USA > Connecticut > Representative men of Connecticut, 1861-1894 > Part 42
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In 1873, Mr. Stiles took his machine and other inventions to the Vienna Exposition, where they attracted marked attention with the result of securing a market in many foreign countries. He was appointed state commissioner from Connecticut. This high compliment was sincerely appreciated by Mr. Stiles, but his position as an exhibitor precluded his acceptance of the honor. At the International Centennial Exposition, held in Philadelphia in 1876, Mr. Stiles's acknowledged ability as an inventor, engineer and expert was again recognized by his official appointment as a member of the advisory committee to the board of commissioners, and his services in this capacity gave high satisfaction both at home and abroad. At the last great international exhibition held in Paris in 1889, Mr. Stiles exhibited his invention, and it was awarded the gold medal of honor, the highest prize conferred. By steady advances the Stiles presses liave made their way to every quarter of the globe, and are now in use not only in the navy yards and armories of the United States, but also in those of Germany, Austria, Sweden, Turkey, Egypt, Mexico and France. Other manufactures of the company have likewise secured a large foreign as well as domestic market. For some years Mr. Stiles has been a member of the United States Patent Association, which includes upon its roll the examiners in the government patent office, solicitors of patents and inventors. He is one of the seven directors of this widely extended association.
Mr. Stiles occupies a leading position among the citizens of Middletown, not only by reason of his brilliant business success, and the importance of his large plant to the community, but through his hearty interest in everything appertaining to the welfare and advancement of the city and its inhabitants. His aid in the management of the affairs of the municipality has been sought frequently and given freely, and at the urgent request of his neighbors he has served two terms in the Board of Alderinen.
As the founder and head of one of the important industries of the country, Mr. Stiles is entitled to stand among the leading manufacturers and business men of America, and by reason of his unrivalled genius in the special field of its exercise, he will always occupy a prominent place among American inventors. His upward progress from the modest position of a fariner's boy and machinist's apprentice to that of the head of a great manufacturing company, with a world-wide reputation as an inventor and business man, has been achieved by rare genius, unflinching perseverance, earnest effort and high character, and affords a lesson to the aspiring youth of the country which is full of profit and stimulus.
Mr. Stiles was married on March 23, 1864, to Miss Sarah M., daughter of Henry Smith, Esq., of Middletown. Both he and his excellent wife occupy a leading place in the social life of the city in which they reside, and they have a record of kindly and unostentatious usefulness which endears them to a large circle. They have three children, Dr. Henry R. Stiles, 110w of New York City, Mr. Edmund S. Stiles, associated with his father in business, and Miss Milly B. Stiles, who is the efficient handmaid of her worthy mother in many noble acts of philanthropy.
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B
ARNUM, PHINEAS TAYLOR, of Bridgeport, the world-renowned showman, and one of Connecticut's best known sons, was born in the town of Bethel, in that statc, on July 5, 1810, and died at his home in Bridgeport, Conn., on April 7, 1891.
His father, Philo Barnim11, was a son of Ephraim Barnim of Bethel, who was a captain in the American forces during the Revolution. Philo Barnum was a farmer who combined with his agricultural skill a mastery of the tailor's trade and a well developed commercial instinct. At times in his life he kept a country store and also an inn or tavern, but fortunes werc few and far between in those days, and although he was a shrewd and industrions man, he left no property at his death, which occurred in 1825, when he was but forty-eight years old. The maiden name of the mother of the subject of this sketch was Irena Taylor, and from her father, Phineas Taylor, of whom he was the first grand- child, the boy derived his name. Phineas Taylor Barnum, who was fifteen when his father died, was the eldest of the five orphaned children, the youngest being seven years of age. In his memoirs he says: "I was obliged to get trusted for the pair of shoes that I wore to my father's funeral. I literally began the world with nothing, and was barefooted at that." Mrs. Barnum bore herself heroically under her heavy burden, and by economy, industry and perseverance, redeemed the homestead so that it remained in the family.
Phineas early developed the love of trading, for which the people of Connecticut are so famous. He worked on the family farm considerably during boyhood and attended school as a matter of course when it was in session. His education was not given special atten- tion, yet he mastered the rudiments, and reading, travel, observation and intercourse with all manner of people, brightened and increased his knowledge, so that even at an early period in his life he appeared to better advantage than many who had devoted years to study. He had in a superlative degree that power of adapting himself to people and to circumstances, and that ready wit which prevents the intelligent New Englander feeling at a disadvantage in any company. Until he was eighteen he worked for others as occasion offered, but then, having saved a little money, he opened a store at Bethel. Combining with his mercantile pursuits the agency for a lottery chartered by the state for building the Groton monument, he prospered so well that he built a larger store and attempted business on a broader scale. The credit system, then so largely in vogue, killed this enterprise in a very short time and forced him to adopt other means of livelihood. He was but nineteen years old when he married a young lady of about his own age, the daughter of worthy parents living in the neighborhood of his birthplace.
His manliness and versatility also were exemplified in a remarkable degree in 1831, when he entered upou an editorial career which, though short, was brilliant in the extremne and full of incident. He was led to this step by the refusal of a Danbury newspaper to print several of his contributions. Purchasing a font of type he founded a small printing office from which, on Oct. 19, of the year named, he issued the initial number of his own paper, The Herald of Freedom. In its columnns he attacked fearlessly whatever he felt was an abuse. The consequence of his youthful intrepidity was a crop of libel suits, and finally, upon conviction in one of them, imprisonment in the local jail for sixty days. The people, however, greatly admired his honesty and courage, and proved their appreciation by giving him a magnificent ovation at the expiration of his term, conducting him in a coach drawn by six horses and preceded by a band of music through the public thoroughfares, and every- where greeting him with loud and oft-repeated huzzas.
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In 1834, finding his property dwindling to small proportions, Mr. Barnum left Bridge- port for New York, hoping to better his fortunes. In the following year he attended an exhibition in Philadelphia where he saw a colored slave woman named Joyce Heth, advertised as "the nurse of George Washington, one hundred and sixty-one years old." Instantly perceiving the show value of this wonderful old woman, he bought her from her owners for $1,000, and, advertising her with imarvellous tact and shrewdness, soon had an income of as high as $1,500 a week. Thus began his long career as a showman. For some years he traveled with small shows in the southern states, but in 1841 returned to New York about as poor as he ever was in his life. At that time Scudder's American Museum, which had cost its founder $50,000, was for sale, the heirs asking $15,000 for it. The New York Museum Company was contemplating its purchase when Mr. Barnum came upon the field. He saw the opportunity and by a brilliant stroke grasped it, purchasing the collection on credit for $12,000. By means of clever advertising, he kept his name and the attractions of the show he had purchased constantly before the public, and Barnum's American Museum soon became known from one end of the country to the other. Situated at the corner of Broadway and Ann street, on the site now occupied by the New York Herald building, it became a Mecca towards which every intelligent traveler bent his steps upon arriving in the metropolis, and the crop of quarter-dollars reaped by its enterprising proprietor and inanager mounted away up into the millions.
It was in 1842 that Mr. Barnum brought forward Charles S. Stratton, of Bridgeport, Conn., then less than two feet high and weighing only sixteen pounds. This little gentle- man, to whom Mr. Barnum gave the happy title of "Gen. Tom Thumb," was exhibited in the United States and Europe with great success, appearing before many of the crowned heads, and everywhere exciting unbounded curiosity and receiving the mnost distinguished courtesies, in which Mr. Barnum participated, on all occasions. In 1869, he made a tour around the world with the little general. In 1849, Mr. Barnum entered into a contract with Jenny Lind, " the Swedish nightingale," for one hundred and fifty concerts in America, agreeing to pay her one thousand dollars for each. Her appearance at Castle Garden, then a hall devoted to public entertainments, created the wildest excitement, and the tickets for the first performance were sold at auction at large prices. Altogether but ninety-five concerts were given, yet the gross receipts amounted to about three-quarters of a million dollars, of which Mr. Barnum's share was considerable.
Mr. Barnum was continually surprising the public. He catered to the millions and from them drew a rich harvest of quarter-dollar pieces. At no other place in the United States could so much be seen for the money as at his museum. By degrees he made it a great public educator, and also an agent of moral reform, for the entertainments given in the lecture room at every performance were not only amusing but instructive and edifying. This lecture room, at first but a small chamber, was gradually enlarged until it was capable of seating three thousand people. Many actors, subsequently very distinguished, made their early appearance on the stage of this hall. A few years after acquiring the American Museum, Mr. Barnum bought Peale's Museum, the only rival he had, and consolidated it with his own. This great and valuable collection was destroyed by fire on July 13, 1865. Although then fifty-five years of age and sorely tempted to try retirement, Mr. Barnum con- cluded to rebuild and open another museum, consideration for his one hundred and fifty employees being an active factor in his resolve. The new museum was equally as successful as the old, but it, too, was destroyed by fire on the night of March 3, 1868.
In the spring of 1871, he established a great traveling museum and menagerie, introduc- ing rare equestrian and athletic performances, to which, after the addition of an excellent
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representation of the ancient Roman hippodrome, the gigantic elephant, Jumbo, and other novelties, lic gave the name of "P. T. Barnum's Greatest Show on Earth." This show opened at Fourteenth street, New York, in November, 1872. Its popularity was assured from the beginning and increased every year. This remarkable show was even taken abroad, where its success was astounding. Its proprietor and founder became as well known in Europe as in America. The great "Olympia " building, situated six miles from the centre of the city of London, could scarcely seat one-half the number of applicants who came every day. Two and a half millions in all paid admission fees during the short season. Before his death Mr. Barnum entered into an agreement with his equal partner in this show, Mr. A. J. Bailey, that in the event of the death of either, the survivor should continue the ex- hibition. This covenant was faithfully carried out by Mr. Bailey, and not only is the show conducted with all its old-time features and many new ones, but Mr. Barnum's name remains connected with it, and his portraits are to be found in the shop windows wherever it appears.
Mr. Barnum was one of the most moral of 'men. In early life he occasionally drank wine, but when, through acquaintance with the world, he saw the dreadful effects of in- toxicating beverages, he unhesitatingly became an advocate of temperance. He began his appearances as a lecturer in the summer of 1866, delivering, with fine effect, a discourse entitled "Success in Life." Every penny received by him from this and all his other public lectures he devoted to charity. His tour was an ovation. In 1869, he began to lecture on temperance, and met with the same brilliant success. In fact, whatever he attempted in the way of a public performance was certain to terminate successfully, yet he was the vic- tim of many heavy losses, for apart from the crushing blows he received through fires, which destroyed several of his museums, and his magnificent palace, Iranistan, at Bridgeport, he sank over a million dollars in 1856-57, through confidence in the representations of a large manufacturing company. The energy of the man could not be crushed, and, backed by his splendid credit, enabled him to rebuild his fortunes in every instance with great rapidity. Mr. Barnumin became prominently and permanently identified with Bridgeport in 1846, when he built there an oriental villa, to which he gave the Persian name of "Iranistan." He expended large sums of money in improving and beautifying the city, built miles of streets, and planted thousands of trees; he encouraged budding manufactures, and inade extensive public donations, including public parks, worth upwards of one hundred and fifty thousand dollars. Institutions of learning, churches, hospitals, and art galleries received from him thousands of dollars, in many cases superb buildings well equipped for the purposes for which they were intended. His donations to charitable and educational institutions alone would foot up a fortune.
In early life Mr. Barnum was a Democrat of the old school, and he conducted The Herald of Freedom as a Jacksonian Democratic journal. His vigorous personality mnade such an impression upon the politicians that in 1852 or 1853, they urged him to accept the party nomination for governor. As his business at that time frequently paid him as much in a day as the salary of the governor would amount to in a year, he respectfully declined the honor. When the treasonable intentions of the southern states becaine apparent in 1860, he joined the Republican party, with which he acted until his death. He gave loyal support to the Federal government all through the war period, and, while too old to take up arms, sent four substitutes to represent him in the field. He rejoiced at the downfall of slavery, and in the spring of 1865 accepted a nomination to the Connecticut legislature from the town of Fairfield, in order that he might have the honor of voting for the proposed con- stitutional amendment abolishing slavery forever, and of supporting an amendment to the
J.D. Srovna
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Mastawiawetts Publishing Co Everett. Mass.
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OF CONNECTICUT, 1861-1894.
state constitution "to allow men of education and of good inoral character to vote, regardless of the color of their skins." In 1866, he was appointed by Governor Hawley a cominis- sioner to the Paris exposition, but declined. In the spring of 1867, he was nominated for Congress. In that year the state went Democratic, and few, if any, Republicans were elected. Mr. Barnum served four years in the state legislature, and during that time placed him- self on record as the unconquerable foe of corrupt railway companies and officials, and the unfailing friend of every movement for the welfare and improvement of humanity.
On the 5th of April, 1875, he was elected mayor of the city of Bridgeport by a imajority of several hundred, although the place was known as a Democratic stronghold. He gave a pure and honest administration of this office, and left it with the best wishes of all. During the forty years he resided in Bridgeport he was unremitting in his efforts to advance the city's welfare, and well deserved the name of public benefactor. He was for several years president of the Bridgeport Hospital, and one of its chief supports. By means of a find established by him, two gold medals are annually awarded in the Bridgeport high school for English orations. As an anthor Mr. Barnum is well-known to faine through his " Autobiography," thousands of which have been sold, and by a work entitled "Hui- bugs of the World," and a story entitled "Lion Jack." He had a great sense of humor, and whatever he wrote was most easy and agreeable reading. His self-possession was one of his most remarkable traits. Nothing was able to ruffle it. He always had his wits about him, and whether in the presence of European royalty or the sovereigns of America, was invariably at ease and master of the situation.
Mr. Barnum was twice married. His first wife, Mrs. Charity Barnum, the esteemed partner of his joys and struggles for forty years, died Nov. 19, 1873. In the autumn of 1874, he married the daughter of his worthy English friend, John Fish, Esq., who sur- vives him. For many years Mr. Barnmin maintained a splendid home in Fifth Avenue, New York city. But he seemed to be too large a inan to be claimned by any one city, however great, and was rather looked upon as a national, indeed it might be said, an international character. His deathi was a source of real grief to hundreds of thousands, especially to the great world of children, as whose steadfast friend he was particularly proud of being known. No higher compliment has ever been paid to a citizen of the United States than that found in an editorial published in the New York Sun years ago, in which, after alluding to Mr. Barnum's "breadth of views, profound knowledge of inan- kind, courage under reverses, indomitable perseverance, ready eloquence and adınirable busi- ness tact," the writer closed his remarks by saying : "More than almost any other living man, Barnum may be said to be a representative type of the American mind."
B
ROWNE, JOHN D., of Hartford, president Connecticut Fire Insurance Company, was born in the town of Plainfield, Windhamn County, Conn., in 1836. The old homestead first occupied by his great-great-grandfather is still in the family, and now occupied by an elder brother.
Mr. Browne comes of long-lived, hardy, Puritan and Revolutionary stock - the kind which broke up the rugged soil, built the public highways and the school houses and churches, and fought the battles for liberty and independence. His grandfather, John Browne, enlisted as a musician in the patriot ariny in 1776, serving with two of his brothers through the long and trying period of the war, and was promoted while in service to the position of fife major of his regiment. His father, Gurdon Perkins Browne, was a hard-working farmer who
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reared his family in habits of industry and frugality, and did not forget to inculcate by precept and example those principles of robust morality and patriotism in which he had himself been trained. He was also a school teacher of considerable celebrity and for more than thirty years tanglit the winter term of the district school. He was an ardent Democrat of the old school, always performing his duties as a patriotic citizen, and voting at cvcry election in his town until tlic very close of his long life, dying at the advanced age of eighty-three years. Mr. Browne's mother was a woman of rare qualities, deeply solicitous for the intellectual and spiritual culture of her children and earnestly devoted to her family. She died at the age of eighty- seven.
Mr. Browne's youthful life was devoted to the farm and the district school, and at the age of nineteen he taught one of the schools of his native town. But the duties of a school teacher were not congenial as a life-work; and having, in 1855, made a visit to the then far-off territory of Minnesota, he made a second journey thither in the spring of 1857, and located in Minneapolis. He was for two years connected with the Minneapolis Mill Company, and aided in the development and improvement of the magnificent water-power at that point. Afterwards he went to Little Falls, then a small hamlet located about a hundred and twenty- five miles north of St. Paul, where he spent a year as secretary and agent of the Little Falls Manufacturing Company, engaged in developing the water power there by the construction of a damn across the Mississippi.
While in Minnesota, Mr. Browne was actively prominent in local and state politics, aided in organizing the Republican party in Minnesota, and held intimate relations with the domi- uant party at the national capital throughout the administration of President Lincoln, for whose election he had been an enthusiastic and effective worker. He was often a delegate to county and state conventions, and was elected an alternate delegate to the national con- vention which nominated Mr. Lincoln. His Republicanismn was known to be of the most pro- nounced type, and his political activity and enthusiasm constituted him an important factor in the councils of his party throughout the greater portion of the period of eight years over which his residence in Minnesota extended.
At the close of the presidential campaign, in the autumn of 1860, he was elected mes- senger to take the first electoral vote of Minnesota to Washington, in which city he remained during the succeeding winter, having been appointed to a desk, embracing suspended land titles, in the interior department at the capitol under Jo. Wilson, then commissioner of the general land office. He returned to Minnesota in the spring of 1861, and for four years, during Lincoln's administration, was chief clerk in the office of the surveyor general of public lands at St. Paul, to which city the office had been recently removed from Detroit.
In 1865, Mr. Browne returned East, and soon afterward entered upon insurance work, in 1867 becoming permanently connected with the Hartford Fire Insurance Company as its general agent and adjuster. In 1870, he was elected secretary of that company, in the duties of which office he was engaged for ten years, until called to the presidency of the Connecticut Fire Insurance Company in 1880. Under his conservative administration the Connecticut has reached high rank among the solid and prosperous business and financial institutions in this great insurance center. The premium income of The Connecticut, as shown by the annual statement Jan. 1, 1880, was $399,348, and the assets, $1,483,480. The premium income for the year ending Jan. 1, 1894, was $1,630,731, and the assets, $2,831,088. During this period the company never failed to pay its regular semi-annual dividend, amounting in the aggregate to $1,200,000. The unique home office building, standing on the corner of Prospect and Grove streets, is due largely to his efforts to secure for the company a suitable and permanent home for the transaction of its large and increasing business.
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In late years, with characteristic independence of thought and action, Mr. Browne has held slack allegiance to the Republican party, earnestly advocating the election of Mr. Cleveland and indorsing the policy of his administration. He sustains official relations with various business and social organizations in Hartford. He is a director in the Phoenix Mutual Life Insurance Company, the National Exchange Bank, the Hartford Board of Trade, the Board of United Charities, the Humane Society and the Connecticut State Prison Association. He is also a member of the Connecticut Historical Society and of the Sons of the American Revolution.
J. D. Browne was married Oct. 23, 1861, to Miss Frances Cleveland, daughter of Luthier Cleveland, Esq., of Plainfield. She died Dec. 25, 1893, leaving two daughters, Alice Cleve- land Browne and Virginia Frances Browne, the elder being the wife of Francis R. Cooley, son of Hon. F. B. Cooley of this city.
S
PERRY, NEHEMIAH D., of New Haven, postmaster of that city for more than a quarter of a century, and ex-secretary of state of Connecticut, was born at Woodbridge, New Haven County, Conn., on July 10, 1827.
He is of Puritan ancestry, being in direct line of descent from Richard Sperry, one of the early settlers of New England, and who, as a member of the New Haven colony, received a grant of land a little west of the city limits near the "Judges' Cave" on the slope of West Rock, so-called from its having been for a time the hiding place and shelter of the "regicide " judges-Generals Goffe and Whalley, and Colonel Dixwell of Cromwell's army, who condemned Charles I., and, after the restoration, fled to America, where they were cared for by their friends in Massachusetts and Connecticut, prominent among whom was Richard Sperry, who became somewhat famous through his brave and generous devotion to these fugitives.
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