USA > Arkansas > Historical review of Arkansas : its commerce, industry and modern affairs > Part 14
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At St. Louis Captain Maurice entered upon a career of great activ- ity, and for many years he was an influential factor in connection with the extensive railroad interests of the west and southwest, as well as with steamboat operations on the Mississippi river. IIe became a mem- ber of the firm of Hatch, Maurice & Company, of St. Louis, and was also an interested principal in the firms of Joab, Lawrence & Company, of Mobile, Alabama: W. C. Graham & Company, of New Orleans, Louisiana, and Graham & Maurice, of Cairo, Illinois. Each of these coneerns was prominently identified with steamboat aud transportation interests.
Captain Maurice originated and carried into effective service the idea of operating fast freight lines in conjunction with the various railroads,
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and his efforts in this connection entitle him to lasting honor and dis- tinetion as one of the veritable captains of industry in America, for he thus did much to further industrial and commercial progress. He organized the Far West Freight Line, which put into operation a fast freight line from New York to the west, and later he became manager of the Erie & Pacific Despateh, which maintained a similar serviee. The success of the enterprise thus inaugurated by him attracted the at- tention of Jay Gould, who was at that time, 1870, president of the Erie Railroad, and this well known railway magnate effeeted with Captain Maurice a freight traffic arrangement that covered all western con- nections at that time. About 1871 Captain Manriee established the Overland Transit Company, which assumed contracts for the overland transportation of freight from the terminus of the Missouri, Kansas & Texas Railroad through the Indian territory to Texas. The railroad mentioned was at the time extending its line through Indian territory to Denison, Texas, of which town Captain Maurice was one of the founders and the first mayor. He established the family home at Denison and continued a resident of northern Texas for several years. He then returned to St. Louis, where his business activities were varied and noteworthy. He was a member of the firm that built the Olympic theater in that eity and continued to be identified with railroad inter- ests. About the year 1880 he came to Arkansas and established his2 home in Hot Springs, where he continued to reside until his death, October 18, 1905. Captain Manrice was a man of unusual business acumen and had exceptional initiative and administrative ability, and though he was long conspicuously identified with enterprises of marked importanee he is best remembered as a kind, genial, lovable man of highly optimistic and hopeful temperament and of most lavish gener- osity-a generosity that at times was almost prodigality. He made and lost several fortunes, but his intrinsie nobility of character is the foun- dation on which rests his most enduring monument. His wife is living in Hot Springs with her son, William G., her age being eighty-six years. Besides this son, there is one other child, George E., Cotton Belt Rail- road agent at Tyler, Texas.
William G. Maurice, the immediate subjeet of this review, gained his early educational discipline in the sehools of the city of St. Louis and supplemented this by a eourse of study in the celebrated Notre Dame University, at South Bend, Indiana. He had in the meantime gained no little experience in connection with the practical affairs of life, and he reverts with pleasure to the labors he performed when a boy in carrying the chain for the surveyors who platted the town of Denison, Texas. He made his first trip to Hot Springs when a lad, in company with his mother. This trip was made from St. Louis to Mem- phis, Tennessee, by rail, thenee to Devall Bluff, Arkansas, by paeket boat ; from that point by rail to Little Roek, from which city the jour- ney to Hot Springs was made over the old "Wire" road on one of the stages of the Chidester & Searles line. At that time the principal hotel in Hot Springs was that which bore the name of the town and which was conducted by Major Gaines and Captain Stitt.
Mr. Maurice did not establish his permanent home at Hot Springs until 1890, and in the following year he erected and equipped the Maurice bath house, which has sinee been admirably maintained as one of the best of the many splendid bath houses that have given world- wide fame to this resort. This bath house is to be demolished, beginning May 1, 1911, and on the site is to be erected the New Mauriee, to be constructed of stone, steel and marble and which will surpass anything
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of its kind in Ameriea. This house will be opened on or about January 1. 1912. Mr. Maurice has been prominently identified with the up- building of the city and has given his influence and aid in support of all measures and enterprises tending to advance its material and social prestige, with the result that he has seeure status as one of the city's most loyal and progressive citizens. He is a man of most gracious per- sonality and during his residence in Ilot Springs has formed the acquaintance of many of the famous men who have here sojourned for health or recreation. He is treasurer of the Hot Springs Business Men's League, is vice-president of the Arkansas Trust Company that owns the Red Spring and bath house at Saratoga, New York. He is a mem- ber of the directorate of the Arkansas State Fair Association, which has done much to exploit the resources and attractions of the state; and his interest in all that touches the welfare of his home city and state is of the most vital order.
In polities, though never an aspirant for public office, Mr. Maurice accords a stanch allegiance to the cause of the Democratie party. In the time-honored Masonic fraternity Mr. Maurice has attained the thirty-second degree of the Ancient Accepted Scottish Rite, in which his affiliation is with Albert Pike Consistory, in the city of Little Rock. lle holds membership also in Sahara Temple, Ancient Arabie Order of the Nobles of the Mystic Shrine, in the city of Pine Bluff. He is also affiliated with Hot Springs Commandery, Knights Templars.
On the 7th of July, 1886, was solemnized the marriage of Mr. Maurice to Miss Eugenia Z. Manier, who was born at Fort Wayne, Indiana, and reared in the city of Peoria, Illinois. Her parents were Vietor and Marie Josephine Manier ; the father was a prominent business man and influential eitizen of Peoria.
It should be noted that recently there has been given further evidence of the progressive spirit of Mr. Maurice, in connection with the ereetion of a costly and beautiful building of modern architectural design at the De Soto magnesia spring, on North Central avenue. This structure was erected by the De Soto Mineral Spring Company, of which he is president, and is coneeded to be the finest building yet con- structed for a similar purpose in the United States. It affords most at- tractive accommodations to those desiring to avail themselves of the fine medieinal water and also for casual visitors. For seeuring remedial action through use of the water by drinking the same this spring is not excelled by any in the famous resort eity. The building was completed in the autumn of 1910.
JOHN R. GREGSON. Ideas backed with indefatigable energy-the desire and power to accomplish big things-these qualities make of success not an aceident but a logieal result. The man of initiative is he who combines with a capacity for hard work an indomitable will. Such a man recognizes no such thing as failure and his final success is on a parity with his well directed efforts. John R. Gregson, of this review, is a member of the well known real-estate firm of Altman, Gregson & Brooks, which has long figured as one of the most important business concerns of Jonesboro, Arkansas.
John R. Gregson was born in Craighead county, near Jonesboro, Arkansas, on the 3d of November, 1870. His father, Frank A. Greg- son, is a farmer near Lake City, Craighead county, and he was a pioneer in this section of the state as early as 1842. Frank A. Greg- son was born near Greensboro, North Carolina, in February, 1834, a son of George Gregson, the founder of the family in Arkansas. George
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Gregson passed away on his farm near Jonesboro. IIe was a blaek- smith by trade and was identified with that line of enterprise in con- nection with farming operations during the major portion of his active career. He was married in North Carolina, and he reared to maturity a large family of children, of whom Frank A. and William were gal- lant soldiers in the Confederate army during the war between the states. Frank A. Gregson was a lad of eight years of age at the time of his parents' removal to Arkansas, and he was reared to maturity amidst real frontier environment. The Civil war, in which he par- ticipated, furnished the chief event of his otherwise quiet and unassum- ing eareer. Following the war he was appointed deputy sheriff of his county but other than that service he has devoted himself entirely to agricultural pursuits. He was married to Miss Naney Cooper, who passed away in 1905, at the age of sixty-five years. Eleven children were the issue of their marriage, among them being Mary, who became the wife of T. B. MeEwen, and they are both deceased; Margaret A. was the wife of Dr. William Gibson at the time of her death; Emma married J. T. Gibson and she, too, is deceased; Martin wedded Ida Roy and was survived by his widow and a child at the time of his demise. The children surviving are: Francis M .; John R., the im- mediate subject of this review; Charles A .; and Walter S. and Nancy L. of Craighead county.
John R. Gregson received his preliminary educational training in the common schools of his native place and after he had attained to his legal majority he became a student in the old State Normal School at Jonesboro, in which excellent institution he was graduated as a member of the class of 1894. As a youth he assisted his father in the work and management of the old home farm but after completing his education he began to teach school, continuing to be identified with that vocation for a period of twelve years and becoming, by appoint- ment, county examiner during that time. In 1900 he decided to ask the Democratic party of Craighead county to nominate him for the office of county clerk and he defeated his competitors for that honor, being elected to the office in September. He succeeded R. H. West in the office and was chosen two years later for a second term, being succeeded, on retirement, by W. B. Armstrong. On going out of office Mr. Gregson was brought face to face with a new field of activity. Having served "his time," as it were, in the school-room, he sought other channels and associated himself with Mr. T. W. Altman to deal in and handle real estate. Subsequently Mr. G. G. Brooks was ad- mitted as a partner in the firm and at that time it assumed its present name of Altman, Gregson & Brooks. In the course of time Mr. Greg- son has acquired considerable valuable farming property, which he is exploiting by proxy, and his connection with this sphere only serves to emphasize his permaneney as a resident in this county and state. He is a member of the board of directors of the Business Man's Club of Jonesboro and is one of the trustees for the Young Men's Christian Association. He is one of the directors of the Jonesboro Building Association, one of the oldest and strongest of its kind in the state of Arkansas.
In June, 1902, was solemnized the marriage of Mr. Gregson to Miss Mary Alexis Armstrong, a daughter of Christie Armstrong. of New York. The children born to this marriage are Mary Louise, John A .. Christine, William E. and Martha.
Mr. Gregson is a stanch adherent of the principles and policies of the Democratic party in his politieal proelivities, and it is worthy
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of note that during his entire active life he has been deeply and sin- cerely interested in community affairs, doing all in his power to ad- vance all measures and enterprises projected for the well being of the county and state at large. He is affiliated with a number of repre- sentative fraternal and social organizations of a local nature and in his religious faith he is a devout member of the Baptist church of Jones- boro. At the present time he is superintendent of the Sunday-school and he has represented the church at all meetings of the state con- vention and of the Southern Baptist convention. During the years 1906 and 1907 he was president of the state Sabbath School Association and in that connection was instrumental in accomplishing a great deal of good for the Sunday schools throughout the entire state. He is a man of splendid business ability, unusual energy and unquestioned probity. As a citizen he is a valuable adjunct to Jonesboro and as a man his affability commands to him the confidence and regard of all with whom he has come in contact.
ANDREW 1. CONNELLY. In the legitimate channels of agriculture and real estate Andrew A. Connelly is winning the success which always crowns well directed labor, sound judgment and executive ca- pacity of a high order, and at the same time he has concerned him- self with the affairs of Craighead county in a loyal, publie-spirited way. so that the community accounts him one of its leading and repre- sentative citizens. He is extensively interested in farm lands and is one of the most enthusiastic upon the subject of the future of the state, in which he has made his residence for the past fifteen years.
By the circumstance of birth Mr. Connelly is a son of Illinois, his birth having occurred in White county September 7. 1859. Al- though himself an American, his father, also Andrew. was born in Ireland and came to the United States as a young man in search of the much-famed opportunity presented by the newer country. He married after reaching our shores, the young woman to become his wife being Miss Alvira Biggerstaff. He died in White county, Illinois, during the infaney of his son. the subject, and shortly after his own death his wife passed away. Their children were Hugh, of White county, Illinois: Thomas, of Bloomfield, Missouri: Alfred, who died soon after locating in Paragould, Arkansas: Elizabeth, who became the wife of Patrick Maloney and resides in MeLeansboro, Illinois: Margaret, who died in Enfield, Illinois, as the wife of Charles Raines : Sarah, who became Mrs. Matthew Garrison, and resides in Belknap. Montana : and Andrew A., the youngest child.
Thus left an orphan at an early age, the educational opportunities of Mr. Connelly were restricted. yet at the same time the very fact that he soon found it incumbent upon him to enter the lists as a wage earner doubtless worked to his advantage. He desired an education and in the face of obstacles he possessed himself of it. attending the public schools and securing a year at college, and amply supplementing this with independent study. After leaving college he entered upon a career as a teacher and for some time pursued this vocation in his native state. Finally convinced, with the Myriad Minded, that "home- keeping youth have ever homely wits." he wandered far afield to southern California, where he sought a location. He eventually went east to Missouri and located in Stoddard county, where he engaged in teaching in the common schools. From 1880 to 1890. his chief interest was educational, but he drifted into farming and stock grow- ing and dealing in the vicinity of Dexter. In 1895 he removed to
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Arkansas and interested himself with agriculture, becoming a large property owner, his three tracts of land embracing more than a thou- sand aeres, and his holdings in Jonesboro being considerable, the man- agement of all requiring his daily activities.
In 1904 Mr. Connelly entered local polities as a Democratic can- didate for the nomination as circuit clerk and recorder of Craighead county and was successful. He was elected in September to succeed T. W. Altman, was re-elected in 1906 and served four years, at the end of that time turning the office over to John R. West, who is one of the capable reeord men of the county and an old employe of the court honse. His services were excellent and he enjoys the regard and confidence of his community. Mr. Connelly's ventures, both busi- ness and professional, have invariably been successful and he has ever given his affairs the intelligent care and guardianship essential to a healthy state in any sphere of activity.
Mr. Connelly was united in marriage to Miss Mary A. Howell December 27, 1886, in Bloomfield, Missouri. His wife is a daughter of Joseph Howell, a native of Tennessee, who enlisted from the state of Missouri into the army of the Confederaey and who is now a resi- dent of Dexter. Mr. and Mrs. Connelly are the parents of two daugh- ters Lebelva, who was graduated from the Cape Girardeau Normal School, elass of 1911; and Grace, a high school student of Jonesboro. The fraternal affiliations of the head of the house extend to the Wood- men of the World and the Ancient Order of United Workmen.
THADDEUS H. CARAWAY is prosecuting attorney of the Second Judicial Circuit of Arkansas and resides at Jonesboro, where he enjoys high prestige as an able and distinguished member of the legal fra- ternity and a citizen of mueh valne in the many-sided life of the community. He has been identified with the state since the year 1901 and a year later he found his way to this city whose eharms and advantages have proven sufficiently potent to influenee him to take up his permanent residence here. Mr. Caraway was born in Stoddard county, Missouri, October 17, 1871, and when a babe was taken by his parents to Carroll county, Tennessee, where he made his home until his advent into Arkansas. His father was Dr. Tolbert F. Caraway, a native Tennessean and a man well and favorably known in his pro- fession. The paternal antecedents were both Welsh and Scotch and the early representatives of the family located in North Carolina. The Caraways were from the Valley of the Shannon River in Ireland and Erin gave America the first of the name just previons to the war of the American Revolution.
Dr. Caraway was a Confederate soldier: prepared himself for his eareer after his marriage, and he journeyed to the "Undiscovered Conn- try" in 1872, while living in Carroll county, Tennessee. The maiden name of the wife was Mary E. Seates, and she survived her honored husband for a full quarter of a century, for her demise occurred in 1897 in Arkansas. They were the parents of two sons-Emmet L., a farmer residing near Manila, Arkansas, and Thaddeus H. of this review.
Mr. Caraway received his education in the public schools and found his earliest means of livelihood as a teacher, also by the salary therefrom finding a way to secure a finished education. He enrolled as a student of Dickson College, of Diekson, Tennessee, and attended that institution of learning intermittently, teaching in Tennessee and Arkansas in the meantime until his graduation in 1896, with the degree
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of Bachelor of Arts. For the three years following he was identified with the pedagogical profession and as an educator became known by his work in both Clay and Mississippi counties. He became imbued with the ambition to become a member of the legal fraternity, and having spent his vacations and other spare time in reading law, was duly admitted to the bar at Osceola, Arkansas, in 1900, before Judge F. G. Taylor. He spent the first year in the practice in Lake City and then established himself in Jonesboro, where he has ever since remained, gaining, to be Shakespearean, "Golden opinions from all sorts of people." He is a member of the law firm of Lamb & Caraway, Mr. N. F. Lamb being his partner. It was not. however, before his candidacy for proseentor of his district that Mr. Caraway became prominent in polities. He is a Demoerat, and was nominated at the primaries of 1908 and elected in the September following. He sue- ceeded L. C. Going and was elected in 1910 for a second term.
On February 5, 1902, Mr. Caraway laid the foundation of a par- ticularly happy life companionship by his union with Miss Hattie Wyatt, daughter of Carroll Wyatt, a merchant and farmer and of Virginia birth. Two young sons, Paul Wyatt, born in 1905, and Forest, born in July. 1909, share their pleasant cultured home with them, and within its portals will be reared to the good ideals of man- hood and womanhood represented by their father and mother.
Mr. Caraway finds thorough enjoyment in the good fellowship provided by his fraternal affiliations. Ile is a member of the Knights of Pythias and the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks and is a Master Mason.
NORMAN C. WOLFF, manager of the Wolff-Goldman Mercantile Company of Newport, is one of the youngest merchants of the state and at the same time one of the most successful. He was born in Jack- son county, Arkansas. in July. 1885, and received his education in the public schools of Newport and St. Louis. From the year 1902 he has been identified with the business of the firm, beginning as a clerk in the store and reaching the management of the establishment by pro- motion until he now holds the offices of secretary and treasurer.
The Wolff-Goldman Company is one of interesting history, its growth and development having been quite remarkable. It was origi- nated and directed by two young German Jews, who began their lives as clerks in Jacksonport. Arkansas, about the year 1873. Both Sig- mund Wolff, father of the subject, and Isaae Goldman were born in the Fatherland, the former in Neustadt, in 1857. They began their independent career in Jacksonport and when Newport gave promise of becoming a thriving center. they joined hands with the promoters of the place and were ever after that active factors in its affairs. They expanded according to the needs of the town and the present immense department store, housed in a splendid two-story pressed brick building erected in 1910 by Norman C. Wolff, is a monument to the wisdom and foresight of the originators of the enterprise. The ground space covered is one hundred by one hundred and twenty-five feet and many departments are represented under its roof. Not alone is the company valuable in that it supplies in admirable fashion the manifold needs of the town, but it also furnishes a market for the various prodnets of the farm, and is thus an additional faetor towards the prosperity of Jackson county.
Sigmund Wolff and his partner subsequently established them- selves in business in St. Louis. Their business in the Missouri metrop-
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olis was the Marquette Cloak & Suit Company, and this enterprise was under his direction until January 18, 1909, when his death oc- curred. The subject's mother was Miss Elise Altschul, of New York, and he is one of the four children born to them.
Norman C. Wolff is admirably equipped by nature and training for a commercial career and is the dynamo which drives the great establishment to success. He possesses much executive ability, sound judgment and an unerring insight into the public tastes and need. In addition to the interests above mentioned he is vice-president of the First National Bank of Newport; is secretary of the Wolff-Goldman Realty Company and of the Marquette Suit & Cloak Company, all of which are under the same management. He finds pleasure in his fra- ternal relations with the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks, and he is also a Mason. Mr. Wolf is unmarried.
OSCAR E. JONES, M. D. Devoting his time and energies to one of the most exacting of the higher lines of occupation, Oscar E. Jones, M. D., holds an assured position among the able and skilful physicians of Newport, having succeeded to the practice here established by his father, Dr. John M. Jones, late of this city. His grandfather, Darling Jones, a life-long farmer of Weakley county, Tennessee, married Mar- garet Miller, and they became the parents of the following-named children : William H., of Paragould, Arkansas; Dr. Andrew M., de- ceased, was for many years a practicing physician at Weldon, Ar- kansas; Marion, of Missouri; Dr. John M., father of the subject of this brief biographical notice; and Mrs. Sallie Kensett, of Cisco, Texas.
Dr. John M. Jones, born in Weakley county, Tennessee, in 1845, acquired his literary and professional education in the Vanderbilt and Nashville universities, leaving college, however, before completing his course to enlist in General Forrest's Cavalry, with which he was con- nected throughout the Civil war. He subsequently taught school for awhile, preferring a professional career to life on a farm. On obtain- ing his degree of M. D. he located in Newport, Arkansas, being among the first of the professional men to add his citizenship to the new town which was destined to become the county-seat of Jackson county. Successful as a practitioner, he remained here, a loyal and faithful citizen, until his death, in February, 1908.
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