Historical review of Chicago and Cook county and selected biography, Volume III, Part 1

Author: Waterman, Arba N. (Arba Nelson), 1836-1917
Publication date: 1908
Publisher: Chicago, New York, The Lewis publishing company
Number of Pages: 608


USA > Illinois > Cook County > Chicago > Historical review of Chicago and Cook county and selected biography, Volume III > Part 1


Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org.


Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39


NYPL RESEARCH LIBRARIES 3 3433 08181566 8


1-20-1-4 1671


BENE AG


CAVENDO


Ex Libris Otto C.Schneider


Chicago


IVF CHICAGO


WATERMA


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Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2008 with funding from Microsoft Corporation


http://www.archive.org/details/historicalreview03wate


HISTORICAL REVIEW


OF


CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY


AND SELECTED BIOGRAPHY 1671


A. N. WATERMAN, A. B., LL. D. 1 EDITOR AND AUTHOR OF HISTORICAL REVIEW


VOLUME III


ILLUSTRATED -


THE LEWIS PUBLISHING COMPANY CHICAGO NEW YORK


1908


206296B


L


CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY


Commerce and Industry as Represented


by Individual Chicagoans


No man of such prominence in practical affairs ever lived in the United States as Philip D. Armour, who persistently refused to par-


PHILIP D. ticipate in public matters; the only digression he ever made from his vast private interests was to ARMOUR. serve for a time as a director of the Chicago, Mil- waukee & St. Paul Railway, and this only upon the continued solici- tation of his lifelong friend, the late Alexander Mitchell. The re- markable expansion of his business, its ramification into numerous fields undreamed of during its initial years, was of such a nature as to keep active and elastic one of the strongest minds of the coun- try, without the necessity of going afield for other exercise of his executive and organizing genius.


Philip Danforth Armour was born at Stockbridge, Madison coun- ty, New York, on the 16th of May, 1832, being the son of Danforth and Julianna (Brooks) Armour, whose former home was in Union. Connecticut, whither they removed to his birthplace in September, 1825. The family consisted of six sons and two daughters, all of whom were reared on the farm homestead and were educated in the typical district school. Philip was fortunate enough to enjoy, in addition, the benefits of the Stockbridge Academy, and even there he was marked as a leader by his associates.


The excitement over the discovery of gold in California in 1849 seethed for three years in the little village of Stockbridge before a company of its people was finally organized, and Philip D. Armour. then twenty years of age, was among the first and most enthusiastic to volunteer for the overland trip. In the spring of 1852 the party left Oneida, New York, and six months later arrived on the coast,


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but after four years of excitement and the usual experiences of those days, most of its members were glad enough to return to the east.


Mr. Armour's experiences in California were interesting enough, but his financial successes were so very moderate as to lead him to settle in the nearer west, and a few weeks after his return from the Pacific coast he settled in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Soon after his arrival in the Cream City he formed a copartnership in the commis- sion business with Frederick B. Miles, which was carried on success- fully until 1863. The qualities of business and commercial leader- ship which he displayed during this period brought him to the favor- able notice of John Plankinton, his senior and one of the foremost of Milwaukee's citizens, and the partnership then formed between the two proved the laying of the cornerstones of two great fortunes, of which Mr. Armour's proved the most magnificent. The tremendous demand for meats and provisions caused by the Union armies in the field occasioned a continuous rise in prices, and Plankinton & Ar- mour, as the saying was, "made money hand over fist." During the decade from 1865 to 1875 the brothers, Herman O. Armour and Joseph FF. Armour, engaged extensively in the meat and provision trade at New York and Chicago, respectively-the New York busi- ness being conducted under the firm name of Armour, Plankinton & Co., and that of Chicago as H. O. Armour & Co. and Armour & Co. The packing house at Kansas City, Missouri, conducted by Plankinton & Armour, was placed in charge of Simon B. Armour, still another of the brothers. On account of the delicate health of Joseph F. Armour, manager of the Chicago house, the rugged Philip D. was called to that point in 1875, and he soon became the central figure and guiding force of all the houses; and thus he remained un- til his death, developing one of the most wonderful industries of the century. At the last nothing in the shape of live stock which came into an Armour plant ever went to waste-in fact, what were for- merly called waste products were so utilized that they became as prof- itable as the pure meats. In connection with the manufacturers, also were developed refrigerating systems, including an immense system of transportation by rail and boat, which was of world-wide scope and one of the modern wonders.


Outside of the wonderful industries which Mr. Armour created, the deceased had many high claims to fame. Personally, he was one


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of the most faithful, warmest hearted and most generous men whom the country ever produced. His family affection was one of his no- blest traits, and the love which he bore his younger brother, Joseph F. Armour, was especially strong and touching. Both were earnest. members of the Plymouth Congregational church, and Joseph was greatly interested in a small mission connected with it. In 1881, at his death, he left $100,000 for the founding of a mission church and school, and Philip not only carried out the provisions of his will in this connection, but added generous bequests of his own during his lifetime and at his decease. Thus was founded Armour Mission. The name of Philip D. Armour is alone connected with the found- ing of the great institute of technical education, which, through his friend and pastor, Dr. Frank W. Gunsaulus, he gave to the high cause of education.


In October, 1862, Mr. Armour was united in marriage with Miss Belle Ogden, daughter of Jonathan Ogden, and their two sons, Jon- athan Ogden and Philip Danforth, were identified with the great in- terests of Armour & Co. The domestic life of Philip D. Armour revealed one of the most lovable traits in his character, and his death in 1901, had the effect upon the household of a keen heart thrust as well as a crushing blow. In a word, there are few men whose lives are recorded in the businses history of the country in whose character unite so closely the best attributes of heart and head as in the personality of Philip D. Armour.


The late George M. Pullman accomplished for the traveling public what a dozen great inventors and business men have done to bring GEORGE M. comfort to those at home and develop their powers PULLMAN. as working members of the community. One who. accomplishes great things in the world, despite unpropitio as and retarding surroundings, is a hero, but as few are cast in this mold, that man is a great benefactor to society who places new conveniences and comforts within the general reach and makes it easier for the average citizen to give his undivided attention and strength to whatever matter is in hand. Mr. Pullman made travel a pleasure and a strength-restorer, instead of a drain upon a man's vitality ; he was thus a great power in bringing the leaders of the business and industrial world together and in preserving their best strength for the development of enterprises which stood tor


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the material progress of the country. He also brought together intellect and culture. In fact, the so-called Pullman Palace Car has proved a great force in bringing the United States from its raw pioneer period to an advanced stage of social and commercial de- velopment.


At the time of his death. October 19, 1897, George M. Pullman was known in both hemispheres as the inventor of the palace car, president of the Pullman Palace Car Company, and founder of the town of Pullman-the last an object lesson to the industrial world of how much more can be obtained from the skilled workman by making his domestic life sanitary and pleasant than by simply ignoring that phase of his existence and considering him as a machine of an average stated capacity. Mr. Pullman was born in the village of Brocton, Chautauqua county, New York, on the 3rd of March, IS31. son of James Lewis and Emily (Minton) Pullman. The father was a native of Rhode Island, of a forceful, original and devout character, while his mother, a New York lady, was all that the two words imply-a motherly lady. There were ten children in the family, of whom eight reached adult life-one of the sons being a leading Universalist minister, three of them being eventually asso- ciated with the Pullman Palace Car Company, and another a prom- inent lawyer of New York, who died in 1879. George M. was a persistent, self-reliant boy, and at the age of fourteen left the home. schools to get into business, his inducements being forty dollars per year and a "chance to learn." After spending a year as a clerk in the Brocton store, he joined his elder brother, R. H. Pullman, who was in the cabinet making line at Albion, New York. He learned the trade, became his brother's partner, and participated in a fair business until his father's death, November, 1, 1853. As the younger brother was unmarried, he returned to his home to be the mainstay of his widowed mother and the four dependent members of the family, and as the income from his trade as a cabinet maker proved inadequate to meet the demands upon him, he took a contract for raising buildings and doing other work along the line of the Erie canal, which was then being enlarged by the state of New York. His contract was so promptly and honestly executed that he was soon one of the best known workers in that field. His talents and success along this line made it natural that he should be attracted


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to Chicago in 1859, which was then growing so rapidly that it had embarked in the seemingly impossible task of raising itself from its muddy site as a city to high, sanitary and attractive ground. With the raising of the grades it became necessary to elevate many large buildings, and this was the work in which Mr. Pullman had become most proficient. In 1859 he therefore removed to Chicago, and, with a capital of $6,000, commenced his career as an engineer and contractor, and some of the largest buildings of the Chicago of that day were raised through the energy and ingenuity of George M. Pullman when a young man of about thirty.


Soon after locating in Chicago Mr. Pullman obtained permis- sion form the Chicago and Alton Railroad to experiment in one of its repair shops on two old cars, and see what could be done in the way of sleeping accommodations. At this time, although traveling was by no means uncommon, it was decidedly uncomfortable and wearing. At a cost of $8,000 he succeeded in fitting the cars with such taste and ingenuity that they were attached to a regular pas- senger train and made several trips. In the midst of these initial experiments he went to California, where his ability as a mechanic and engineer assisted him to collect quite a capital with which to push his sleeping car project. Returning to Chicago in the early sixties, Mr. Pullman confidently resumed his enterprise, and with the aid of skillful assistants and at a cost of eighteen thousand dol- lars, produced a model car within about a year from the commence- ment of his labors. It was beautifully frescoed, finely upholstered. richly carpeted and the woodwork showed that the builder had no superior in the country as a cabinet maker. It was an innovation to the railroad world and rightly named the "Pioneer." Its size, how- ever, made it impossible to be used until both railroad bridges and station platforms were adjusted to accommodate it. At this stage of the enterprise Abraham Lincoln was assassinated. and that his precious remains might be duly honored, they were placed in the magnificent "Pioneer," bridges were raised along the line, plaforms were adjusted, and the body of the beloved president was conveyed to its last resting place in Springfield. Not long afterward General Grant, then heralded as the foremost living American, came to his old Galena home, and to bear the war hero thither the palace car was again called into requisition. Another railroad therefore ad-


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juste itself to its magnificence, and before the public were aware, It had been transferred from the class of luxuries to that of necessi- ties. The "Pioneer" was first placed on the Chicago and Alton road, and sleeping cars modeled upon it were successively introduced on the Michigan Central, Chicago, Burlington and Quincy, and the Great Western systems. The Union Pacific first received the benefit of his dining cars. In 1887 he designed the vestibule car and placed the first vestibule trains on the Pennsylvania Company's trunk lines.


Mr. Pullman established his first car works at Atlanta, Georgia, in 1866, and in the following year organized the Pullman Palace Car Company and founded the Chicago plant. In ISSo he com- menced the erection of his great works at the town of that name, which he also founded upon


a 3,000-acre site, twelve miles south of Chicago on the line of the Illinois Central railroad. The town is laid out with broad boulevards, lined with elms, lawns and flower beds. and the car shops themselves are surrounded by beautiful grounds, as well as architecturally graceful. South of the works and separated from them by a wide boulevard, lies the handsome residen- tial quarter. A spacious and elegant building called the Arcade con- tains all the stores of the town, postoffice, library, theater and bank. In the center of the town is a huge tower which is the nucleus of a fine water and sewerage system. The town of Pullman has always stood as a model industrial center, and its founder took especial pride in maintaining it at the highest standard, both as regards com- fort and morals. In 1889 it was incorporated into the municipal body of Chicago. Other industrial plants than the car works have been founded at Pullman, and since the Pullman Palace cars have become also a necessity of foreign countries, as well as of the United States. the town is perhaps more widely known than any other indus- trial center in the world. The works represent the largest single railroad manufacturing interest in the universe, the employes aver- aging some twenty thousand, and the product of the plant equals about six sleeping cars. fifteen passenger coaches and four hundred freight cars per week. In 1899 the name was changed from the Pullman Palace Car Company to the Pullman Company.


During his lifetime Mr. Pullman was also interested in the Egle- ton Iron Works, of New York, ranking with the largest of its kind in the country, and was one of the three founders of the Manhattan


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Elevated Railroad of New York City. He held a third of the stock of the original company, serving also as its president, and although he and his associates were opposed by all the street railways in the metropolis and Commodore Vanderbilt, the courts upheld the inno- vators, and within one hundred days from the time all legal restric- tions were removed from the enterprise the road was in operation. In Chicago one of Mr. Pullman's monuments is the magnificent build- ing which he erected at the corner of Adams street and Michigan avenue, in 1884, and which still contains the administration and executive offices of the Pullman Palace Car Company. His private residence, on Prairie avenue, south side, is among the most massive and beautiful in the city, and his summer residence was long known as Castle Rest. being situated on one of the St. Lawrence isles and built in honor of his aged mother, who was then alive.


In March, 1867, Mr. Pullman was married to Miss Hattie A. Sanger, daughter of James A. Sanger, an early settler of Chicago, who was largely interested in its pioneer railroad enterprises. Four children were born of their union-Florence Sanger Pullman, Harriet Sanger Pullman, George M. Pullman, Jr., and Walter Sanger Pull- man.


Mr. Pullman was far more than a king of industry, being a pro- moter of countless charities and educational enterprises. He was one of the founders and at one time president of the Chicago Athæneum, long a director of the Relief and Aid Society, and a member of the board of councilors of the Chicago College of Dental Surgery. Among other illustrative features of his will were those provisions which donated $10,000 to each of thirteen Chicago charities and set aside $1,200,000 to found and endow a free manual training school at Pullman.


To accomplish what he did the deceased must necessarily have been intensely practical; but he was also of broad caliber and made a useful and even a generous distribution of his means. Through the vast business and industrial enterprise, which was the chief work of his life, he had the honor of being the builder of American homes to a degree which made him a benefactor to the country. A friend of Mr. Pullman, and a leading railroad man, has this to say of the broad-reaching results of his labors: "An experience of nearly forty years has taught me that the quiet, safe, luxurious accommodations


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of railway travel originated by Mr. Pullman have added fifty per cent to the revenue of the passenger departments of the railroads; social intimacies have been fostered, political and business ties formed, great financial enterprises created by these comforts, while for labor new industries have been made, and the sum of human happiness for the rich and poor has been immeasurably increased."


For a period of more than forty years Philip F. W. Peck was a leader of the advance guard of strong and enterprising men who


won position for Chicago as the typical western


PHILIP F. W. PECK. city. While possessing the power of initiative in a remarkable degree, he saw his way clearly before he moved out into the open, established his base of supplies with admirable judgment and he was therefore never forced to beat an ignominious retreat. He was the pioneer merchant of progressive tendencies, displayed his stock of goods in the first frame store in Chicago, erected its first brick structure, was one of the founders of the town and the city, accumulated.a fortune, and what is still more to his credit, was a stanch promoter of all good movements, from the time he threw open his unfinished frame store to the first Sun- day school ever organized in the city, until the day of his death, October 23, 1871. He passed away amid the deep affection and pro- found gratitude and sorrow of thousands of people of this city, the only cloud upon his demise being the calamity of the Great Fire, which still hung over Chicago, or over what seemed at the time to be the ruins of a municipality to whose founding the strength of his life had been devoted. But the future proved far otherwise. .


Mr. Peck was born in Providence, Rhode Island, in the year 1809, and was reared in New England, the home of several genera- tions of his ancestors. He was trained to a mercantile and moral life, and when he had attained his majority, like other young men of New England of any spirit, he left his home to prove himself in the outside world. But instead of going to some neighboring New Eng- land town and securing a clerkship in a store, he cut his home con- nections entirely, relying solely upon himself for the carving of a career. In 1830 he loaded a stock of general merchandise aboard a sailing vessel at Buffalo, and started for the frontier post of Illinois known as Fort Dearborn. He already foresaw the advantages of its geographical location, but questioned the expediency of throwing


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himself into the development of such a raw settlement. But once there, the atmosphere of friendliness and confidence which surrounded the few settlers who had preceded him decided him to remain. Ac- companying him on this expedition was Captain Joseph Napier, who also brought out a stock of goods with him, and proceeded farther to the interior and founded the town of Naperville. But Mr. Peck soon saw that the larger town would concentrate at the foot of the lake and at the mouth of the river, at a natural port for lake traffic and a central point of overland travel. In 1831 he therefore erected a small log building near Fort Dearborn, in which for several months he carried on his first mercantile operations in Chicago. In the fall of that year he had sufficiently completed a frame building (the first one in Chicago) at what is now the southeast corner of South Water ' and La Salle streets, to allow the transfer of his stock to the more pretentious structure. It was in the unfinished second story of this structure that the first Sunday school was organized, the first religious services of a permanent nature were held, and where Rev. Jeremiah Porter, Chicago's first minister, found a study and a lodging place. This building remained Mr. Peck's headquarters for merchandising until it became necessary for him to withdraw from active business and devote himself to the care of his realty interests and his increas- ing fortune, and its site is still owned by members of the family.


As a leading citizen of the little, struggling settlement around Fort Dearborn, Mr. Peck joined other plucky settlers in the expedi- tion against Black Hawk, in 1832, and in the following year assisted in the organization of the village of Chicago. He was a member of the first fire company organized in Chicago; erected at the corner of Washington and La Salle streets the first brick dwelling as his own residence, in 1836, and was a voter at the first city election in 1837. Having supreme confidence in the substantial prosperity of Chicago, he was never carried away by speculative fevers, but while keeping his mercantile enterprises well in hand, invested judiciously and generously in real estate and other properties. Thus, while his interests were large and somewhat varied, he weathered the financial crises of 1837 and 1857, which proved the ruin of many of his asso- ciates. The periods of general depression following the panics failed to weaken his confidence in the city's continued progress, but rather stimulated him to make most advantageous investments, so that his


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advancement to a large fortune and a substantial name for generosity, public spirit and benevolence, was uninterrupted to the day of his death.


In 1835 Philip F. W. Peck was married to Miss Mary K. Wythe. a native of Philadelphia of English parentage, and a niece of Dr. Stoughton, a celebrated Baptist clergyman. The wife and mother died in 1899, having borne eight children in Chicago. Four of them died in infancy, and one of the sons, Harold S., in 1884. Another, Walter L., in 1908. The other sons, Clarence I. and Ferdinand W. Peck, are identified with the large interests of the present Chicago, the last named having an international reputation as the founder of the world-famed Auditorium and the commissioner general from the United States to the Paris Exposition in 1900.


The labors and personality of Ferdinand W. Peck have been to modern Chicago what those of his fine and rugged father were to the city before the great fire. As Philip F. W.


FERDINAND


IV. PECK. Peck passed away when even the future of Chicago seemed to be in ruins, so the son has become a large part of its later progress in business, the arts and the higher devel- opment of the world. His great monument is the Auditorium, than which there is perhaps no palatial pile in the United States which is less in need of a description. The University of Chicago, the Athen- aeum, the Illinois Humane Society, the Confederate monument in Chicago, and two international expositions. with other institutions of an educational, patriotic and benevolent nature, have all felt his guiding hand and deferred to his sound judgment.


In the early days of the city, when the business and resident por- tions both centered around Lake street and extended only a few blocks away, Philip F. W. Peck came to Chicago and established a home at the corner of Washington and LaSalle streets, erecting for that purpose the first brick dwelling house in Chicago. Later, in the family residence standing on the present site of the Grand Pa- cific Hotel, Ferdinand W. Peck was born on the 15th of July, 1848, being the youngest of four sons, two of whom still live as leading citizens. The father, a Chicago merchant and pioneer whose splen- did life work is previously detailed, died two weeks after the great fire of 1871. and the widow (nee Mary Kent Wythe ) in 1899.


Mr. Peck, of this review. passed through the public and high


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schools of Chicago, afterward pursuing a literary course in the old Chicago University and a law course in the Union College. He was graduated from the latter institution, admitted to the bar in 1869, and entered practice. But upon the death of his father he was obliged, with his brothers, to assume the management of the Peck estate, one of the largest and best controlled in Chicago.




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