USA > Connecticut > Encyclopedia of Connecticut biography, genealogical-memorial; representative citizens, v. 1 > Part 53
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He soon regained his former practice and came to occupy the leading place in his profession throughout that district.
Important as was the service rendered by Dr. Harrison in the way of his profes- sion, and surely no man in that part of the State ever did more for the health of the community than he, yet it is to be doubted if the less formal service wrought by the influence of his strong and wholesome personality was not even greater. For Dr. Harrison was in many respects a unique character, combining in his single person many virtues which though often the possession of men separately, are not often to be met with in so fortunate a union. He was at once a student and a man of affairs, a moralist and an artist. A keen observer of men and things, ap- proaching his subjects without prejudice or bias, a great reader, his motto in scien- tific research, as, indeed, in life gener- ally, was truth. No matter how strong the associations surrounding any belief might be, no matter what venerable pre- judice was threatened, he never hesitated to apply his acid test of close analytical reasoning, in the certain confidence that facts and the truth they represented was the result most worthy of attainment. But this cold and unflinching inquirer after truth was warmed and softened in ali his human intercourse. His knowl- edge was indeed a trenchant weapon in his hand, and it was delightful to see him, his wits stimulated by contact with other clever minds, rise to the height of the brilliant conversationalist that he was. But formidable as his weapon was, it was ever wielded in the cause of and never against virtue and innocence and true and worthy sentiment. His memory was at once long and mobile, his mind was stored with the results of his own keen thinking and that of the many great minds he came into contact with through books, and all
this wisdom was ready to his tongue at an instant's call, yet he never made use of it merely for the sake of prevailing, but always in some impersonal or disinter- ested cause. One of his particular pleas- ures, and in that he kept up with the most unwearying consistency through life, was the scientific observation of the weather. He provided himself with a complete meteorological equipment and kept a faithful record of the daily rainfall and changes in temperature, together with other weather conditions from the year 1856 until his death, with the single break occasioned by his service in the Civil War. Dr. Harrison's scientific attain- ments were not by any means hidden under a bushel. On the contrary they attracted general notice, to such an ex- tent, indeed, that they were taken cog- nizance of by Yale University, which con- ferred upon him in 1872 the honorary degree of Master of Arts.
Dr. Harrison's artistic side showed it- self most conspicuously in the somewhat unusual department of public affairs. His political and aesthetic ideals were the same in a large measure, and it was in the development of a community, beau- tiful and worthy in all particulars, that his aesthetic nature strove to express it- self. His ideal was, to be sure, far in advance of the comprehension of most of his fellow citizens, and far beyond what he could hope to realize concretely in this life, but Dr. Harrison did not flinch from working for an ideal only to be realized by posterity, nor scorn to avail himself of the somewhat prosaic means at hand to help him on his way. The picture which he formed in his mind was doubt- less of a very ideal character, but no one realized better than Dr. Harrison that as a basis for any such community of the future, the present must lay a solid ma- terial foundation consisting of adequate
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water supply and other public utilities. For these things he therefore labored with all his heart, and with a high degree of success, not forgetting to influence as much as he could, both by precept and example, his fellow townsfolk to beautify their own homes and the streets of Wall- ingford. His own activity took the shape of planting handsome shade trees, an act to which the town owes much of its great beauty.
It would be difficult to praise too highly Dr. Harrison's dealings with men, in all relations of life, both public and private. His code of morals was a high one and he a severe judge where his own conduct was concerned, though charitable and tolerant to others. His conscience played umpire to all his acts, and where it had once given its decision, no other consider- ation, whether of interest, public opinion or ridicule, served to alter it. It is im- possible that such a life, wheresoever it is placed, can fail to bring about good to its environment, and certain it is that in the case of Dr. Harrison his life has been absorbed into the structure of the com- munity, which is what it is partly in virtue of his strong and beneficent influence upon it.
Dr. Harrison married (first) Susan Lewis, of Wallingford, to whom he was wed June 8, 1837, and who died Septem- ber 10, 1839. To them was born one child, a daughter, Susan Lewis Harrison, who died when she was seventeen years of age. Dr. Harrison married (second) June 20, 1868, Virginia Abell, of Frank- lin, Connecticut, who died childless on December 27, 1869. Dr. Harrison mar- ried (third) Sarah Electra Hall, of Wall- ingford, in June, 1885, who survives him.
Mrs. Harrison is a daughter of one of the oldest and most highly respected families in that part of the State of Con- necticut, and is related on both sides of
the house to many prominent New Eng- land families. The Halls were among the founders of Wallingford back in the old Colonial days, when our pious forefathers carried guns to church on the Sabbath for fear of the Indians. The family in- creased largely and was very prominent in the neighborhood, there being at one time as many as twenty families of the name resident in and about Wallingford. Augustus Hall, the grandfather of Mrs. Harrison, owned half the land which forms the present site of Wallingford, and his son, Joel Hall, Mrs. Harrison's father, owned four hundred acres of land in the neighborhood. He was a well-to- do farmer of the type which has made New England what it is and more than any other single class in the community has written its stirring records in their sweat or blood. He was a man of whom those two expressive old phrases were often and appropriately used, to the effect that "his word was as good as his bond" and that "he was honest in the dark." He was married to Hannah Beach, of a prominent and wealthy family of Bran- ford, Connecticut. Of Mrs. Harrison's great-grandfather Beach, the local legend ran that he had a chest of gold and silver too heavy for a single man to lift. Mr. and Mrs. Joel Hall were the parents of seven children, as follows: Julia, who became Mrs. H. M. Wallingford and is now deceased; Mary, who became Mrs. Almer Hall and is now deceased ; Sarah Electra, now Mrs. Harrison ; Alice, deceased ; Agnes, who became Mrs. Fred- erick Hall and is now deceased; John, now a resident of New York City; Au- gustus, who still resides in the old Hall homestead. The Halls were all members of the Congregational church, and all the children received excellent educations at boarding schools. Mrs. Harrison was educated at Miss Dutton's Private School
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at New Haven, and is a woman of great culture who has always played an active and prominent part in the life of Walling- ford, particularly the intellectual side thereof. She was a member of the building commission which had in charge the erection of the Wallingford Public Library and is now a member of the finance committee of the Library Board. Dr. Harrison's fine library, of which he was justly proud, Mrs. Harrison has given to Yale University, knowing well that no other disposition of it could have so well pleased its late owner. Since the death of her husband Mrs. Harrison, with Miss Jessie Martin, a niece who resides with her, has done much traveling both in the United States and abroad.
LANE, John Sherman, Soldier, Man of Affairs.
John Sherman Lane, in whose death on September 28, 1913, the city of Mer- iden, Connecticut, lost one of its most prominent citizens and successful busi- ness men, was a member of a well known and highly regarded Connecticut family, the Lanes having sprung from fine old Puritan stock which so largely settled New England in the early times. On hi. mother's side he was even more promi- nently related to the distinguished Sher- man family which has furnished the his- tory of New England with so many illus- trious names. His father was Daniel P. Lane, a soldier of the War of 1812, and a conspicuous figure in the life of the State in his day, having represented his district in the Connecticut State Assembly in the year 1840. He was a lifelong resident of Kent, Connecticut, and in that place his children were born. To him and his wife were born five children, John Sher- man being the second.
John Sherman Lane was born Novem-
ber 27, 1839, in Kent, Connecticut, and there passed his boyhood and early youth until he reached the age of eighteen years. He was a product of that magnificent training which falls to the lot of the farm- er's boy, but which a smaller and smaller proportion of the youth of this country enjoy as time goes on. There is some- thing about the close contact which farm life necessitates with the elemental facts of nature that seems calculated to develop strong and steadfast character, and cer- tainly Mr. Lane himself was an exemplifi- cation of this truth. Up to the age of thirteen years he attended the local school in the winter and worked on his father's farm during the summer months. At that age he secured a position as clerk in the neighboring store, remaining there a year. At the age of eighteen years he left the parental roof and his native town and made his way to the larger place, Bridgeport, where it was his intention to make his fortune. Although it was not in Bridgeport that he was destined to accomplish this, he had taken the right way to go about it, nor was he afraid to take the surest if the most arduous course to fortune, that which lies from the very foot of the ladder to the top. Mr. Lane secured work first with the New York, New Haven & Hartford Railroad Co1 pany in the humble capacity of a track repairer. He was not the sort of man to remain long at that work, however, and was shortly promoted to the position of foreman over the kind of gang he had previously worked in. Later he secured a similar position with the Housatonic rail- road, his work being on the double track which was then being laid between New York and New Haven. Mr. Lane pos- sessed one of those enterprising natures of which his native region has given so many to the world, which is continually on the outlook for an opporunity to better
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itself, and the courage to take advantage of such opportunity whatever its nature and wherever perceived. It was just about this time that the wonders of the West were the theme of so much discus- sion among the young men of the East and so many of them were following the advice of Horace Greeley. The great California gold agitation had somewhat worn itself out, its greatest time having been in 1849 about ten years before, but that great land full of vast and unknown possibilities held out no less a lure to adventurous youth than previously, and Mr. Lane was one of those to feel its appeal most potently. Accordingly in the year 1859 he went to Peoria, Illinois, but had not remained there more than two years when destiny cut short his visit.
The outbreak of the Civil War in 1861 was followed by two calls for volunteers on the part of President Lincoln, the sec- ond, after the first battle of Bull Run, being for five hundred thousand. Mr. Lane was one of those who responded to this appeal, but desiring to enlist from hi native State, he quickly returned to Con- necticut and there joined the Eighth Con- necticut Volunteers at New Milford, Sep- tember 14, 1861. His regiment was sent to the front and he began at once to see active service. Possessed of great natural courage he distinguished himself highly for gallantry in a number of important engagements, among them the famous actions at Roanoke Island; New Bern, North Carolina; siege of Fort Macon, North Carolina; Antietam; Fredericks- burg, Virginia; Fort Huger, Virginia ; Fort Darling, Virginia; Cold Harbor ; Petersburg; Watthall Junction and Fort Harrison. He was promoted through the various ranks of non-commissioned offi- cers and at length became a first lieuten- ant, an office which he held when on Oc- tober 14, 1864, he was mustered out of service.
His many years from home had bred a strong desire to return there and he accordingly went to Connecticut where he accepted the offer of a position of supervisor of the Housatonic railroad, re- maining with that company until 1880. In that year he returned to the employ of the New York, New Haven & Hart- ford Railroad Company in the same capacity and thus came into contact with the business in which he later made his fortune. It happened in the following manner : Mr. Lane's duties as supervisor included overseeing the construction and maintenance of the road bed and ballast- ing the tracks. For this purpose crushed stone of a certain variety is used, and it entered Mr. Lane's head that the business of furnishing this material should be a very remunerative one. He consequently caused inquiries to be made and discov- ered that the hills about the city of Mer- iden were largely formed of the required quality of rock. Moving to that city, he established the firm of John S. Lane & Son, his son, Arthur S. Lane, becoming his partner. From the start the business prospered. A ready market was found in the various railroads of the region which were all at that time engaged in exten- sive construction. Under the able man- agement of the Lanes, father and son, the business grew to enormous proportions and is to-day one of the great industries of Meriden. The quarries were opened in the year 1891 in the Meriden hills, and two years later another was opened near Westfield, Massachusetts, along the line of the Boston and Albany railroad, and that line was thenceforth supplied there- from. His own business so successful, Mr. Lane became one of the prominent figures in the industrial and financial world, exerting a powerful influence among his associates in business, who could not fail to recognize and value his great ability and wisdom. His company
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was finally incorporated under the name of John S. Lane & Son, Incorporated, and there have been founded a number of allied companies also controlled by him during his life. Besides being president of the original company, he also held that office in the Lane Construction Company, Incorporated, and the Lane Quarry Com- pany. He was also a large shareholder in the Connecticut Trap Rock Quarries, Incorporated. Some years before his death Mr. Lane became interested in an entirely new enterprise, and as usual was successful. The development of Florida was at that time attracting the attention of northern capital, through the great oppor- tunities to be had in orange raising. That State was also becoming more and more popular as a winter resort, so that the hotel business was experiencing a great growth there. Mr. Lane invested largely in that region, and became the owner of extensive orange groves and a handsome hotel at Eustis, Florida.
Mr. Lane married, January 27, 1863, Emma S. Plumb, who with their children survives him. To them were born five children, as follows: Arthur S., already mentioned in this sketch; Bertha, now Mrs. W. R. Smith; E. LeRoy; Harry C .; Edna C., now the wife of Oliver Yale, formerly of Meriden and now of Brook- lyn, New York. The three sons are all engaged in the great business inherited from their father.
MERRIMAN, Charles Buckingham, Man of Affairs, Public Official.
Charles Buckingham Merriman, in whose death, on March 15, 1889, the city of Waterbury, Connecticut, lost one of her most prominent and highly respected citizens, was a member of one of the old Connecticut families, a family which since early Colonial times has occupied an en-
viable position in the regard of the com- munity. The Merriman arms are as follows: A chevron cotised, charged with three crescents, between three ravens. Crest: A cubit arm entwined with a serpent and bearing a sword. Motto: Terar dum prosim.
The first of the name to live in this country was Captain Nathaniel Merri- man, one of the founders of Wallingford, Connecticut, in the year 1670. The Mer- rimans continued to live in Wallingford for four generations, taking part in those stirring events which marked the Colonial period in New England, one of them lost a wife and daughter killed by Indians, and finally in the time of Charles Mer- riman, who enlisted in the Revolution as a drummer, changed their abode to Watertown in the same State. This Charles Merriman was the grandfather of Charles Buckingham Merriman, of this sketch, and his son was William H. Mer- riman, father of Charles Buckingham Merriman. William H. Merriman was a prosperous merchant of Watertown, Con- necticut, spent most of his life in that town, but eventually removed from there to Waterbury, where he lived for the re- mainder of his years, and where the fam- ily has since resided. He married Sarah Buckingham, of Watertown, a daughter of David and Chloe (Merrill) Bucking- ham, of that place, and member of another eminent New England family.
Charles Buckingham Merriman, the eldest child of William H. and Sarah (Buckingham) Merriman, was born Oc- tober 9, 1809, in Watertown, Connecticut, and there passed his childhood and youth. He received the elementary portion of his education in the excellent public schools of Watertown, and later attended the Leonard Daggett School, in New Haven. He accompanied his parents when they removed to Waterbury, in the year 1839,
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and from that time to his death made that city his home. He was thirty years of age at the time this move was made, and before that time he had been associated with his father in the latter's business. On his arrival in Waterbury he entered into a partnership with Ezra Stiles, who was engaged in a dry goods business in Waterbury, on the corner of Center square and Leavenworth street. He con- tinued in this association and enjoyed a good business until the year 1843, when he withdrew in order to form a partner- ship with Julius Hotchkiss, under the firm name of the Hotchkiss & Merriman Manufacturing Company, succeeding the firm of Hotchkiss & Prichard. The Hotchkiss & Merriman Manufacturing Company was engaged in the manufac- ture of suspenders and carried on this industry on a large scale until January, 1857, when it was merged with another concern, the Warren & Newton Manufac- turing Company, in the same business, into the American Suspender Company. This large corporation finally discon- tinued its business in 1879, after a most successful career, which was in no small degree due to the resourceful business management of Mr. Merriman, who occu- pied the office of president in the Hotch- kiss & Merriman Manufacturing Com- pany for a considerable period. As years went on Mr. Merriman became a power in the industrial world of Waterbury, and his interests gradually broadened to in- clude many of the most important insti- tutions in the city. He became the presi- dent of the Waterbury Gaslight Com- pany, president of the Waterbury Sav- ings Bank and a director of the Citizen: National Bank.
In spite of his large and varied indus- trial and business interests, which might well be supposed to tax most men's abili- ties, Mr. Merriman found time and energy
to devote to many other departments of the community's life. Of these particu- larly may be mentioned politics, in which he was an active participant. He was a member of the Republican party and from early youth had taken a keen and intelli- gent interest in all questions of public polity, alike the most general and the most local. His high sense of right was another force which impelled him to take a hand in the conduct of the city's affairs, while his zeal, his prominence and gen- eral popularity, quickly impressed his party with his availability as a candidate. It thus came about that he was elected to the Waterbury Common Council for a number of terms, and in 1869 was elected mayor of the city, serving from June 14, of that year for a one-year term. His administration was one which redounded greatly to his own credit and to the good of the community at large. Mr. Mer- riman was a prominent member of St. John's Protestant Episcopal Church of Waterbury for many years, and served for a considerable period as vestryman. He was an indefatigable worker for the aims of the church and the parish and did much to aid the many benevolences connected therewith. He was a man of most generous instincts and one who could not hear unmoved the plea of dis- tress, but his aid was of so unostentatious a kind, that few if any realized the extent of his benefactions.
Mr. Merriman married, June 30, 1841, Mary Margaret Field, a daughter of Dr. Edward Field, of Waterbury, Connecti- cut. Dr. Edward Field was born July I, 1777, at Enfield, Connecticut, where Mrs. Merriman was born March 12, 1817. Mrs. Merriman's death occurred October 5, 1866. To Mr. and Mrs. Merriman were born six children, as follows: Charlotte Buckingham, August 21, 1843, died Feb- ruary 9, 1911 ; Sarah Morton, born August
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7, 1845, died February 20, 1903; Helen, born January 19, 1848; Margaret Field, born March 16, 1850, became the wife of Dr. Frank E. Castle, died January 23, 19II ; William Buckingham, born June II, 1853, married Sarah Kingsbury Parsons ; Edward Field, born September 1, 1854, died June 28, 1909.
CURTIS, George Redfield, Man of Affairs.
There is no name more honored in Meriden, Connecticut, and the region round about, than that of Curtis, which has been borne by many of its most dis- tinguished sons, and by a family which claims an antiquity greater than that of the city. It traces its ancestry in Amer- ica to the earliest period of colonization, and still further in England, the land of its origin. From that time down to the present, from John Curtis, who first landed in America with his widowed mother and his brother William, down to George Redfield Curtis, the subject of this sketch, and his son, George Munson Curtis, the bearers of this name have held a high place in the esteem of the com- munities in which they have made their homes.
It was to old Stratford, Connecticut, that this immigrant ancestor, John Cur- tis, first came, in the year 1639. He was one of the earliest of the settlers in that place, and there he and his children dwelt until about 1669 or 1670 his son, Ensign Thomas Curtis, moved to Wallingford, where in the latter year he is recorded as present at a church meeting, the first record of the town. A son of Ensign Cur- tis was Major Nathaniel Curtis, to whom was granted a farm in that part of Mer- iden known as Falls Plain or Hanover From his time on, the Curtis family was associated with the region about Mer-
iden, which is dotted here and there with picturesque old homesteads of this and collateral lines of the house.
George Redfield Curtis, in whose death on May 20, 1893, Meriden lost one of its most prominent and public-spirited citi- zens, was of the seventh generation from John Curtis. He was the youngest of the five children of Asahel and Mehitable (Redfield) Curtis, and was descended through his mother, who came from Clin- ton, Connecticut, from John and Priscilla Alden. He was born on Christmas Day, 1825, in Meriden, and with the exception of a short absence in his youth, made it his home during his whole life. He re- ceived his education in the excellent local schools, remaining a pupil until eighteen years of age, and in that time used his opportunities to good advantage. When he had finally completed his studies, he went to Middletown, Connecticut, and secured there a position as clerk in a dry goods store. There he remained four years, and gained in that time an insight into mercantile and general business methods which later in life stood him in good stead. His mind was naturally alert, and he acquired the details of business easily and quickly. In 1847 there came a break in the course of his business career, and the young man of twenty-two years accepted a position as teacher in a school in a small town near Rochester, New York, where he remained for one year. He then returned to his native city of Meriden, and during the season of 1848 he taught school. The next year, how- ever he received and accepted an offer of a position as bookkeeper with the firm of Julius Pratt & Company, manufacturers of ivory goods, and here the young man added materially to his knowledge of busi- ness and industrial methods. His marked ability quickly made itself apparent and began to attract attention outside of the
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