USA > Connecticut > Fairfield County > Bridgeport > History of Bridgeport and vicinity > Part 7
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various offices he has advanced until he is now president and treasurer of N. Buckingham & Company and thus has leading voice in the management and direction of the extensive furni- ture business owned and controlled by that firm-a business which has added to Bridgeport's well earned reputation of being the industrial center of Connecticut. He is moreover a trus- tee of the City Savings Bank of Bridgeport.
In 1875 Mr. Buckingham was united in marriage to Miss Justine H. Bellows and they had three children, of whom two are living, Nathan C. and Earl M., both associated with their father in business. The wife and mother passed away in September, 1905. Mr. Bucking- ham was married in 1908 to Miss Susan Christine Gillette, a daughter of William and Susan Buckingham Gillette, and a representative of an old Milford family. Mr. Buckingham is a member of the Sons of the American Revolution and served on its state board for six years, while of the General Silliman branch of that society he was president in 1905 and 1906. He manifests the military spirit and the patriotic loyalty of his ancestry and for five years had military training and experience as a member of the Connecticut National Guard. He belonged to the Bridgeport Board of Trade for many years, also to the Bridgeport Business Men's Association and does everything in his power to advance the city's interests and extend its commercial connections. Politically he is a republican. His religious faith is that of the Universalist church and along purely social lines he has connection with the Independent Order of Odd Fellows and with the Seaside Club. His activities in business have centered along a single line and under his wise guidance his interests have grown to gratifying pro- portions.
PHILIP L. HOLZER.
Prominent among the financial men of Bridgeport and Connecticut is Philip L. Holzer, whose identifieation with many corporate and business interests has constituted a contributing factor to the development of business conditions in this section of the state. He was born February 20, 1854, in the city where he still resides, his parents being John and Catherine (Andres) Holzer. The father was born, reared and educated in Germany and became a lieutenant in the army of the grand duke of Baden, serving at the time of the revolution of 1848 and 1849. He afterward came to the new world and when this country became involved in civil war he again was active in military service, becoming captain of Company B of the First Regiment of Connecticut Volunteers. With that command he went to the front and aided in the preservation of the Union.
Philip L. Holzer acquired his education in public and private schools of Bridgeport and in the Bryant & Stratton Business College. He has throughout his entire life, however, been a student, reading broadly and thinking deeply. He was a youth of but fourteen years when he made his initial step in the business world, securing a clerkship in 1868 in the office of J. & G. A. Staples, who conducted a real estate and insurance business. A year and a half later, however, he became assistant bookkeeper with the wholesale grain firm of Crane & Hurd. In 1870 he entered the Connecticut National Bank in the capacity of bookkeeper and soon afterward was promoted to the position of teller and later to that of paying teller, in which capacity he continued to serve until 1884. He then entered into copartner- ship with his first employer, James Staples and his son Frank T. Staples, forming the firm of James Staples & Company, bankers, real estate and insurance agents. He then devoted himself to the mastery of the insurance business, becoming acquainted with it in all of its various phases, and several times he was called to the presidency of the Bridgeport Fire Underwriters Association. He was also one of the organizers of the Connecticut State Asso- ciation of Local Fire Insurance Agents, of which he became president. Into other channels, too, he extended his efforts, becoming a director of the Holzer-Cabot Electric Company of
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Brookline, Massachusetts, a director of The White Manufacturing Company of Bridgeport, a director and treasurer of the Masonic Temple Association, a director and treasurer of the Mountain Grove Cemetery Association and a trustee of the Peoples Savings Bank.
Mr. Holzer has also been prominently identified with various fraternal interests. He is a member of Corinthian Lodge, No. 104, F. & A. M., is a past commander of Hamilton Com- mandery, No. 5. K. T., a member of Lafayette Consistory, A. & A. S. R., and a past potentate of Pyramid Temple, A. A. O. N. M. S. In club circles he is a member of the Seaside Club, of which he was formerly president, of the Algonquin Club and the Brooklawn Country Club, and he is likewise a member of Franklin Bartlett Camp, Sons of Veterans. His powers of concentration constitute one of the strong elements in his life. He is capable of giving his whole attention to the work in hand and turns with equal energy and vigor to the next duty. It is this which has enabled him to cover a broad field and various lines of activity. He is known as one who has done much to mold public thought and opinion along political lines. In 1896 he was elected alderman of Bridgeport and the following year was chosen president of the board. In 1898 he was appointed a member of the board of fire commissioners and in 1899 was elected president thereof. In 1908 he was elected to represent the twenty-first district of Connecticut in the state senate and gave earnest consideration to various public questions which came up for settlement and with equal persistence fought those projects which he deemed inimical to the best good of the commonwealth. He is now serving as a member of the park board of Bridgeport, and the development and extension of the city's parks finds in him a stalwart supporter.
In 1878 Mr. Holzer was united in marriage to Miss Sara M. Smith, a daughter of John Glover and Margaret Porter Smith, representatives of old New England families. Mr. and Mrs. Holzer hold membership in St. John's Protestant Episcopal church, and they have a very wide acquaintance in Bridgeport, where the hospitality of the best homes is cordially accorded them.
JOHN CHARLES LYNCH, M. D.
Dr. John Charles Lynch, a prominent physician of Bridgeport who is specializing in neurology, was born in the town of Trumbull, Fairfield county, Connecticut, February 6, 1865, being the only son of Owen and Bridget Read Lynch, both of whom are now deceased. The father was born in Ireland.
Dr. Lynch spent his boyhood to the age of twelve years in Trumbull and then entered the Emory Strong Commercial and Military Institute at Bridgeport, in which he spent four years. When a youth of seventeen he became a student in the New York College of Dentistry and won the D. D. S. degree upon graduation with the class of 1884. He afterward practiced dentistry in New York city for about eighteen months and at the same time pursued the study of medicine in the New York University, which conferred upon him his M. D. degree at his graduation with the class of 1886. It was his work as a member of the dental profession that brought him the money with which to meet the expenses of his medical course. Following his graduation he opened an office in Newtown, Connecticut, but in the fall of the same year he removed to Bridgeport, although, owing to ill health, he did not at once begin practice. From April until November, 1887, he followed his profession in New Canaan, Connecticut, and the following year returned to Bridgeport, where he has since actively engaged in the practice of medicine, winning a well deserved reputation that establishes him as one of the most prominent physicians of the city. He has made a specialty of the treatment of mental and nervous diseases and in that connection has won a reputation that has made him widely known far beyond the borders of his state. In fact his opinions as a diagnos- tician and a neurologist are widely accepted as authority and for many years he has been
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adjunct professor of neurology in the New York Post Graduate School and visits the city twice each week to deliver lectures in that institution. Previous to his connection with the Post Graduate School he was adjunct professor in the New York Polyclinic. He has himself taken post graduate work in the New York Post Graduate School, the Johns Hopkins University of Baltimore and in the Harvard Medical College and has further supplemented his knowledge by study in many of the largest cities of Europe, including London, Paris, Vienna and Berlin, where he has come under the instruction of some of the most eminent physicians and surgeons of the old world. He has gone abroad twelve times in the pursuit of knowledge and of pleasure. For twenty years he has served on the staff of the Bridgeport Hospital and is now in charge of the department of neurology.
On the 18th of April, 1895, Dr. Lynch was united in marriage to Miss Sadia Esther Walls, who was born in Springfield, Massachusetts, a daughter of Henry Jerome and Mary Caulwell (MeIntyre) Walls, who were also natives of the old Bay state and have now passed away. In his student days Dr. Lynch had as one of his early medical preceptors the late Dr. Robert Hubbard of Bridgeport, who was one of the most beloved physicians of this city, and in honor of this early preceptor and friend Dr. Lynch and his wife named their elder son Hubbard. He was born January 21, 1898, and is now a junior at Yale. The younger son, John Charles, horn December 10, 1901, is attending the Bridgeport schools.
Dr. Lynch has attained high rank in Masonry, reaching the Knight Templar degree of the York Rite and the thirty-second degree of the Scottish Rite, and he has also crossed the sands of the desert with the Nobles of the Mystic Shrine. He has membership with the Bridge- port, the Fairfield County and the Connecticut State Medical Societies and the American Medical Association, and in these organizations his opinions along the line of his specialty are listened to with great interest and careful consideration is given thereto, for he is an acknowledged authority upon mental and nervous diseases.
GEORGE WILLIAM JACKMAN.
The years of Bridgeport's phenomenal development-the years which made up the last three decades of the nineteenth century and immediately followed the spectacular success of Phineas T. Barnum, were productive of a great number of brilliant men whose united efforts were in a large measure the material out of which that development was wrought. The names of these men are deserving of perpetual honor on the part of the community which they have so benefited and among them none is more so than that of George William Jackman, whose death on August 15, 1913, ended a long and most useful career- a career that contributed to the well being of the community in almost every department of its life.
Mr. Jackman was a native of Vermont, born in the town of Barre, February 4, 1851. His parents were Angier and Christina (French) Jackman, both members of prominent and honored families of that state, the father himself being a conspicuous figure in the life of the town. Angier Jackman was the owner of a small farm in the vicinity of Barre, which he operated successfully, but he was best known in that region as an able and honorable politician and official. He held at different times many important offices in the gift of his fellow citizens and was sheriff of Washington county and judge of the police court there for many years. George William was the fourth of the five children born to him and his wife.
The early life of George William Jackman was spent on the paternal farm in the usual pastimes and duties of childhood, chief among which was the gaining of his education in the local schools. His ambition to make his mark in the world developed at an early age and he left school while still' a mere lad to begin the active business of life. The clever
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and alert youth found no great difficulty in making his beginning, soon securing with the Central Vermont Railroad Company a position as station agent at Waterbury, Vermont. He always declared in later life that the experience in this capacity had been of great value to him and had given him a clear insight into business methods that later served him in good stead. He did not remain long in this employment, however, but engaged in the granite business in various parts of his native state and in Chicago. He continued in this line for upwards of eight years and during that time met with considerable success. He was ever on the alert, however. to find a larger field for his activities and at length found such, when, about the year 1891, an opportunity arose to become connected with a group of energetic young men in the organization of the Springfield Emery Wheel Company. The name of this concern was derived from the city of Springfield, Massachusetts, which was chosen for its location. Mr. Jackman was chosen treasurer of the company when it was removed to Bridgeport, Connecticut, and he served in that capacity for some time, its growth being attributable in no small degree to his capable handling of its affairs. Eventually he bought the interests of his partners and became the sole owner and president of the concern. The late P. T. Barnum had much to do with the removal of the company to Bridgeport, and he built for it there a factory on Howard avenue. In the year 1900 the company was reorganized, receiving at that time the name of the Springfield Manufacturing Company, by which it is still known. At the same time a fine new factory was built on Mountain Grove street, where it has been located ever since. In 1908 Mr. Jackman finally withdrew from its management and sold his interests therein and turned his attention to the direction of his personal estate and the enlargement of his real estate holdings in Bridgeport, which were already very great.
But the versatile mind of Mr. Jackman was not one to be satisfied by an exclusive attention to business. His interests were too broad and his sympathies too sensitive to permit him to close out of his life the other activities of the great world, which he turned to at once for relaxation and with the sincere desire to aid his fellows.
Political questions and issues had interested him theoretically from his early youth, and when he grew to manhood the practical application of the principles he held with no little tenacity. claimed much of his attention. He was a republican in his beliefs and allied himself with the party organization in Bridgeport. His name first came before the public in this connection as his party's candidate for alderman from the fifth city district. an office to which he was elected and in which he served during the term of 1906-7. The next office held by Mr. Jackman was a member of the board of apportionment and taxation, to which he was appointed in the latter part of the year 1909 and which he continued to hold until the time of his death. Some time later the board of contract and supply was created and added to the city government, and Mayor Wilson, of Bridgeport, appointed Mr. Jackman one of its original members.
In social and fraternal circles Mr. Jackman was a prominent figure. He was a member of the Connecticut Society of the Sons of the American Revolution and was extremely active therein, and he was also active in the Masonic order, having taken the thirty-second degree. He was a member of St. John's Lodge, F. & A. M .; Hamilton Commandery, K. T .; and of the Arab Patrol of the Mystic Shrine. He was also a member of the Knights of Pythias and for many years of the Algonquin Club of Bridgeport. One of the very strong interests in Mr. Jackman's life was his church. A Universalist in belief, he was for many years a member of the church of that denomination in Bridgeport, and for an equal length of time an ardent participant in its work in the community. For many years he served as moderator of the board of trustees.
Mr. Jackman was married when but nineteen years of age to Miss Josephine Caswell, of Washington, Vermont, a daughter of Nelson H. and Sibyl E. (Watson) Caswell, of that place. The Caswell family, long prominent in that region, had contributed two of its members to the Revolutionary war, in which they distinguished themselves by gallant
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service, and in virtne of which Mrs. Jackman is a member of the Society of the Daughters of the American Revolution. These were Nathan Caswell and Nathan Caswell, Jr., the great-grandfather and the grandfather respectively of Mrs. Jackman. The marriage of Mr. and Mrs. Jackman took place September 26, 1870, at Barre, Vermont, and they were the parents of two children: Charles N., who died at the age of ten years; and Burtis A., who died when but six months old. After that time Mr. and Mrs. Jackman adopted a little daughter, Esther Leona Bemis, who has since married Andrew B. Hicks, of Bridgeport. They are the parents of two children, George Jackman Hicks and Doris May Hicks. Mrs. Jackman survives her husband and still occupies the beautiful home erected by him at No. 2403 North avenue, Bridgeport, in 1894. of which he was particularly proud.
Mr. Jackman's character was an unusually attractive one and combined many of the traits that are associated with success. A face in which strong will and a genial temper seemed equally to rnle was the accurate mirror of his mind and heart, and his objects were won as much by his power of persuading the thoughts of others as by his own direct and forceful efforts to reach them. His friends were many and true, and his death caused a feeling of deep sorrow to spread through a wide circle of his fellows. His tastes were of the manly open sort that are so powerful in their appeal to men-life in the open air and the hardy sports connected therewith. Automobiling and allied pastimes formed his recreations which he indulged in as often as the opportunity arose.
Mr. Jackman was an influential figure and a popular figure in the general life of the community as was well shown by the testimonials of admiration called forth by his decease. The local press was loud in its praise of the strong and sterling qualities which had raised him to the position he occupied in popular regard, the following being from the Bridgeport Morning Telegram, which said in part:
"He was prominently identified with the industrial development of the city, prominent in polities, in fraternal circles, in enterprises for the health and convenience of the public. in movements to help the city to an economical conservation yet progressive development. * * * He was called successful and was in the common acceptation of the word. But he was successful in many of the real things that contribute to individual community happenings- the real success that in comparison makes the material gains seem small. Mr. Jackman was what is known as self-made. He was a surprise to his friends in the wealth of his knowledge, in his grasp of practical affairs, and in his mastery of details. * * * Mr. Jaekman was reliable-in politics incorruptible-in business to his word-in friendship steadfast-in his home affectionate and devoted; as a citizen public-spirited, in his church constant in attendance and conspicuous in devotion to its interests."
HON. CIVILION FONES. D. D. S.
Among those men whose efforts have lent dignity to the dental profession and who are representatives of the highest type of American manhood and citizenship in Bridgeport was numbered Hon. Civilion Fones. His life record spanned the intervening years between October 1, 1836, and September 20, 1907, and his death was the occasion of deep and wide- spread regret. He was born in Toronto, Canada, at a period when his father, Christopher Fones, an architect and builder, was actively engaged at his vocation in that city. The ancestral records of the family show Dr. Fones to be a descendant of two prominent French Hugenot families. His great-grandfather in the paternal line was exiled to England during the reign of Louis XIV and later became an officer in the English navy. At the time of his retirement from naval service he was given a tract of fifteen hundred acres of land in Rhode Island, where the town of Wickford now stands. It was there that Christopher Fones was born. He married Sarah A. Marigold, of South Carolina, who was a descendant of an old English family.
HON. CIVILION FONES, D. D. S.
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Civilion Fones acquired his early education in the schools of Toronto and of New York city and his training prepared him for the profession to which his father devoted his atten- tion and which the son followed for a short time. In 1858, however, he arrived in Bridgeport and became connected with the pioneer dental manufacturing establishment of Dr. D. H. Porter, whose plant and residence were located at the corner of Park and Fairfield avenue, now the site of St. John's church. It was there that Dr. Fones began the study of dentistry. He afterward attended the Baltimore College of Dental Surgeons, from which he was in due time graduated. Upon bis return to Bridgeport he entered upon the practice of his profession and for more than a quarter of a century was located at the northwest corner of Main and Bank streets. For more than a quarter of a century Dr. Civilion Fones occupied a foremost position in his profession not only in Bridgeport but throughout the state. That he enjoyed in full measure the high regard and confidence of his colleagues and contemporaries was indicated in his selection to the presidency of the Connecticut Valley Dental Association and the presidency of the Connecticut State Dental Society. In 1893 he was appointed by Governor Morris one of the first five state dental commissioners and upon the organization of the commission was chosen its president, which position he filled for a number of years. Probably no other member of his profession in the state during the period of Dr. Fones' activity wielded a greater influence for higher standards of professional service.
In civic affairs, too, he took a most prominent part. He was a stanch republican and on that ticket was elected an alderman of Bridgeport in 1884, while in 1886 he was chosen mayor of the city, in which office he served for two terms, his being a businesslike and progressive administration that resulted in the inauguration of various needed reforms and improve- ments. In 1886 he was one of the prime movers in the project to secure a new postoffice building for the city and was empowered to take the necessary steps to secure the passage of a bill to that end. With that object in view he went to Washington and was successful in his mission. He instituted many improvements in the streets and in public buildings while in office and his administration was a very progressive one. He belonged to a number of clubs in the city and state and in 1892 served as president of the Seaside Club. He was a Scottish Rite Mason, attaining the thirty-second degree, and he was also a member of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows. He was chosen to act as grand marshal in the great military parade which was held at the time Bridgeport celebrated her bi-centennial in 1888.
On the 21st of October. 1863, Dr. Fones was married to Miss Phebe E. Wright, a daughter of Alfred S. Wright, of New York city, and three children were. born to them: George, who died in childhood; Grace Fones Copeland, of Philadelphia; and Dr. Alfred C. Fones, of Bridgeport, who is mentioned elsewhere in this work. A man of striking personal appearance, always well dressed, Dr. Fones possessed, moreover, a force of character that operated so gracefully that leadership came without affront. He was an entertaining talker. possessed unusual congeniality and made friends wherever be went. A thorough gentleman at all times, he could adapt himself at once to any company. He was one of the city's best known men and had a very wide acquaintance, being highly respected and enjoying a degree of popularity that is accorded to but few.
ALFRED C. FONES, D. D. S.
Dr. Alfred C. Fones has taken a notably advanced step in relation to dental practice on the side of prevention of oral diseases. In fact, he has instituted progressive campaigns for the dissemination of knowledge that will minimize trouble of that character and his interesting, instructive and scientific writings on dental hygiene have made his opinions largely accepted as authority upon the questions of which he treats.
Because of his progressive work in this connection Bridgeport may well be proud to
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claim Dr. Fones as one of her native sons. He was here born December 17, 1869, a son of the Hon. Civilion Fones, a descendant of two prominent French Huguenot families and of whom a more extended mention will be found elsewhere in this work. Dr. Alfred C. Fones, after completing a course in the Bridgeport high school entered the New York College of Dentistry, from which he was graduated with the class of 1890. He then returned to Bridgeport to enter into practice with his father, with whom he was associated for seventeen years, or until the latter's death. There is no more devoted, prominent nor progressive representative of the profession in Bridgeport or New England than Dr. Fones.
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