USA > Connecticut > Encyclopedia of Connecticut biography, genealogical-memorial; representative citizens, v. 4 > Part 10
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Mr. Freeman married Blanche, daugh- ter of Charles C. Tudor, of Hartford, the Tudors an old family of Walpole, New Hampshire. Mr. and Mrs. Freeman have three children : Doris Louise, Stuart Ivan- hoe, and Tudor Shippey Freeman.
BUTHS, Joseph, Public Official.
Joseph Buths, street commissioner of the city of Hartford, is before the public eye constantly through the nature of the services which he renders in office. Only the highest praise can be given Mr. Buths' administration thus far. In every respect it has proved satisfactory and beneficial to Hartford. The multifarious duties which it embraces require for their suc- cessful management a man with technical knowledge and skill. The ability to handle a large number of subordinates is a requisite also. Problems which are unknown in offices of a different nature are here a daily occurrence. The skill with which Mr. Buths has handled the exigencies of his administration is to be commended, and is an evidence of quality of character and ability which will bring success to anything which he undertakes.
Joseph Buths was born June 2, 1858, at Koenigstein, near Frankfort-on-the- Main, Germany, the son of Anton and Eva (Colloseus) Buths. Anton Buths, of fine family connections, a native of Bibrich-on-the-Rhine, was a lawyer of some repute at Koenigstein, and held the responsible position of clerk of the courts for about eighteen years, acquitting him- self of its onerous duties in such a man- ner as to gain high commendation for
his long and faithful work on the court records. He married Eva, daughter of Joseph Colloseus, a hotel keeper at Koe- nigstein. Joseph Colloseus was a man of importance in the city and held the office of postmaster for fifty years. He was the owner of about sixty horses, with which he supplied the various stage lines, which were the conventional mode of travel in those days. He died at the age of seventy-nine years, in 1879. Anton Buths was a Protestant in religious faith. He died 1874, aged forty-four years, and his wife, who was a Catholic, died in 1891, aged fifty-five years.
Joseph Buthis was born in Germany, and there he attended schools that cor- respond with the grammar and high schools of America, receiving the excel- lent and thorough training which is characteristic of the German schools. After being graduated from high school at the early age of thirteen years, he entered the service of the government in the railway mail and telegraph service, where he continued to serve for ten years, at the end of which time he came to America. He was then twenty-three years old. In 1881 he secured a com- paratively unimportant position in the State Savings Bank in Hartford, and through constant application and a genius for the line of work which he had undertaken he became an expert col- lector and appraiser of real estate for the bank, having charge of all the collections and appraising, especially that done for court purposes. The bank does a loan- ing business of several millions of dol- lars on real estate, and Mr. Buths has, in connection with this, done a large busi- ness in land. Mr. Buths, through his connection with the bank, became quite prominent in Hartford public life. He is a Democrat in politics. He was elected to the Common Council, and
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served from 1890 to 1891 ; was Alderman in 1892-93 ; was appointed member of the Board of Street Commissioners in 1893. His administration of the office has proved so satisfactory that he has been continued in the office until the present time. He was a member of the board of directors of the Hartford Building & Loan Association for nine years, resign- ing this office in 1899. For five years he served on the board of fire under- writers. He has always taken an active interest in educational affairs, and since 1894 has served on the Washington school district committee.
Mr. Buths is a member of several fraternal organizations, among which are the following: Lafayette Lodge, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, of which he has been treasurer for about fifteen years; Pythagoras Chapter, Royal Arch Masons; Wolcott Council, Royal and Select Masters, of which he was treas- urer for nine years; Washington Com- mandery, Knights Templar; Sphinx Temple, Mystic Shrine, of Hartford ; Connecticut Consistory, Ancient Ac- cepted Scottish Rite; treasurer of Grand Lodge, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons of the State of Connecticut. He is also treasurer of the Masonic Charity Foundation, and a member of the Hart- ford Club and the Saengerbund. Mr. Buths is an active member of the First Universalist Church of Hartford, and is a member of the church committee.
Mr. Buths married, January 8, 1883, Louise R. Stamm, of Hartford, one of the four daughters of John and Rosina Stamm. John Stamm was a well-known Hartford tailor. Mrs. Buths died in 1893, at the age of thirty-seven years. The children of Mr. and Mrs. Buths are : I. Anna Eva, married Alec N. Penny, of Utah, a mining engineer. 2. Louis S., who became associated with his father
in 1910, under the firm name of Joseph Buths & Son. Mr. Buths married, June 23, 1914, Jean C., daughter of Mrs. Cath- erine Clement, of Barnet, Vermont. She is descended from Colonel Bidell.
KIRSCHBAUM, Edward Harry, M. D., Physician.
Dr. Edward Harry Kirschbaum, one of the rising young physicians of Waterbury, Connecticut, although him- self a native of the Uinted States, is of German parentage. A student of un- usual intelligence and concentration; devoted to his work, and with a practical grasp of the needs of the medical profes- sion and the situation generally, he is peculiarly well fitted to succeed in the practice of his difficult and self-sacrific- ing calling.
Dr. Kirschbaum was born in Water- bury, Connecticut, September 28, 1888, and is a son of John and Anna (Brown) Kirschbaum. His parents are living at the present time (1916) ; his father a man of ability and a prominent figure in the community. Mr. Kirschbaum is a native of Wurtemburg, Germany, where his birth occurred on April 29, 1844, and the first twenty-two years of his life were spent in the country of his birth, where he lived the typical life of the German child in youth, gaining his education at the nearby local volkeschule, and later learning the trade of toolmaker. In 1866 he sailed for the United States, locating at first in New York City, where he was employed at his trade of making tools for a number of years. He then went to Naugatuck, Connecticut, and from there to Newark, New Jersey, where he remained two years and finally to Waterbury, Connecticut, which has been his home ever since. In Newark he was employed by the Goddard Brass
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Bullion Manufacturing Company and had charge of the manufacture of tools in their large machine shop, but upon coming to Waterbury he first worked for Steele, Johnson & Company, and then engaged in business upon his own account. It was at that time that, in company with others who became his partners, he organized the Novelty Manufacturing Company of Waterbury which has continued most successfully to conduct its business to the present time, Mr. Kirschbaum remaining associated with it until 1914, when he retired at the age of seventy. He married (first) at Waterbury, in 1869, Elizabeth Brickel, and her death took place there in 1884. To them were born seven children as follows: William, a resident of Detroit, Michigan; John; Elizabeth, wife of Frank Huber, of Waterbury; Karl; Joseph ; Lillian, who married William G. Grieve, now deceased; and Louis. Mr. Kirschbaum married (second) in 1886, Anna Brown, of Waterbury, there being two children of this marriage; Anna Blake, who resides with her parents in Waterbury, and Edward Harry, of whom further. Mr. Kirschbaum was one of nine children of Michael and Barbara (Kromer) Kirschbaum, who lived and died in Wurtemburg, Germany. Five of these children are still living. three of them in the United States, Mr. Kirsch- baum in Waterbury, George J. Kirsch- baum, also of that city, and Michael, who makes his home in New Jersey. Mr. Kirschbaum has been prominent in the public affairs of the town and held several offices, among them being his membership on the water commission of the city for some time.
Dr. Kirschbaum received the prelimi- nary portion of his education in the schools of his native Waterbury. He was still quite young when he decided
upon following medicine as a career, and this decision was approved by his father who desired that he should have the best possible educational advantages to fit him for the profession. He was pre- pared, therefore, for his college course at the excellent Crosby High School in Waterbury, from which he was gradu- ated in 1907. He then spent one year in preparatory work and then went to Yale University where he entered the Medical School. From this institution he was graduated with the class of 1912, having proven himself gifted with all the qualities that go to make a profound and proficient scholar. He was made secretary of his class, a position he still holds. Upon taking his degree, he re- paired at once to the Fordham branch of Bellevue Hospital, there to gain the requisite practical experience, and after remaining there and in several allied hos- pitals in New York City as an interne for the better part of three years, he returned to Waterbury and established himself in practice. His home and office is at present situated at No. 20 Grove street, Waterbury, and he has already made a name for himself as a practitioner of many attainments in the city among the general public and among his col- leagues of the medical profession. His practice is constantly growing in size and importance and there is every reason to look upon him as one of the important factors in the medical situation in the future. He is a member of the staff of the Waterbury Hospital.
Dr. Kirschbaum is a man of large public spirit and broad sympathies, and he takes an active part in the general life of the community of which he is a member. He is especially prominent in fraternity circles and is a member of a number of such and similar organiza- tions. Among the societies of which he
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is a member should be mentioned: The American Mechanics, Improved Order of Red Men, Knights of Pythias, the Ma- sonic Order and the Independent Order of Odd Fellows. In all of these he is active and takes a considerable part in the affairs of the various lodges. An Episcopalian in the matter of his re- ligious belief, Dr. Kirschbaum attends St. John's Church of that denomination in Waterbury, and is very prominent in the affairs of the parish.
FARRINGTON, Daniel Thomas, Real Estate and Insurance.
The great manufacturing cities of Eng- land have a certain resemblance to the in- dustrial centers of the Western Hemi- sphere and in this matter old England and New England have much in common. Of course there are differences as well as like- nesses, differences that are almost all in favor of the New World. The English cities possess all the evil peculiarities in- separable from such huge aggregations of toiling creatures in a more extreme form than their fellows of America. In them there is an even less mingling of the two classes of employers and employed and a consequent less understanding of each other. A deeper poverty, a more complete subordination of the individual to the in- stitution of which he is a member, gener- ally an unwilling member, and a corres- pondingly greater difficulty for the man at the bottom of the ladder to work his way to the top. Among the similarities should be remarked the power as of the magnet to draw from all the country about, and even from great distances, the human units of which they are made up. It is not often, however, that those who are absorbed in these great maelstroms, espe- cially those of England, find their way out again, and the fact of one having done so
is a sufficient criterion of his enterprise and courage. Such was the achievement of the Farrington family, especially of Daniel Thomas Farrington, with whose career this sketch is principally concerned.
Daniel Thomas Farrington was a son of Patrick and Anna (Vardon) Farrington, both natives of Ireland, having been born at Castlebar, County Mayo. His parents removed to Birmingham, England, and it was here that he was born June 30, 1868, and passed his childhood and early youth. He was one of five children, two of whom are deceased, and his remaining brother and sister live in America, in Detroit, Michi- gan, and Bridgeport, Connecticut, respec- tively.
Mr. Farrington attended the local schools of his native city, but in 1886, at the age of eighteen, he left the parental home and came to Waterbury, Connecti- cut. An elder sister, Mary Ann Farring- ton, now deceased, had already come to the Connecticut city and the young man joined her there, finding employment with the Waterbury, Farrell Foundry and Ma- chine Company. He did not remain with this concern more than four months, how- ever, when, finding a better position with the Scoville Manufacturing Company of Waterbury, he left his first employers and became associated with the concern which was to benefit by his valuable services for so many years. The year following his arrival in this country his father followed him, his mother having died in Birming- ham in 1882, and spent the remainder of his life in Waterbury. For seventeen years the younger Mr. Farrington re- inained with the Scoville Manufacturing Company, rising rapidly in rank until he held a position of responsibility in that concern. All the time, however, it was his greatest ambition to engage in business on his own account, and as time went on and his resources increased the possibility
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of realizing his desire began to grow more definite. Mr. Farrington is possessed of a very keen business instinct and it was not a great while before he came to appre- ciate the wonderful possibilities offered to investment by the rapidly increasing land values in a growing city like Waterbury. This fact, together with the large volume of business done in city properties, thou- sands of transactions in this commodity, determined him to enter the field, and as soon as he had accumulated sufficient capi- tal to make him in a degree independent he opened a real estate and fire insurance office at No. III West Main street, Water- bury, and quickly worked up a large busi- ness of the very best type. The volume of this business has constantly increased un- til to-day he is doing one of the largest of its kind in the city.
For many years Mr. Farrington has been interested in the conduct of the city's public affairs, and has taken a leading part therein, showing so wide a public spirit that he won the regard of his fellow citizens generally. His talents were appreciated by Mayor Reeves, who at the beginning of his administration appointed Mr. Farrington assessor. So marked were the services rendered by him in this capacity that he was reappointed by Mayor Scully in 1916, and is at pres- ent holding the same office to the great satisfaction of the community. Before these appointments Mr. Farrington had been elected alderman, in October, 1911, and served from January 1, 1912, un- til January, 1914, and at the first meet- ing of the Board of Aldermen was elected its president, also served on the Board of Finance during his term as president. Though not what is known as a fraternity man, Mr. Farrington is a member of some of the non-secret orders, the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks, the Waterbury Order of Eagles,
and the Loyal Order of Moose. In his religious faith he is a Roman Catholic and a member of the Church of the Sacred Heart in Waterbury.
Mr. Farrington was united in mar- riage, July 28, 1892, at Waterbury, with Mary Barrett, a native of Castlebar, County Mayo, Ireland, from where it will be remembered Mr. Farrington's own parents came. Mrs. Farrington is the daughter of John Barrett, who is still residing at Castlebar at the age of seventy-two years, her mother dying there in 1910. She came as a young girl to this country alone and met her husband in Waterbury where they were both living. To them have been born four children, as follows : Anna Mary, born October 7, 1893; Daniel Thomas, Jr., born July 4, 1895, now a student at the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor in that State, class of 1920; Edward John, born June 14, 1897; and Thomas Francis, born July 11, 1907.
BYRNE, Michael John,
Judge of Probate.
There is, of course, no royal road to success. There is no road, even, of which it may be said that it is superior to all others, yet we can scarcely doubt that there are certain stretches of well travelled way that lead rather more directly to some specific goals than do others, and that it well pays those who would travel thither to take note of their existence. Let us take for example that so widely desired success in public life. for which so many strive and so few effectively win here, putting aside a cer- tain undue influence said to be too fre- quently exerted to-day in this country. there are few ways of such direct approach as through the time-honored profession of law. There is certainly
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nothing astonishing in this fact-and it surely is a fact-because the training, the associations, matters with which their daily work brings them in contact are of a kind that peculiarly well fit the lawyers for the tasks of public office, many of which are merely a continuation or slight modi- fication of their more private labors. To step from the bar to the bench is to step from private to public life, yet it involves no such startling break in what a man must do, still less in what he must think, and although there are but few offices in which the transition is as direct as this, yet there are but few to which the step is not comparatively easy. Of course it is not, as has already been remarked, a royal road, for the law is an exacting mistress and requires of her votaries not merely hard and concentrated study in preparation for her practice but a sort of double task as student and business man as the condition of successful prac- tice throughout the period in which they follow her. Nevertheless what has been stated is unquestionably true as anyone who chooses to examine the lives of our public men in the past can easily dis- cover in the preponderance of lawyers over men of other callings who are chosen for this kind of advancement. The career of Michael John Byrne, the promi- nent attorney of Waterbury, Connecticut, is a case in point, although his choice of the law as a profession was rendered doubly difficult by the circumstances of his youth even to the extent of more than making up for any hypothetical advan- tages contained in that profession once he had entered it.
Michael John Byrne is a splendid example of the best type of Irish man- hood, and was born in County Carlow. Ireland, October 3, 1872. His family had been resident in that region for many years before and the old homestead had
remained in the hands of its members for generations. It was on this old place, that locally had the name of Graig-Alug, that Mr. Byrne's father and grandfather lived and died and it was there he was born also. The grandfather, Patrick Byrne, was married to Mary Maher and had two children, William and Cather- ine, both of whom are now deceased, the former having been the father of the present Mr. Byrne. William, Byrne's life was an eminently quiet one, his work consisting in the operation of the old family farm, where he died in 1901 at the age of sixty-five years. His wife, also deceased, was Elizabeth (Carroll) Byrne, and their marriage occurred in 1864 and was blessed with twelve children, of whom seven are at present living, as fol- lows: James, a clergyman in Queens County, Ireland; Thomas, a clergyman in Kildare, Ireland; William, a clergy- man in Kings County, Ireland; Peter, who now lives on the old homestead in County Carlow; Elizabeth, now the widow of John McGrath, and the owner of Nurney House, County Carlow, where she resides; Daniel J., who came to the United States, was graduated from the Yale Medical School, practiced for some time in Waterbury and then returned to Ireland and is now medical examiner for the Hospital District in Tullow, near his old home, and Michael John.
Michael John Byrne passed the years of his childhood and early youth in his native region and gained his education at the local schools. In the month of April, 1891, when he was a youth of eighteen years, he set sail for the United States and, upon reaching this country, settled in Waterbury, Connecticut, which has ever since been his home and the scene of his busy activities. Mr. Byrne was the first of his family to come to America and, though an ambitious
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youth, he found that it was necessary for him to seek employment of the first kind that offered. As may be supposed this was humble enough at the outset, his first work being in the case depart- ment of the Waterbury Clock Company. He was possessed of an alert and intelli- gent appearance, however, and favor- ably impressed those whom he met, and it was in the autumn of the same year that he secured a position as salesman for a large book concern, his territory covering all of New England, New York and New Jersey. This was in 1891 and he continued to sell books with a high degree of success for two years. The success won by Mr. Byrne in the book- selling business at once stirred his am- bition and made it possible for him to gratify his desire to study for a profes- sion. He had chosen that of law and accordingly, in 1893. he entered the De- partment of Law at Yale University, and was a member of the first class gradu- ated from that school in the new building known as Hendrie Hall, his class being that of 1895. He returned at once to Waterbury and in 1896 began practice there. He was admirably fitted for the practice of his profession both by natural talent and acquired ability, and it was but a short time before he began to make a name for himself. Rapidly his prac- tice increased in size and importance and much important litigation was intrusted to his hands. But though a compara- tively young man he acquitted himself admirably in this work and came to be regarded as one of the rising attorneys of the city and a leader of the county bar. He remained in private practice entirely by himself, taking a decidedly active part in the general life of the com- munity and especially in politics. He identified himself with the Republican local organization. He became the can-
didate of his party for Judge of Probate and was elected and entered upon his office, January 1, 1909. Judge Byrne was the first Republican Judge of Probate in the Waterbury district in twenty years, and his election is a splendid tribute to the popularity and respect which he enjoyed among his fellow citizens. Judge Byrne has always been highly interested in the cause of education and for two years he was a member of the Old Center School District Committee.
It has not been the case that Judge Byrne has confined his activities either to his legal practice or to his duties as judge. On the contrary, he is one of the inost conspicuous figures in the industrial and financial life of the city. He has organized many of the important con- cerns in Waterbury and in a number of cases has retained the chief office to the present. Such is The Connecticut Oil Company of Waterbury, of which he is president and treasurer, and such are The National Company of Waterbury, The Columbus Building Corporation of Waterbury and The Diamond Oil Com- pany of Stamford, Connecticut, in all of which he holds the same offices. He is greatly interested in the efforts of the independent oil men to maintain their position in the mercantile world and is a member of the board of directors and vice-president of the Independent Oil Men's Association of the United States, the headquarters of which are in Chicago. He is a prominent figure in club and fraternity circles and a member of many organizations among which should be mentioned, besides the Connecticut and American Bar Associations, the Young Men's Republican Club of New Haven, the Knights of Columbus, the Country Club and the Mattatuck Historical So- ciety. He is greatly interested in the Boy Scout movement and is a member
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fo the council of the organization that bears that name. In the matter of re- ligion Judge Byrne is a Roman Catholic and a devoted member of the Church of the Blessed Sacrament in Waterbury.
It was at Troy, New York, on October 30, 1895, that Judge Byrne was married to Susan Kannally, a native of Chicago, and a daughter of Patrick and Cather- ine (Curran) Kannally, both natives of Ireland, both now deceased. To Mr. and Mrs. Byrne seven children have been born as follows: William Patrick, born July 24, 1896, a graduate of Taft School in 1914 and a freshman at Yale Univer- sity, Sheffield Scientific School, class of 1916, now employed in the purchasing department of the Waterbury Manufac- turing Company ; Edward Michael, born October 9, 1899, a graduate of the Water- bury High School, class of 1916; now a freshman at Mount St. Mary's College, Emmetsburg, Maryland; Elizabeth Kan- nally, born October 14, 1900, now a student in the Waterbury High School; Francis Carroll, born February 24, 1902, now a student in the Waterbury High School; Townsend, born August II, 1903, now a student in the Waterbury High School; Louise, born February 16, 1905, now a student in Bunker Hill Grammar School; and James Thomas, born July 19, 1909, now a student in the Bunker Hill School.
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