USA > Connecticut > Representative men of Connecticut, 1861-1894 > Part 29
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For many years Mr. Landers was a director of the New Britain National Bank, resigning i11 1878 to accept his appointment as bank commissioner. He was again appointed to this office in 1887 by Governor Lounsbury. He was one of the incorporators of the New Britain Gas Light Company, a member of the first board of directors, and from 1865 to 1893 he served as president of the company. A share of Mr. Landers's time has been devoted to railroad matters. He was one of the incorporators of the New Britain Railroad, and for a long series of years was a director in the New York & New England Railroad.
In every movement which has taken place for the last half-century to advance the material prosperity of New Britain, Mr. Landers's influence has been felt. His fourscore years sit lightly on his shoulders, and his bearing is that of a sprightly gentleman of seventy. Honored most by those who know him best, it is to be hoped that he may be spared yet many years.
EALY, WILLIAM ARNOLD, of Hartford, was born in Scituate, R. I., Sept. 7, 1815. His father, Thomas Healy, was of English origin, his ancestors having come to Rhode Island in 1730. Through his mother, Patience Arnold, Mr. Healy was able to trace his ancestry in an unbroken line back to Ynir, a Welsh king, who flourished about the middle of the twelfth century. The Arnolds were a well-known and prominent family, and intimately connected with the early history of Rhode Island. Mr. Healy was also a direct descendant from Roger Williams, the founder of the State of Rhode Island.
After receiving a common school education, he went to Packerville at the age of seven- teen, entering the store of Mr. Daniel Packer. Mr. Packer was a inan of large property and varied business interests, owning most of the town of Packerville, which was named after him. Upon the death of Mr. Packer, Mr. Healy was appointed agent and manager of his extensive business interests in Packerville, and in this position displayed marked ability and faithfulness.
OF CONNECTICUT, 1861-1894. 18I
In July, 1853, Mr. Healy went to West Virginia as the representative of a syndicate composed imostly of Hartford gentlemen : Mr. E. A. Bulkeley, father of Ex-Governor Bulkeley, Hezekiah Huntington, John Warburton, Daniel Phillips and others. This syndicate had purchased a large tract of land in Mason county, and sent Mr. Healy there to develop the coal and salt resources which were supposed to exist there. Mr. Healy started the work inder the charter of the Mason County Mining and Manufacturing Company, and Hartford City, a town of several thousand inhabitants situated upon the banks of the Ohio, was founded by him in the prosecution of this enterprise. The chief factor of profit in the business proved to be in the production of salt which was vigorously and successfully carried on.
In 1859, Mr. Healy, with the cooperation of Hon. B. B. Horton, the president of a neighboring salt company, formed a syndicate comprising all the salt companies on the Ohio river. The name of the new combination was the Ohio River Salt Company, and Mr. Horton was elected president, while Mr. Healy was appointed selling agent. This position necessitated his removal to Cincinnati, and he at once plunged into great business activity. The output of the new salt company was not less than a half millions barrels yearly, and Mr. Healy had the entire charge of selling this large product. When the war broke out, water freight rates became very high, and he saw that there was a large profit to be derived from steamboats. Accordingly, in company with Mr. I. B. Davis, a steamboat named the Crescent City was bought and partially paid for. Shortly after her purchase she was chartered by the United States government and remained in the service of the government for twenty months, when she was sold at a handsome advance over the purchase price. The success of this venture led to further investments in steamboats, and many boats were built and handled by Mr. Healy and Mr. Davis with satisfactory profits.
Living in Cincinnati, Mr. Healy was in a centre of stir and excitement while the war lasted, and it was during this period that he laid the foundation of his fortune, as the high prices which prevailed made large and profitable operations possible. One transaction in salt deserves mention not only for its successful issue, but as an illustration of the integrity of a Southerner. When the war broke out, the Ohio River Salt Company had a large quantity of salt at Nashville, Tenn., consigned to a merchant by the name of Mallet. The company con- sidered this salt as an almost total loss, and Mr. Healy, with two other gentlemen, made the company an offer for it which was accepted. Salt soon rose to a high figure in the Con- federacy, and Mr. Mallet sold the entire consignment at an extremely handsome profit. But when Mr. Healy's agent went to Nashville to settle the accounts and receive the money, General Polk had established martial law in Nashville and had issued an order that no money should be allowed to go through the lines. Mr. Mallet, however, by bringing to bear powerful personal influence, succeeded in obtaining a pass allowing the agent to go through the lines without being searched. He thereupon departed by train and reached Cincinnati safely with his money, this being the last train which went out of Nashville for many inonths.
While in Cincinnati, Mr. Healy was widely known and respected. His ability and integrity were universally recognized, and he was regarded as one of the leading business inen of the city. He was a director of the Merchants' National Bank, a large and prosperous institution, and whose president, Mr. H. C. Yergason, was brought when a young man from Hartford to Cincinnati by Mr. Healy, taking the position of teller, from which he steadily advanced to the presidency.
In 1866, Mr. Healy left Cincinnati, owing to the poor health of his wife, and caine to New York, where he entered the wholesale coal business in partnership with Elisha and Daniel Packer, sons of his old employer at Packerville. He remained in New York a little more than two years, when he was again obliged to change his residence, owing to Mrs.
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Healy's eontinned ill-health, and in 1868 he came to Hartford, making his home at first in the Allyn House. A little later he purchased the property situated on the corner of High and Walnut streets, formerly oeeupied by the poctess, Lydia Sigourney. Here he crected a colli- modious residenee, where he resided until his deatlı.
Mr. Healy soon began to make himself felt in Hartford business eireles. The first posi- tion held by him was the presideney of the National Serew Company, to which he was elected upon the death of the former president, Hon. William Faxon. He continued in this position until the company became merged with the Providence Serew Company in 1876. One of the most important and sneeessful of business achievements was the resnseitation of the Pratt & Whitney Company, one of the finest machine shops in the world. At the time Mr. Healy beeame interested in this company, its fortunes had fallen to a low ebb, and it was on the verge of bankruptey. Mr. Healy advaneed a large sum of money, took charge of its finances, aud in a few years had the satisfaction of seeing the eoneern prosperous and paying regular dividends. Mr. Healy was a direetor in many loeal institutions, and his advice and aid were sought for on all sides. His business experience had been so wide and varied that his judg- ment was mueh broader and more comprehensive than that of the business specialist. He was an exeellent judge of commercial paper, and bought large quantities yearly, rarely making a loss.
His characteristies were courage, good judgment and strict integrity. He had the courage of his convictions to an unusual degree, but was not rash in forming an opinion or over-hasty in reaching a eonelusion. Loving business for its own sake, its atmosphere was as necessary to his happiness as the breath of life to his existenee. His integrity and honesty were well known, and having once made an agreement he could be relied upon to carry out his part to the letter, even though at a financial loss. He had a generous heart and feelings as tender as those of a woman, though often concealed under a somewhat stern exterior. Many deeds of kindness and charity, unknown save to the recipient and himself, might be chronieled, and numerous young men were quietly helped by him who owed their later success to his kindness and encouragement.
Among the institutions with which Mr. Healy was officially connected, in addition to those already mentioned, are the following: The Pratt & Cady Company, the Billings & Speneer Company, the Capewell Horse Nail Company, the Hartford Eleetrie Light Company, the Norwich Bleachery Company, the Yantie Woollen Company, the Hudson River Water Power and Paper Company, the American National Bank, the Iowa Mortgage Company, the Ditne Savings Bank, and others of lesser note.
The following newspaper extracts will serve to show the estimation in which Mr. Healy was held in Hartford. Among other things the Courant said : "The deceased was a man whose counsels in business matters were valuable, and they were appreciated by financial and business men of this eity. To a elear head and diseriminating mind he had added the advantages of a sueeessful business life, varied in character and extensive in scope. He had kindly feelings and a frank and pleasant way of dealing with his fellow men. Socially he was agreeable, always gentle, inanly and courteous. He was ever ready to lend a helping hand, and, while conservative and reasonably cautious, he dared to embark in enterprises from which more timid minds shrank."
The following extract is from the Post: " Mr. Healy was in all respects an able and judi- cious business man, and will be greatly missed in Hartford, where he has been known and honored for a long period. He was careful and conservative, but never hesitated to engage in new enterprises when his judgment was eulisted in their favor. His prepossessions were always in support of business men, and a great inany successful people in this city owe their prosperity to his stimulating interest in thein."
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OF CONNECTICUT, 1861-1894.
Mr. Healy was married to Susan Clark Moore of Jewett City, Conn., July 21, 1841. Two children were the fruit of this union, William Arnold Healy, born in Packerville, in 1852, and Susie Virginia Healy, born in Hartford City, W. Va., in 1859. The son lived but two years, dying in 1854. Mrs. Healy died in Hartford, May 13, 1879, and Mr. Healy survived her six years, the date of his death being Sept. 29, 1885. Miss Healy was married in April, 1885, to Mr. John S. Camp of Middletown, Conn.
A UGUR, PHINEAS MILLER, of Middlefield, pomologist of the State Board of Agriculture, and vice-president for Connecticut of the American Pomological Society, was born in Middlefield, Feb. 8, 1826. He was the only child of Phineas and Esther (Kirby) Augur, who lived to adult age, being a grandson of Deacon Prosper Augur, and a descendant, in the sixth generation, of Robert Augur, who settled in New Haven Colony, and married Mary Gilbert, daughter of Deputy Governor Gilbert, Nov. 20, 1673.
After receiving a good education in the common English branches in the public schools, he entered an academy and gained still further instruction in Latin, higher mathematics, and natural science. The faculty of imparting information was strong in Mr. Augur, and he began to teach in the Durham Academy, following this up with work in the old Wells Grammar School in Hartford and elsewhere. This experience had, with close study, fitted him for the position of surveyor, and soon after he was married he was appointed county surveyor, and some years later surveyor-general's deputy for Middlesex County, an office he filled for several years. During this time he made a survey and map of Middlefield, with the necessary post roads, compiling statistics, etc., which David Lyman used successfully at Washington in securing the establishment of a postoffice at Middlefield.
That Mr. Augur was held in high esteem in his own town, is best evidenced by the confidence shown in him by its citizens, especially in the matter of conferring office upon him. In 1866, when Middlefield was set off from Middletown, he was chosen sole assessor, and made out the first assessment list of the town, a piece of work which required mnich care and excellent judgment. He was elected a member of the first board of education, and held that office for twenty-five years, and was justice of the peace from the organization of the town until 1884. In 1869, he was sent to represent the town in the General Assembly, and while he was at the state capitol he served as a member of the committee on incorporations, and was the author of several bills now on the statute books.
Mr. Augur, when first married, settled on the farm which had previously belonged to his father and grandfather, and lived there until the time of his death. He taught school only one or two winters after he was married .. He was employed a considerable portion of the time in his early life in surveying in Middletown and adjoining towns, but he gave up that business in 1869 to his oldest son. He had always been an enthusiast in fruit culture, and had established the business of growing and selling fruit trees, plants, shrubbery, etc., his two youngest sons being associated with him, under the name of P. M. Augur & Sons.
When the Middlefield Farmers' Club was organized, Mr. Augur was appointed secretary, and by successive elections held that office for many years. His prominence and reputation as a farmer secured him an election as member of the State Board of Agriculture in 1869, but after two years' service he declined a reelection. Three years later, however, he was chosen pomologist of the State Board of Agriculture, and acted in that capacity until his death.
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It was while he was in this offiec that he rendered his most important service to the state at large. In the early part of 1876, he was delegated by the board to make a collection of the agricultural products of Connecticut for the Centennial Exhibition at Philadelphia. Although a very small and inadequate sum had been appropriated by the State Centennial Commission for the purpose, by close economy an exhibit was made which, in excellence, extent and variety of grains, corn, fruits, vegetables and seeds, was regarded as among thie very best. It was specially remarkable from the great number of fruits of Connecticut origin.
Throughout his life Mr. Augur was always an independent thinker, sympathizing with the anti-slavery movement, with temperance reform, and civil service reformn. His voice was ever heard and his vote cast in favor of the best common roads, the best common schools, and the improvement of the villages of the state. A strong believer in economy, he condemned extravagance either in public or private life. In carly life he united with the Congregational church of Middlefield, and in 1850, was elected deacon of the church, and for over thirty years he filled that office. Mr. Augur was a life ineinber of the Massachusetts Horticultural Society, and was vice-president for Connecticut of the American Pomological Society for several years, and was also a member of the State Horticultural Society.
Almost from his youth he was interested in the cause of temperance, and though he had been an enthusiastic Republican, in 1884, he joined the ranks of the Prohibition party. In 1890, he was the candidate of the party for the governorship of the state. His election was not anticipated, but lie received a very complimentary vote.
Mr. Augur was one of the best known fariners in the United States. Original but practical in his methods, he made frequent and valued contributions to the leading agricultural publications. He was always an active supporter of educational and humane institutions, and in this way did inuch to advance the inoral welfare of the state in which he was born, in which he lived his useful life, and in which he died.
To Mr. Augur's influence and effort the town of Middlefield is largely indebted for its excellent school-houses. When he began his married life, all the school-houses in Middlefield School Society were of the old style, with plain wooden benches, and desks around the outside of the roon1. Resolved never to send his children to school until a better school-house should be built in his own district, he began to work for a new school-house. A beautiful site was finally purchased, and the district voted to build a new school-house, and Mr. Augur was chosen chairman of the building committee. He spent much time in examining the best and most 1110dern school-houses in the state, and in planning for the new one in his own district. It was finally completed, with all the improvements then known in the arrangement of rooms and furniture, method for heating and ventilating, reference library, circulating library, etc. In1 a comparatively short time all the other three districts, of what is now the town of Middle- field, had new school-houses of similar arrangement and construction. With modern school- houses of such excellence, there was a demand for only the best teachers.
Just before he attained his majority, Mr. Augur was united in marriage to Miss Lucy E. Parmelee of Guilford, a lady of marked worth and excellence. Three sons and two daughters were born to them. E. P. Augur, the oldest son, is now city surveyor of Middle- town. Alfred and Charles carry on the business in which they had been engaged with their father. The two daughters, Lucy and Mary, are both married and reside in Guilford, Conn.
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OF CONNECTICUT, 1861-1894.
ELLOGG, STEPHEN WRIGHT, ex-member of Congress, and a distinguished member of the Waterbury bar, was born in Shelburne, Mass., April 5, 1822. Mr. Kellogg descends from Revolutionary stock. The Biography of Con- necticut says that "his great-grandfather, Lieut. Jacob Pool of Massachusetts, was second in command of the company of troops raised in Franklin county, in that state, which formed part of the small army, under General Arnold, that left Canlı- bridge on September 11, 1775, penetrated the wilderness of Maine, and boldly marching across the intervening territory, climbed the Heights of Abraham and attacked the strongly fortified citadel of Quebec, before the walls of which the gallant patriot died. The grand- father also of General Kellogg, although theu but a lad of sixteen years, served in the American army during the last year of the successful struggle for independence."
The parents of the subject of this sketch were Jacob Pool Kellogg and Lucy W. Kellogg, the latter the daughter of Stephen Wright of Westford, Mass. His early years were spent upon his father's farin. Having completed the usual course in the district school he entered the academy at Shelburne Falls, of which the Rev. John Alden was then the esteeined principal. Later he studied at the excellent private school in the same village, kept by Alvin Anderson, his warin friend. While pursuing this advanced course of study, which occupied him from his sixteenth to his twentieth year, he taught the district school in the winter months, and during the entire summer worked upon his father's farm. At the age of twenty he entered Ainherst College, where he passed two terms of the freshinan year. In the spring of 1843, he entered the freshman class in Yale College. Three years later he was graduated there, taking one of the first three honors of his class, in the saine class with Governor Harrison, always his warin friend. After graduation he had charge of an academy at Wilbraham, Mass., for a few months. In the winter of 1846, he began the study of law in the Yale Law School, and at the same time took a position as instructor in Greek in the classical school then kept by the Hou. Aaron N. Skinner at New Haven. Mr. Kellogg successfully passed the required examination for admission to the bar in the summer of 1848, and was admitted at the same time with Governor Harrison, and at once entered upon the practice of law, opening his first office at Naugatuck. Six years later he removed his law office to Waterbury, where he permanently established his home.
In 1853, he was elected to represent the fifth district in the State Senate, of which, in 1851, he had been the clerk, and in 1856 he represented the town of Waterbury in the Connecticut House of Representatives. He was offered the nomination of speaker of the House by the caucus, but declined in favor of an older colleague. His high legal attainments were appropriately recognized in 1854 by his appointment as judge of the New Haven County Court, and by his selection the same year for the office of judge of probate for the district of Waterbury, in which capacity he served seven years. He was a delegate to the Repub- lican national convention at Chicago in 1860, and a member of the committee on platform, upon which the Republican party wou its first national victory under the lead of Abraham Lincoln. He was also appointed delegate to the national convention of 1868, and was chairman of the Connecticut delegation in the national convention of 1876 at Cincinnati. As an ardent Union inan Mr. Kellogg gave his cordial support to the Federal government during the Rebellion period, and loyally aided his state in every patriotic effort to maintain the integrity and dignity of the nation. Becoming connected with the military forces of Connecticut he rose rapidly to the rank of colonel of the Second Regiment, a position he held three years. He took a leading part immediately after the war in the work of organ- izing the National Guard of the state to take the place of the militia, and drafted and pro-
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cured thic passage of the bill which secured this result. The term "National Guard," and the system of organization first introduced by him in that state, have since been adopted by a large number of the states of the Union. He was promoted to the rauk of brigadier- general in the Connecticut National Guard in 1866, and served as such until the absorbing nature of his official duties in the national legislature compelled him to tender his resignation, which was reluctantly accepted by the state authorities, who thoroughly appreciated his intelligent labors in connection with the state troops.
The soundness of Mr. Kellogg's views upon national questions led to his nomination for Congress in the second district of Connecticut in the early part of 1869. In this canvass his personal popularity was no unimportant factor, as the majority of the voters of the dis- trict were politically opposed to him. Elected by a flattering majority over his opponent he took his seat in the Forty-first Congrees and served therein with marked distinction for a new member. His success in maintaining the interests of Connecticut in the national legis- lature and the prominent part he took in the tariff legislation of 1870 led to his renomina- tion for Congress in 1871, and the same services sufficed to wipe out the political antago- misin of many voters of the opposite party, and to secure his reelection. In the Forty- second Congress his record was even more brilliant than during the preceding, he having be- come thoroughly familiar with the customs and precedents which obtain at the national capital. At the close of his second terin he was reelected aud served a third. While in Congress lie performed most effective work on a number of important committees, among them being those on the judiciary, patents, war claims, Pacific railroads, naval expenditures and civil service reform. He was chairman of the committee on naval expenditures in the Forty- second Congress, and of that on civil service reform in the Forty-third, and as such was untiring in his labors. His successful efforts in behalf of the improvement of the harbors of Connecticut, which had long been neglected by Congress, won him the gratitude of the peo- ple of the state irrespective of party and added greatly to his political strength.
The fact that on each occasion when he was elected to Congress, it was necessary to overcome an opposition majority of fully twenty-five hundred votes in the district, attests the high appreciation in which his services were held by the public at large. A leading Demo- cratic lawyer of New Haven, the late Hon. Alfred Blackman, used often to say that "Mr. Kellogg was the best congressman the state ever had." General Kellogg was one of the first to perceive the necessity for reorganizing both the war and treasury departments at Wash- ington. Each had completely outgrown the original provisions under which it was conducted, and relief could only be effected by radical changes. The treasury department, in particular, having been run on a system inaugurated some forty years previously, had become unwieldy, "having grown to immense proportions by means of appropriation bills passed as the necessi- ties of the service required, especially during the Civil War." This department is still carried on under the enactments as prepared by General Kellogg. He was renominated by acclamation for the Forty-fourth Congress in the spring of 1875, as Connecticut then held its elections in April. Most members of that Congress had been elected the preceding Nov- ember, and the House already elected was Democratic by about eighty majority. That fact contributed largely to his defeat, and the tide of Democratic success was then at its full height, for though he ran nearly fifteen hundred ahead of his ticket, it was not enough to overcome the large Democratic majority of the district. He then retired from public life to recover his law practice, which had been very large when he entered Congress. He had never left his duties in the House during its session to try a single case in the whole six years, but had tried such cases as he could during vacation, and his law practice had suffered by his close attention to his public duties.
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