USA > Illinois > Cook County > Chicago > The biographical dictionary and portrait gallery of representative men of Chicago, Minnesota cities and the World's Columbian exposition : with illustrations on steel. V. 2 > Part 2
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At the age of seventeen he began a course of study in the Rock River Seminary at Mount
Morris, Illinois. After graduating from that in- stitution, he determined to devote himself to the legal profession, and accordingly entered the law department of the University of Michigan, and was graduated therefrom with the class of 1865. He afterwards spent some time traveling through the Western and Northern States, and finally began the practice of his profession at St. Louis, Missouri. Owing to the unsettled state of affairs after the close of the war, he abandoned the law for a time and worked at his trade, continuing thus employed until the fol- lowing year, when he left St. Louis by reason of the cholera epidemic. He soon afterward be- came acquainted with Mr. Benjamin F. Taylor; of the Chicago Evening Journal, who was lectur- ing through the West, and, following his advice, removed to Chicago and resumed his profession. The move was a most happy one. Entering, with all the vigor of his young manhood, into the work of his profession, with a determination to succeed,
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he soon made a name at the Chicago bar, and built up an extensive and lucrative practice.
In 1879 Mr. Hammer was appointed by Gov. Shelby M. Cullom a Justice of the Peace of the city of Chicago for a term of four years, and in 1883 he was reappointed by Gov. John M. Ham- ilton for another term. The office was one for which he was well qualified, both by reason of his judicial mind and his practical knowledge of the law, to which, with his great popularity, may be attributed his almost unparalleled success, he having, during his term of service, disposed of about four thousand cases each year. Aside from his professional duties, Mr. Hammer has always kept himself well posted on matters of public interest, and besides being a most able and successful lawyer he is an enterprising and public-spirited man. Being a gentleman of cul- tivated tastes and fine literary attainments, he has always taken an active part in all movements tending to advance the interest of art and lit- erary culture. His private library, comprising some five thousand volumes, is one of the finest and best-selected collections of books in the city of Chicago.
In 1890 Mr. Hammer made an extensive trip abroad with his family, and visited the countries of Holland, Belgium, Germany, Switzerland, France and Bavaria, and witnessed the passion play at Ober-Ammergau. In 1891 he extended his trip through England, Scotland, Wales, Ire-
land, Italy and Spain, Norway, Sweden, Russia and Egypt, thus adding much knowledge to his already well-informed mind.
In political sentiment Mr. Hammer is and al- ways has been a staunch Republican. He served in the Common Council as an alderman from the Fourth Ward in 1887 and 1888, with credit to himself and the city alike, and is at present (1892) a Master in Chancery of the Superior Court of Cook county.
Mr. Hammer married Mrs. Emma L. Carpen- ter, of Athens, Ohio, June 4, 1874. They have one child, Miss Hazel Harry Hammer, born July 4, 1881.
Mr. Hammer is in the very prime of life, en- dowed with a healthy constitution ; he is a man of fine presence, and a highly interesting talker. His official life has brought him into intimate contact with many of the most prominent and notable men of this and other countries. Hav- ing accumulated an ample fortune, he lives in the enjoyment of all the comforts of a happy and cheerful home.
He is an active member of Chevalier Bayard Commandery, Knights Templar, Oriental Con- sistory, Medina Temple, Foresters, Royal Arca- num, and other societies; also a member of the Calumet, Union League and Washington Park clubs of Chicago, and president of the Veteran Union League, and member of the Old Settlers' Association of Cook county.
NOAH E. GARY,
CHICAGO, ILL.
T HE subject of this article is a native of Illi- nois. He was born September 8, 1844, in Du Page county and is the eldest son of the late Erastus Gary, an old-time citizen of Wheaton, who came to Illinois, in 1832, from Pomfret, Wind- ham county, Connecticut.
He was of the Pilgrim Fathers' stock, his an- cestors having settled in Roxbury, Massachusetts, in 1831. Noah E. received his education in the public schools and Wheaton College.
In 1862, he enlisted in the One Hundred and Fifth Illinois Infantry Volunteers. This regi- ment was on detached duty until the spring of
1864, when it was attached to the Twentieth Army Corps under General Hooker, and with him advanced on Atlanta. At Resaca Mr. Gary was severely wounded in four places and sent to Nash- ville to the hospital, and was mustered out of ser- vice as a sergeant, November 1, 1864, but could not walk without crutches until the following spring. He then returned to Wheaton and engaged in business pursuits and teaching school until the spring of 1868, in the meantime employing his leisure hours in the study of the law. He then entered the office of the clerk of the Superior Court of Cook county, serving there as chief dep-
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uty for the greater part of the time until October, 1872. He then commenced the practice of the law with E. H. Gary, his brother.
In 1870 Hon. Hiram H. Cody retired from the bench, and was admitted a partner in the firm under the style of Gary, Cody & Gary, which continued until 1887. Mr. Gary remained in partnership with his brother until January, 1890, since which time he has practiced law without a partner. While in partnership with E. H. Gary and Judge Cody, he paid particular attention to the examination of abstracts and chancery prac- tice. In the years 1879-1880 he was president of the town council of Wheaton, and in 1870 was ap- pointed master in chancery of Du Page county, which office he still holds.
He is a member and secretary of the Board of Education in Wheaton, and takes much interest in the public schools of that city.
Mr. Gary's practice has made him familiar with real-estate values, and he is a large holder of real estate in both Cook and Du Page counties.
In 1865 Mr. Gary married Ella M. Guild, of Aurora. She died in 1870. In 1873 he married Caroline H. Wheat, of Wheaton. There are sur- viving two children by the first marriage, Carle- ton N., a lawyer in good practice in Chicago, and Ella Ethelle, just finishing at Northwestern Uni- versity. By his second marriage Mr. Gary has three daughters-Anna Louisa, Dora Bernice and Ava Grace. All of these children are the comfort of their parents.
The author of this sketch was forbidden to write any word eulogistic of Mr. Gary, whose pride seems to be confined to his ancestry and his descendants. He is the sixth descendant of his ancestors who settled in Roxbury, and knows the genealogy of his family better than any other Gary of his acquaintance.
Mr. Gary is the commander of E. S. Kelly Post, 513, G. A. R., Department of Illinois, and is sec- retary of the First Brigade, Third Division, Twen- tieth Army Corps, of which Gen. Benj. Harrison is president.
HENRY J. REYNOLDS, M. D.
CHICAGO, ILL.
T HE successful man is he who chooses his life-work with reference to his native abil- ities and tastes. The men who fail in their call- ings are not men without ability-often they are men of brilliant genius-but they are those who have turned the current of their life-force into a wrong channel.
The subject of this sketch has been eminently successful and to-day stands high among the med- ical practitioners of Chicago. The son of James and Sarah (Wilkinson) Reynolds, he was born in Meaford, Ontario, April 26, 1852. Both his par- ents were natives of Dublin, Ireland. His father was a successful farmer, and it was on the family homestead that young Reynolds spent his early years. Receiving his primary education in the district schools, he subsequently completed it at Toronto University. In 1871 he commenced the study of medicine in the Toronto School of Med- icine. Four years later he was graduated from the Bellevue Hospital Medical College of New
York, and was awarded the " Mott" prize against more than five hundred competitors-many of them old practitioners. He had an elder brother, who was a professor in Detroit Medical College and his preceptor and to whose early training he owes much of his present success. He also has a younger brother, Dr. Arthur R. Reynolds, who is in practice in Chicago, while another brother, Ed- win R. Reynolds, is a barrister in Toronto, Canada, where his parents have for many years past re- sided.
Dr. Reynolds practiced in Michigan for ten years, and there, while not yet thirty, he was vice- president of the Northeastern District Medical Society and vice-president of the Michigan State Sanitary Association.
In 1883 Dr. Reynolds settled in Chicago, where he has since occupied a prominent position. He has succeeded in building up a fine practice, and in adding to an already high reputation. This is an age of specialists. The learned professions "of
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to-day differ in many respects from those of for- mer times and this is perhaps more especially true in our great cities. Time was when the lawyer and physician found it necessary to practice all branches of their profession ; to-day, however, all this is changed. By following some special branch and applying all their energies better results are obtained, and the ultimate reputation gained much more valuable and lasting.
Dr. Reynolds' specialty is probably that of skin diseases and diseases of the genito-urinary organs, and in these particular branches of the profession he has perhaps few equals. He was one of the founders and formerly professor of skin diseases of the Chicago Polyclinic. He is professor of skin diseases in the College of Physicians and Sur- geons, and has been elected at various times to many other positions of responsibility in the med- ical profession. He is at present (1892) a member of the Chicago Medical Society, Illinois State Medical Society, American Medical Association, International Medical Congress, and is also an hon- orary member of the Northeastern District Med- ical Society of Michigan.
Prominent as a contributor to medical journals, he is also an author of wide reputation, whose treatises on skin diseases and kindred ailments are accepted
as authorities not only in this country, but also in Europe. Among those already published are : "Synovitis of Knee-Joint;" "Puerperal Fever;" " Puerperal Eclampsia ; " " The After-Treatment in Tracheotomy Cases;" "The Treatment of Ec- zema;" "A New Method of Producing Local An- æsthesia of the Skin ;" "A New Method in the Treatment of the Vegetable Parasitic Diseases of the Scalp ;" " Treatment of Stricture of the Ure- thra ;" "On the Etiology of Urethral Inflamma- tion ;" " The Treatment of Pruritus," while his public lectures include those of Acne, Psoriasis Lupus, Vitiligo, Favus, Lichen Ruber, Sycosis, Parasitic Sycosis, Syphilis, Elastic Skin and many others.
Dr. Reynolds is a member of La Salle Club, a thirty-second degree Mason, and a member of Oriental Consistory, S. P. and R. S., and Apollo Commandery, No. I, K. T.
In politics he is a Democrat.
Dr. Reynolds' success is largely attributable to the fact that, in his profession, he is thoroughly at home. A man of liberal views, his actions have been governed by the strictest integrity, and by his open and fair dealing he has drawn around him a host of admiring acquaintances and many true, personal friends.
JOSEPH DONNERSBERGER,
CHICAGO, ILL.
J OSEPH DONNERSBERGER, President of the South Park Board of Commissioners, and one of the leading real-estate dealers of Chicago, was born at Cincinnati, Ohio, in 1843. He ob- tained his school education and also his earlier business training in that city ; his first experience in the real-estate business, in which he has continued all of his life, was as clerk in the office of Samuel A. Sargent & Co., in his native place. He occupied a position of trust with this firm for four years, but in 1868, the firm retiring from business, he was compelled to seek a new field, and removed to the West. His first real- estate venture in the West was in lands on the line of the Illinois Central Railroad, and becom- ing acquainted with Mr. Adam Smith, he was in- duced by him to settle in Chicago, whither he
removed in 1870, and immediately entered into business relations with Mr. Smith, who soon after began making improvements at Brighton Park, forming the Brighton Cotton Mill Company in 1871. Mr. Donnersberger was one of the investors in the enterprise, and he disposed of much of the property that had been sub-divided into lots, in such a manner as to be advantageous both to himself and fellow investors, and has handled most of the property sold in Brighton Park.
Mr. Donnersberger has been in the real-estate business continuously since 1864, and since 1875 has conducted his business in his own name. His transactions, however, have not been confined to that section, he having handled other large tracts of property in the south and west divisions of Chicago. He has also had charge of the purchase
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of rights of way for several leading railroads in Chicago.
In 1873, Mr. Donnersberger was elected collect- or of the town of Cicero, and in 1874 was further honored by being chosen assessor of that town. In 1874 he was elected a member of the Board of Trustees of Cicero, and was re-elected in 1880, and served as president of the Board for seven years. In 1881, he was elected a member of the Cook County Board of Commissioners, and on December 3, 1883, was elected its president. In 1886, several vacancies occurred in the Board on account of the indictment and conviction of the " boodle " commissioners, and there was a public demand that these vacancies should be filled by men of undoubted honesty and integrity. Mr. Don- nersberger was selected as one, and was appointed to fill the unexpired term of J. J. McCarthy.
On April 30, 1889, Mr. Donnersberger was appointed by the Judges of the Circuit Court of Cook County to the position of South Park Com-
missioner, the other members of the Board being Messrs. John B. Sherman, Wm. Best, Martin J. Russell and Jas. W. Ellsworth. At the last election for officers of this Board, Mr. Donners- berger was elected president. He has always been prominent in any enterprise he ever became interested in, as he is a hard and persistent worker. He is a prominent member of the Chicago Real Estate Board, a director in the Northwestern Horse-shoe Nail Company of Chicago, and Presi- dent of the Chicago Glass Manufacturing Com- pany. On December 27, 1863, he was married to Miss Wilhelmena HonKomp, at Cincinnati, Ohio; they are blessed with eight children, by name, Eva, Emma, Anthony, Mary, George, Aggie, Gertrude and Frank.
Such is an outline of his biography; it is that of one who has always tried to do by others as he would be done by, and who has filled the offices with which he has been honored in such a manner as to merit the confidence of all.
LEWIS L. COBURN,
CHICAGO, ILL.
L EWIS L. COBURN was born at East Mont-
pelier, Vermont, November 2, 1834, being the youngest of five children of Larned and Lo- visa (Allen) Coburn. His father was a man of great activity, and owned one of the largest es- tates in Central Vermont. His prominence was more than local, and he was held in high es- teem. At different periods a representative in the State legislature, he also held various offices in his town and county with honor to himself and lasting good to his constituents.
Our subject's paternal grandparents hailed orig- inally from Massachusetts, removing at an early day to Washington county, Vermont. His ma- ternal ancestors were early settlers in East Mont- pelier, and much esteemed by the community in which they lived.
Lewis worked on the farm in summer, and attended school during the winter months. At the age of fifteen he entered Morrisville Academy, afterwards that of Northfield, and subsequently that at Barre, Vermont, studying during the spring and fall terms, and teaching school during
the winter months and working on the farm sum- mers. His reputation as a teacher was more than local, and he was employed to teach the largest and most difficult schools to manage in that part of the State. Having completed his preparatory course at Barre, in the summer of 1855, he entered the University of Vermont, from which, four years later, he was graduated with mathematical honors and the degree of Bachelor of Arts. Hav- ing decided to enter the legal profession, his studies while at the university were directed to this end, while during vacations he read law in the offices of Roberts and Chittenden, at Burling- ton, Vermont, and, on leaving the university, en- tered the office of Hon. T. P. Redfield, at Mont- pelier, for a short time. He entered Harvard Law School, at Cambridge, Massachusetts, and was graduated therefrom in 1861. Subsequently passing the necessary examination, he was ad- mitted to practice in all the Courts of Massachu- setts.
In February, 1861, he settled in Chicago. In other and older cities, several lawyers had won
HC Cooper Jr & Co
Lewis L Gerburn
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success by adopting patent law as their specialty, and Mr. Coburn decided to devote himself to this branch of practice, and was the first lawyer in Chicago who made this branch a special study. With the opening of the War of the Rebellion about this time, inventions multiplied to supply machinery to do the work of those called from home to serve their country. Inventions were numerous, the results often complicated, requiring the services of those well versed in the laws relat- ing to patents.
Successful from the commencement, Mr. Co- burn's business rapidly assumed large propor- tions, and in November, 1861, he took as his partner an old college friend and classmate, Mr. William E. Marrs, of the Vermont bar. The business continuing to grow, it at length assumed such proportions that it extended to the United States Courts of nearly all the Western States. In the summer of 1862, Mr. Coburn visited his parents. It so happened that a brigade of nine- months' men were then being enlisted in Vermont, one of the companies of which was being raised in East Montpelier and adjoining towns. Unani- mously elected as the captain of this company, although his business interests were large and responsible, he did not hesitate; his duty to his country was urgent, and he accepted the position, leaving his partner to conduct the business mean- while. As captain of Company C, Thirteenth Regiment of Vermont Volunteers, he was in the front line at the battle of Gettysburg, in General Stannard's brigade, and led his company on a charge by which one of the batteries captured by the rebels was retaken. He was the first to reach two of the cannon. Amongst others who surrend- ered to him personally was Major Moore, of a Florida regiment, and a captain and lieutenant of a Mississippi regiment, whose swords and pistols he was permitted to keep.
On being mustered out of service he immedi- ately returned to Chicago and the practice of his profession. His partner dying in 1868, Mr. Coburn was left alone with an enormous practice in the United States Courts. His con- stitution, however, was such that with the aid of a corps of clerks he was enabled to keep up and even increase an already extensive business. In 1875 he was joined by Hon. John M. Thacher, also an old classmate, and who for ten years had been in
the United States Patent Office, holding, when he resigned to join Mr. Coburn, a commissionership.
Mr. Coburn has a clear knowledge of mechan- ism, and readily grasps the principle of an inven- tion, and his great experience and diligent study of all questions bearing upon inventions is such that the inventor who places a case in his hands finds his work. greatly facilitated, while at the same time he obtains the advice and counsel of an attorney whose authority on such matters is incontrovertible. To state this is but doing Mr. Coburn justice, for his eminence in this particular branch of the law, is an admitted fact.
He has been connected as attorney with several of the most important patent litigations that have occurred in Chicago, among them being the Irwin tubular lantern patent suits, the barbed-wire suits, the beef-canning suits, and many others. The practice of his firm is one of the largest and most lucrative in the West.
He was married June 23, 1880, to Miss Annie S. Swan, at the residence of her grandmother, Mrs. Shaler, in Brooklyn, New York.
Always a firm believer in Chicago's future greatness, even in its darkest and most critical periods, he has made considerable investments in real estate, and to-day reaps the reward of his sagacity, while he has lived to see the city of his adoption become the second in population in the Union-a city whose phenomenal growth has been the surprise and admiration of the civilized world. He has been closely identified with many of the important material interests, both politi- cally and financially, of Chicago. When her finances were at a low ebb, he inaugurated the movement which led to a change in the South Town and City governments, and presided at the first public meeting. Not confining his interests, however, to municipal affairs, he has been, with others, the originator of several charitable and benevolent institutions, notably the Christian Union-now the Chicago Athenaeum-also the Vermont Association of the State of Illinois, in the latter of which he has taken great interest, having been one of its most active supporters and officers from its inauguration, and at one period its president. He was also the first president of the Union League Club.
Frequently urged to become a candidate for political offices, he has hitherto uniformly de-
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clined. He was proposed as a candidate for the State Senate, and almost unanimously indorsed by the press of Chicago, and by his many friends, as a candidate for the United State Congress to represent the First District of Illinois, but his business and other interests are so great, and the demands upon his time so many, that he has felt himself justified in declining these offers, honorable and flattering as they undoubt- edly were.
A man of great natural ability, his success in his profession has been uniform and rapid, and,
as has been truly remarked, after all that may be done for a man in the way of giving him early opportunities for obtaining the acquirements which are sought in the schools and in books, he must essentially formulate, determine and give shape to his own character, and this is what Lewis L. Coburn has done. He has persevered in the pursuit of a persistent purpose, and gained a most satisfactory reward. His life is exemplary in all respects, and he has the esteem of his friends and the confidence of those who have business rela- tions with him.
ELIAS F. GOBEL,
CHICAGO, ILL.
E LIAS F. GOBEL was born in Morris county, New Jersey, on July 1, 1834, and is a son of Robert and Margaret (Martin) Gobel. His father was a farmer and also a carpenter, and worked at his trade when not engaged on the farm. Mr. Gobel had the misfortune to lose his mother when a child a little more than' a year old ; she dying August 30, 1835. In 1844 his father removed to the West, and located at Elgin, Illinois, where he died in 1850.
Elias received a common-school education in the public schools of Elgin, attending school until he was old enough to take care of himself. He then learned the mason's trade, and not only became a skillful workman in that line, but also by careful study and hard work, became thor- oughly versed in the various branches and details of building. After serving three years as an apprentice, he was employed by the old Galena Railroad Company, now the Chicago and North- western Railroad Company, as superintendent of construction of nearly all of the arch bridges on the line between Chicago and Freeport, and made for himself a splendid reputation.
His next great work was the construction of the approaches and piers for the second bridge that spanned the Mississippi River; it was at Clinton, Iowa. He also erected the stone shops at the same place. The successful completion of this great work placed Mr. Gobel in the front rank of contractors in mason work. At that time, 1861, he was also superintendent of construction
for the Iowa division of the same railroad and remained in the employ of that company until 1865, when he engaged in the mercantile business for two years.
Commercial life, however, was not suited to his taste, and closing out his business in 1867, he removed with his family to Chicago, where he has since made his home, and at once entered the employ of the city as inspector and superintend- ent of masonry. In 1868 he superintended the construction of the Washington street tunnel and two years later, the La Salle street tunnel. This work being completed in August, a short time previous to the great fire of 1871, he commenced business on his own account, as a general con- tractor and builder, and many monuments of his work may be seen in every part of Chicago. His first contract was on the Clark street bridge, where his derricks and all his tools burned in the great fire. After that calamity he rebuilt the masonry work for all the bridges on the river, excepting one or two. He also rebuilt for the city a great many of the police stations, engine- houses, also viaducts and other public buildings ; among these were the West Side Water Works, the Fullerton Avenue and South Branch Pumping Works, the lake crib (a marvel of masonry), the Administration building, Cook County Hospital, the Polk, Lake and Twelfth street viaducts, the Merchants' building; the Presbyterian Theological Seminary, the Women and Children's Hospital, McCoy's European Hotel, and scores of other
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