The United States biographical dictionary and portrait gallery of eminent and self made men, Iowa volume, Part 16

Author: American biographical publishing company, pub
Publication date: 1878
Publisher: Chicago, New York, American biographical publishing company
Number of Pages: 954

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SAMPSON C. BEVER,

CEDAR RAPIDS.

T THE subject of this memoir, a native of Ohio, was born in Columbiana county, on the 31st of July, 1808. His birthplace is a romantic spot on the Ohio river, overlooking the state line divid- ing Pennsylvania and West Virginia. His father, James Bever, owned a small farm, and when Samp- son was born it was about the western boundary of the "settlement." Sampson Bever, the grandfather of our subject, a native of Germany, lived for a time in Ireland, and immigrated to this country in 1777. He joined the revolutionary army under Washing- ton, and when the war was over and independence gained, settled first in Fayette and afterward in Washington county, Pennsylvania, and died at the latter place. The maternal grandfather of our sub- ject, James Imbrie, was a native of Scotland, and settled in Washington county, Pennsylvania, in 1780, where he died.

In the spring of 1809, when Sampson was in his infancy, his father moved to a wild tract of land which his brother, John Bever, had surveyed for

the government and selected for him. It was the first entry made on the so-called " New Purchase," now in Holmes county, Ohio. They found their home by following an Indian trail, and using pack horses for transportation, the only means of travel at hand in those early days in Ohio. Their new home was at "Old Town," on Salt Creek, near its junction with the Killbuck river, which had been vacated and burned by the Delaware Indians. The nearest house or cabin was thirteen miles distant, the headquarters of his brother John's surveying party. Subsequently, on the same spot, this brother laid out the now flourishing city of Wooster, Wayne county. The hardships of a frontier life were too severe for James Bever, and on the 22d of April, 1811, he died in the little cabin which he had built two years before; leaving his widow, with two little boys, to continue to experience the hardships of a wilderness life. The next year, when war with Eng- land was declared, the Indians became troublesome, and this family, with others which had settled in

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that vicinity, spent some time in a block-house, not daring to leave until Indian depredations were over.

Young Sampson had no opportunities for school education until he was nine years old, at which time he was enabled to attend a subscription school about three months in the year for a few seasons. His mother, however, a woman of thoughtfulness and great energy, had previously taken pains to teach him to read and write. Some years later she mar- ried a man who had a family of several children ; and him Sampson helped to clear up a farm, occa- sionally working as a day laborer to procure clothes and the means to pay for his schooling in the win- ters. He was a faithful lad, of kindly and genial disposition, and very much endeared to the little circle of his acquaintances. But the new family re- lations not proving the most pleasant and satisfac- tory, when about fourteen he spent a few months with his mother's brother in Beaver county, Penn- sylvania; and before he was fifteen, walked one hundred and fifty miles to Brownsville, in the same state, and became a clerk in a store and worked five years at four dollars a month. This may have looked then, as it certainly looks now, like small wages, but Mr. Bever, has been often heard to re- mark that it was the crowning point in his life. During the five years that he was in that store, he was often called to assume important responsibilities, and always proved competent and trustworthy, and gave unqualified satisfaction to his employer, Henry Sweitzer, whose memory Mr. Bever cherishes very tenderly.

At the age of twenty he took charge of the Albany Glass Works, near Brownsville, at the mouth of the Little Redstone creek, for Bowman, Sweitzer and Bowman, receiving a compensation of one hundred and fifty dollars a year. They were men of large means, entirely independent, and soon turned over to Mr. Bever the store, goods, glass works, coal bank,-everything they had there; he taking a partner, William Eberhart, an experienced glass blower, and the firm being S. C. Bever and Co. The business prospered, and in two years the firm had paid their indebtedness to the old firm, and had a remunerative surplus left. Upon Mr. Eberhart's re- tirement from the business Geo. B. Woltz joined with Mr. Bever for the term of three years, but died before its close; the business, however, continued under the name of Bever and Woltz to the end of the three years. During this time President Jack- son was making war on the United States Bank, and

Mr. Bever, though highly prospered, saw the cloud gathering in the financial heavens and sold out. The parties to whom he disposed of his interest in the glass works lost all they had in the course of two or three years.

In the autumn of 1836 he formed a partnership with Goodloe H. Bowman, one of his former em- ployers, but at that time cashier of the Mononga- hela Bank at Brownsville. They opened a mercantile house at Coshocton, Ohio, and the firm of Bever and Bowman continued for ten years. Mr. Bever then moved to Millersburg, now in Holmes county, Ohio, and there sold goods for six years. The location was near the old homestead, and the rustic grave- yard where his father was laid to rest more than sixty years ago, whose remains filial love prompted the son to remove to Cedar Rapids, Iowa, a few years since. Mr. Bever built himself a beautiful home at. Millersburg, but afterward determined to "go west," and accordingly sold the elegant home- stead, and, after prospecting in the states on the Mississippi, settled with his family in Cedar Rapids, where he arrived, after a circuitous route by the Ohio and Mississippi rivers, and by private con- veyance, on the 4th of April, 1852. He had pre- viously bought several large tracts of land near the town, designing to make farms for himself and his sons. He began to fence and " break " the prairie, and in a short time had between two and three hundred acres ready for cultivation. In a few months, however, he became dissatisfied with farm- ing, and during the following winter purchased a stock of goods and resumed his old business, and continued it until 1859. During the last five years of mercantile life Mr. Bever became identified with the construction of the Chicago, Iowa and Nebraska railroad (now a branch of the Chicago and North- western), the first railroad that crossed Iowa. In 1859, the year this road reached Cedar Rapids, Mr. Bever started a private bank with his son, James L. Bever, under the firm name of S. C. Bever and Son. This enterprise proving an abundant success, after the passage of the national banking law by congress, they organized the City National Bank of Cedar Rapids, converting their private bank into the same, with a capital of one hundred thousand dollars. S. C. Bever, president ; J. L. Bever, cashier, and two younger sons, Geo. W. and John B. Bever, tellers. ..

Having made many important improvements of a private character, and contributed largely to the interests of the flourishing city and home of his

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adoption, Mr. Bever is now enjoying the fruits of a long, active and very useful life.

At a meeting of the American Banker's Associa- tion, held in Philadelphia, on the 4th of October, 1876, he was chosen one of the vice-presidents of the association.

Though not an active politician, Mr. Bever has always been a warm friend of liberty and equal rights, and contributed liberally of his means for the suppression of the recent rebellion, and sent two sons, George and Henry, to aid in saving the Union.

Mr. Bever is a member of the Protestant Episco- pal church, has been senior warden for many years. He was one of the delegates and elected secretary of the convention that organized the diocese of Iowa in 1854, has been a standing lay deputy to the annual diocesan convention ever since, and was several times elected a deputy from this diocese to the general convention of the Protestant Episcopal Church of the United States.

On the 8th of August, 1833, he was married to Miss Mary Blythe, daughter of John Blythe, Esq.,

of Fayette county, Pennsylvania. She is a lady of true womanly virtues, and in her he has found a true helpmeet for more than forty years. They have had eight children, six of whom are living. The sons are among the best business men, of a younger class, in Cedar Rapids. They have had a father's excellent training and example in all the best habits in life. One of their daughters is the wife of A. H. Spangler, who is also connected with the City Na- tional Bank, and the other is the wife of Upton C. Blake, Esq., an attorney-at-law in Cedar Rapids.

Mr. Bever has always had a great aversion to going into debt. Since first embarking, whenever he has made an investment he has had at his com- mand the means of payment. He has lost money by signing for others, but of late years has been more cautious, choosing to relieve necessity rather than become security. The poor have no better friend, no prompter helper, than Sampson C. Bever. He is warm-hearted, and kind to everybody. A neighbor, who has known him since 1852, remarked of him, " Mr. Bever is one of the best men that ever lived."

JAMES M. ROBERTSON, M.D.,

MUSCATINE.

JAMES M. ROBERTSON, one of the oldest med- ical practitioners in the state, was born in Wash- ington county. Pennsylvania, on the 14th of October, 1804. His father, Peter Robertson, was a native of Scotland, but emigrated to Pennsylvania in his youth and died when our subject was but six years old. His mother, Jane Moore, was a native of the United States, of English ancestry. The settlement of his father's estate was attended with some embarrass- ment, and the proceeds found to be small, so that but little provision remained for the education or maintenance of the son. The early years of James M. were passed under the careful, devoted christian watchfulness of his excellent mother, who survived her husband some ten years and died ere he had attained his sixteenth year. Thus left orphaned and destitute he was led to realize in a remarkable manner the divine promise: " When my father and mother forsake me, then the Lord will take me up." Kind friends were raised up to assist him with means to complete his education. Among others, Dr. William Stephenson, of Cannonsburg, Pennsyl- vania (whose name the only son of our subject per-

petuates), became his generous and unwavering friend and patron, directed his studies and treated him in all regards as a son or brother. He pursued his literary education at Jefferson College, Cannons- burg, Pennsylvania, and received his medical edu- cation at Jefferson Medical College, Philadelphia, from which he was graduated with distinction in 1827. Hopeful, ardent and overflowing with grat- itude to the kind friends who had thus far helped him on his way, and whose generosity he hoped to be able soon to repay, he entered upon his life work in Lancaster county, Pennsylvania, in March, 1827. Here he remained some six years with moderate sticcess. Induced by the larger possibilities and greater need of professional men in what was then considered " The West," in the spring of 1833 he re- moved to Franklin county, Ohio, where he practiced for some five years. Realizing, however, that Ohio- was no longer "The West," and that if he would obey the injunction of the distinguished journalist, he must pitch his tent at least beyond the "Father of Waters," he immigrated with his family, in the spring of 1838, to Burlington, Iowa. Here he

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opened a drug store,- one of the first in that city, which be carried on successfully in connection with his practice for several years, which soon became both large and lucrative. He began to accumulate property and to feel satisfied with his surroundings, when, in an evil day, he formed a partnership with a designing and covetous man, who found means of robbing him of his hard-earned property and leaving him almost penniless to start anew in the journey of life. He still owned some uncultivated lands in Louisa county, Iowa. These he intended to dispose of and return to Ohio or Pennsylvania, but fresh disappointments awaited him. In that county he found more land than money, more work than pay, and realized that for the time being at least he had an elephant on his hands. Thus circumscribed he was again obliged to don the toga of professional warfare, and "fight it out on that line." Accord- ingly, resolved to look his disasters fairly in the face, and, if possible, to regain his losses, he resumed his practice in Columbus City, where he remained for twenty-six years, not only repairing all his pecuniary losses, but attaining to an eminence in his profession, which formed the best test of his skill and industry. The removal of his son, Dr. Wm. S. Robertson, elsewhere sketched in this volume, to Muscatine in 1869 induced him to follow in 1870 and locate in the same city, where he continued his professional work till 1874, when he retired from the practice, having been actively engaged as a physician for a period of almost half a century.

In politics, the doctor was for many years an old- line whig, and being strongly opposed to slavery he was among the first to adopt the principles of the free-soil party, and naturally drifted into the great republican party, During the slaveholders' rebel- lion he was an ardent supporter of the government, and employed all the influence which God had given him in church and state in favor of liber- ty and union. He was also an earnest helper of the sanitary commission, and did everything in his power to aid them and to supply the needs of the families of the gallant men who risked their lives in their country's defense. In 1865 he was elected state senator from Louisa county, Iowa, for a period of four years.

He was a member of the Ohio State Medical So- ciety ; also of the medical societies of Louisa and Muscatine counties, Iowa, and of the Iowa State Medical Society, of which he held the office of vice- president and treasurer, each one term. He was

also a pioneer in the cause of temperance in the west, and lectured extensively in this cause through central Ohio at an early day, and did much to ex- tend the principles of total abstinence there and in Iowa, both by precept and example.

He united with a branch of the Presbyterian church at the age of fourteen years, and has con- tinued in connection ever since. He has been an elder in the congregation for many years, and among the most generous contributors to religious and be- nevolent institutions of the community.

On the 15th of March, 1829, he married Miss Maria Armstrong, of Lancaster county, Pennsylva- nia, by whom he has an only son, Dr. Wm. S. Robertson. Her habits are domestic, making her house a home of love, purity and good cheer. Benevolent, charitable, a true wife, a fond mother, a most excellent neighbor, she is loved and re- spected by all who know her.

The doctor, although past the "threescore years and ten" usually allotted to man's existence, still possesses much of the physical elasticity of his ear- lier years, and nearly all the vivacity and vigor of youth. At his prime he was tall, graceful and handsome; a man of great perseverance and un- tiring energy. In the development of his section of Iowa he was one of the most active, enterprising *and influential men of the day. He was shrewd and far-seeing.

His advice was generally sought by his neighbors on all subjects pertaining to their material interests, and usually adopted. He had a large practice and traveled mainly on horseback, shortening distances by ignoring the prescribed highways and going by direct lines across the prairies. At his home he was noted for his kindness and hospitality, his house was always open to his friends or any one who chanced to avail themselves of his generosity. His hand was ever ready to bestow good gifts to the poor and needy. He was always a man of piety of character and of honesty of purpose. Himself honest and un- suspecting, he was not unfrequently made the victim of avarice and design, and, as intimated above, on one occasion, by trusting to the advice of one whom he supposed to be his friend, he was reduced from easy and comfortable circumstances to almost utter destitution. Yet his confidence in men as a class remained unshaken. He could not consent to the doctrine that "all men are to be treated as knaves till proved to be honest." He acted upon the con- trary principle.

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A pioneer in the temperance cause, a life-long advocate of total abstinence, he labored therein earnestly and incessantly, yet without ostentation.

His generous nature revolted at the thought of man's holding property in his fellow-man, and from his earliest manhood was known as an abolitionist, who dared to denounce the wickedness of slavery, and to proclaim the right of universal liberty.

Socially of a retiring disposition, he cared little for large crowds, but enjoyed the company of a few

known friends, and was never more happy than when thus surrounded, discussing some topic of re- ligion or reform.

He has always been a believer in the christian religion, and an unswerving observer of the christian virtues, a great student of the bible, and of all works designed to elucidate its sacred teachings, and now in his declining years he spends the greater portion of his time in the study of subjects pertaining to the eternal world.

SAMUEL SINNETT,

MUSCATINE.

S AMUEL SINNETT, farmer and economist, was born in the city of Dublin, Ireland, on the 17th of March, 1817, and is the second son of John T. Sinnett and Mary Susan née Abbott. His father was for many years a silk manufacturer at No. 8 Merchants' Quay, in the Irish capital, and was descended from an old -Huguenot family, driv- en from the neighborhood of Lyons, France, on the revocation of the celebrated edict of Nantes by Louis XIV in 1685. By this barbarous act all the Protestant churches of France were destroyed, their ministers banished, and every individual out -. lawed or compelled to renounce his religion. They were hunted like wild beasts and great numbers put to death, and not less than five hundred thousand of the most useful and industrious citizens were driven into exile, and carried the arts and manu- factures of France, in which the Protestants greatly excelled, into the various countries in which they found an asylum. The Sinnetts carried their in- dustry with them to Dublin, where for several gen- erations they were among the most prosperous and useful citizens of that metropolis.

One of the most serious evils, however, resulting from the legislative union of Ireland with Great Britain was the prostration of the silk interests, the manufacture of which has since entirely ceased in Ireland. This circumstance led to the expatri- ation of our subject. He left Ireland in 1835, in the eighteenth year of his age, in company with his only brother, John T. Sinnett, an artist by profes- sion, and now a resident of Middletown, New York.

Our subject received a first-class English and classical education in the city of his nativity-one of the most renowned seats of learning in Europe.

On arriving in the United States he settled down as a pioneer farmer in Park county, Indiana, where he remained some five years, and in 1840 removed to Muscatine county, Iowa, where he purchased a farm of three hundred and twenty acres, on which he has since resided. His home is located some two miles north of Muscatine, and is among the most beautiful and ornate suburban villas in the county, where a hospitality peculiarly Irish is dis- pensed, and a cordial welcome greets every exile hailing from the Emerald Isle. As a farmer, Mr. Sinnett has been eminently successful, and has ac- cumulated a competence. He is also interested in every movement, organization or enterprise for the benefit of his fellow-husbandmen or the community at large. He was one of the original organizers of the "Patrons of Husbandry " in 1872-the only se- cret society with which he was ever connected - and has since continued one of its leading niem- bers. He has also been for many years a steady contributor to the agricultural and political press both in America and the old world. He has been a special correspondent of the "Irish Farmer's Ga- zette," and has rendered important service to the material interests of his adopted country by calling the attention of the Irish pork and beef packers to America as a source of supply, in consequence of which many Irish packers have located in the north- west, and are the most extensive operators in that line in the country.

He has visited Europe several times during his residence in Muscatine, and has traveled over Ire- land, Great Britain, Belgium, France and other countries, and made himself familiar not only with the manners and customs of these various peo-

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ples, but also with their industries, and is, perhaps, among the most intellectual and best informed men of the period.

He was originally a member of the democratic party, but is at present associated with the inde- pendent or greenback party.

He is an attendant of the Presbyterian church, and a generous supporter of religious and chari- table enterprises generally, and is recognized as one of the most useful and valuable citizens in the community in which he resides.

He has been twice married : in September, 1840, to Miss Susan L. Higley, daughter of Ozias Higley, of New York. She died on the 14th of July, 1844, leaving one child, Susan A., now the wife of P. C. Donaldson, Esq., a retired merchant of Iowa City. On the 3Ist of October, 1847, he married Miss Sarah A. Knox, daughter of Factor Knox, of Har- dinsburg, Indiana, who survives. By her he has had seven children, namely, Sarah Jane, Georgiana, Isabella, William Abbott (died in infancy), Samuel Townsend, Charles Eugene, John Harris. Georgi- ana is the wife of Russell B. George, Esq., druggist, at Arlington, Illinois. The girls are all graduates of high literary institutions, and the sons are. being educated with a view to professions.

In personal appearance Mr. Sinnett is rather above the medium height, of strong, muscular framework, ruddy complexion, light hair and gray eyes ; a clear and pleasant voice strongly tinctured with the Dublin accent, a large head and distinctly marked features, which at once strike the eye of a stranger as belonging to a man of no ordinary caliber. His manners, which partake largely of the western mold, are, perhaps, not as highly polished as those of some, but he has a hearty, whole-souled, breezy way that wins the good-will of strangers at once, and a broad, sunny smile that begets con- fidence without further question. His large and liberal culture make him an entertaining and in- structive conversationalist and public speaker, while his ready wit and genuine Irish humor always ren- der him a welcome guest in society. He could hardly be called an eloquent public speaker, but the stern logic of the bristling array of facts and figures with which he fortifies his positions is hard to overcome. Owing, however, to an occasional hesitancy in his speech, he is less successful as an orator than as a writer. With him, as with Horace Greeley, it is the pen rather than the tongue which is his strongest weapon. Being well posted upon

the current literature of the day, and devoting much time and thought to the political and social questions which concern society, he is a frequent and valued contributor to many of the leading newspapers and periodicals both of this country and of Great Britain. By nature a democrat, he is always found on the side of the people against their oppressors; of the weak against the strong; of labor as against capital and monopolies. Strong in his convictions and fearless in their expression he is often found on the side of the few and against the many, advocating what he believes to be right, not for the sake of popularity but from principle. Of indomitable energy, and perseverance which knows no flagging, he attacks and pursues a wrong or an abuse, no matter at what cost to himself. As illustrating this characteristic, it is related of him that upon one occasion, when a large meeting was held in one of the city halls to consider the pro- priety of voting a five per cent tax in aid of a certain railroad, Mr. Sinnett strenuously opposed the proposition, upon the principle that no one has a right to vote money out of his neighbor's pocket for the benefit of a private company. Al- though nearly every man of the four or five hun- dred who were present was in favor of the project, and almost to a man voted for it, yet Samuel Sin- nėtt alone voted "no!" amid the jeers and ridicule of the crowd. He is to-day one of the few men who is proud of his vote on that occasion. As a farmer, he has done much to better the condition of the class to which he belongs, and to obtain for it just treatment and fair play at the hands of corporations. Hence he has been one of the earliest and strongest opponents of railroad mo- nopolies, and through his speeches and writings contributed very materially toward the public sen- timent which resulted in legislative enactments regulating railroad tariffs in Iowa. He has also devoted much attention to the currency question, and believes it to be the duty of the government to issue a sufficient volume of paper (greenbacks) to meet all the demands of commerce, and he holds that this paper should be a legal tender for all debts, public and private, and should be received by the government for all dues and taxes of what- ever kind. He also favors the abolition of the national banks, and maintains that the government should do the banking of the country, issuing to its depositors bonds bearing a low rate of interest, and making these bonds convertible into green-

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The United States biographical dictionary and portrait gallery of eminent and self made men, Iowa volume, Part 16

Author: American biographical publishing company, pub Publication date: 1878 Publisher: Chicago, New York, American biographical publishing company Number of Pages: 954

Author: American biographical publishing company, pub
Publication date: 1878
Publisher: Chicago, New York, American biographical publishing company
Number of Pages: 954