History of Davenport and Scott County Iowa, Volume II, Part 2

Author: Downer, Harry E
Publication date: 1910
Publisher: Chicago : S.J. Clarke
Number of Pages: 1166

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Mr. Adler's activities extend to political circles, wherein his labors have largely advanced the interests of the republican party in Iowa. He was made state central committeeman from the second district, was chosen secretary of the committee and given charge of the press bureau in the Taft campaign. To prac- tical politics he brings the results of business experience and that wise direction of forces which have been salient elements in the general movement toward placing the republican party in Iowa beyond the pale of possible diminution of power.

On the 5th of February, 1902, occurred the marriage of Mr. Adler to Miss Lena Rothschild, a daughter of the late David R. Rothschild, president of the Rothschild Grain Company. Their only son, Phillip David Adler, is now a lad

HISTORY OF SCOTT COUNTY

of six years. Mr. Adler's social nature finds expression in his membership in the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks, the Arsenal Golf Club, the Out- ing and Rock Island Clubs-associations which also indicate the nature of his recreation. Moreover, he is prominent in the Davenport Commercial Club, serving as its vice president and as a member of its board of directors. He is active in all projects looking to the development of the city along many lines of general improvement and has done much in promoting desired results.

ALFRED CHRISTIAN MUELLER.

Fortunate is the man who has back of him an ancestry honorable and dis- tinguished, and happy is he if his lines of life are cast in harmony therewith. In person, in talents and in character Alfred Christian Mueller is a worthy scion of his race. He is a representative in the maternal line of a family that has figured conspicuously in connection with the legal history of Davenport for fifty-seven years, and in his personal connection with the bar he has demon- strated the possession of those qualities which win success in law practice- close application, comprehensive study of legal principles and unfaltering devo- tion to the interests of his clients.

Mr. Mueller was born in Davenport, June 14, 1875, a son of Christian and Elfrieda (Claussen) Mueller. The father, for many years a leading lumber mer- chant and prominent and beloved citizen of Davenport, is mentioned at length on another page of this volume. The mother was a daughter of Hans Reimer Claussen, who in 1853 was the founder of the present law firm with which A. C. Mueller is now connected. The business has descended by legacy or purchase to son and grandson to the present time and the firm has ever stood as one of the most successful and representative among the practitioners of the Daven- port bar. Hans Reimer Claussen, the founder of the firm, was born in Schles- wig-Holstein, in 1804, and prepared for. the practice of law as a student in the University of Kiel between the years 1824 and 1829. The following year he was admitted to the bar and entered upon the active duties of the profession near his old home. In 1834 he opened an office in Kiel, where he remained in active practice until 1851, when he was exiled by the King of Denmark, then ruler of Schleswig-Holstein. He had served as a member of the legislature of Hol- stein from 1840 until 1851 and in 1848-9 was a member of the German parlia- ment, which convened in May of the former year. For the prominent part which he took in the discussion of governmental affairs, and because his son Ernest fought in the ranks of the revolutionists of 1848, the family were exiled. America, the refuge of so many political exiles from Germany, offered shelter and opportunity to H. R. Claussen, who, arriving in Davenport in 1851, began the study of the English language and two years thereafter was admitted to the bar. His son Ernest became his law partner and the firm soon took rank with the leading representatives of the legal profession in this city. In 1869 Hans R. Claussen was elected to the state senate for a four years' term, and his knowledge of the law enabled him to take active part in the revision of the court in 1873.

HISTORY OF SCOTT COUNTY

He left the impress of his individuality upon the laws enacted during his con- nection with the general assembly and also upon the history of the republican party, aiding largely in shaping its history in this state. In May, 1832, he married Anna Rahbeck, a daughter of a Danish civil officer and niece of a celebrated Danish poet. Ernest Claussen, who became his father's law partner and was an uncle of A. C. Mueller, was born in 1833, spent the first two years in Amer- ica in St. Louis and then became a resident of Davenport. Following his father's retirement from the bar in 1870 he continued in practice alone until his son Al- fred became his associate. Moreover, he was prominent in connection with munic- ipal affairs and that his fellow townsmen recognized his devotion to the public welfare is indicated in the fact that he was for five terms mayor of Davenport.

From a family of lawyers, therefore, Alfred Christian Mueller was de- scended in the maternal line. At the usual age he became a pupil in the pub- lic schools and afterward attended Duncan's Commercial College, while for one year he was a student in the polytechnic school at Hanover, Germany. His literary course completed, he took up the study of law and afterward pursued his reading for one year under the direction of Julius Lischer. He next entered the law school of the Iowa State University, from which he was graduated in 1897 and afterward spent one year in the office of Lischer & Bawden. He next went to New York and pursued a three years' course in law in Columbia Uni- versity, from which he was graduated in the class of 1901. Returning to Daven- port, he became associated with the Mueller Lumber Company as auditor, but in 1903 entered actively upon the practice of law and became the successor of his cousin, Alfred Claussen, thus continuing the firm which was founded by his grandfather.

On the 21st of January, 1903, Mr. Mueller was married to Lulu May Ells- worth, a native of New York city and a daughter of Albert Starr and Cora Ells- worth, who were of English descent. Mr. Mueller takes little active part in politics but is a member of the school board and is much interested in the cause of education, recognizing the full value of public instruction as one of the bul- warks of the nation.

EDWARD SAVAGE CROSSETT.

The lumber industry occupies a most important relation to the development of the United States. One of the most interesting chapters in our national his- tory is that recounting the origin of this far-reaching activity, the struggles of its pioneers, their privations and triumphs and the marvelous growth which the business has now attained in certain sections of our common country. Employ- ing, as it does, literally an army of men; offering channels of investment for mil- lions of dollars; this branch of trade takes easily front rank as one of the wealth producing agencies of America. One of the captains in this great industry is the subject of this sketch.

When one has spent the fifty most active years of his effective life in one section of the country and in the pursuit of a single enterprise which has issued

El Crossett

HISTORY OF SCOTT COUNTY

in ultimately fortunate results to himself and those associated with him, he most certainly has contributed to the development of the industry and has won for himself a large and merited place in the history of that locality. Such a man is Edward Savage Crossett of Davenport, Iowa. For half a century he has played a conspicuous part in the lumber business of the entire Mississippi valley and is a masterful factor in council and conference wherever in that entire section men interested in yellow pine foregather.

Mr. Crossett was born in West Plattsburg, Clinton county, New York, Feb- ruary 4, 1828, near the scene of the battle of Plattsburg, historic in the war of 1812. His father, John Savage Crossett, participated actively in that war as a soldier in the American army. The subject of our sketch received his educa- tion in the public schools and in an academy . His first employment was in the printing office of Bardwell & Kneeland, at Troy, which work, however, he aban- doned on account of failing health. His new position as clerk in a shoe store brought him the munificent salary of two dollars and fifty cents each month and board. In 1846, when eighteen years of age, he became clerk in the village store at Schroon Lake, New York, and two years later he and his brother pur- chased the establishment. It was here that he first became interested in the lumber business, handling pine and spruce lumber in small quantities.

At the age of twenty-two Mr. Crossett turned his business over to his brother and started west. From Cincinnati he journeyed to St. Louis by steamer, and in the spring of 1852 on to St. Paul, going soon to La Crosse, Wisconsin, where he remained one year and six months. In the meantime business matters had not gone well in the east, his brother had sold the property at a loss and young Crossett was under the handicap of debts, if anything can handicap one so strong and courageous. With the restiveness of an honest nature smarting under the sense of unmet obligations, he assumed the entire burden and eventually paid the last dollar.

In the fall of 1853 Mr. Crossett went to Black River Falls, Wisconsin, where he took charge of a supply store for lumbermen. He was in entire command of this enterprise, from the making contract for supplies to the sale of the goods. His experience as a merchant in the Adirondacks served him well, and so satis- factory were the results that his employers united their four stores into one and gave him its management. From 1854 to 1856 he was postmaster of Black River Falls, and in the latter year he associated himself with W. T. Price in a supply store business of their own, returning, however, a year later to his former employers.

Then came a period of reverses in which Mr. Crossett suffered heavy losses. The freshet of the following year swept the company's logs down the river and out of reach; as a result the company was forced to suspend operations and go into bankruptcy. A portion of Mr. Crossett's capital and two years salary were sunk in the general collapse. In 1859 he started a supply store of his own, but shortly after was burned out with the complete loss of stock and building. Still undaunted and unafraid, Mr. Crossett gathered up the threads of his raveled business and attempted to again weave them together. Succeeding in obtaining the equivalent of some bills due him, in the shape of lumber and hewn timber, he rafted it down the river in 1861 and sold it where he could, but was obliged

HISTORY OF SCOTT COUNTY

to take in payment "stump tail currency," which depreciated largely before he could dispose of it. Thus Mr. Crossett's first eight years in the west brought him little but valuable experience.

In this same year Mr. Crossett was employed to assist J. E. Lindsay, who was shortly thereafter joined in partnership by J. B. Phelps; and subsequently he was connected with other concerns until 1870. For several years he ran the · yards of Isaac Spaulding in East St. Louis, spending his winters in picking up stock on Black river. From 1870 to 1875 he was engaged in scaling logs and estimating timber ; purchasing for himself parcels of timber land whenever such were available and seemed valuable ..

In 1873 Mr. Crossett was united in marriage to Miss Harmony E. Clark, of Pittsfield, Massachusetts, and from that auspicious day dates, as he declares, his real prosperity. The two made their home in Nielsville, Wisconsin, until February, 1875, when they removed to Davenport, Iowa, where Mr. Crossett became a member of the firm of Renwick, Shaw & Crossett. Their son, Edward Clark Crossett, was born at Davenport, August 7, 1882. The same year marks Mr. Crossett's first investment in yellow pine, as one of the organizers of the Lindsay Land & Lumber Company.

In 1884 Renwick, Shaw & Crossett bought a sawmill and some pine land at Cloquet, Minnesota. Two years later Mr. Crossett sold his interest to Mr. Shaw, taking in payment ten thousand acres of Arkansas land covered with yellow pine. His friends were confident that he had made a serious mistake in acquiring Arkansas property, but the soundness of his judgment was speedily vindicated. Convinced by personal inspection of the great possibilities in yellow pine, he became extensively interested in other companies operating in the south. Already a heavy stockholder in the Eagle Lumber Company, of Eagle Mills, Arkansas, and in the Gates Lumber Company, of Wilmar, Arkansas, he, in company with C. W. Gates and Dr. J. W. Watzek, purchased in 1892 the Fordyce Lumber Company, of Fordyce, Arkansas.

In the principle of cooperation Mr. Crossett has always been interested. With William Morris, its modern apostle, he has believed that the profits accru- ing from any enterprise should in some equitable way be divided among those producing them. In 1899 the Crossett Lumber Company was organized on a cooperative basis, not as the result of any dreaming of a modern Utopia, but as a business proposition, and partly no doubt because of his own long bout with the "slings and arrows of outrageous fortune." In the cooperative organization Messrs. Crossett, Watzek and Gates held three-fourths of the stock and certain employes the other one-fourth. In recognition of Mr. Crossett's generosity, his fine sense of justice in this self-centered age, and of his wise council and cooperation always so freely given, his associates named the new town in his honor, and Crossett, Arkansas, came upon the map.

After eight years of actual operation, this town has come from the virgin forest to be one of the "show towns" of the entire south. Here dwell a pros- perous people, numbering upward of two thousand, each in a home good enough for the best and at rents that return to the corporation only a very low interest rate on the investment. The town rejoices in a fine public school costing upward

HISTORY OF SCOTT COUNTY

of fifteen thousand dollars, a well equipped hospital worth thirty-five thousand dollars, two good churches well supported and effective, and a clubhouse and swimming pool costing something like fifteen to twenty thousand dollars, these latter the personal gift of Mr. Crossett to the youth and manhood of the town. There is a five-mile liquor law and it is enforced; the finest type of labor gravi- tates here naturally, and it is to be doubted if any finer specimens of life and character can be found in any lumber town in the world than flourish and mature in this favored spot. While much credit for these conditions is surely due to the splendid men whom Mr. Crossett has associated with him, the fact still re- mains that it is due to his influence, his ideals and his character that the town is what it is.

More recently Mr. Crossett has extended his holdings and, as an influential member of the Jackson Lumber Company, of Lockhart, Alabama, has with his associates invested in one hundred and fifty thousand acres of virgin timber in Alabama and Florida. In cooperation with Messrs. Watzek and Gates, the two remaining members, a large sawmill plant was built at Lockhart, and the prop- erty otherwise developed and increased. In 1906 the Crossett Timber Company, of Davenport, Iowa, was organized for operation in the Pacific northwest, with holdings chiefly in Washington and Oregon. Mr. Crossett not only organized and projected this company but retains a controlling portion of the stock and direction in management through his son, Edward Clark Crossett, its president. Believing that a man should dispose of his property and provide for his family during his lifetime, while still in his early seventies Mr. Crossett organized the Crossett Land & Investment Company as a holding company for the greater part of his property and gave his wife and son equal shares with himself.

Religiously Mr. Crossett has always been known as a sincere and earnest worshiper of the God of the forests. Reared as a Methodist, and a member of the Baptist church from the age of twenty-five, his sympathies have always been with all genuine men of whatever name or creed. It would be expected that a man of such robust personality and breadth of vision would have fellowship with all good men, and hence his interests and beneficences have outrun all de- nominational bounds. He was a member of the building committee of St. John's Methodist Episcopal church, of Davenport, of which his wife and son are com- municants, and his generosity and liberality, with that of one or two others, made that superb structure possible. His proposition to give fifty thousand dollars to a Young Men's Christian Association building in Davenport, providing the citizens would contribute an equal amount, was the means of securing for his home city one of the best equipped structures in the middle west, while his private benevolences, about which even his right hand knows not, are perpetual and broadcast.

Mr. Crossett is that type of manhood for which America is most famed and for which she may well be proud; yet only now and then in a century is she able to grow one of his superfine qualities. Born with little promise of what was to be, with little to assure him such a future as has been his, little save his rugged, stalwart character and his tireless determination, all graciously shot through with his changeless trust in God. Honest to the core, circumspect in life, genial in spirit, alert in mentality, helping everybody and hindering none, wronging no

HISTORY OF SCOTT COUNTY

man that he might himself gain, but enriching all others by his own prosperity, he lives an honored and conspicuous type of that noblest of all men-an Ameri- can gentleman.

GEORGE W. CABLE.

George W. Cable, since 1866 a resident of Davenport and for many years one of the most prominent representatives of the lumber trade in the city, is now practically living retired but still has large investments and commercial in- terests. He was born in Athens county, Ohio, June 17, 1831, his parents being Hiram and Rachel (Henry) Cable. The father was a native of Jefferson county, New York, and the mother's birth occurred in Washington county, Ohio. The family is of English lineage and was founded in America by James Cable, the grandfather of our subject, who came from England in 1770 and settled in Mas- sachusetts, whence representatives of the name removed to other localities and established other branches of the family. Mrs. Rachel Cable, the mother of George W. Cable, was of Scotch-Irish descent and was a lady of high charac- ter, whose influence has been one of the potent forces in the life of her son. Hiram Cable, prominent in public affairs, labored along practical and effective lines for the advancement and improvement of the section of the state in which he lived. Various public enterprises were promoted by him and commercial activity was also stimulated by his efforts through the years in which he was engaged in merchandising in Athens county, Ohio. Later he became one of the projectors of the Piqua & Indiana Railroad, now a branch of the Pennsyl- vania Central, and was one of the largest contractors in its construction. He also served for nine years as a director of the company. He was one of the founders of the picturesque town of Cable in Champaign county and in many ways left the impress of his individuality for good upon the development and substantial upbuilding of that section of the state. A republican in politics, he represented his district in the state legislature and did not a little toward mold- ing public thought and action. He was a man of strong character, fearless in defense of what he believed to be right and his championship of any measure was an effective force for its accomplishment.

George W. Cable acquired a good English education in the schools of Ur- bana, Ohio, and commenced business life as a farmer in Champaign county, where he successfully conducted agricultural interests for two years. He then sold out in 1857 and came to Scott county, Iowa, where for nine years he de- voted his energies to general agricultural pursuits. In 1866 he came to Daven- port and with his father engaged in the coal business and lumber trade. Extend- ing the scope of their activities to include an extensive and up-to-date lumber manufacturing enterprise, George W. Cable has since been actively or financially interested in the business. In 1874 his father retired and was succeeded by John Hornby, under the firm name of Hornby & Cable. This association was main- tained until the death of the senior partner in 1879, in which year the business was reorganized under the name of the Cable Lumber Company, with George

G. W. Cable

HISTORY OF SCOTT COUNTY

W. Cable as president. The business grew to mammoth proportions, the Cable Company becoming a power in lumber circles. The enterprise was developed along modern business lines, its ramifying trade interests reaching out to various sections of the country, while the close conformity of the house to a high stan- dard of commercial ethics has made its reputation an unassailable one. By the stimulus of his exertions Mr. Cable aroused the enterprise of others and through this means added to his own efforts, while at the same time he furnished many with remunerative employment. His strict integrity, business conservatism and judgment have always been so universally recognized that he has enjoyed pub- lic confidence to an enviable degree and naturally this has brought him such a lucrative patronage that through times of general prosperity and general adver- sity alike he has witnessed a steady increase in his business until the Cable Lum- ber Company now controls one of the most important enterprises of this charac- ter in the middle west. Now, owing to failing health, Mr. Cable has retired from active work, his interests, however, being carefully guarded and augmented by his son. As the years went by he made other investments of an important char- acter, including some of the milling enterprises, banking and telephone interests. He was likewise a director in several railroads and his cooperation in any pro- ject has been taken as proof of its worth because of his business discernment and known reliability.

On the 18th of October, 1854, Mr. Cable was united in marriage to Miss Eliza E. Baldwin, a daughter of Richard Baldwin, of Champaign county, Ohio. Their only son and Mr. Cable's namesake is his worthy successor in business. Active in the Presbyterian church, Mr. Cable practices charity without ostenta- tion and Christianity without cant. His name is unsullied and there is no man who occupies a more enviable position in industrial and financial circles. His rise in the business world has been continuous and has been the legitimate out- come of methods that neither seek nor require disguise.

HON. GEORGE W. SCOTT.

Hon. . George W. Scott, mayor of the city of Davenport, whose experiences have been wide and whose course has been marked by continuous progress, was born on a farm near Le Roy, in Oldtown township, McLean county, Illinois, January 31, 1861. His parents were William H. and Eunice B. (Lebo) Scott, the former of Irish descent. and the latter of French lineage. The maternal grandfather was born in France, and some of the Lebo family were participants in the Revolutionary war and the war of 1812, while brothers of Eunice B. Lebo served in the Civil war.

William H. Scott was a farmer by occupation and carried on agricultural pursuits and stock-raising on an extensive scale. He died March 19, 1889, near Lincoln, Nebraska, which city was at that time his home. His widow now re- sides with a daughter near Enid, Oklahoma. Their family numbered four sons and two daughters, five of whom are living: George W .; Ira, who is on a farm near Cashion, Oklahoma; Wilson H., living near La Cygne, Kansas; Orris,

HISTORY OF SCOTT COUNTY

whose home is near Norfolk, Nebraska; and Emma, the wife of John Hollar, near Enid, Oklahoma.

George W. Scott was reared to farm life and attended the district schools until nineteen years of age, when he continued his studies in the Evergreen City Business College, at Bloomington, Illinois, pursuing a commercial course. He afterward entered the Illinois State Normal University at Normal, Illinois, and there pursued a two years' course. He afterward engaged in teaching in the country and graded schools for three years and, making advance in this field of labor as he has in every other to which he has directed his attention, he became principal of the graded schools at Morton, Illinois. After a short time he was appointed superintendent of the Indian school and special disbursement agent at Fort Stevenson, Dakota, now North Dakota. He continued in that position from October 28, 1885, until January 8, 1889, when he was appointed superintendent by Hon. J. D. C. Atkins, commissioner of Indian affairs, and at the same time received appointment as special disbursing agent from the Hon. L. Q. C. Lamar, secretary of the interior during President Cleveland's first administration.

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History of Davenport and Scott County Iowa, Volume II, Part 2

Author: Downer, Harry E Publication date: 1910 Publisher: Chicago : S.J. Clarke Number of Pages: 1166

Author: Downer, Harry E
Publication date: 1910
Publisher: Chicago : S.J. Clarke
Number of Pages: 1166