; son of James Gor-
don Bennett, founder of the "New York Her-
ald" in 1835, and Henrietta Agnes Crean Ben-
nett. Educated abroad and by private tutors, he returned
to New York to learn the newspaper business. His father
placed him in control of the "New York Herald" in 1866,
and in the following year he founded the "New York Even-
ing Telegram." Three years after he assumed the con-
trol of the "Herald." Mr. Bennett started Henry M. Stan-
ley on that famous expedition in search of Livingstone.
Livingstone was then generally believed to be dead, and
Stanley himself believed it, and wondered at the calmness
of the order to penetrate to the heart of Africa. Mr. Ben-
nett placed no limit upon the expense, but told him to
"find Livingstone." Stanley found Livingstone, renewed
his courage and refreshed him with supplies, and returned
to civilization with the story of one of the most extraor-
dinary achievements ever undertaken by a newspaper
proprietor.
Ten years later Mr. Bennett equipped the celebrated
Jeanette expedition, headed by Lieutenant George W. De
Long, to search for the North Pole. In this undertaking
he had the approval and a certain amount of support from
the United States Government. The expedition was fitted
out in Havre, France, proceeded to San Francisco, and
thence entered the Arctic Ocean through the Behring Sea.
r> ^j
Caught in the ice, the "Jeanette" managed to force her
way northwestward above the northern coast of Siberia,
133
134 HISTORICAL REGISTER
her company fighting great hardships and steadily press-
ing northward until their vessel was crushed and the com-
mander perished.
Moved by an ambition to free the American press
from the clutches of a great cable monopoly, Mr. Bennett
next undertook, in 1883, with the late John W. Mackay,
the organization of the Commercial Cable Company, and
the laying of an independent cable across the Atlantic
Ocean. The enterprise was successful and the Mackay-
Bennett cable, as it was long known, became, and with
its developments still is, one of the great world lines of
communication.
In 1887 Mr. Bennett established the European edi-
tion of the "New York Herald." He was a pioneer, ven-
turing into fields hitherto untried by American newspaper
makers, but his wisdom was justified in the position
achieved by the Paris edition.
In the realm of sport Mr. Bennett held a peculiar and
exalted position. He introduced polo to America, spent
hundreds of thousands of dollars in leading the revival of
coaching in France and in promoting it in England and
America, abandoning the whip only after an almost mor-
tal accident in 1 893 ; organized international automobile
races, built and sailed many yachts in international and
transatlantic races.
He inaugurated the celebrated Casino at Newport,
and contributed largely to the development of that city as
the fashionable summer resort of the North Atlantic coast.
Beginning his career as a yachtsman with the ownership
of the "Rebecca," which he sailed in a race with the "Rest-
less," he discarded her and built the "Julia," but with no
greater success. Next he built the famous "Henrietta,"
and with her raced George Osgood's "Fleetwing" across
JAMES GORDON BENNETT 135
the Atlantic, but did not win. Afterward he defeated the
"Restless" with the "Henrietta," which craft sailed the
notable undecided race with the "Vesta" across the Atlan-
tic, in which it was reported that both vessels had been lost.
Having laid out the famous Sandy Hook race course,
over which the international yacht races have been held,
Mr. Bennett, by his enthusiasm, induced Commodore Ash-
bury to bring his yacht, the "Cambria," to America as the
first challenger for the America's Cup. Mr. Bennett, with
his yacht, the "Dauntless," raced the "Cambria" across the
Atlantic from the Isle of Wight to Sandy Hook, losing the
race by four hours, after two men of the "Dauntless" crew
had been lost. In the memorable contest for the America's
Cup, over the thirty mile Sandy Hook course, he sailed
the "Dauntless" and outsailed the "Cambria" by one and
a half miles.
Turning his attention to steam yachting, he built the
"Namouna," and made many voyages on board that yacht
before he built the splendid "Lysistrata," the largest steam
yacht ever built on the Clyde. To promote the racing of
steam yachts, he gave the famous "Lysistrata Cup," which
was won and held for several years by H. H. Rogers' swift
"Kanawha."
In recognition of his services to yachting, he was
made vice-commodore of the New York Yacht Club in
1867, was elected commodore in 1871 and retained that
position until 1 874. Again in 1 884 he was elected to the
same position. He was the donor of the Coupe Interna-
tionale des Aeronautes for the annual contest for free
balloons, which has become an annual event in which the
most expert balloonists of the world participate. The
Coupe Internationale d' Aviation, the challenge trophy em-
blematic of the world's championship in the sport of flying,
136 HISTORICAL REGISTER
was offered by Mr. Bennett for international competition
in 1908. By his offer of the James Gordon Bennett Cup
for international automobile competition he initiated the
memorable series of international automobile races, the
first of which was held in France.
He married in Paris, September 10th, 1914, the Bar-
oness de Reuter. The Baroness was the widow of the
Baron George de Reuter, a brother of Baron Herbert de
Reuter, manager of Reuter's Telegram Company, of Lon-
don. Mrs. Bennett was Miss Maud Potter, daughter of
Mr. John Potter, of Philadelphia.
One of the interesting phases of Mr. Bennett's many-
sided character was his intense love for all dumb animals.
He waged a valiant fight against vivisection, to which he
devoted thousands of dollars. The result was that he con-
tributed largely to the awakening of the world to the cruel-
ties inflicted upon animals in the name of science. An-
other proof of his love for animals was the founding of
the famous dogs' hospital in Paris.
Mr. Bennett died May 1 4th, 1918. He was the most
remarkable man in the history of journalism.
Andrew Robeson Sargent
NDREW ROBESON SARGENT was born De-
cember 2nd, 1 877 ; son of Charles Sprague and
Mary Allen Robeson Sargent. His father is an
international authority pertaining to arboricul-
ture and plant life.
He began his preparation for his professional career
at Groton School, and was graduated from Harvard with
the class of 1 900. During his college course he was prom-
inent in athletics and was left guard on the Varsity foot-
ball team in 1899.
Soon after graduation from Harvard he took up the
first serious work of his professional career at the Clarence
Mackay estate on Long Island. For a considerable time
he made this place his residence and transformed it into
an estate of conspicuous beauty. Mr. Sargent, who in-
herited to an exceptional degree the natural attributes and
taste of his father, did much to supplement his father's
work in the creation of many rare and beautiful gardens
in New England, particularly among the summer homes
of the north shore and the Cape; also in New York, in
New Jersey and on Long Island.
His knowledge of all that pertains to plant life and
the successful use of the wealth of beautiful native ma-
terials was expanded through frequent travels in which
he accompanied his father. After entering the architec-
tural field he divided his time between New York and
Boston. In 1 900 he made a trip through Russia, Korea,
Java and other European and Asiatic countries, for the
purpose of collecting exotic specimens and transplanting
them in this country.
137
138 HISTORICAL REGISTER
He was a member of the Racquet and Tennis, the
Country, Somerset Clubs of Boston, and the Union and
Rockaway Hunt Clubs of New York. He was a member
of the Zeta Psi, the Hasty Pudding and Delta Kappa
Epsilon at Harvard.
He married, November 9th, 1909, Maria de Acosta,
daughter of Ricardo and Miguela Hernandez de Acosta, of
New York, and had one son: Ignatius Sargent.
Mr. Sargent died March 1 8th, 1918. His labors were
useful and honorable. Throughout his whole career, his
generous instincts, his serenity of spirit, and his honest
friendships dignified his life, and brought to him honor,
respect and admiration.
•. i. .
wl!
Robert Edwin Peary
Robert Edwin Peary
OBERT EDWIN PEARY was born at Cresson,
Pennsylvania, May 6th, 1856; son of Charles
N. and Mary Wiley Peary. After his father's
death in 1 858 he lived in Portland, Maine, where
he prepared for college. He was graduated from Bowdoin
College with second honors and Phi Beta Kappa in 1877;
was a land surveyor at Fryeburg, Maine, from 1877 to
1 879, and was employed in the Coast and Geodetic Sur-
vey at Washington from 1879 to 1881 .
He studied civil engineering, and passed in that branch
into the naval service, and became Lieutenant Peary, U.
S. N. His first assignment was to Key West and later to
the tropics. He was sub-chief of the surveying for the
Nicaragua Canal route. It was when he returned to Wash-
ington that he fell upon the book about Greenland, and
thereafter virtually consecrated himself to polar explora-
tion. Obtaining leave from the naval service, he led an
expedition into Greenland to determine the extent of this
mysterious land. He determined its insularity, discovered
and named many Arctic points which today are familiar
names, such as Independence Bay, Melville Island and
Heilprin Land, and in one of his voyages he discovered the
famous meteorites, which he brought back to civilization.
One of them, weighing ninety tons, is the wonder of vis-
itors to the Museum of Natural History in New York City.
Between voyages Peary resorted to the lecture platform to
raise funds for further exploration. In one instance he
delivered one hundred and sixty-eight lectures in ninety-six
days, raising $13,000. For determining the insularity of
139
140 HISTORICAL REGISTER
Greenland Rear- Admiral Peary received the Cullum Medal
of the American Geographical Society, the Patron's Medal
of the Royal Geographical Society of London, and the
Medal of the Royal Scottish Geographical Society at
Edinburgh.
He made another Arctic voyage, lasting from 1 893
to 1895, during which he made a thorough study of the
little tribe of Arctic Highlanders. In 1 894 he discovered
the famous Iron Mountain, first heard of from Ross in
1818, which proved to be three meteorites. One of them,
weighing ninety tons, is the largest known to exist. He
brought the Cape York meteorites during summer voyages
in 1896 and 1897. From 1898 until 1902 he commanded
the expedition to the Arctic under the auspices of the Peary
Arctic Club of New York, rounding the northern extremity
of the Greenland Archipelago, the last of the great groups.
He named the northern cape, the most northerly land in
the world (eighty-three degrees, thirty-nine minutes north
latitude), Cape Morris K. Jesup, and attained the highest
north in the Western Hemisphere (eighty-four degrees,
seventeen minutes north latitude) . In July, 1 905, he sailed
north again, in a vessel especially built by the Peary Arc-
tic Club and named "The Roosevelt," and returned in Oc-
tober, 1906, having reached the "highest north."
By the time Peary had reached civilization after his
sixth trip, he decided on still another voyage. With the
especially designed ship, 'The Roosevelt," he drove fur-
ther into the frozen ocean than navigator had ever been
before. On foot he advanced until his record for this sev-
enth trip stood at 86.6, where starvation and cold again
checked the party. The explorer was fifty-two years old,
when in July, 1 908, he set out on his eighth and successful
invasion of the polar region. Captain Bartlett, the veteran
ROBERT EDWIN PEARY 141
navigator for Peary, shouted to Colonel Roosevelt as the
ship was leaving its wharf: "It's the Pole or bust this time,
Mr. President."
The method of attacking the Pole was in five differ-
ent detachments, pushing north in the manner of a tele-
scope, and planned with the precision of a military cam-
paign. At the eighty-eighth parallel Peary parted with
Captain Bartlett, in charge of the fourth detachment, and
he, with another member of his crew and four Eskimos,
made the final dash. They covered one hundred and
thirty-five miles in five days. Peary's last march north-
ward ended at ten o'clock on the forenoon of April 6th.
After the usual arrangements for going into camp he made
the final observation, indicating that his position was then
eighty-nine degrees, fifty-seven minutes. Within sight of
the Pole the commander was so exhausted that he could
not proceed. The Pole was gained on the next day. Ob-
servations which were later registered at the United States
Coast and Geodetic Survey in Washington were made,
and the return trip made in all haste. Though conscious
that he was leaving, said Peary, he did not wait for any
lingering farewell to his life's goal, as four hundred and
thirteen nautical miles of ice floes and possibly open leads
still lay between the party and the north coast of Grant
Land. "I gave one backward glance and then turned my
face south and toward the future," he said. He had spent
thirty hours from April 6th to April 7th around the Pole,
a great tract of frozen sea. The weather was cloudless
and flawless. The temperature ranged from thirty-three
degrees to twelve below. Where open places permitted
soundings nine thousand feet of wire, which was all Peary
had, failed to touch the bottom.
Upon his return he was raised to the rank of Rear-
142 HISTORICAL REGISTER
Admiral of the United States Navy, and retired on pay.
Congress voted him its thanks in a special act, and gold
medals, decorations, and honors of many kinds were show-
ered upon him. A scientific and popular narrative of his
success he wove into a book called 'The North Pole,"
while his other expeditions are described in detail in his
"Northward Over the Great Ice" and "Nearest the Pole."
Peary's closing years were spent in a well-earned
rest, living for a large part of the time with his family on
Eagle Island, off the coast of Portland, Maine. He mar-
ried, in 1888, Josephine Diebitsch, daughter of Herman
Henry and Magdelene Schmid Diebitsch, of Washington,
D. C., and had two children: Marie A. and Robert Peary.
Mrs. Peary frequently accompanied her husband on his
northward journeys, and on one of these trips Marie
Ahnighite Peary was born and bears the distinction of
having been born further north than any other white child
in the world. She was married to Captain E. Stafford on
October 7th, 1917.
Rear-Admiral Peary became interested in aviation,
and was prominently identified with the aeronautic pre-
paredness movement. He was a member of the Board of
Governors of the Aero Club of America and was presi-
dent of the Aerial League of America, and had been
elected president of the Aero Cruiser Corporation. He
was a member of the Royal Geographic Society of Lon-
don, the Philadelphia Geographic Society, the Peary Arc-
tic Club, the Aero Club of America and the Explorers*
Club. He received the Hubbard Gold Medal and also a
"Special" Gold Medal by the National Geographic Society,
the Culver Gold Medal by the Chicago Geographic So-
ciety, the Kane Gold Medal by the Philadelphia organi-
zation, as well as the Daly and Cullum Gold Medals by
ROBERT EDWIN PEARY 143
the American Geographic Society. Rear-Admiral Peary
also received medals from the German, Austrian and Hun-
garian Societies, and the Royal, Royal Scottish, Italian and
Belgian Geographic Societies. He was president of the
Eighth Geographic Congress held in Washington in 1 904 ;
honorary vice-president of Ninth Geographic Congress at
Geneva, 1908; and the Tenth, at Rome, in 1913, the year
he was made an officer of the Legion of Honor of France.
He was a member of all the principal home and foreign
Geographical Societies; the American Alpine Club, the
Museum of Natural History, the New York Chamber of
Commerce, Phi Beta Kappa and Delta Kappa Epsilon
fraternities.
Admiral Peary died February 20th, 1920. Honors,
showered by learned societies the world over, demonstrated
the greatness of the achievement of the man, but those
who understood knew that to him the chief source of pride
and satisfaction was the service to his country, and that
America had wrested from Fate the prize denied all other
lands and ages. Loyalty to his country was reflected and
intensified toward his friends.
Samuel Stephen Curtis
IAMUEL STEPHEN CURTIS was born in
McConnelsville, Ohio, March 7th, 1838; son
of General Samuel Ryan Curtis. He came of
old New England stock and back of that Eng-
lish. His grandmother, Phaley Yale, was a direct de-
scendant of Thomas Yale, who came from London, Eng-
land, with his mother and stepfather, Theophilus Eaton, on
the "Hector," which landed in Boston, June 26th, 1637.
His father, David Yale, was a descendant of an ancient
and wealthy family of that name in Wales. After land-
ing in Boston they proceeded to New Haven, then Quin-
nipiac, and Mr. Eaton and Mr. Hopkins (who afterward
as Governor Hopkins was the husband of Thomas Yale's
sister, Ann) formed the company which founded New
Haven and later assisted in the making of the Blue Laws
of Connecticut. His brother, David, married in this coun-
try and was the father of Elihu Yale, who, while a boy,
returned to England and became the Governor of Madras,
where he amassed a great fortune. In 1716, when it was
decided to remove the Collegiate School of Saybrook to
New Haven, funds were badly needed and Dr. Cotton
Mather of Boston wrote to Governor Yale a most persua-
sive letter which brought forth the gift that made Yale
College possible and caused it to be named after Governor
Yale. Phaley Yale was married to Zerab Curtis, who was
a descendant of William Curtis who named Stratford,
Conn., after his old home, Strat ford-on- Avon, where he
lived until he came to America on the Lyon in 1 632. This
William Curtis was brother-in-law to John Elliot, the
144
SAMUEL STEPHEN CURTIS 1 45
apostle to the Indians. He was also related to the Wash-
ington family; the sister of John Washington, who settled
in Virginia in 1 657, having married Philip Curtis. Colonel
Curtis' mother was Belinda Buckingham, and it is a queer
coincidence that her first American ancestor was Thomas
Buckingham, who came over on the same boat as the
Yales, and was a member of the same company with Gov-
ernors Eaton and Hopkins, that founded New Haven. His
son, the Rev. Thomas Buckingham, was one of the found-
ers and fellows of Yale College from 1 700 until his death.
He held a high place among the clergymen of his time
and was one of the moderators of the famous Synod held
at Saybrook and formed the platform for the Government
of Churches in 1 708. Samuel Ryan Curtis was graduated
at the United States Military Academy in 1 83 1 , but re-
signed from the Army in 1 832 and became a civil en-
gineer, superintending the Muskingum River improve-
ments in 1837-39. He then studied law, and practised in
Ohio from 1 84 1 -46. He had been promoted Captain of
Militia in 1833; was Lieutenant-Colonel in 1837-42;
Colonel 1843-45, and in 1846 was made Adjutant-General
of Ohio for the special purpose of organizing the State's
quota of volunteers for the Mexican War. He served as
Colonel of the 2d Ohio Volunteers, and while in charge
of the army stores at Camargo defeated an attack by Gen-
eral Urrea and drove the enemy by forced marches
through the mountains to Ramos, thus opening General
Taylor's communications. After the discharge of his regi-
ment he served on the staff of General Wool and
was Governor of Santillo, 1847-48. He then engaged in
engineering in the West and in 1855 opened a law office
in Keokuk, Iowa. He was a Representative from Iowa in
the 35th, 36th and 37th Congresses, resigning from the
146 HISTORICAL REGISTER
37th Congress before the extraordinary session of July
4th, 1861, to command the 2d Iowa Volunteers. He was
a member of the Committees on Military Affairs and the
Pacific Railroad, 1857-61 , and was a delegate to the Peace
Congress in 1 86 1 . He was one of the first officers to be
commissioned Brigadier-General, May 17th, 1861. He
organized and had charge of a camp of instruction near
St. Louis, commanded the Southwestern District of Mis-
souri from December to February, 1862, and the Army of
the Southwest till August, 1862, taking possession of
Springfield, Mo., February 13th, and defeating Generals
Price and McCulloch at Pea Ridge, Arkansas, March 8th,
1862. He was promoted to Major-General of Volunteers
March 21st, 1862, and from July 14th to August 29th
occupied Helena, Ark., having marched over 1 ,000 miles
through swamps and wildernesses. While on leave of ab-
sence from August 29th till September 24th, 1862, he
was President of the Pacific Railroad Convention in
Chicago.
He commanded the Department of Missouri 1862-63,
and that of Kansas, 1864-65. He aided in the defeat and
pursuit of General Price's army and commanded the De-
partment of the Northwest from February 1 6th to July
26th, 1865. He was United States Commissioner to
negotiate treaties with the several tribes of Sioux and
Cheyenne Indians of the upper Missouri from August to
November, 1865, and Commissioner to examine the Union
Pacific Railroad in 1 866. He was mustered out of the
volunteer service April 30th, 1866.
Samuel S. Curtis was educated in the public schools
of Wooster, Ohio; Keokuk, Iowa, and St. Louis, Mo. He
left school in 1853 to accompany his father, who was
chief engineer of a projected railroad from Fort Wayne,
SAMUEL STEPHEN CURTIS 147
Indiana, to Council Bluffs, Iowa. He continued with the
surveying party to Kanesville and then took passage on
the steamer Ben Campbell for St. Louis. The following
winter the Kanesville post-office was changed to Council
BlufTs, the Kansas-Nebraska Bill was passed, the Omaha
town site was claimed by the Ferry Company of which
General Curtis had become a member, and in the spring
of 1854 Omaha was laid out. Mr. Curtis had crossed the
plains to the Rocky Mountains eight times before the first
railroad line was built. On September 20th, 1858, he was
electee! captain of a train of emigrants at Columbus,
Nebraska, and immediately left Council Bluffs for Pikes
Peak. He arrived in camp about one and a half miles be-
low Denver on October 20th, attended a meeting of the
Auraria Town Company on the following day and was
one of the first hundred to sign the paper of organization.
The "Lawrence Company," consisting of seven members,
had claimed 320 acres as a town site in the east bank of
Cherry Creek, calling it St. Charles. Six of the members
returned to the States leaving Charles Nichols to protect
the town site, four logs crossed being the only improve-
ment. Mr. Curtis immediately began negotiations with
Mr. Nichols for an interest in St. Charles. He turned out
cattle to haul logs and with men from the camp built up
his four logs to about six feet high, put on the roof, and
when finished it was occupied by Hank Way as a black-
smith shop. In November the Kansas party with commis-
sion from Governor Denver obtained control of the St.
Charles town site. The name Denver was adopted, and
Mr. Curtis became a member of the Denver Town Com-
pany. There were forty-one original interests in the com-
pany, nine of which were given to the Leavenworth and
Pikes Peak Express Company, which commenced running
148 HISTORICAL REGISTER
a stage line to Denver in the spring of 1859. Mr. Curtis
drew the first plan of the city of Denver, and staked out
Larimer, Blake, E and F and other streets during Novem-
ber and December, 1858, and named the principal street
Curtis, which remains its name today.
He then laid out Arapahoe on Vasquez Fork, now
Clear Creek, just east of the Table Mountains. In Febru-
ary, 1 859, Mr. Curtis opened a store on Ferry Street and
in the fall became a director of the Denver Town Com-
pany and served on a committee to settle with F. J. Bayard
for the construction of a bridge over the Platte. In the
spring of 1860 he disposed of his stock of merchandise
and engaged in mining in Pleasant Valley. On March
7th, 1861, he was made postmaster at Denver, receiving
appointment number one, the first made by a Republican
administration. The following spring the Organic Act
of Colorado was passed at the extra session of Congress
and in June the Territorial Officers arrived in Denver to
organize the government, the settlement having been for
2 1/2 years trespassers on Indian lands, and with no form
of government except such as had been adopted by mass
meetings of the different communities and mining camps.
Mr. Curtis drew up the constitution of the Peoples' Gov-
ernment of the city of Denver, which was afterwards
recognized by the Territorial Legislature, with little to be
improved upon.
In the meantime the Civil War had come on and the
Secessionists were organizing in Denver and in the moun-
tains. Governor Gilpin obtained authority to raise two
companies of volunteers and Mr. Curtis was sent to Fort
Laramie, 225 miles north of Denver, to get arms for these
two companies and if possible for a regiment. He finally
secured equipment for 1 ,200 men. Shortly after he was
SAMUEL STEPHEN CURTIS 1 49
sent to Washington to get the "Gilpin Drafts" paid, where
he succeeded in getting a regular army officer sent to Den-
ver with money to pay such accounts as he found honest
and just. Mr. Curtis was appointed Major of the 2d Colo-
rado Infantry. In September, 1862, he became Lieu-
tenant-Colonel and aide-de-camp to his father, General
Samuel R. Curtis; shortly after, by request of Governor
Evans, he returned to Colorado and took command of
Camp Weld. He was made Lieutenant-Colonel of the 3d
Colorado Infantry Volunteers and on March 5th, 1863,
with five companies, started for the front. He was in ac-
tive service in southern Missouri and in the fall General
Schofield ordered the 2d and 3d Colorado Infantry Volun-
teers consolidated and made cavalry, and on January 1st,
1864, he was ordered to report to General Curtis at Fort
Leavenworth for staff duty. After the close of the cam-
paign against Price in the fall of 1 864, he was Senior
Major of the 2d Colorado Cavalry, which regiment was
doing garrison duty in Cass, Bates and Jackson counties,
Missouri, with headquarters at Kansas City, and Colonel
of the regiment in command of the aforesaid district.
Major Curtis was on detached service as Judge Advo-
cate of the Department of Kansas and A. D. C. on the
staff of Major-General Curtis at Fort Leavenworth.
During this time Major Curtis made his memorable
trip on the steamer Benton, running the gauntlet from
Glasco to Kansas City without a guard and only the
boat's crew. He came through a perfect fusilade a dis-
tance of two hundred miles. Attacks were almost con-
tinuous from Brunswick to Independence. Major Curtis
through remarkable coolness and courage saved the boat.
After the war Colonel Curtis made a trip to Europe
in 1 866 and on his return was appointed Assistant United
150 HISTORICAL REGISTER
States Attorney at Keokuk, Iowa, in 1868. He moved
to St. Louis in 1871, returning to Keokuk in 1 874 and
removed to Omaha in 1882, where he engaged in the real
estate business. In 1 896 he was appointed Master-in-
Chancery of the United States Circuit Court, District of
Nebraska, and served until 1912. He was a member of
the Omaha Real Estate Exchange, Loyal Legion and
G. A. R.
He married, in 1 868, at Christ Church, New York
City, Mary Kate Bird, daughter of James D. Bird of that
city, and had six children, two of whom survive: Kate
Belinda Curtis and Carita, wife of E. Dimon Bird of New
York.
Colonel Curtis died March 3rd, 1920. His successes
were won by steady purpose, indomnitable will and re-
markable pervision; and yet, there was inwoven with the
strong masculine traits of his character a thread of grace
and delicacy of perception and emotion that responded
intimately to all beauty of form, color, sound or senti-
ments. Few outside the circle of his family and intimate
friends appreciated how richly his spiritual nature was
endowed.
Stephen Perry Jocelyn
ITEPHEN PERRY JOCELYN was born in
Brownington, Vermont, March 1st, 1843;
son of William Joslyn and Abigail Nims
Wilder Jocelyn. He was a descendant of the
Jocelyns who left Britain with the Romans in 426, and,
with others of the brave Roman British soldiers, settled in
Little Brittany, and gave their names to the town of Jose-
lin or Gosselin in Upper Brittany. The family derives its
descent from Charlemange "with more certainty than the
Houses of Loraine and Guise, who so highly boast of it."
The first of the family in this country, Thomas Josse-
lyn, came over on the ship "Increase" in 1635, and settled
first at Hingham, where he was an inhabitant and landed
proprietor in 1637. He removed to Lancaster, Massachu-
setts, where he subscribed to the town covenant November
12th, 1654. His descendants comprise governors, United
States senators, representatives in Congress, generals,
senators and representatives to the Legislature and other
high official circles.
Nathaniel, son of Thomas, married Sarah King, and
their son, Peter, became prominent in the civic and mili-
tary life of Lancaster. His wife, Sarah Howe, and three
children were massacred during his absence by the Indi-
ans, July 18th, 1692. He then married Johanna Whit-
comb, and their son, Peter, married Alice Woods.
Nathaniel, son of Peter, married Martha Fairbanks, and
their son, Joseph, married Dorothy Osgood. Dr. William
Joslyn, son of Joseph, married Rebecca Perry, and his son
was the father of Stephen Perry Jocelyn. His mother was
151
152 HISTORICAL REGISTER
named after Abigail Nims, who was carried away by the
Indians, kept for a time and returned.
Stephen Perry Jocelyn received his education at the
Morrisville Academy and at Barton Academy, Barton,
Vermont, and entered the United States military service
in 1 863, serving as a Lieutenant of Volunteers throughout
the Civil War. He took part in the operations before
Richmond, Virginia, and was present at the occupation of
that city on April 3rd, 1865. He entered the regular
army as a Lieutenant of the Sixth Infantry in 1 866, being
promoted to the rank of Captain in 1 874 in the same regi-
ment, and serving in the same position in the Twenty-first
Infantry until 1897, when he was appointed Major of the
Nineteenth Infantry. He had previously received the
brevet rank of Major "for conspicuous gallantry" in the
Nez Perce Indian Campaign in 1877. In 1899 he was
promoted to Lieutenant-Colonel of the Twenty-fifth In-
fantry, and in 1901, Colonel of the Fourteenth Infantry,
serving in that position and on the general staff until 1 906,
when he was appointed Brigadier-General. He served in
the Philippines in 1900, and again in 1903, commanding
in the Island of Samar. From 1 904 to 1 906, the period
embracing important work of the army, incident to the
earthquake and fire in San Francisco in the latter year, he
was on duty in that city as Chief of Staff of the Pacific
Division, being later assigned to the command of the De-
partment of the Columbia. General Jocelyn retired from
active service, March 1st, 1907.
He was a member of the Military Order of the Loyal
Legion, the Society of Colonial Wars, and the Buffalo
(New York) Historical Society, besides the Army and
Navy Clubs of New York and Washington, District of
Columbia; and the Algonquin Club of Burlington,
Vermont.
STEPHEN PERRY JOCELYN 153
He married at St. Louis, February 2nd, 1886, Mary
Chamberlain Edgell, daughter of Stephen Madison and
Louise Carter Chamberlain Edgell, and had three children:
Louise Edgell, wife of Julian Bouton Clark; Dorothy, wife
of Colonel William Irving Westervelt; and Captain
Stephen Perry Jocelyn, Jr., who was on detached service
in France as an observer in the Aviation Department, fly-
ing over the lines for a period of five months, and then
became an instructor at Tours, and later was in the Bureau
of Claims.
General Jocelyn died March 8th, 1920. He was a
born leader. His firmness of purpose and strength of
character, combined with his personality, were always in-
spiring to his men. He was kindly and courteous and a
loyal friend, seeking and retaining the friendship of all
around him.
Llewellyn Marr Bickford
1LEWELLYN MARR BICKFORD was born at
Westbrook, Maine, August 30th, 1864; son of
Charles S. and Johanna Jewett Bickford. He
was educated in the public schools of Portland.
Maine. After leaving school he became associated in busi-
ness with his father, who was a dealer in grain and flour
in the city of Portland. Later on he became salesman for
the Cumberland Bone Company, and in 1 894 he was made
treasurer of the Otis Falls Pulp and Paper Company at
Livermore Falls, Maine. In 1898 he became purchasing
agent for the International Paper Company, and in 1909
he was made vice-president and general manager of the
Oxford Paper Company, which position he held at the
time of his death. He was also vice-president and gen-
eral manager of the Nashwaak Pulp and Paper Company,
the Cape Breton Pulp and Paper Company, Ltd., and
president of the Maine Coated Paper Company.
He was a member of the Manhattan, Republican and
New York Athletic Clubs, of New York City; the Port-
land Country Club, and the Cumberland Club of Portland,
Maine.
He married, June 20th, 1 888, Gertrude, daughter of
Thaddeus and Rinda Lewis, of Portland, Maine, and had
one daughter, Dorothea Bickford.
Mr. Bickford died March 22nd, 1 920. He was a man
of sympathetic and attractive personality, large and ben-
evolent purpose and really useful ' accomplishment, who
won a high and honored place in the community. The
loftiest principles governed him in all of his transactions.
154
LLEWELLYN MARK BICKFORD 155
He was a singularly retiring man, and was never publicly
active in any way, but was intensely interested not only
in the material advancement of the community and State,
but in their spiritual development in the highest sense, as
exemplified in the intellectual progress of an enlightened
citizenship. His sympathy was genuine and his hospitality
a fine art, and he never lost an opportunity of showing
kindness to even slight acquaintances. He was loved and
respected by all who knew him.
Henry Foster Sewall
ENRY FOSTER SEWALL was born in New
York City, December 16th, 1876; son of
Charles and Anna Brooks Sewall. He was a
direct descendant of Henry Sewall, Mayor of
Coventry, England, 1 606, whose son, Henry, emigrated to
New England and settled in Newberry in 1634, where he
married Jane Drummer. His son, Samuel, married Judith
Quincy Hull, Governor Bradstreet performing the cere-
mony, and it is of this marriage that the story is told of the
father presenting the groom with a chest of pine-tree
shillings equalling the bride in weight. He was a noted
jurist, a Fellow of Harvard College, and author of "The
Selling of Joseph," "Accomplishment of Prophecies," "A
Memorial Relating to the Kennebeck Indians," "A De-
scription of the New Haven." He gave five hundred acres
of land at Petaquamscutt to form an elementary school,
and five hundred acres in the same locality to Harvard.
Joseph Sewall, son of Samuel, was pastor of the
South Church, Boston, Massachusetts, 1 7 1 3-69. He de-
clined the presidency of Harvard College tendered him in
1 724. His grandson, Samuel, was a Representative from
Massachusetts in the Fifth and Sixth Congresses; a Judge
of the Supreme Court of Massachusetts, 1801-13, and
Chief Justice, 1813-14.
Henry Foster Sewall was educated at the Condon
School, Columbia Grammar, and was a member of the
Class of 1 897 at Cornell University. His father had been
the United States manager of the Commercial Union As-
surance Company, and after leaving college he entered
156
Henry Foster Sewall
HENRY FOSTER SEW ALL 157
the fire and accident insurance field, in the office of Weed
& Kennedy. Shortly after, he formed the firm of Sewall,
Prouty & Dyett, which was dissolved in 1 899, and the
firm of Duer, Gillespie & Sewall was organized, becom-
ing general agents of the General Accident, Fire and Life
Assurance Corporation. In 1 905 he severed his connec-
tion with the firm and became one of the incorporators
and president of Sewall & Alden, general agents for
automobile and burglary and personal accident and health
companies. He was active in New York legislative mat-
ters permitting casualty companies to write automobile
collision and property risks. He was vice-president of
the Motion Picture News, Inc., A. B. & S. Realty Com-
pany and the Surbrug Chocolate Corporation, and a mem-
ber of the Downtown Association, Alpha Delpha Phi, and
the St. Maurice Fishing and Game Club of Canada.
He married, May 13th, 1905, Ethel, daughter of Red-
ford Joles and Ellen Cornelia Mount, of New York, and
had two children: Barbara and Eleanor Sewall.
His sister, Miss Edith Brooks Sewall and two broth-
ers, Otis Prescott and Duer Irving Sewall, survive him.
Mr. Sewall died June 16th, 1920. His ready com-
radeship made him popular among men of all classes wher-
ever he went. He was generous, liberal minded, optimis-
tic and devoid of petty prejudice. The tragedy of his
untimely taking off is mitigated by the brilliant achieve-
ments of his brief life of less than fifty years.
James Maxwell Wheaton
AMES MAXWELL WHEATON was born in
Warren, Rhode Island, March 10th, 1842; son
of Elbridge Gary and Abigail Cole Wheaton,
and a descendant of Robert Wheaton, who
came to America in 1636, and settled first at Salem and
then became one of the original proprietors of Rehoboth,
Massachusetts.
James Maxwell Wheaton was educated at the high
school and under the private tutelage of Nathan Moore.
At the outbreak of the Civil War in 1861 he enlisted in
the 5th Regiment, Rhode Island Volunteers; on December
8th he was appointed Second Lieutenant, and in June,
1862, he was promoted to First Lieutenant and Adjutant
of the Regiment, 1 862 to 1 864. He recruited a regiment
of colored soldiers, and was appointed Major by General
Butler.
He rendered distinguished service in the battles at
Roanoke Island, Fort Macon, Rawles Mills, Kingston,
Raleigh and Little Washington. He was honorably mus-
tered out December 23rd, 1864.
He was then employed as inspector in the Custom
House at Chicago, and in December, 1865, became pay-
master of the Russell Paper Company at Lawrence,
Massachusetts. He held various positions in the com-
pany, continuing as manager until 1 898, when the prop-
erty was taken over by the International Paper Company,
and he became treasurer of the Russell Paper Company.
He was president of the Androscoggin Pulp and
Paper Company, treasurer of the Green Mountain Pulp
158
JAMES MAXWELL WHEATON 159
Company, and a director of the Mount Tom Sulphate
Pulp and Paper Company, the Russell Coal Company and
the Bellows Falls Electric Light Company.
He was a Mason and a member of the Boston Art
Club and numerous other clubs and societies in Boston
and Portland.
He married Julia Augusta Sprague, daughter of
James Madison and Charity Sprague Gooding, of Bristol,
Rhode Island, and had two children: Mrs. Nelson R. Hall,
of Warren, Rhode Island, and Mrs. William Parker
Sargent, of Providence.
Mr. Wheaton died October 1st, 1916. He was a
man filled with practical and constructive ideas, with the
ability to carry them through to success. To his friends
and associates the recollection of his character and work
will always be an inspiration.
Joseph Nelson White
OSEPH NELSON WHITE was born at Win-
chendon Springs, Massachusetts, October 4th,
1 85 1 ; son of Nelson Davis and Julia Davis
Long White. The first of the family in Amer-
ica was Thomas White, who came over on the ship "Anna-
bel" from England in 1 660 and settled in Charlestown,
Massachusetts. He was a Freeman of Charlestown in
1 666, and admitted to the Church in I 668. He served in
Captain Syll's Company in King Philip's War, and was
also a member of Captain John Cutler's Company.
John Nelson White attended the schools of his native
town until his fifteenth year, when he was sent to the
Highland Military Academy in Worcester, where he re-
mained for two years, graduating in 1 867 with high rank.
He then spent a year at the Institute of Technology in
Boston, taking a course in mechanical engineering, English
literature, physics, and chemistry.
In 1 869 he entered his father's mill at Winchendon
Springs, and began that connection with the business
which lasted for fifty years. In 1876, in addition to the
work of the mills, he engaged in a cotton brokerage busi-
ness, which he followed for several years, and which
proved to be very lucrative. In 1877 he bought, with his
brother, Zadoc, the Jaffrey Mills, starting out simply with
credit and developing very shortly a profitable and con-
stantly growing enterprise. In 1 898 the brothers bought
and developed the White Valley property in Coldbrook.
In addition to these enterprises he was one of the prime
factors in the various additions to the Springs estate, par-
160
JOSEPH NELSON WHITE 161
ticularly in the enlargement of the Springs mill by the
building of a large weaving mill. Not the least of his ad-
ventures in business was the development by his sons,
Nelson and Joseph, of the great plant and remarkable
water power at West Peterboro, to which Mr. White gave
as much enthusiasm and inspiration as if the enterprise
were his own.
Mr. White had been a director in numerous banks
and corporations, besides holding other positions of trust
and honor. But at the time of his death he had withdrawn
from everything except the trusteeship of the Murdock
Fund, to the presidency of which he succeeded the late
Rodney Wallace of Fitchburg.
He traveled extensively, both in this country and
Europe, deriving keen enjoyment and fresh inspiration
from his travels. It seems unfortunate that his really re-
markable natural aptitudes for literature, art and social
intercourse should have been largely sacrificed to his ex-
clusive devotion to business. He had wit, an inherent turn
for letters, a sensitiveness to natural beauty, combined
with original and thoughtful expression.
Mr. White was charitable in the broadest sense of the
word. He was constantly looking for worthy objects of
his assistance, and contrived in his modest, generous way
to make the recipients of his gifts feel that the obligation
was almost mutual.
He married, September 14th, 1875, Annie Evans, of
Cincinnati, and had five children : Nelson D. and Joseph N.
White, Mrs. John Badger, of Brookline; Mrs. Loy E.
Hoyt, of Chillicothe, Ohio, and Rachel White.
Mr. White died March 13th, 1920. He possessed a
master mind backed by a master spirit. He was one of
the greatest constructive business forces in New England.
162 HISTORICAL REGISTER
Starting with nothing but his own ability, industry, fore-
sight and courage, he built up in a short space of time a
remarkable manufacturing organization. He was con-
stantly upbuilding, never tearing down. Without politi-
cal aspirations, he had a clear conception of public ques-
tions which challenged the respect of men whose lives
had been devoted to the public service, but who too often
lacked the courage to follow to a logical result the prin-
ciples they knew must be correct. In everything he under-
took his power and vitalizing energy were strongly felt.
He was a believer in publicity, but it was always his work,
not himself personally, which he advertised. A strong
man, loved by his associates, he was a remarkable example
of what may be achieved in America by the man of force
and character.
Alexander Cochrane
ALEXANDER COCHRANE was born at Bar
Head, Scotland, May 12th, 1840; son of
Alexander Cochrane and Margaret Rae. His
father, also Alexander, was the fifth son of a
family of nine of John Cochrane of Glanderston House,
Neilston, and Isabella Ramsey, and grandson of Hugh
Cochrane and Bethiah Douglas, daughter of Francis
Douglas and Elizabeth Ochterloney. Francis Douglas
was a direct descendant of Archobald Douglas, fifth Earl
of Angus, through John Douglas, brother of the ninth
Earl. Elizabeth Ochterloney was second cousin to Gen-
eral Sir David Ochterloney, a leading figure in early British
Indian history.
John Cochrane, of Glanderston House, father of
Alexander, Sr., dying in middle life, his business of bleach-
ing fell to the management of his oldest son who got into
such difficulties that the family had to leave Glanderston.
This left his younger brother, Alexander, to his own re-
sources, the result being he came to New York in Septem-
ber, 1847, with his wife and two children: Alexander, the
subject of this sketch, seven years, and Hugh, a year old.
He first settled in New Jersey but later entered into an
arrangement with C. P. Talbot & Co., of Lowell, Mass.,
to build and manage a chemical works at Billerica, Mass.
At Billerica, young Alexander Cochrane spent his
boyhood and was educated in the public schools and at a
private school in Lowell. At the age of sixteen he en-
tered his father's works, and when, in 1857, Alexander,
Sr., began business on his own account, he soon took his
163
164 HISTORICAL REGISTER
son in as partner, forming the firm of A. C. Cochrane &
Co. This was the beginning of the business which in
1883 was incorporated as the Cochrane Chemical Com-
pany, and which, after his father's death in 1865, Alexan-
der Cochrane with his brother, Hugh, eventually made the
largest business of its kind in New England.
Mr. Cochrane had many other interests besides the
chemical company. He was a prominent factor in the de-
velopment of the telephone company; he became a direc-
tor of the New England Telephone Company on its forma-
tion in 1 878, and of the National Bell Telephone Company
on its formation the following year. A year later he be-
came a director of the American Bell Telephone Company.
In 1 899, on its formation, he became a director of the
American Telephone and Telegraph Company. He con-
tinued as director of these interests and as a member of
the Executive Committee continuously until 1 907 when
he resigned, serving as president of the American Tele-
phone and Telegraph Company in 1 900. About 1 909, at
the special request of Mr. Vail, he again went on the Ex-
ecutive Committee and served until 1917.
He was a director of the Eliot National Bank, the
Chicago, Burlington and Northern Railroad, the Boston
and Lowell Railroad, the New York, New Haven and Hart-
ford Railroad, the New England Navigation Company, the
Boston and Maine Railroad, the Maine Central Railroad,
the Massachusetts Electric Company and various other
corporations, also vice-president and director of the New
England Trust Company. He was president of the Man-
ufacturing Chemists' Association of the United States, and
president of the Board of Trustees which built the Peter
Bent Brigham Hospital. He was a vestryman of Trinity
Church, Boston, and was chairman of the committee
ALEXANDER COCHRANE 165
which built the splendid porch and western tower in 1 894.
He was also one of the committee on the Philip Brooks
Memorial Monument on the church grounds. He was
chairman of the committee of the Boston merchants by
whom the money was raised for the former building of
the Y. M. C. A. on Boylston Street, and also chairman
of the Building Committee.
He was a member of the Somerset Club and Union
Club, of which he was vice-president; the Thursday Eve-
ning Club, the Country Club, the Long Point Shooting
Club on the Ontario Shores of Lake Erie, the Canaveral
Club in Florida and the Restigoushe Salmon Club in
Canada. He was an extensive traveler and was deeply in-
terested in literature and art.
He married, March 24, 1 869, Mary Lynde Sullivan,
daughter of John Landgon and Mary Lynde Sullivan, of
Maiden, a descendant of Governor Sullivan, of Massa-
chusetts. Mr. and Mrs. Cochrane had eight children:
Alexander Lynde Cochrane, Mrs. Lindsley Loring, Mrs.
George R. Fearing, Jr., Francis Douglas Cochrane, Mrs.
F. Murray Forbes, James Sullivan Cochrane, Mrs. Howard
G. Cushing and Miss Mary Cochrane.
Mr. Cochrane died April 10th, 1919. He was a man
of unusual versatility and charm, a most loyal friend,
happy in trying to spread happiness around him. He gave
ungrudgingly of his mental ability and his physical
strength as his contribution to the public welfare. His
various activities, of philanthropic and otherv/ise, imposed
upon him many tasks. He did them all with credit to him-
self and benefit to his fellowmen.
James Mitchell
AMES MITCHELL was born in Pembrooke,
Ontario, Canada, June 19th, 1866; son of
Charles David and Anna Parteous Mitchell,
who came to America from Aberdeenshire,
Scotland.
In 1 869 the family removed to the United States and
settled near Milton, Massachusetts. He was graduated
from the Milton High School in 1882; prepared for Har-
vard, but finally decided to take up electrical work instead
of going to college. He entered the employ of Stern &
George, Boston, where he did a great deal of electrical and
experimental work, and shortly after became associated
with Mr. Milliken in the making of telephone instruments.
In 1884 he went to work for the Thompson-Houston
Company, afterward part of the plant of the General Elec-
tric Company at Lynn. He made personally all the early
volt meters and ampere meters put out by the company,
and had direct charge of the manufacture of the first sta-
tionary and railway motors. In 1887 he was sent to
Alleghany City to co-operate with the Bentley-Knight
group in the installation and operation of the Observatory
Hill Railway. Later on he went to Pullman, Illinois, as
an engineer at the Chicago office of the Thompson-Hous-
ton Company, where he had charge of the building and
equipping of street railway cars and trucks at the Pullman
works, and the electrification and operation of numerous
street railways in the Middle West. In 1896 he went to
California as chief engineer of the Pacific Coast Depart-
ment, and from there went to Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, and
166
JAMES MITCHELL 167
installed the first trolley cars in South America. He re-
mained in Brazil seventeen years and was associated with
Dr. F. S. Pearson in the financing and equipment of the
Sao Paulo Tramway, Light and Power Company and the
Rio de Janeiro Tramway, Light and Power Company,
which control, under the name of the Brazilian Traction,
Light and Power Company, all the street railways, electric
light and power and telephone systems of these two
important cities.
Mr. Mitchell designed and suggested many improve-
ments in connection with street railway equipment, and
patented the undermining service wheel trolley, extensive-
ly used in England and the Continent.
Although never a resident of the South, Mr. Mitchell
was one of the first to recognize the immense possibilities
that section of the country offered for the development of
water power. He endeavored to interest American capital
in his undertaking to harness the streams in Alabama.
Capitalists in this country were skeptical because they
thought it would be many years before there would be
adequate returns on their investment. Mr. Mitchell went
to London for the initial capital, the arrangements being
made through the banking house of Sparling & Company,
with whom he was associated for about ten years in financ-
ing numerous enterprises in Canada and Latin America.
When the war came, additional capital for the push-
ing of the development of the project had to be secured in
this country. By this time he had demonstrated the real
merit of his proposition and had no difficulty in sell-
ing bonds in this country for the continuance of the
construction work.
Besides the Alabama Power Company, Mr. Mitchell
was president and director of the Alabama Interstate
168 HISTORICAL REGISTER
Power Company, the Alabama Traction, Light and Power
Company, Limited; the Birmingham, Montgomery and
Gulf Company, the Little River Power Company; director
of the Attalla Oil and Fertilizer Company, Cities Service
Company, Manaos Tramways and Lighting Company,
Limited; Mexican Northern Company, Mussel Shoals
Hydro-Electric Power Company, and Utah Securities
Corporation.
He was a member of the Engineers', Union League,
Bankers* and Columbia Yacht Clubs, the Down Town As-
sociation, and the Automobile Club of America; the Royal
Automobile, Stokes-Pages, and Golf Clubs of London; the
Roebuck Country Club of Birmingham, Alabama, and the
Engineering Club of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
He married, January 22nd, 1901, Carolyn Marie,
daughter of James Jenkins and Margarite Fletcher Steven-
son, of Maryland. Mr. Mitchell is survived by his wife
and two children: John Malcolm Mitchell, a junior at
Cornell, and Marion Mitchell.
He died July 23rd, 1 920. He was gifted with extra-
ordinary intelligence, quick perception, accurate judgment,
and more than all, he had the imagination to realize the
ultimate objects of policy in all the various fields in which
he was pre-eminent, and tireless energy and enthusiasm
and devotion in pressing towards those objects. The in-
terests which he established are so soundly founded that
they will endure of his tradition, but the breadth of his
vision, his freshness of view, and his instinctive judgment,
cannot readily be replaced. His generosity and enthusi-
asm is an unforgetable inspiration to his associates.
JONATHAN PRESCOTT HALL
Jonathan Prescott Hall
ONATHAN PRESCOTT HALL was born in
Pomfret, Connecticut, July 9th, 1796; son of
Dr. Jonathan Hall and Bathshebab Mumford,
of Newport, Rhode Island. He was descended
from John Hall, who came from Coventry, Warwickshire,
England, in 1 630, to Charlestown, Massachusetts, prob-
ably in the fleet with Governor Winthrop. His name is
number nineteen on the list of church members of the
First Church of Charlestown at its organization, July 30th,
1630. There was then no church in Boston; but in 1632,
a majority of its members being on that side of the Charles
River, they caused its removal, and it became the First
Church of Boston.
Jonathan Prescott Hall was graduated from Yale Col-
lege in 1817, and was admitted to the Bar shortly after
graduation. He was elected and served as clerk in the
House of Representatives of Connecticut, and following
the advice of his friend, Daniel Webster, he removed to
New York, where he became one of the most distinguished
members of the Bar. Two noted lawyers, Charles E. But-
ler and William Maxwell Evarts, were students in Mr.
Hall's office, and among his clientele, in an advisory
capacity, were to be found Henry Clay and Daniel
Webster. Each of these gentlemen gave Mr. Hall a bronze
medal having a bust of themselves engraved thereon as a
token of affection.
In politics he was a Whig, and he served as United
States District Attorney in New York under Tyler and
again under Fillmore. He published in two volumes "Re-
169
170 HISTORICAL REGISTER
ports of Cases in the Superior Court of the City of New
York," 1828-29.
He was a counsellor of extraordinary ability. While
he was a most exact logician, an erudite pleader, and fam-
iliar with abstruse learning of real property law, he was
richly endowed with noble and generous impulses, which
bound to him in bonds of affection all who were admitted
to his acquaintance. As an orator he was frank, argu-
mentative, clear, forcible and convincing. His knowledge
was extensive and thorough.
As a student of English and American law and litera-
ture he had few equals. His learning was not limited to
the technical routine of professional practice, but included
all departments of agriculture, horticulture and arboricul-
ture, and geology and chemistry.
He married, in 1 822, the daughter of James De Wolf,
of Bristol, Rhode Island.
He died at his villa, Malbone Garden, at Newport,
Rhode Island, September 28th, 1862. Charles E. Butler
said, that he was "Endowed with great natural abilities,
trained in the discipline of a liberal education, eminent in
the labors and honors of the Bar, practiced in every excel-
lent and honorable art of popular eloquence, furnished
with every faculty of personal and social influence, an
earnest lover of his country, of an absolute loyalty to its
government and institutions, faithful to all public trusts
and private duties, manly, brave, generous, warm in his
affections, devoted in his friendship, intrepid against every
form of fraud and falsehood, enthusiastic in his love of
nature, and exact and eager in his pursuit of knowledge.
He drew to himself the respect and affection of all who
knew him.'
Henry Bedlow
ENRY BEDLOW was born in New York City,
December 2 1 st, 1 82 1 ; son of Henry and Julia
Halsey Bedlow. He was a descendant of Isaac
Bedlow, one of the earliest Dutch settlers of
New Amsterdam, son of Godfrey Bedlow, physician to
William, Prince of Orange, who emigrated from Leyden,
Holland, in 1 639. He immediately became identified with
the development of the city, and was for five years one of
its aldermen. Isaac Bedlow was a counsellor and was
admitted Freeman of the city in 1717.
In 1 668, he acquired by purchase, the historic Bed-
loe's Island, now the site of Bartholdi's Statue of Liberty,
the difference in the spelling of the name being the result
of an error in the records. Another descendant, William
Bedlow, was one of the government commissioners to
make surveys for the Military School at West Point, and
was postmaster of the first American post-office in New
York City, in 1783. He married Catherine, sister of
Colonel Henry Rutgers, of Revolutionary fame.
Henry Bedlow was educated under private tutors and
at Yale College, being graduated at the Harvard Law
o o +j
School in 1 842. He was admitted to the Bar of New York,
but afterward studied medicine both in New York and
France. He never practiced in either profession.
Early in life he was appointed attache to the Ameri-
can Legation in Naples, Italy, where his knowledge of the
court language and its etiquette enabled him to be of great
service to the charge d'affaires at this most ceremonious
court of Europe.
171
172 HISTORICAL REGISTER
In 1848 he accompanied Lieutenant W. F. Lynch in
his exploration of the Dead Sea and the Jordan River, and
is specially mentioned for his labors in the published report
of the expedition.
He was elected mayor of Newport, Rhode Island, for
three terms from 1875, and won universal commendation
for his efficient and business-like administration.
He was a member of the Union, Players' and Union
League Clubs, of New York City; and the Reading Room,
Casino, Golf and Harvard Clubs, of Newport, Rhode
Island. He was a chemist of ability and a writer of great
versatility. His published writings include 'The White
Tsar, and Other Poems," "War and Worship" and "Dead
Sea Expeditions."
He took an active part in amateur theatricals, and in
Poor Pillicody and Beau Farintosh he fitted the role with
marked acceptancy. Wallack said his interpretations were
the finest he had ever seen.
He married, March 2nd, 1850, Josephine Maria De
Wolf, daughter of Fitzhenry and Nancy De Wolf Homer,
of Boston, Massachusetts, and had two children: Mrs.
Francis Morris and Mrs. William Henry Mayer.
Mr. Bedlow died May 30th, 1914. He was a scholar
and a man of science, whose bright temper and mirthful
conversation were in no way inconsistent with sound
judgment and good sense. Beneath his laughter lay wis-
dom; below the extravagancies of his imagination lay the
equilibrium of spirit, strong and clear. He traveled ex-
tensively and saw all things in color; the world was for
him so much booty for the eye. Endowed with a marvel-
ous memory, he could transfer the visual impression into
words as exact and vivid as the objects which he beheld.
If his imagination recomposed things, it was in the man-
ner of some admired painter.
FRANCIS MORRIS
Francis Morris
IRANCIS MORRIS was born in Fordham in
1848; son of Lewis Gouverneur and Emily
Lorillard Morris. The family was descended
from the great chieftain, Rhys, who, in com-
pany with Richard de Clare, known as Strongbow, took
part in the Anglo-Norman Conquest of Ireland in 1171.
For his valiant deeds he was called Maur Rhys, and his
descendants proudly held to this title, which eventually
became transformed into Morris. The first of the family
in America, Richard Morris, came to New York in 1668
and purchased three thousand acres of land near the Har-
lem River, which he named Bronxland.
The Morris family, for more than two centuries, have
been identified with great estates on the one side and pub-
lic affairs on the other. They can look back upon an illus-
trious record in the three great wars of American history.
From the first they have been marked by studious habits,
broad culture, philanthropy and patriotism. Lewis Morris
was a signer of the Declaration of Independence and a
Major-General in the Revolution.
Lewis Gouverneur Morris devoted himself to the de-
velopment of the southern part of Westchester County;
as early as \ 838 he began the movement for the deepen-
ing and rectification of the Harlem River, and for the
drainage of the marshes in its neighborhood. He en-
• — ' *j
countered considerable opposition from the conservative
elements of the district, but by sheer pluck and indomi-
table patience, carried his plans through to a triumphant
end. His greatest victory has its memorial in that noble
173
1 74 HISTORICAL REGISTER
structure, the High Bridge. When it was determined to
bring the Croton water through to New York, the first
proposition was to build a solid structure, which would
have rendered the Harlem unnavigable. He fought the
project with all his strength, and urged an aqueduct along
the lines of the present structure. His plans excited an
outburst of protestations upon the ground of extravagance,
corruption and folly. He even went so far as to employ
force.
When the contractors began driving strong piles,
which threatened to close the stream, he studied the laws
and found some precedent whereby he could legally sail
a heavily laden craft through the navigable stream even
when this was impeded by trespassers. Fie chartered an
unwieldly craft, loaded it in Philadelphia with coal, sailed
it up the Harlem at flood tide, and as he approached the
piling, refused to drop anchor. The tide made the vessel
an enormous battering ram, which swept away the works
like reeds. He anchored a quarter of a mile above, and
upon the ebb raised his anchors and swept back, demolish-
ing, it is said, what little of the structure that remained.
This was too much for the contractors. They gave up
their attempt, and the Harlem River was preserved in its
integrity.
In the fifties he wrote a monograph in favor of a ship
canal at Spuyten Duyvil. The project was regarded as
visionary at the time, but -was adopted by the United
States Government and made a fact in the nineties. He
was active in the breeding of fine stock, and was one of
the earliest importers of Devonshires, Shorthorns and
Southdowns. His brother was mayor of New York for
three terms.
Francis Morris attended a private school in Bridge-
FRANCIS MORRIS 175
port, Connecticut, and on September 27th, 1860, was ap-
pointed to the navy. During the next three years he was
in the Naval Academy at Annapolis, and on October 1st,
1863, was promoted to ensign. In 1863-64 he was at-
tached to the steam sloop "Powhattan," the flagship of
the West India Squadron. He next served in the North
Atlantic Blockading Squadron, and was present at both at-
tacks on Fort Fisher. In 1 865 he was transferred to the
steam sloop "Monongahela," of the West India Squadron,
on board which vessel he remained two years, being pro-
moted to Master, November 10th, 1866. On February
21st, 1867, he was commissioned Lieutenant, and for the
next three years was on board the steam sloop "Piscata-
qua," the flagship of the Asiatic Squadron. He was com-
missioned Lieutenant-Commander March 1 2th, 1 868, and
ordered to the "Ossipee" of the Pacific Squadron. During
1871-72 he was located at a torpedo station, and in 1873
was assigned to the "Shawmut," at the North Atlantic Sta-
tion. In the early part of 1 876 he was sent to the Boston
naval rendezvous, and in 1877 was promoted Commander
and assigned to duty on board the "Franklin."
He married, February 9th, 1875, Harriette Hall,
daughter of Henry and Josephine Maria de Wolf Homer
Bedlow, and had two children : Alice Prescott Morris and
Lewis Gouverneur Morris.
Commander Morris died at Newport, Rhode Island,
February 1 2th, 1 883. He was one of the best known and
valued officers in the navy. His firmness of purpose and
strength of character, combined with his personality, were
always inspiring to the men under his command. He was
extremely broad minded and tolerant — a born leader of
men.
William Brown Plunkett
IJILLIAM BROWN PLUNKETT was born at
1 Adams, Massachusetts, April 4th, 1850; son
of General William C. Plunkett and Olivia
Brown Plunkett. His grandfather, Patrick
Plunkett, came to this country from Wicklow County, Ire-
land, in 1 795, and settled in Lenox, Massachusetts, where
he purchased a twenty-acre tract, about a mile south of
the village. He built a log cabin on the property and
shortly after married Mary Robinson, a native of Ireland.
William C. Plunkett, who developed cotton man-
ufacturing in Adams, Massachusetts, was born in this
cabin, October 23rd, 1 800. He was educated at the Lenox
Academy, from which he entered upon a temporary oc-
cupation as teacher in Lee and Lanesboro, attracting in the
latter town the attention of Thomas Durant, a merchant,
who afterward attained much prominence in connection
with the building and management of the Northern Pacific
Railroad. Generously offering to his protege a share of
the profits in 1 826, Mr. Durant had the satisfaction of
observing the marked success of the young merchant and
his later remarkable progress in the field of manufacturing
in Adams, where, with small means, he succeeded,
through innate frugality and indomitable perseverance, in
accumulating sufficient capital to purchase the entire stock
of the company before the close of 1 83 1 .
General Plunkett served many terms in the Lower
House of Representatives, was Lieutenant-Governor with
Emory Washburn, and served in the Constitutional Con-
vention in 1853. He was superintendent of the Sunday
176
WILLIAM B PLUNKETT
WILLIAM BROWN PLUMCETT 177
School of the First Congregational Church, of Adams, for
forty years. He died January 21st, 1884.
William B. Plunkett was educated at the Monroe Col-
legiate Institute, and at the age of twenty entered the em-
ploy of Plunkett & Wheeler. Shortly after he became
a member of the firm, and in 1 878, with his younger
brother, Charles T. Plunkett, the firm of William C.
Plunkett & Sons was organized.
Before the Western Railroad connected Boston and
Albany, at about 1 844, the transportation of goods was
carried on by teams to Troy, a distance of fifty miles,
thence to New York by river boats, returning with cotton
and supplies; while in winter the route was via team and
New Haven boats or through to New York. In 1 865 a
rear structure and new dye house were erected, and in
1 874 a second mill was added. Several additions have
since been built, and the entire plant modernized for the
efficient production of the endless variety of plain and
fancy weaving yarns for looms or further conversion. In
1 880 the company organized, with Theodore Pomeroy,
the Greylock Mills Corporation in North Adams, placing
the direction in the hands of William B. Plunkett as agent.
Several enlargements of the mill have since been made
and changes in products from ginghams to fine carded
plain cottons and finally to the superior combed fabrics.
The mills contain one hundred thousand spindles and over
sixteen hundred looms. In 1889 the Berkshire Cotton
Manufacturing Company, a corporation growing out of
the seed planted seventy-five years before, constructed a
mill for the production of fine counts of carded cottons,
having thirty-five hundred spindles and seven hundred
looms. In 1892 an adjoining mill was built, with forty-
one hundred spindles and nine hundred looms. This
178 HISTORICAL REGISTER
building was dedicated in the presence of over nine thou-
sand people, with addresses by William McKinley, after-
ward President of the United States, and Lieutenant-Gov-
ernor Haile, of Massachusetts. In 1896 a third mill was
built, with eighty thousand spindles and twenty-two hun-
dred looms, and a few years later President McKinley,
when visiting Mr. Plunkett in Adams, laid the cornerstone
of the fourth mill, the largest of the group, containing one
hundred and three thousand spindles and twenty-six hun-
dred looms.
During this period Edward M. Gibbs, of Norwich,
Connecticut, had been president, and with Gardiner Hall,
Jr., of South Willington, Connecticut, the Plunketts con-
trolled the stock. Following the death of Mr. Gibbs in
1902, he was succeeded in order by Honorable John A.
McCall, Stephen A. Jenks, and Charles T. Plunkett.
William B. Plunkett was treasurer. The corporation con-
trols over eleven thousand acres in the Yazoo delta, from
which the choicest cottons are now obtained.
Mr. Plunkett was a trustee of the New York Life In-
surance Company. He had been a member of the Gov-
ernor's Council, of Massachusetts, in 1897, and a delegate
to the Republican National Conventions of 1 892 and
1900. He served on the National Advisory Committee
during President McKinley's first campaign, and it was
through his efforts that a monument to McKinley was
erected. He was president of the Greylock National Bank
and of the Cotton and Woolen Mutual Fire Insurance Com-
pany, of Boston, and a director of the Berkshire Life Insur-
ance Company, the Berkshire Fire Insurance Company,
and the Mutual Fire Insurance Company, of Boston. He
gave the Plunkett Memorial Hospital, and was a generous
contributor to all worthy causes. The Adams Library was
WILLIAM C. PLUNKETT
WILLIAM BROWN PLUNKETT 179
dedicated by President McKinley, a close personal friend
of Mr. Plunkett.
He was president of the Home Market Club, of Bos-
ton, a member of the Congregational Church, and super-
intendent of the Sunday School for over twenty-five years.
He married, January 1st, 1873, Lydia F. French, and
had two children: William Caldwell and Theodore R.
Plunkett.
Mr. Plunkett died October 25th, 1917. He was one
of our illustrious and public spirited citizens. His digni-
fied and delightful personality, his kindness of heart, his
wide, ever continuing and unbounded philanthropy, his
bigness of soul, his unostentatious and gentle demeanor,
his broad vision, his unswerving integrity and safe judg-
ment, all combined to make him a dominant personality
in the financial and philanthropic activities of our country.
A man of the loftiest ideals, an exemplary citizen, by na-
ture a leader of men, he made his influence felt in every
movement that tended to the promotion of good will in
the community. His broad sympathies, however, knew
no bounds of race or creed. In life he radiated sunshine
and happiness, and he bequeathed to his fellowmen the
priceless legacy of a resplendent example of true steward-
ship of wealth and of God-given powers.
William Caldweil Plunkett was born at Adams,
Massachusetts, September I 1 th, 1 876. He was educated
at the Adams High School, Riverview Academy, Pough-
keepsie; Exeter Academy, and was graduated from Will-
iams College in 1900. He then entered the cotton man-
ufacturing business v/ith his father and became manager
of the Greylock Mills, of North Adams, Williamstown,
and North Pownal, Vermont, and the W. C. Plunkett &
Sons, of Adams. Upon the death of his father he was
made director and treasurer of the Greylock Mills.
180 HISTORICAL REGISTER
He was a member of the Executive Committee of the
Home Market Club, of Boston; charter member of the
Adams Lodge of Elks, president of the Forest Park Coun-
try Club, and a member of the Kappa Alpha Fraternity,
the Colonial and Berkshire Clubs, and was the youngest
selectman of the town of Adams.
He married, in 1900, Florence Canedy, of North
Adams, and had two children: Lydia and William
Plunkett, Jr.
Mr. Plunkett died December 17th, 1917. He was a
man of high personal character, and a useful and public
spirited citizen. He fully maintained the fine traditions
of a family that in three generations rendered distin-
guished service to the country. His example has been an
inspiration, and his precepts will ever be cherished in our
midst.
Theodore R. Plunkett was educated at the public
schools of Adams, Philips Academy, Exeter, New Hamp-
shire; Riverview Academy, Poughkeepsie, and at Will-
iams College, Williamstown, Mass. In 1902 he entered
the plant of the Berkshire Manufacturing Company,
where he acquired a practical knowledge of the cotton in-
dustry, and in November, 1910, was made manager of the
Pownall Mill of the Greylock Mills. In 1915 he became
superintendent of the Berkshire Cotton Manufacturing
Company, which position he held until the death of his
father in October, 1917.
At an early age he exhibited the qualities which had
characterized his father and grandfather; sharp, perceptive
faculties, quickness of decision, excellent judgment, re-
markable intuition and understanding of human nature.
Mr. Plunkett organized the Greylock Mills Supply Com-
pany in October, 1918, and was made president and
general manager.
WILLIAM BROWN PLUNKETT 181
He is a director of the Greylock National Bank, a
charter member and first exalted ruler of the Adams Lodge
of Elks, a member of the Berkshire A. F. & A. M.; Corin-
thian Chapter, R. A. M.; St. Paul's Commandery, K. T. ;
Anota Lodge of Perfection, Pontoosuc Princes of Jerusa-
lem, Pittsfield Rose Croix, Massachusetts Consistory,
32nd Degree; Forest Park Country Club, Kappa Alpha
Fraternity at Williams College; Colonial Club, of Adams;
Park Club, of Pittsfield, and the Fay Club, of Fitchburg.
He has been superintendent of the Sunday School of the
First Congregational Church, Adams, since the death of
his brother in December, 1917.
He married January 3rd, 1905, Bessie Helen Daniels,
daughter of Arthur Burdette and Ida Millard Daniels, of
Adams, Mass. Mr. and Mrs. Plunkett have three chil-
dren: William Brown, Douglas Robinson and Theodore
Plunkett.
Mr. Plunkett has shown himself to be an excellent
example of that type of man which is essentially Ameri-
can, who puts his character into his business; all his quali-
ties, whether they be intellectual or normal, are shown in
his corporation, as well as in his social life. He uses his
influence for the benefit of those under him as well as for
his own. He makes his profit their profit.
Urban Andrain Woodbury
RBAN ANDRAIN WOODBURY was born in
Acworth, New Hampshire, July llth, 1838;
son of Albert M. and Lucy L. (Wadleigh)
Woodbury, and eighth in descent from John
Woodbury, who came from Somersetshire, England, and
landed at Cape Ann, Mass., in 1624. The latter was first
envoy to England from the Salem Colonists in 1627; also
first constable in Salem, at that time a very important of-
fice, preceding all others. He was also eighth in descent
from Governor Simon Bradstreet, who landed in Massa-
chusetts in 1630; ninth in descent from Governor Thomas
Dudley, of Massachusetts, who came to this country in
1 630, and fifth in descent from John Porter, who was Ad-
jutant in 1 738. Albert M. Woodbury, father of our sub-
ject and a native of Cavendish, returned to Vermont in
1 840, after a temporary residence in New Hampshire.
Urban A. Woodbury was educated in the public
schools of Morristown and at the People's Academy in
Morrisville, and was graduated in the Medical Department
of the University of Vermont in 1859.
In response to President Lincoln's call for troops, he
enlisted in Company H, Second Regiment Vermont Vol-
unteers, May 25th, 1861, and shortly after was advanced
to First Sergeant. Two months later he lost his right arm
at the Battle of Bull Run, the first Vermonter to lose a
limb in the Civil War. This calamity compelled him to
relinquish his aspirations in the medical profession. He
was taken prisoner, and when paroled, October 5th, 1861,
was discharged from service on account of wounds, on
October 18th.
182
URBAN ANDRAIN WOODBURY 183
A year later the nation was in great need of addi-
tional troops, and Mr. Woodbury gave his effort to the re-
cruiting of a company, which became Company D, 1 1 th
Vermont, of which he was commissioned Captain, Novem-
ber 17th, 1862. June 17th, 1863, he was transferred to
the Veteran Reserve Corps, a body of veteran soldiers
who, like himself, unable to endure the hardships and ex-
posures of the march, were capable of garrisoning impor-
tant posts and supply depots, thus freeing thousands of
able bodied men for duty at the front.
In March, 1865, after having faithfully discharged all
the duties of a soldier in the service of his country, he
resigned.
Upon his return from the war, Captain Woodbury
settled in Burlington, Vermont. For two years he was
located at Ottawa, Canada, as representative of Shepard,
Davis & Company. In 1 874 he became connected with
the firm of C. Blodgett, Sons & Company, with whom he
remained for two years. In 1876 he established the busi-
ness in Burlington conducted by J. R. Booth, now a
branch of the J. R. Booth Lumber Company, of Ottawa.
He also engaged in real estate operations, was president
and principal owner of the Mead Manufacturing Company
and the Crystal Confectionery Company, and was presi-
dent of the Queen City Cotton Company. For thirty-three
years he was the owner and proprietor of the Van Ness
House, one of the best known hotels in the State. In poli-
tics he was a staunch Republican, and was elected alder-
man from the Second Ward in Burlington in 1881-82, and
the latter year was president of the Board. He was mayor
of the city during 1 885-86.
In 1884 he was appointed aide-de-camp with rank of
Colonel on the staff of Governor J. L. Barstow, and in
184 HISTORICAL REGISTER
1 888 was elected Lieutenant-Governor of the State on the
ticket with William P. Dillingham as Governor. In 1 894
he was elected Governor of Vermont by over 27,000
majority — the largest majority ever received in an "off
year," and the largest, save one, in any year in the State
since the organization of the Republican party.
In September, 1898, President McKinley appointed
him a member of the commission to investigate the con-
duct of the War Department in the war with Spain, and
President Roosevelt appointed him a member of the
Board of Visitors to West Point.
In every position, both public and private, he made
a most honorable record, and one that justly entitled him
to the confidence and respect of his fellow-citizens, to
whom he proved by his career as a soldier, State official
and citizen, to be worthy of all the honors which he
received.
The honorary degree of LL.D. was bestowed upon
him by the University of Vermont in 1914. He was a
member of the First Congregational Church of Burlington,
was a Thirty-second Degree Mason, a Knight Templar, a
member of the Mystic Shrine (first man admitted to
Masonry having lost a limb), Odd Fellows, Knights of
Pythias, Military Order of the Loyal Legion (commander,
1907-08), and the G. A. R., being Department Com-
mander of Vermont in 1900; also a member of the Sons
of American Revolution, Sons of Colonial Wars.
He married, February 12th, 1860, Pauline L., daugh-
ter of Ira Darling, of Morristown, Vermont, and had six
children: Charles L., Minnie Woodbury May, Gertrude
Woodbury Powers, Edward P., Lila Woodbury Lane and
Mildred Woodbury Page.
Governor Woodbury died at Burlington, Vermont,
April 15th, 1915.
Anson George McCook
NSON GEORGE McCOOK was born in Steu-
benville, Ohio, October 10th, 1835; son of Dr.
John McCook and Catherine Julia Sheldon
McCook. He attended school until 1850,
when he secured a position in a business house in Pitts-
burgh. He remained there two years, and then taught
school in a small country place near (New) Lisbon, Ohio,
and became a member of an engineering organization en-
gaged in a preliminary survey of a projected railroad.
In the Spring of 1854, young McCook got a touch of
the gold fever and started overland with a party for Cali-
fornia. He lived as a miner and business man in Cali-
fornia and Nevada for five years and returned East late in
1 859. He read law in the office of his cousin, George W.
McCook, a partner of Edwin M. Stanton, later Secretary
of War under Abraham Lincoln, the firm being Stanton
& McCook.
The McCooks were "war Democrats," and upon the
outbreak of the Civil War, all entered the military or naval
forces of the Union, which won for them the proud title,
"the fighting McCooks." Doctor McCook's sons were
among the first to present themselves. Edward M.
McCook was brevetted a Major-General of Cavalry, was
Territorial Governor of Colorado and Minister to Hawaii;
the Reverend Henry C. McCook, chaplain in an Illinois
regiment, afterward a well-known Presbyterian clergyman
and scientist in Philadelphia; Roderick Sheldon McCook,
a graduate of the Naval Academy at Annapolis, who, at
the time of his death was a Commander in the navy, hav-
185
186 HISTORICAL REGISTER
ing fought all through the Civil War, and the Rev. John
J. McCook, of Hartford, Conn., during the war a Second
Lieutenant in the First West Virginia Infantry and now
professor of modern languages at Trinity College. There
was also a sister, Mary Gertrude, later Mrs. Lewis Sheldon.
This branch of the family was known throughout the army
as 'The Tribe of John," while the Doctor's brother and
his nine sons were known as "The Tribe of Dan." Sur-
geon Latimer A., Colonel George W., General Robert L.,
Major-General Alexander McD., General Daniel, Jr.,
Colonel Edwin Stanton, and Colonel John J., were offi-
cers in the army, while Charles M., a private, was
killed at Bull Run, and Midshipman John James died
in naval service before the War of the Rebellion.
Generals Robert and Daniel died of wounds received
in action, and Surgeon Latimer, soon after the war,
from the same cause. The two fathers also served
in the war, and General Anson McCook's uncle, Major
Daniel McCook, was killed in repelling the Confederate
General Morgan's raid into Ohio.
At the first call for troops, Anson G. McCook or-
ganized a company of infantry in Steubenville and was
commissioned its Captain in the Second Ohio Volunteers,
April 17th, 1861. He rose successively to be Major,
Lieutenant-Colonel, and finally Colonel of the same regi-
ment, and when it was mustered out of the service, was
made Colonel of the 1 94th Ohio Volunteer Infantry. In
March, 1865, he was brevetted Brigadier-General of vol-
unteers "for meritorious services." Among the battles in
which he took part were Bull Run, Perryville, Stone
River, Chattanooga, Lookout Mountain, Missionary
Ridge, Peach Tree Creek and Atlanta. With his second
command he took part in the Shenandoah Valley cam-
paign until the surrender of Lee.
ANSON GEORGE McCOOK 187
After the war General McCook returned to Steuben-
ville, was admitted to the Bar, and became Assessor of
Internal Revenue. He moved to New York City in 1873,
was admitted to practice in the Courts of this State and be-
came interested in the Daily Register, later the Law Jour-
nal. He remained president of the New York Law
Publishing Company until his death.
General McCook was elected to Congress from the
Eighth Congressional District in New York City in 1876,
1878 and 1880. He was Secretary of the United States
Senate from 1884 to 1893, and was City Chamberlain of
New York City, under Mayor Strong, from August 1st,
1 895, to January 1 st, 1 898. He was a Republican in poli-
tics and active in many movements for good government
in New York City.
In October, 1900, General McCook was the grand
marshal of the second "Sound Money" parade in New
York City, and moved 107,000 men, without a break,
from the Battery to Fortieth Street and Fifth Avenue,
where they were dismissed without the slightest con-
gestion.
In May, 1 907 and 1 908, he was elected Senior Vice-
Commander of the Military Order of the Loyal Legion,
and in May, 1 909, Commander, succeeding Rear-Admiral
Joseph B. Coghlan. In 1916 the Union League Club
made him an honorary member.
He married, June 3rd, 1886, Hettie B. McCook,
daughter of George W. McCook, and had two children:
Mrs. Katherine McCook Knox and George A. McCook, a
First Lieutenant on the staff of Brigadier-General E. M.
Johnson, Acting Division Commander, Camp Upton.
Lieutenant McCook served with the 77th Division until
wounded on the Vesle River.
188 HISTORICAL REGISTER
General McCook died December 30th, 1917. He
possessed, in a striking degree, the essential chracteristics
of the successful soldier and business man and the good
citizen. His charming manner, purity of character and
absolute loyalty to his superiors and to the work in which
he was engaged gained him the devotion of the humblest
of his subordinates. A loving husband and father, and a
true friend, he represented the highest type of American
citizenship.
William Wells
fILLIAM WELLS was born in Waterbury, Ver-
mont, December 14th, 1837; son of William
Wellington and Eliza Carpenter Wells, a de-
scendant of Hugh Wells, who came to this
country in 1635 and aided in founding a colony in Hart-
ford, Connecticut.
He was educated in the public schools of his native
town, at Barre, Vermont Academy and Kimball Union
Academy, Meriden, New Hampshire. At the age of
seventeen he made a map of Caledonia County, using an
odometer in surveying, which is remarkable.
After leaving school he entered his father's business,
where he remained until the outbreak of the Rebellion,
when he enlisted as a private soldier, September 9th, 1 86 1 ,
and assisted in raising Company C, First Regiment, Ver-
mont Cavalry; was sworn into the United States service
October 3rd, 1861; was commissioned First Lieutenant,
October 14th, 1861, and Captain, November 18th, 1861;
mustered, November 1 9th, 1861, with field and staff of
the First Regiment, Vermont Cavalry, to serve three years.
He was promoted Major, October 30th, 1862; Colonel,
June 4th, 1864; appointed Brevet Brigadier-General of
Volunteers, February 22nd, 1865; and May 19th, 1865,
upon the personal solicitation of Generals Sheridan and
Custer, he was commissioned a Brigadier-General; ap-
pointed Brevet Major-General of Volunteers, March 30th,
1865, "for gallant and meritorious service," having re-
ceived more promotions than any other Vermont officer
during the war. He distinguished himself repeatedly in
189
190 HISTORICAL REGISTER
action; was in the thickest of the fight at Orange Court
House, Virginia, August 2nd, 1862, and commanded the
Second Battalion, First Vermont Cavalry, in the repulse of
Stuart's Cavalry at Hanover, Pennsylvania, June 30th,
1863. In the famous and desperate cavalry charge on
Round Top, Gettysburg, July 3rd, 1863, he commanded
the leading battalion, rode by the side of General Farns-
worth, the brigade general, and, almost by a miracle,
came out unharmed, while his commander fell in the midst
of the enemy's infantry. Eight days later in the savage
cavalry melee at Boonsboro, Maryland, he was wounded
by a sabre cut. At Culpeper Court House, Virginia, Sep-
tember 13th, 1863, he charged the enemy's artillery with
his regiment and captured a gun, and was again wounded
by a shell. After the return of the regiment from Kil-
patrick's raid, in March, 1864, Major Wells was detached
and placed in command of the Seventh Michigan Cavalry
(which had lost its commander) for a month. He com-
manded a battalion in Sheridan's cavalry battle of Yellow
Tavern, Virginia, May 11 th, 1 864, in which General
Stuart, the greatest Confederate cavalry general, was
killed. In the cavalry fight at Tom's Brook, Virginia,
October 9th, 1 864, General Wells commanded a brigade
of Custer's Division ; and at Cedar Creek, October 1 9th,
1 864, his brigade took a foremost part in turning the rout
of the morning into a decisive victory at nightfall, captur-
ing forty-five of the forty-eight pieces of artillery taken
from Early 's fleeing army. He served under Generals Kil-
patrick, Sheridan and Custer; was with the former in his
famous raid on Richmond, and with Wilson in his daring
foray to the south of that city. At Appomattox, on the
morning of the surrender of the Army of Northern Vir-
ginia, his brigade had started on its last charge and was
WILLIAM WELLS 191
stopped by General Custer in person. From September
19th, 1864, to April 9th, 1865, he was several times in
command of the Third Cavalry Division. The departure
of Sheridan and Custer for Texas left him as the ranking
officer and last commander of the cavalry corps.
At the grand review of the Army of the Potomac in
Washington, District of Columbia, May 22nd, 1865, he
commanded the Second Brigade, Custer's Division of the
Cavalry Corps, which led the advance. A medal of honor
was awarded General Wells by Congress "for distin-
guished gallantry at the battle of Gettysburg, July 3rd,
1863." He participated in seventy cavalry engagements,
in eighteen of which he led a brigade or division, and his
service in the field was continuous from the date of his
muster in until the close of the war. January 1 5th, 1866,
he was honorably mustered out of the United States serv-
ice. General Wells' military career throughout four years
and a half in the War of the Rebellion evinces the highest
personal qualities of a cavalry commander, combining
coolness, promptness, and daring intrepidity, with most
thoughtful consideration for his men.
Soon after his return to civil life he became a partner
in a firm of wholesale druggists at Waterbury. In 1 868
they transferred their business to Burlington, which was
thereafter his residence. He represented the town of
Waterbury in the Legislature of 1 865-66, being Chairman
of the Military Committee, and an influential legislator.
In 1 866 he was elected Adjutant-General of Vermont, and
held the office until 1872, when he succeeded General
Stannard as Collector of Customs for the district of Ver-
mont, a position which he filled with efficiency and credit
for thirteen years. He then resumed his active connection
with the business house of Wells & Richardson Company.
192 HISTORICAL REGISTER
In 1886 he was State Senator from the County of
Chittenden. He was active in veteran soldiers' societies;
was one of the presidents of the Re-union Society of Ver-
mont Officers, and president of the Society of the First
Vermont Cavalry. He was one of the trustees and first
president of the Vermont Soldiers' Home, and was a mem-
ber of the Gettysburg Commission in 1889-90. He was
the first commander of the Vermont Commandery of the
Loyal Legion, and would have been re-elected had he lived
until the coming annual meeting of the Commandery. He
was a member of Stannard Post No. 2, Grand Army of
the Republic, Department of Vermont, and of the Ver-
mont Society of the Sons of the American Revolution.
General Wells was identified with many important
business enterprises in Burlington, being president of the
Burlington Trust Company, president of the Burlington
Gas Light Company, president of the Burlington Board
of Trade, director of the Burlington Cold Storage Com-
pany, director in the Rutland Railroad Company, director
in the Champlain Transportation Company. He was a
member and a vestryman of St. Paul's Church; he was
one of the trustees of the Young Men's Christian Associa-
tion of Burlington, and one of its most liberal supporters.
Few men, if any, touched the life of the community in
which he lived, in so many important capacities.
He married, in January, 1 866, Arahannah Richard-
son, of Fitchburg, Massachusetts, and had two children:
Frank R. and Bertha R. Wells.
He died April 29th, 1892. He was a courteous and
kind-hearted man, a gallant soldier, and one of the most
respected citizens of the Green Mountain State.
Frederic Beach Jennings
IREDERIC BEACH JENNINGS was bom in oid
Bennington, Vermont, August 6th, 1853; son
of the Reverend Isaac Jennings and Sophia
Day. His first American ancestor, Joshua Jen-
nings, came to this country from England in 1645, and
settled first at Hartford, and later on removed to Fairfield,
Connecticut. In each of the five successive generations
came an Isaac Jennings. Isaac, the third, was a man-
ufacturer in Fairfield, and during the Revolutionary War
served as a Lieutenant. He married Abigail Gould,
daughter of Colonel Abraham Gould, a descendant of
Major Nathan Gould, or Gold, one of the early settlers of
Connecticut. Isaac, grandfather of Frederic, was a noted
physician and author of "Medical Reform," 'The Philoso-
phy of Human Life," The Tree of Life," and "Ortho-
pathy." He married Anne, daughter of Eliakim Beach, of
Trumbull, Connecticut.
Frederic Beach Jennings was prepared for college in
his native town, and was graduated from Williams College
in 1872. He was graduated from the Dane Law School
of Harvard University with the degree of LL. B. in 1 874,
and from the New York University Law School in 1875,
taking at his graduation first prize for the best essay. The
same year he was admitted to practice, and entered the
law firm of Evarts, Southmayd & Choate. He established
the firm of Jennings & Russell in 1 880, and consolidated,
in 1 894, the firm of Stetson, Jennings & Russell.
Mr. Jennings was general counsel for the Associated
Press, the International Paper Company and the Erie Rail-
193
194 HISTORICAL REGISTER
road. He represented the Associated Press in its litigation
against the International News Service, a Hearst organiza-
tion, for pirating news. In this now famous case the
United States Supreme Court, in December, 1918, upheld
the contention of the Associated Press, and permanently
enjoined the International from pirating, in what was re-
garded as the most sweeping decision ever rendered, es-
tablishing the property right in news.
He was a director of the Erie Railroad, American
Trading Company, Atlantic Coast Steamship Company,
Continental Paper Bag Company, International Paper
Company, St. Maurice Lumber Company, Umbagog Paper
Company and the Piercefield Paper Company. He was
president of the First National Bank of North Bennington,
and of the Long Dock Company, and a trustee of the New
York Trust Company, the Provident Loan Society and
Williams and Barnard Colleges.
He was a member and one of the Executive Commit-
tee of the Bar Association, and a member of the Univer-
sity, Union League, Metropolitan, Century, Jekyl Island,
New York Athletic, City and Down Town Clubs; Mid-
day, Garden City and St. Andrew's Golf Clubs and West-
chester Country Club, the New England Society, Century
Association, and president of Delta Kappa Epsilon and the
Mount Anthony Country Club. He received the degree
of LL. D. from Middlebury College.
He married, in 1 880, Lila Hall Park, daughter of
Trenor William Park, and granddaughter of Governor
Hiland Park, of Vermont, a descendant of Richard Park,
who came to this country from Hadleigh, Suffolk, Eng-
land, in 1630. John Hall, her maternal Puritan ancestor,
was one of the first settlers of Middletown, Connecticut.
Mr. and Mrs. Jennings had four children : Percy Hall,
FREDERIC BEACH JENNINGS 195
Elizabeth, wife of George Small Franklin; Frederic Beach,
Jr., and Edward Phelps Jennings.
Mr. Jennings died May 26th, 1 920. The Executive
Committee of the Board of Directors of the Associated
Press, in session assembled, have learned with profound
grief of the death of Mr. Frederic B. Jennings, general
counsel of this organization. Mr. Jennings has served
with distinguished ability and efficiency in this capacity
for more than twenty years, and has won alike the ad-
miration and affectionate regard of his associates. We
recognize the great loss which the Associated Press has
sustained, a loss which in even larger measure has fallen
upon the legal profession and his fellow-citizens."
John Henry Bradley
OHN HENRY BRADLEY was bora at Marshall,
Michigan, June 5th, 1845; son of Edward
Bradley and Ellen Louise Bradley. His father
was Associate Judge of the Court of Common
Pleas of Ontario County, New York, until 1 839, when he
removed to Michigan and became one of the leading
lawyers of the State. He was a member of the Senate in
1842, and was elected to Congress in 1847. On his ma-
ternal side he was a descendant of Governor Mayhew, of
Martha's Vineyard Island.
John Henry Bradley was educated at Battle Creek,
Michigan, and at the age of seventeen entered the employ
of the American Express Company, where he remained
for fifty-three years continuous service, retiring in 1915.
He entered the employ of the company in the capacity of
a general assistant and gradually worked his way through
the numerous ranks until he reached the position of traffic
manager of the Western Department, from which time on
he exercised supervision over the traffic situation in all
territory west of Buffalo. In 1 898 he was appointed gen-
eral traffic manager, and in 1909 was elected vice-presi-
dent and director of the company.
He was one of the seven honorary members of the
American Railway Guild, and was the representative of
the express companies at the International Railway Con-
gress held in Washington in 1905. Mr. Bradley's active
participation and progressive advancement in the molding
and growth of the express system in pace with the needs
of the country, his striking familiarity with every phase
196
JOHN HENRY BRADLEY 197
and advantage of the system, and his happy personality
caused him to be the expounder of the method and service
of the express utility.
His work directly benefitted the attitude of public
officials toward a comprehension of the evolution and
modern requirements of the business. In 1916, Mr.
Bradley was again called into active service as vice-presi-
dent, and made a tour through South America to plan an
extension of the company's sphere.
Mr. Bradley was a member of the Board of Trustees
of St. John's Riverdale Hospital, a life member of the
Union League Club of Chicago, and an honorary mem-
ber of the American Railway Association.
He married, in 1869, Sophia P. Robinson, of
Marshall, Michigan, a descendant of the Rev. John Robin-
son, who came over on the Mayflower. Mr. and Mrs.
Bradley had five children: Mrs. A. J. Smith and Mrs. W.
B. Bliss, Jr., of Yonkers, N. Y., and Ralph R. and James
C. F. Bradley, of Chicago, 111., and Florence Bradley, who
died at the age of nine years.
Mr. Bradley died January 18th, 1920. He possessed
extraordinary business instinct and perception, a well
trained mind, versed in matters financial and legal. He
was entirely genuine and sincere, a man whose friend-
ship was highly valued by all who possessed it. He
was generous with his money, and charitable in his
thoughts, and in the expression of his opinions. He was,
as well, a man with great strength of character and tenacity
of purpose.
John Lyon Gardiner
OHN LYON GARDINER was born on Gardiner
Island, July 26th, 1841; son of Samuel Buel
and Mary Thompson Gardiner. The first of
the family in this country, Lion Gardiner, was
born in Yorkshire, England, in 1 599. He received more
than an ordinary education, and at an early age gave evi-
dence of independence of thought and action. He was
trained as a military engineer and joined the English army
in Holland. He received an appointment as "An Engineer
and Master of Works of the Fort" in the Leaguers of the
Prince of Orange in the Low Countries. This was a posi-
tion that required professional skill and technical knowl-
edge; Lion Gardiner proved that he possessed both. Cer-
tain Colonists needing such a man urged him to accept an
office under them to construct and assume command of
forts they wished to build. It required considerable per-
suasion because he had married a Dutch girl, Mary Wilam-
son Duercant, daughter of Derike Wilamson Duercant and
Hachin Bastavis, and had a career before him in Holland.
Finally he accepted. His salary was to be 1 00 pounds per
annum, including transportation and subsistence for him-
self and family, and his contract was to run for four years.
It was signed by John Winthrop, the younger, for the
Colonists.
Gardiner and family reached Boston in November,
1635. He was immediately sent to build a fort at Fort
Hill, and the Colonists contemplated having him build
another at Salem. When Gardiner went to Salem he
found that village in penury, and he reported to the Boston
198
JOHN LYON GARDINER 199
elders that Salem was in danger of starvation and needed
material help more than a fort.
Gardiner then went to the mouth of the Connecticut
and built the first fort ever reared in that wilderness. It
was constructed of square hewn timber, with a palisade
and ditch. The fort was named Saybrook, after Lord Say
and Lord Brooke. The work was performed amid tre-
mendous difficulties. Surrounded by tribes of hostile
Indians, the Pequots, Narragansetts and Mohegans, it was
by the rule of dividing and ruling that Gardiner found it
possible to keep his men at work. Other enemies har-
rassed the Colonists, among whom were the Dutch of New
Amsterdam, who claimed the land as their own.
In these perplexing affairs Gardiner displayed cour-
age, wisdom and knowledge of human nature. He made
friends of two tribes of Indians, enabling him to hold in
check the ominous Pequots. He had also to undo the
faults of the Commissioners from Massachusetts, who
were present to overlook the work and by their irritable
attitude involved the builders with the Indians. Finally
the storm which had been brewing burst out, and no diplo-
macy could avail to postpone a battle. Lion Gardiner
proved to be a great warrior; he conducted the defense
himself and was almost constantly exposed to the arrows
of the Indians. On one occasion he fell, his doublet ap-
parently pierced by a score of arrows. The savages
thought they had slain their chief enemy, but greatly to
their chagrin he appeared the next day at the head of his
little band of defenders and drove the Indians away. Two
"great guns" that he caused to be fired on this, the third,
day of the assault, gave the Indians a great fright.
Gardiner reported to Governor Vane that there
would be no security on the Connecticut border until the
200 HISTORICAL REGISTER
Pequots were conquered. The Governor wrote back in
scriptural phrase, telling him to "smite the Pequots." The
Massachusetts Governor sent twenty armed men to rein-
force the garrison and Gardiner proceeded to carry out
his plans of exterminating the tribe. He made friends
with the Narragansetts and Mohegans and led a force of
his settlers in combination with these warriors against the
Pequots at Mystic, on the Thames River, himself in su-
preme command. The expedition was a complete success,
and the hostile tribe was almost wiped out.
While at Saybrook Gardiner frequently had crossed
to Long Island and made friends with Wyandanch, chief
of the Montauks. In 1639, as a result of this friendship
of Chief Wyandanch for the "White Chief Gardiner," the
latter was able to purchase for one big black dog, one gun,
powder and shot, a gallon of rum and three Dutch blankets
the island called by the Indians Manchonake. A formal
conveyance of it was made to him by Yovawan, the local
sachem, and his wife, Aswaw. Gardiner started imme-
diately to improve his land, and in the same year he re-
ceived a grant from the Royal Governor creating his
estate a manor and a lordship.
Captain Lion Gardiner died in 1 664. Among his de-
scendants are fine men and women, who have taken high
rank in the army, in business, as agriculturists, stock rais-
ers, sheep farmers, lawyers, divines, physicians, historians,
and all the members of the different generations have
borne a reputation for generosity and philanthropy.
David Gardiner, son of Lion, born at Saybrook in
1 636, was the first white child born in Connecticut. Lion's
daughter, born on Gardiner Island, was the first white child
born in New York State. David was sent to England to
be educated. He was public spirited and always in favor
JOHN LYON GARDINER 201
of the Colonies. He died in 1 689. His oldest son, John,
the third lord of the manor, was born in 1 66 1 . It was dur-
ing his reign that Captain Kidd sailed into the roadstead
of Gardiner Island on his sloop "Antonio." John Gardi-
ner paid him a visit on board and found Kidd civil and
"well behaved." Kidd had shortly before been one of the
most respected citizens of New Amsterdam. Secretly
Kidd buried some piratical treasure on Gardiner Island,
which was afterward recovered and delivered to Lord
Bellamont.
The fourth lord of the manor was David, born in
1 69 1 . He was a gentleman farmer, who gave all his time
to improving his estate. His son, John, born in 1714,
married, first, Elizabeth Mulford; and, second, Dorothy
Lothrop A very. Another David, born in 1738, was the
sixth lord; he married Jerusha Buel and had two sons.
His eldest son, John Lyon, according to the law of primo-
geniture, succeeded. He went to Princeton in 1 789, and
married Sarah Griswold, and had five children. The eld-
est of these was David Johnson, born in 1 804, who was
graduated at Yale and died unmarried.
John Griswold, born in 1812, David's brother, be-
came the ninth proprietor, and never married. The tenth
proprietor was Samuel Buel Gardiner, who married Mary
Thompson, of New York, and had four children. His eld-
est son, David Johnson, 2nd, was the eleventh lord, and
was succeeded by his brother, John Lyon, the twelfth
proprietor.
He was educated at the old East Hampton Academy,
Hopkins Grammar School, and was graduated from the
Columbia Law School. Shortly after the outbreak of the
War of the Rebellion he gave up his studies in college and
enlisted. By successive stages of promotion he was made
202 HISTORICAL REGISTER
Lieutenant-Colonel of the Sixteenth Regiment, Sixth Bri-
gade of the Second Division of the New York National
Guard, and later, in 1 868, he became Colonel of his regi-
ment. It was not until 1866 that Colonel Gardiner, re-
suming his study of the law, which was interrupted by
the war, was admitted to the Bar.
He associated himself with Colonel Alfred Wagstaff,
and formed the firm of Gardiner, Ward & Wagstaff. He
continued in the active practice of his profession until the
death of his father in 1 880, when he retired, to devote his
time to managing his magnificent island estate. Colonel
Gardiner traveled extensively and lived abroad many
years. He was a well known shot and won many contests
in the annual matches held at Monte Carlo.
He married Carolie Livingston Jones, daughter of
Oliver Jones, president of the Atlantic Mutual Insurance
Company, and Elizabeth Livingston Jones, of New York
City. Their family consisted of five children: Carolie Liv-
ingston, who married Alexander M. Cox, the noted Eng-
lish horseman; Adele Griswold, who married W. S.
Groesbeck Fowler, Lion, Winthrop and John Gardiner,
who died in 1905.
Mr. John Lyon Gardiner died January 21st, 1910.
The present head of the family is the first born son, Lion,
who is engaged in the banking business in New York. He
is the thirteenth proprietor of Gardiner's Island, the only
estate in America which has descended directly from royal
grant to the successive generations of a single family. His
sister, Mrs. Fowler, carries on the reputation of the family
for patriotism and philanthropy. During the Spanish-
American War she organized, at her own expense, a nurs-
ing bureau for the yellow fever hospitals, and herself
superintended this benevolent work.
Andrew Dickson White
NDREW DICKSON WHITE was born at
Homer, N. Y., November 7th, 1832; son of
Horace White, who was one of the pioneers
in western railroad building. For his higher
education young White went to Geneva, now Hobart Col-
lege, but after a year there he went to Yale, where the
De Forest Gold Medal was awarded to him for his oration
on "The Diplomatic History of Modern Times;" upon his
graduation, in 1853, he went abroad, studied for a year
at the Sorbonne, the College de France, and the University
of Berlin, and then went to Petrograd as an attache of the
American Legation, serving during the Crimean War.
Another year of post-graduate study followed, this time at
Yale, and then he went to the University of Michigan as
professor of history and English literature, where he es-
tablished a wide reputation for his work.
In 1860 his father died, and the responsibilities of
the estate left to him led him presently to return to New
York, and settle at Syracuse, though he held the position
of lecturer at Michigan until 1867. Dr. White became ac-
tive in Republican politics, and was a member of the State
Senate from 1863 to 1867, devoting himself especially to
the preparation of measures for better common schools,
to the organization of the State normal schools, and to
pushing through the charter for Cornell University.
Cornell University was founded in 1865, bearing the
name of Ezra Cornell, an older man of Quaker birth and
breeding, who shared Mr. White's enthusiasm for a new
university. The two men had been thrown together in
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204 HISTORICAL REGISTER
the New York State Senate, in the discussion of the act
passed by Congress in 1 862 for the endowment of higher
educational institutions throughout the country by grants
of public land. New York was thus to come into posses-
sion of nearly a million acres.
When the offer was made by Mr. Cornell of $500,000
for the endowment of a great university, if the State would
transfer to it the public land and would locate the institu-
tion in his own town of Ithaca, and when the offer was
accepted, it was the young Mr. White who, after his serv-
ices in the Senate as one of the founders, was invited to
become the first president of Cornell. During his admin-
istration he personally contributed $300,000 to the needs
of the institution, and later founded the school of history
and political science bearing his name, giving to it his
historical library of thirty or forty thousand volumes. In
his autobiography Dr. White says that in the founding
and maintaining of Cornell University, he thinks he did
his best work. "By the part I have taken in that," he
wrote, "more than any other work of my life, I hope to be
judged." His interest in the establishment of a new uni-
versity came largely through revolt against the conserva-
tive sectarian influences and restricted curriculum of other
institutions. The idea seized him during the Civil War
period, when he was a professor of history in the University
of Michigan. His aim was a great American university,
"where any person could find instruction in any study."
"It should begin," he said, "by taking hold of the chief
interest of the country, which is agriculture, and should
rise step by step until it met all the wants of the hour."
In his presidency of Cornell he also assumed the duties of
professor of history, and used his influence successfully
in attracting Goldwin Smith, James Russell Lowell,
ANDREW DICKSON WHITE 205
George William Curtis, Bayard Taylor and other able men
to service at Ithaca.
Dr. White kept up his interest in politics, and in 1 87 1
was one of a commission sent by President Grant to study
conditions in Santo Domingo. In 1 879 he obtained leave
to serve as Minister to Germany, and he held that post
until 1 88 1 . In 1 885 he resigned as president of Cornell,
and for the next few years spent most of his time in
Europe. President Cleveland, in 1 887, offered him a place
on the Interstate Commerce Commission; he refused, but
five years later he again entered public life as President
Harrison's appointee as Minister to Russia. He remained
there until 1894. In 1896 Mr. White was appointed by
President Cleveland on the Venezuela Boundary Commis-
sion, and in the following year President McKinley sent
him as Ambassador to Germany. He was serving there
when the Spanish-American War was fought.
Dr. White served as president of the American del-
egation to the first Hague Peace Conference in 1 899. His
public life closed in 1902 with his retirement from the
German embassy, and he spent the remainder of his years
at Ithaca.
Dr. White was first married to Miss Mary A. Out-
water, who died in 1887. Three years later he married
Miss Helen Magill, daughter of President Magill, of
Swarthmore College, and herself a scholar of considerable
attainments.
He was an officer of the Legion of Honor; the recipi-
ent of the Royal Gold Medal from the Prussian Academy
of Sciences in 1902; first president of the American His-
torical Association in 1 884 ; a member of the American
Social Science Association, the American Philosophical
Society, the American Academy of Arts and Letters; a
206 HISTORICAL REGISTER
regent of the Smithsonian Institute for thirty years; a
trustee of the Carnegie Institute, of the Carnegie Endow-
ment for Peace, of Cornell University and of Hobart
College.
In all the advantages of wide travel he enjoyed, Dr.
White pursued systematically his historical study, and was
the author of numerous historical works, particularly in-
terpreting European history to American readers. He was
recognized as a thinker of great directness and force. His
"History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in
Christiandom," his "Seven Great Statesmen in the War-
fare of Humanity with Unreason," his "Fiat Money in
France," and his autobiography are the most important of
his historical books. He was among those who firmly be-
lieved in the establishment of an international tribunal of
permanent working value, and he hoped that the European
war, deeply though it grieved him, might lead to that end.
He died November 4th, 1918.
Samuel Dwight Brewster
IAMUEL DWIGHT BREWSTER was born in
Bowling Green, Ohio, August 6th, 1 85 1 ;
son of Sydney Lyman and Catherine Evers
Brewster. He was a direct descendant of
Elder William Brewster, the leader of the "Mayflower"
pilgrims who landed in Cape Cod Harbor, November 1 1 th,
1620, and settled at Plymouth; and of William Bradford,
first Governor of the Colony; John Howland, the pilgrim
and historian, and other noted New England men, among
whom are William Collier, John Lyman, Christopher
Wads worth, John Stebbins, William Phelps, Andrew New-
combe and Francis Peabody.
Samuel Dwight Brewster, after completing his educa-
tion, came to New York, February 1 st, 1871, and entered
the mercantile house of P. Van Volkenburg & Company.
In 1885 he became associated with Deering, Milliken &
Company, and, in 1892, was admitted to partnership in
that firm. He was prominently identified with the estab-
lishment and development of cotton mills throughout the
country; particularly in South Carolina and Alabama,
where his unerring judgment assisted materially in de-
veloping the Southern cotton industry to a high state of
efficiency. Mr. Brewster continued to take an active part
in the affairs of the firm until his death.
He was Deputy Governor of the Mayflower Society,
and a member of the Society of Colonial Wars, Sons of
the Revolution, Huguenot Society, New England Society,
Asiatic Society, Order of Colonial Governors, Union
League Club, New York Yacht Club, Nassau Country
207
208 HISTORICAL REGISTER
Club, International Garden Club, the New York Histori-
cal Society, and the Merchant's Club, of which he was one
time president.
He married, April 19th, 1893, Isabel Erskine Parks,
daughter of Robert Hall and Isabel Erskine Parks, who
survives him. He also leaves two sons, Sydney Erskine
Brewster and Warren Dwight Brewster.
Mr. Brewster died January 8th, 1 920. Though un-
identified with public life, in the eyes of all his friends he
was a great man. Unassuming, yet always coming to the
fore when the occasion required, steadfast in his every
purpose and the following of his ideals, thorough in his
every undertaking, generous, helpful and sound in judg-
ment, he was loved and admired by all who knew him.
Thomas Thacher
HOMAS THACHER was born in New Haven,
Connecticut, May 3rd, 1850; son of Thomas
Anthony and Elizabeth Day Thacher. His
father was for almost half a century a professor
at Yale College. His maternal grandfather, Jeremiah Day,
was president of Yale from 1817 to 1 846. Robert Day,
the first of the family in this country, was one of the
founders of Hartford, Connecticut. His first paternal an-
cestor, Thomas Thacher, was the first minister of the Old
South Church, in Boston, and his father, Peter Thacher,
was rector of the Parish of St. Edmunds, in Salisbury,
England. The Thacher family came to this country in
1635 and settled in Weymouth and Boston.
Thomas Thacher was educated at the Webster Public
School, Hopkins Grammar School, and was graduated
from Yale College with the B. A. degree, in 1871. He
taught for one year in the Hopkins Grammar School;
spent a year in graduate study at Yale, and then entered
the Columbia Law School, where he was graduated with
the degree of LL. B. in 1875.
His first legal work was to collaborate with Ashbel
Green in the preparation of Green's Brice's "Ultra Vires,"
a book which became a standard American work on cor-
poration law. He was associated with Judge Green in the
office of Alexander & Green, and then became attorney
for one of the largest mortgage companies. This connec-
tion brought him wide experience in the real estate law
of the Western States.
Since January 1 st, 1 884, he had been a partner in the
209
210 HISTORICAL REGISTER
successive firms of Simpson, Thacher & Barnum; Reed,
Simpson, Thacher & Barnum; Simpson, Thacher, Barnum
& Bartlett, and Simpson, Thacher & Bartlett.
Mr. Thacher was actively engaged in important work
dealing with railroad foreclosures and reorganizations, and
in the preparation of new business consolidations. In the
organization of the Brooklyn Union Gas Company, the
American Smelting and Refining Company, the Republic
Iron and Steel Company, the American Sheet Steel Com-
pany, the American Steel Hoop Company, the American
Car Company, the American Locomotive Company, the
Railway Steel Spring Company, and other large consolida-
tions, the legal work was largely done by him.
A brief review of some important cases in which he
figured is necessary to give an idea of Mr. Thacher's truly
remarkable activity in his profession. Among them was
the well known Hocking Valley case, submitted originally
to the determination of James C. Carter, of New York,
and Lawrence Maxwell and E. W. Kitridge, of Ohio. In
the cases of Gale against the Chase National Bank, and
Ward against the City Trust Company, he went to the
foundation of the rule that the presumption of authority
of a corporate official ceases when the transaction in which
he acts for the corporation discloses an interest of his own.
In the American Tobacco Company case, Mr. Thacher
filed a brief in the Supreme Court of the United States
upon the fundamental question involved. He concisely
and convincingly combated the proposition that the prior
decisions of the Supreme Court necessitated a determina-
tion that any restriction or limitation of competition was
an unlawful restraint of trade under the Sherman Act.
Mr. Thacher had maintained for years that the Supreme
Court of the United States must ultimately adopt as the
test of the lawfulness of an association of men the effect
THOMAS THACHER 2 1 1
of that association and the acts done under it upon the
public interest, and that a negligible restraint of competi-
tion could not condemn an otherwise useful association.
The United States Supreme Court finally accepted this
view. In the case of Russel against the American Gas and
Electric Company he helped to clarify the law as to the
right of holders of preferred stock to share in the stock-
holders' "right of pre-emption" in new issues of stock. In
the American Smelting and Refining Company against
Colorado in the United States Supreme Court, the Court
followed Mr. Thacher's contention that a State statute re-
quiring a corporation to pay consideration for a license to
do business within a State, and the corporation's compli-
ance therewith, precluded the imposition of further bur-
dens upon corporations for the right to do business in that
State. He loved brevity, and his papers were prepared in
disregard of forms which had been used before.
Mr. Thacher was a Republican, and was a member
of the University, Yale, Century, City, Midday and Rail-
road Clubs of New York, and of the Graduates' Club of
New Haven. He was president of the Yale Alumni Asso-
ciation, in New York, from 1895 to 1897, and of the New
York Yale Club from 1 897 to 1 904. He was president of
the University Club from 1913 to 1918. He was a mem-
ber of the Alumni Fund Association, and of the Alumni
Advisory Board. He was vice-president of the New York
City Bar Association from 1907 to 1909.
He attended all of his Yale class reunions except that
of 1 906, when he was detained in New York by the trial of
an important case. His devotion to the interests of Yale
was one of the leading factors of his life. In college he
had been a member of Delta Kappa, Phi Theta Psi, Psi
Upsilon, Brothers in Unity, Skull and Bones, and had won
the key of Phi Beta Kappa.
212 HISTORICAL REGISTER
He was considered an authority on corporation laws.
His writings include "Construction," Yale Law Journal;
"Corporations at Home and Abroad," Columbia Law Re-
view, June, 1902; "Incorporation," Yale Law Journal;
"Federal Control of Corporations," Yale Law Journal;
"Limits of Constitutional Law," Yale Law Journal; ad-
dress on "Yale in Relation to the Law," delivered at the
Yale bi-centennial ; address on "Referendum to the Courts
of Legislation," before the New York State Bar Associa-
tion, June, 1903; "Corporations and the States," Yale
Law Journal, December, 1907; "Legislation by Commis-
sion," North American Review, April, 1907; "Corpora-
tions and the Nation," Yale Law Journal, February, 1909;
"Corporate Powers," Columbia Law Review, March,
1909; "New Tariff and the Sherman Act," North Ameri-
can Review, April, 1909.
He received the degree of LL. D. from Yale Univer-
sity in 1903. Mr. Thacher was a pioneer in the develop-
ment of Watch Hill, Rhode Island, and maintained his
summer home there for many years.
He married, December 1st, 1880, Sarah McCulloh
Green, daughter of Ashbel and Louisa B. Walker, of
Tenafly, New Jersey. Mr. and Mrs. Thacher had four
children: Thomas Day Thacher, Mrs. Theodore Ives
Driggs, Mrs. Lewis Martin Richmond, and Miss Elizabeth
Thacher.
Mr. Thacher died July 30th, 1920. He was a great
lawyer and a great citizen. He was genial and kindly,
warm hearted, frank, sympathetic, always giving more
than he received. In his forty-five years at the Bar he saw
a great transformation in the economic life of the country,
and he played a large part in the analysis of the law, ap-
plicable to these ever-changing conditions.
H. C. CHRISTIANSON
Harry Conrad Christiansen
ARRY CONRAD CHRISTIANSON was born
in New York City, February 7th, 1868; son of
Ernest Lauritz Anton and Anna Christine
Narvasen Christiansen. His father came to
New York from Aalborg, Denmark, in November, 1 859,
and for more than thirty-five years has been connected
with the Massachusetts Mutual Fire Insurance Company.
He was made Knight of Danneborg by King Frederick
VIIL, September 10th, 1907.
His ancestors were prominent in the affairs of Den-
mark. In the fifth century, Peder Aagesen Torup, free-
holder, of Simested, Denmark, married Gertrude Peders-
datter. Their son, Mogens Pedersen, freeholder, of Skin-
drup, Denmark, married Kirsten Krestensdatter. Their
son, Jep Mogensen, freeholder, of Simested, Denmark,
married Karen Uielsdatter. Their son, Niels Jepsen (or
Jacobsen) born 1556, died 1624, mayor of Randers, Den-
mark, married Maren Pedersdatter Lassen. Their son,
Soren Nielson Hoffman, born 1 600, died 1 649, court phy-
sician to King Christian IV. He was named for his
mother's first husband, an Englishman, of the name of
Howman. He married Gertrude Pedersdatter. Their son,
Thoger Hoffman, born 1 648, died 1 692, proprietor of
Gunderupsaard, married Karen de Hemmer. Their son,
Soren Hoffman, born 1688, died 1771, en-nobled January
29th, 1 749, "de Hoffman," chancellor of justice, proprie-
tor of Skerrildgaard, married Karen Elizabeth Dreyer.
Their son, Jane de Hoffman, born 1716, died 1785, pro-
prietor of Kaasgaard, judge of the Supreme Court, mar-
213
214 HISTORICAL REGISTER
ried Ingeborg Bjerring. Their daughter, Karen Elizabeth
de Hoffman, born 1747, died 1821, in 1767 married her
cousin, Captain Ernest Halchius, later Lieutenant-Colonel,
who was born 1743, died 1806; en-nobled November
1 5th, 1 780, with the name "de Hoffman." In 1 767 he
purchased Aabjergsgaard, in Vedderso Parish, and in 1 800
he sold this place and removed to Viborg. They had
twelve children, of whom the youngest, Matthias de Hoff-
man, was born October 20th, 1 782, at Aabjergsgaard, died
March 23rd, 1 829, in Aalborg. He was a merchant in
Aalborg. In 1 8 1 0 he married Charlotte Catherine Deich-
man, born December 23rd, 1788, died June 2nd, 1823, in
Aalborg. She was a daughter of Hendrik Deichman, a
merchant, of Aalborg, and was born 1 747, and died 1 797.
Of their seven daughters, Ernestine Henriette de Hoffman,
was born April 10th, 1812, in Aalborg, died July 15th,
1853, in Copenhagen; married, November 28th, 1834, as
second wife, Jens Christian Christiansen, born May 5th,
1 796, died August 1 4th, 1 860, in Copenhagen. Proprie-
tor of Kearsmolle. His first wife was Caroline Annette
Winkel, who died 1833, and their son was Ernest Lauritz
Anton Christianson.
Harry Conrad Christianson received his education in
the public schools of New York City, and at the College
of the City of New York. After leaving college he be-
came associated with the firm of H. L. Hobart & Com-
pany. In a short time he was made a partner in the firm,
and later on acquired the controlling interest and changed
the name of the firm to H. C. Christianson & Company,
jobbers and dealers in sugar.
His career in the sugar business extended over a
period of thirty-five years, and during that period he made
and retained many real friendships, as his personality was
HARRY CONRAD CHRISTIANSON 215
such that he readily attracted cordial relations at once. Mr.
Christiansen was one whose opinion and ideas were much
sought after, as his experience in sugar was wide and
varied, and practically covered all branches of the industry.
In the fullness of his experience in sugar — manufacturing
as well as commercial — he was always generous with his
advice and counsel, and many firms have often profited by
his knowledge of sugar conditions.
During the difficult conditions of the sugar market,
following the World War, he was called upon by buyers
and sellers to arbitrate questions of rates and contracts,
and its excessive labors in this regard are believed to have
brought on his fatal illness. He was a close friend and
associate of H. O. Havemeyer. Mr. Christiansen had been
for a number of years a resident of Ridgewood, New
Jersey.
During the activities of the World War he was par-
ticularly patriotic, not only in a financial way in furthering
the activities of the village authorities at a time when the
village was apparently facing a serious situation without
financial means to meet it, but also his contributions to as-
sociations connected with the war's activities, and also to
the citizens as individuals, through whose assistance the
distribution of approximately twenty-five thousand pounds
of sugar was made possible at a time when the article was
beyond the reach of the average household.
He was always willing to help in a financial way in-
stitutions which he felt were worthy of assistance, and
his financial assistance to individuals was handled in such
a manner that their benefactor was unknown to them.
He was a prominent member of the Masonic fra-
ternity.
He married, June 24th, 1 890, Harriette Grace Lewis,
216 HISTORICAL REGISTER
daughter of William Bartlett Lewis, and Clara Dewey
Arrell, who is the daughter of the late Reverend John and
Clarette Dewey (Sherman) Arrell, all of New York City.
She is a member of the Society of the Mayflower Descend-
ants in New York State, and of the Daughters of the Revo-
lution, being descended from Philip Sherman, the first
treasurer of Rhode Island, on the maternal side, and from
Robert Cushman, Isaac Allerton and Colonel Leonard
Lewis on the paternal side.
Mr. Christianson died November 17th, 1920. He
won his own way to success by his broadness of vision,
his constructive policies, and his genius for business de-
velopment. He was kindly, lovable, gracious. He had
charm of manner and voice, and infinite tact. He liked
men, and men liked him. No appeal to his fairness or
generosity found him unresponsive. He delighted in a
quiet helpfulness to the individual and an unobtrusive
service to the community. In his death the sugar trade
loses one whom it will be hard to replace, and to many of
the trade his death cannot be felt as other than a deep
personal loss.
Julien Tappan Davies
ULIEN TAPPAN DAVIES was born in New
York City, September 25th, 1845; son of
Henry E. and Rebecca Waldo Tappan Davies.
He was descended from Robert Davies, of
Gwysang Castle, high sheriff of Flintshire, who was de-
scended from Cymric Efell, Lord of Eylwys Eyle, in the
Thirteenth Century.
The first American ancestor, John Davies, came to
this country from Kinton, Hertfordshire, in 1735, and set-
tled in Litchfield, Connecticut. He was one of the found-
ers and benefactors of St. Michael's Church. On his ma-
ternal side he traces his descent to the Quincys, Salisburys,
Wendells, the famous Anneke Jans, and to John Hull, the
master of the mint and treasurer of Massachusetts, who
coined the pine tree shillings. The first of the Tappan
family in this country, Abraham Tappan, came to Amer-
ica in 1 630. Benjamin Tappan and John Foote were both
Revolutionary soldiers, and Arthur and Lewis Tappan
were prominent in the abolition movement.
Henry E. Davies was long prominent in public life.
He was an alderman in 1840, corporation counsel in 1850,
justice of the Supreme Court in 1 856, and in 1 860 a judge
and afterward chief justice of the Court of Appeals.
Julien Tappan Davies was educated at Mount Wash-
ington College Institute, the Walnut Hill School, Geneva;
the Charlier Institute, and was graduated from Columbia
College with the B. A. degree in 1 866, and A. M. in 1 869,
and from the Columbia College Law School with the de-
gree of LL. B. in 1 868.
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218 HISTORICAL REGISTER
During the Civil War he enlisted, with his brother,
William G., in the Twenty-second Regiment of the Na-
tional Guard of the State of New York, and was mustered
into the United States Army in June, 1863, and served in
the Pennsylvania campaign of that year.
His preceptor in the law was the Honorable Alexan-
der W. Bradford, and in 1867 he formed a partnership
with Richard M. Harrison. In 1 884 he succeeded David
Dudley Field, as general counsel of the Manhattan Rail-
way Company. The conduct of the Manhattan Railway
Company involving damages claimed by property owners
for deprivation of or injury to their rights of light, air and
access, and extending over a period of more than twenty
years, was the most extensive litigation on a single sub-
ject in the history of the law. One of the most important
land marks in this litigation was the victory of the railway
company won by Mr. Davies in the famous Story case,
decided by the New York Court of Appeals.
When the firm of Grant & Ward failed, he was made
assignee and afterwards receiver. He was one of the or-
ganizers of the Title Guarantee and Trust Company, in
1 88 1 , and served as its vice-president for two years.
He won much distinction among his colleagues by his
compilation of the statutes relating to taxation and assess-
ments, which he prepared for the Senate Committee on
Taxation and Retrenchment. He held the office of presi-
dent of the Tax Reform Association of New York. He
was senior member of the firm of Davies, Stone & Auer-
bach, afterwards Davies, Auerbach & Cornell, and was
general solicitor for the Mutual Life Insurance Company,
1 905-6. He assisted, in 1871, in forming the Young
Men's Municipal Association, and was chairman of the
Executive Committee of the Campaign of Judge Scott for
Mayor of New York City.
JULIEN TAPPAN DAVIES 219
He was president of St. David's Society, the Colum-
bia College Alumni Association, and one of the vice-presi-
dents of the Association of the Bar of the City of New
York. He was a trustee of the Mutual Life Insurance
Company, the Title Guarantee and Trust Company, the
Bond and Mortgage Guarantee Company, and the Saint
George School at Newport, Rhode Island. He was a mem-
ber of the American Bar Association, the New York State
Bar Association, Association of the Bar of the City of New
York, New York Historical Society, American Geographi-
cal Society, the Board of Managers of the Foreign and
Domestic Missions Society of the Protestant Episcopal
Church, and the James Monroe Post, Grand Army of the
Republic. He was a member of the Union League, Uni-
versity, Metropolitan, Southside Sportsmen's, Church,
Riding, City, New York Yacht, and Tuxedo Clubs.
He married, April 22nd, 1 869, Alice Martin, daugh-
ter of Henry Hull and Anna Townsend Martin, of Albany,
New York. They had six children ; one daughter survives,
Mrs. Archibald Gourlay Thacher.
Mr. Davies died May 6th, 1 920. He possessed force,
a superior intellect, and purity of character. His great
usefulness in many fields made the world his debtor. He
adorned and en-nobled the American Bar.
Eben Dyer Jordan
BEN DYER JORDAN was born in Boston, No-
vember 7th, 1857; son of Eben Dyer and Julia
Clark Jordan. He was descended from the
Reverend Robert Jordan, who came from
England to this country in 1 640, and settled at Spurwink,
Cumberland County, Maine. His father was a noted mer-
chant ; one of the founders of Jordan, Marsh & Company,
and a public spirited citizen.
Eben Dyer Jordan attended Phillips School, and was
prepared for Harvard at the Adams Academy. He then
made his first tour abroad by way of rounding out his edu-
cation. Upon his return he entered Harvard College, in
1 876, as a member of the class of 1 880 — now famous as
the Theodore Roosevelt Class. He was made captain of
the Freshmen eleven, and when the Harvard Varsity
eleven played McGill University, of Montreal, Captain
Jordan, while yet a freshman, played on the 'varsity team
and won his "H."
After leaving college he entered his father's mercan-
tile house as a clerk, and was soon advanced to foreign
buyer. In this latter position he acquired a thorough and
comprehensive knowledge of the world's markets. In
1 880 he was made a member of the firm, and in 1 895 he
became the head of the house of Jordan, Marsh & Com-
pany.
Mr. Jordan from childhood had been a lover of art,
and his collection of paintings is among the finest in the
United States. Among his most treasured pictures was
one he purchased with his own savings when he was six-
teen years old.
220
EBEN DYER JORDAN 221
One of the keenest disappointments of Mr. Jordan's
life was the failure of his efforts to make Boston one of the
grand opera centers of America. He expended a fortune
in the construction of a magnificent opera house in the
Back Bay and financed the organization of an opera com-
pany composed of the best artists of the world, but after
several seasons the company was forced to abandon the
undertaking.
Mr. Jordan was responsible for the establishment of
the New England Conservatory of Music, of Boston, and
until it was able to become self-supporting was its financial
sponsor. He was also a director of the Metropolitan Opera
Company, of New York, and an honorary director of the
Royal Opera, London.
Mr. Jordan was a lover of fine horses; he imported
and bred some of the best horses of the hackney type in
America. He became one of the leading exhibitors at the
horse shows in Boston, New York, Philadelphia and
Chicago. The pre-eminence of his entries was attested by
his collection of blue ribbons and other trophies, number-
ing over twelve hundred. In the gentlemen's classes he
drove his own entries and displayed a fine quality of
horsemanship.
Mr. Jordan was a great hunter, and to gratify his
fondness for shooting under the most ideal conditions, he
leased, in 1895, Inverary Castle, on Lock Tyne, Scotland,
the historic abode of the successive dukes of Argyll. Here,
amid the wraiths of the old Campbell chieftains, he en-
tertained his friends during the hunting season. Subse-
quently, after a season at Glencoe House, in 1911, the
property of Lord Strathmore, Mr. Jordan leased Drum-
mond Castle, at Crieff , for two seasons. In 1913 he leased
Invercauld Castle. Another favorite sporting resort was
222 HISTORICAL REGISTER
the Santee Club, situated at the mouth of the Santee River,
in South Carolina. Mr. Jordan was the original Boston
member.
He was one of the owners of the "Boston Globe,"
and director of the Boston Dry Goods Company. He was
a member of the Essex County, Art, Country, Santee,
Algonquin, Eastern Yacht, Puritan, and Exchange Clubs.
He married, November 23rd, 1883, May Sheppard,
of Philadelphia, and had two children: Robert Jordan and
Mrs. Monroe Douglas Robinson.
He died August 1st, 1916. Endowed with a won-
derfully attractive and commanding personality, Mr. Jor-
dan had the gift of winning the affection of his great army
of employees and the esteem of all who met him. The
universal range of his information, the clarity and deci-
siveness of his views made even those who met him but
casually feel that they were in the presence of a leader of
men. A truly versatile sportsman, Mr. Jordan was able to
reserve a part of his time to be devoted to the wholesome
outdoor sports in which he loved to participate. His was
a full and busy life.
Blither Kountze
[UTHER KOUNTZE was born at Osnaburg,
near Canton, Ohio, October 29th, 1841; son
of Christian Kountze, who was born at Bur-
kersdorf, Saxony, April 5th, 1795, and died
January 24th, 1 866, and of Margaret Zerbe, born at Osna-
burg in 1807, and died February 23rd, 1887. His mother
was a daughter of Jacob Zerbe of old Dutch stock. The
family came to this country in the late Seventeenth and
early Eighteenth Centuries, from Palatinate and Alsace.
The name was originally spelled sixteen different ways,
such as "Sevier," "Sarva," etcetra. Like the Huguenots,
the Palatines, and many Alsatians, brutal treatment caused
their removal to Holland and London, and finally to
America. The records show they were volunteers, in
1701, in the expedition against Montreal for the defense
of Albany, N. Y. John Penn contemplated, upon return-
ing from Europe, to give them title to property in Pennsyl-
vania, but as his plans failed, in his absence, his son, James
Penn, in 1732, gave them title to lands in Berks County,
from which county Schuylkill County was formed after-
wards. The records also show that members of the family
fought through all of the Indian and Colonial, as well as
the French and Revolutionary Wars, and many members
of the family taking the oath of allegiance in Mil . Jacob
Zerbe married Barbara Schaeffer, who came from Pal-
atinate, arriving in this country via Holland and England,
in 1 738, on the ship "Robert and Alice." The first of the
family in this country was Alexander Schaeffer. The
Schaeffer family, like the Zerbe family, was prominent in
223
224 HISTORICAL REGISTER
the development of Lebanon County for more than one
hundred years.
Christian Kountze was the son of Johann Michael
Kountze, who was judge in his native town in Saxony, to
which position he was elected for life. The family had
been prominent in the establishment of the Reformation
of I 524, and a number of them had been ministers of the
Lutheran Church. The last surviving member of the fam-
ily in Germany was a college professor in the city of
Meerana, Saxony.
Christian Kountze learned the trade of lace weaver,
serving from his fourteenth to his seventeenth year as an
apprentice in his trade, when, according to an old custom,
he went forth as a journeyman weaver, traveling in the
principal cities, such as Vienna, Berlin, Dresden and
Copenhagen, Denmark. In 1816 he came to the United
States. For a number of years he worked at different lines
of business, later settling in Pittsburgh, where he opened
a store. Working further West, he finally settled in
Osnaburg, in 1 824, where he married Margaret Zerbe.
He was a man of the strictest integrity, and would never
permit an employee to do anything that was not absolute-
ly upright. His word was as good as his bond, and he
raised his family on the same principles of integrity and
industry. The people of the community in which he lived
had such confidence in him that when they had money
for safe keeping or deposit they would entrust it to him
without even taking a receipt. In this way he handled
large sums of money, which he returned with interest, and
by the skilful use of this money he laid the foundation for
establishing his family, which was a large one, in com-
fortable circumstances.
LUTHER KOUNTZE 225
Luther Kountze, in 1857, went to Omaha, Neb,,
where he and his brothers, Augustus and Herman, estab-
lished the house of Kountze Brothers. This house sub-
sequently became, and still is, the First National Bank of
Omaha, being one of the oldest and strongest banks in
Nebraska.
Believing that a bright future was in store for those
who went further West, he left Omaha in 1862, and was
one of the first pioneers in Colorado, where he traded in
gold that was being dug out of the mountains of Colorado.
The same year he started a bank in Denver, and another in
Central City. His plan was to buy gold and store it and
exchange it for currency, always having in mind general
banking principles, which seemed to be inherent in the
four brothers. During the great fire in Denver, April 1 9th,
1863, he was instrumental, with Henry M. Porter, who
occupied the office with him, in rendering great assistance
to the people of Denver.
In the same year, Charles B. Kountze, a younger
brother, joined him, becoming a full partner. The Colo-
rado National Bank was organized the same year, with
Luther Kountze as president, Joseph H. Goodspeed, vice-
president, and Charles B. Kountze, cashier. The Colorado
National Bank today, like the First National Bank of
Omaha, is one of the strongest institutions in the West,
and is still controlled by the family.
In 1 866, Luther Kountze went to Europe for a more
intimate study of finance and banking, spending his time
in Paris and London. He remained abroad a year, inter-
esting himself, not only in banking, but in matters of art
and fox hunting. Returning to Denver he began to build
the Denver Pacific Railway. Soon after this he left Colo-
rado for a wider field in the East, leaving Charles B.
226 HISTORICAL REGISTER
Kountze as president of the Colorado National Bank,
which position he held up to the time of his death. Com-
ing to New York he opened an office in Wall Street and
started business under the name of Luther Kountze,
banker, in 1 868, making a study of, and dealing in bonds
and securities.
The system on which the House of Kountze was based
was unique. All four brothers were free to act in their
own field, the other brothers automatically becoming part-
ners. Luther Kountze cut out a new field for himself, but
the other brothers, whether they believed in the new work
or not, were pledged to become partners, each one shar-
ing in the profits and losses. It is a remarkable trait that
all four brothers, during their lives, never had a dispute
concerning financial transactions, their theory in business
being to trust each other, and each to work for the interests
of all. They never had a written agreement between them
during their lifetime.
Augustus Kountze removed to New York in 1 870,
joining Luther Kountze, when the firm of Kountze Broth-
ers was established in New York. In the meantime Her-
man Kountze, of Omaha, and Charles B. Kountze, of Den-
ver, continued their work of industrial development. The
firm of Kountze Brothers continued in business, two sons
of Herman Kountze moving to New York and becoming
partners. Barclay Ward Kountze, the elder son of Luther
Kountze, died August 29th, 1901, and at the time of his
death was a member of the firm. Lieutenant-Colonel de
Lancey Kountze, the younger son, was a member of the
firm until he entered the service of the United States
Army, in April, 1917, when he retired.
Mr. Kountze was a generous patron of the arts, and
one of the founders of the Metropolitan Opera House
LUTHER KOUNTZE 227
Company, being a director and stockholder up to the time
of his death; also being the first treasurer. He was a di-
rector of many institutions, among them being the Na-
tional Bank of Commerce, the United States Mortgage
and Trust Company and the International Banking Cor-
poration. He was deeply concerned in the future develop-
ment of coal properties, and for many years was interested
in coal lands in both Virginia and Kentucky. He was a
member of the Union and Metropolitan Clubs, of New
York, and was associated with hunting and country clubs,
such as Tuxedo, Westchester and Meadowbrook. He took
many trips to Europe, and was a great lover and connois-
seur of paintings, tapestries and other objets d'art. He was
especially interested in early American history, leaving a
rare collection of Americana and Washingtonia letters,
prints, furniture and furnishings.
In 1875 he married Annie Parsons Ward, daughter
of Montagnie and Susan Barclay Ward, a descendant of
Cadwallader Colden and James de Lancey, one of the
last of the Colonial governors in America. Mrs. Kountze's
family was connected, in the earliest colonial days, with
the government and administration of New York State,
being related to practically all of the prominent families
of the early days in the history of this country. Luther
Kountze's eldest son, Barclay Ward Kountze, was born
in Paris, November 27th, 1876, and died August 29th,
1 90 1 . His son, de Lancey, was born in New York, July
23rd, 1878. Helen Livingston Kountze, who married
Robert L. Livingston, was born August 1 4th, 1 88 1 , and
died February 5th, 1904. Anne Ward Kountze, now Mrs.
Williams Burden, was born March 1 7th, 1 888. Luther
Kountze moved to New Jersey in 1 88 1 , where he built
his home near Morristown, laying out the place along the
lines of a great English estate. He died April 1 7th, 1918.
Howard Taylor
OWARD TAYLOR was born in New York
City, November 23rd, 1865; son of Henry
Augustus and Catherine Osborn Taylor. The
first of the family in this country, William
Taylor, set sail from England with his brother-in-law, John
Coultman, for the Barbadoes, in 1633. About ten years
later they removed to the Colonies and were established in
Weathersfield, Connecticut, before 1 648.
His great grandson, John Taylor, moved down the
Connecticut River to Portland, in 1 721 , to the land which
has been the home of the Taylors ever since, and where
Mr. Taylor is buried. The various members of the Taylor
family have rendered distinguished service to their coun-
try, and in their different localities have been a great force
for good.
Howard Taylor was graduated from Harvard Uni-
versity with the degree of A. B., in 1886. While in col-
lege he was business editor of the Harvard "Crimson," and
took an active part in athletics. He won the National ten-
nis championship, in doubles, at Newport, in 1 888. He
was admitted to the Bar of New York in 1888. In 1891
he became junior partner in the firm of Hornblower, Byrne
& Taylor ; and in 1 899 he became the head of a firm
which is now Taylor, Jackson, Brophy & Nash.
He entered into the work of his profession with
characteristic energy and enthusiasm, and for several years
led the life of a busy and rising lawyer, being much in the
courts. With the growth of the business of his firm, and
his association with the large financial interests, he became
228
HOWARD TAYLOR 229
known as a business lawyer, acting in an advisory capac-
ity, and occasionally as a negotiator.
He was, in the best sense of the word, a lawyer free
from the taint of commercialism. To him the profession
was an art. A legal problem fascinated him in much the
same way that the finer touches of the painter's brush ap-
peal to the connoisseur. In short, its intrinsic merit meant
more to him that the mere question of result. He was
equally at home in the trial of a cause, or the argument of
an appeal. He was always thoroughly prepared. His
learning was profound and immediately available, and few
lawyers had a more accurate knowledge of the law.
In dealing with property and the business of large in-
stitutions, there is constant need to interpret charters and
statutes, to understand trusts and contracts, to apply the
laws of property and of corporations, and in this work Mr.
Taylor displayed great knowledge and skill. The letter of
the law did not circumscribe his interest in the problems
he was called upon to solve. The immediate question was
always presented to his mind against an enlightening back-
ground of philosophic understanding. Effects interested
him as deeply as processes; he was not one of those to
whom an apparent advantage quickly achieved obscures
remoter and secondary consequences. His trained curios-
ity and insatiable desire for knowledge prevented him from
the easy acceptance of cut and dried opinions and led him
to fruitful excursions in original investigations. He be-
came known as forceful in his argument of cases, and of
high repute as an authority upon corporation and com-
mercial law.
He had a successful part in much notable litigation,
such as the Fayerweather will case; Joseph Richardson
will case; the Pennsylvania Sugar Refining Company
230 HISTORICAL REGISTER
against the American Sugar Refining Company; the
United States Government against Walsh, and the Van-
derbilt Estate against Erdmon. He also was counsel for
the "New York World."
Mr. Taylor was a member of the Union, Century,
Metropolitan, Riding and Down Town Clubs, of New
York City; the Metropolitan of Washington; and of the
Bar Association of New York City, the American Bar As-
sociation, the New York State Bar Association, and the
Sons of the Revolution.
He married, at Goshen, New York, in 1892, Gertrude
Barnard Murray, and had three children: Mrs. Gouverneur
Morris Carnochan, Geoffrey and Murray Taylor. Both
sons served with distinction in France with the American
Army during the World War.
Mr. Taylor died November 26th, 1 920. He achieved
the most brilliant and distinguished success. His discus-
sion of constitutional questions strengthened the founda-
tions of our free institutions. The reports of causes argued
by him supported the judgment of those who heard or
read the arguments that they exhibited a wide range of
sound learning, extraordinary discrimination, capacity to
divine crucial questions, and power of effective presenta-
tion. He was never uninteresting; his wit and humor
never obscured or belittled his serious thought; his man-
ner was dignified and courtly, but perfectly simple and un-
affected. He possessed something that character and in-
tellect do not always give — he had distinction; and above
all, he had charm.
Francis Lynde Stetson
Francis Lynde Stetson
RANCIS LYNDE STETSON was born at Keese-
ville, Clinton County, N. Y., April 23rd, 1846;
son of Lemuel and Helen Hascall Stetson. He
was a descendent of Robert Stetson, who came
from Kent, England, in 1 634, and settled in Scituate,
Massachusetts. He was Cornet of the first 'Troop of
Horse," in 1 658.
Lemuel Stetson was eminent as a lawyer, jurist, State
legislator and Congressman. He served three years in the
Assembly and was Representative in Congress from 1 843
to 1845. He was County Judge of Clinton County from
1847 to 1851.
Francis Lynde Stetson was educated in the public
schools of Plattsburg, and at Williams College, from which
he was graduated in the class of 1867. He studied law at
Columbia University, and in 1870 began practice with his
uncle, William S. Hascall. His readiness in making
friends, and his skill in the management of his business at-
tracted the attention of William C. Whitney, who made
him Assistant Corporation Counsel while Mr. Whitney
was at the head of the city's legal department.
He left the Corporation Counsel's office to become a
partner in the notable firm of Bangs & Stetson. Francis
M. Bangs was one of the leading lawyers of New York
City. It was Mr. Stetson who advised J. P. Morgan when
the latter made his famous loan to the Government. He
became the intimate friend and personal counsel of the
late J. P. Morgan, as well as of the present head of the
Morgan banking firm. The firm of Stetson, Jennings &
231
232 HISTORICAL REGISTER
Russell is the successor of the firm of Bangs & Stetson.
Mr. Stetson was organizer of the United States Steel
Corporation, and had been its general counsel from its in-
ception. He was also general counsel for the Northern
Pacific Railway Company, the International Mercantile
Marine Company, the Erie Railroad, the United States
Rubber Company, the Southern Railway, and some years
ago handled the reorganization of the Philadelphia and
Reading.
His first appearance in politics was during the Tilden-
Hayes contest, in 1876. He was selected to handle what
was known as the "Florida returns" end of the Tilden
fight, and he prepared the papers in the Florida case for
the tribunal that passed on the contest. Mr. Stetson's in-
terest in politics continued after this contest ended, but
was always outside the ranks of Tammany, and he was
at sword's point at all times with the leaders of Tammany
Hall. He was one of the leaders of the "Cleveland Democ-
racy." Mr. Cleveland joined the law firm of Stetson, Jen-
nings & Russell at the end of his first term as President.
When Mr. Cleveland was re-elected President later, he
urged Mr. Stetson to join his official family in Washington,
but he declined. However, he was the real Cleveland
leader in New York State during the administration, and
it was through him that much of the Presidential patronage
was dispensed. Before Mr. Cleveland was President, Mr.
Stetson was his friend and political adherent.
Mr. Stetson was senior warden of the Church of the
Incarnation of this city, and had been a delegate to every
Protestant Episcopal convention for many years. He was
a trustee of the General Theological Seminary. It was Mr.
Stetson who framed the canon on divorce and marriage
of the Episcopal Church.
FRANCIS LYNDE STETSON 233
He had been president of the New York State Bar
Association and the Bar Association of the City of New
York. He had also been president of the Alumni Associa-
of the School of Law of Columbia University, and of the
Alpha Delta Phi Club of this city. He was also a mem-
ber of the Phi Beta Kappa Fraternity. His clubs were the
Century, University, Metropolitan, Tuxedo, Downtown,
Riding, Reform, Grolier, Church and Democratic. He was
a member of the Williams College Board of Trustees, and
a devoted alumnus of the college, having missed no com-
mencement up to the year of his last illness; of the Dun-
lap Society, the New England Society, the Metropolitan
Museum of Art and the American Geographical Society.
He was also a director of the New York Botanical Gardens,
and president of the Stetson Kindred of America. His
charities were bountiful, and but few persons, save those
who benefited, ever knew of them.
In addition to his connections as general counsel at
the time of his death, he was a director of Erie Railroad,
the Chicago and Erie Railroad, the Niagara Development
Company, the New York, Susquehanna and Western Rail-
road. He had been a director of the Alabama Great South-
ern Railroad, the Buffalo, Bellevue and Lancaster Rail-
way, the Buffalo Railway, the Cincinnati, New Orleans
and Texas Railway, the Crosstown Street Railway, the
Niagara Falls Power Company, the Niagara Junction Rail-
way, the South Carolina and Georgia Railway, the South-
ern Railway Company, in Kentucky; the Southern Rail-
way, in Mississippi. He had also been first vice-president
of the Cataract Construction Company.
He married, June 26th, 1873, Elizabeth Ruff, of Rah-
way, N. J. In 1917, Mr. Stetson adopted as his daughter,
Margery H. Lee, daughter of Alfred Lee, of Germantown,
234 HISTORICAL REGISTER
Philadelphia, and granddaughter of Bishop Lee, the Prot-
estant Episcopal Bishop of Delaware.
Mr. Stetson died December 5th, 1920. He was one
of the leading lawyers of the country, and but few men of
his generation have exercised a more potent influence in
New York. Entirely without the aid of office he acquired
universal recognition as a great public character, and a
significant figure in the public life of his time.
Index
Page
Adams, Charles Henry 65
Baker, William Henry 96
Barrett, William Emerson... 1 2
Bedlow, Henry 171
Bennett, James Gordon 133
Bickford, Llewellyn Marr...154
Blakeslee, George Elmer 78
Bourne, Frederick Gilbert... 86
Bradley, John Henry 196
Brewster, Samuel Dwight ...207
Carnegie, Andrew 38
Christiansen, Harry C 2 1 3
Cochrane, Alexander 1 63
Cragin, Edwin Bradford 72
Curtis, Samuel Stephen 144
Davies, Julien Tappan 2 1 7
DeLamar, Joseph R 35
Donnelly, Charles Francis... 81
Douglas, William Proctor... 1 1 9
Dyer, Elisha 9
Eger, Theodore G 108
Evans, William Thomas 1 06
Fearing, George Richard....
Frick, Henry Clay
54
47
^o-^-^w-e^ .^ &AWV l_s ^w
Gautier, Dudley Gregory 1 1 0
Hall, Jonathan Prescott 169
Hallenback, Harry Clay 74
Halsey, Francis Whiting 30
Harmon, Benjamin Smith... 99
Holbrook, Edward 1 5
Holden, Edwin Babcock 25
Hunter, Arthur Middleton... 1 1 6
Jennings, Frederic Beach 193
Jocelyn, Stephen Perry 151
Jordan, Eben Dyer 220
Kayser, Julius 1 1 8
Kountze, Luther 223
Langdon, Woodbury G 67
Lawrence, Cyrus Jay 20
Page
Lawrence, Henry Corbin 22
Lowell, Percival 128
McCook, Anson George 185
McCullough, John G 27
McCutcheon, James 103
McWilliams, Daniel W 59
Mitchell, James 166
Morgan, John Pierpont 124
Morris, Francis 1 73
Nelson, Stuart Greenleaf 112
Nichols, John White T 84
Olney, Richard 90
Peary, Robert Edwin 139
Peene, Joseph 83
Plunkett, Theodore R 180
Plunkett, William B 176
Plunkett, William C 179
Quincy, Henry Parker 94
Ripley, Edward Hastings 56
Sargent, Andrew R 137
Schmidlapp, Jacob G 69
Sewall, Henry Foster 156
Shepard, Frederick M 88
Stephens, James Brown 101
Stetson, Francis Lynde 231
Stone, Isaac Frank 122
Tailer, Henry Pennington... 1 1 4
Tailer, William Hallett 115
Taylor, Howard 228
Thacher, Thomas 209
Thayer, Bayard 5
Thorne, William V. S 33
Vatable, Auguste 121
Wells, William 189
Wheaton, James Marwell... 1 58
White, Andrew Dickson 203
White, Joseph Nelson 160
Woodbury, Urban A. ..182
Gardiner, John Lyon .198
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