The biographical encyclopedia of Illinois of the nineteenth century, Part 114

Author: Robson, Charles, ed
Publication date: 1875
Publisher: Philadelphia, Galaxy
Number of Pages: 770

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the past, Mr. Derickson has said that nothing gives him so shelter of the public charity. The following correspond- ence will show the energy with which this great responsi- bility was discharged : much pleasure in his course of life as his connection with the early anti-slavery movement. It was the fore- shadowing of his public career. He is a man who enters with great zeal and perseverance into any work of benevo- lence to which he is led by a sense of duty. Mr. Derick- HEAD-QUARTERS OF RELIEF, Corner of Ann and Washington streets. 3 A. M., October 11th, 187 1. son now found it necessary to engage more largely in busi- R. B. MASON, Mayor : ness. Consequently, in 1847, he permanently left St. Charles Early yesterday two bands of men were organized to scour the suburbs, with instructions to impress men and teams when necessary, and bring in all women and children. So far as is known every man, woman and child has been supplied with food and shelter. There appears to be an oversupply of cooked and perishable food coming in. Would it not be well to telegraph the country to that effect ? and removed to Wisconsin, where he built a mill, and went into the lumber and wood trade in connection with Chicago. A few years later he made his permanent residence in Chi- cago, and continued in this line of business with increasing prosperity till the breaking out of the war in 1861. His previous anti-slavery labors had prepared him for the emer- Very truly, R. P. D gencies of this occasion. With his two sons he entered the army, he receiving a commission as First Lieutenant in the HEAD-QUARTERS OF RELIEF, Corner of Ann and Washington streets. R. B. MASON, Mayor : 4 A. M., October 12th, 1871. 16th Wisconsin Regiment of Volunteer Infantry. He served in this capacity for about a year, when he was ap- pointed Captain. The regiment suffered very severely in Dear Sir :- The work of relief was vigorously prosecuted yesterday. Twenty-six depots for food, etc., were estab- lished, and nearly one hundred car-loads of food distributed. It will be necessary to appoint some one to take my place here, as Governor Palmer has called an extra session of the Legislature, and it will be better for me to go to Springfield. I respectfully recommend that you turn the whole matter of relief over to the Aid and Relief Society of the city without delay. .... O. C. Gibs, secretary of that society, has been assisting in this work, and has been of great service. its various engagements, and at length, in 1863, what re- mained of it was consolidated into others. His health being impaired, upon the consolidation of his company he left the service, and located permanently in Chicago, resuming his lumber business, and adding to it that of brick manufacture, which, with the assistance of his sons, he still (1875) carries on. He has held various important official positions. Very truly R. P. DERICKSON. He was a member of the Illinois Legislature from 1870 to 1872, during which time four sessions of that body were held. . He was also, from 1872 to 1875, a member of the State Among the self-made men of the West, Richard P. Derickson is justly entitled to a prominent place. He has worked his own way unaided from the condition of a poor and almost friendless boy up to that of a substantial citizen, holding an honored position. He has been the designer and builder of his own fortune, and his success was founded on the old-fashioned principles of steady integrity and ear- nest work. The public positions given to him by his fellow- citizens are founded on the same principles which have led to his social success, the able and steady discharge of one duty leading to a higher trust. Especially did he deserve well of his fellows in the fearful period of the great fire, and were it only for his disinterested and thoroughly effi- cient service in that memorable timc, he would merit a niche among the worthies of the State. Board of Equalization. He was the Vice-President of the " Citizens' Association," a body formed in 1874 by the prominent citizens of Chicago to protect the tax-paying com- munity against political corruption. He was intimately connected with the organization of the Illinois Humane Society and of the " Floating Hospital Association," of both of which he is President. He was President of the Anti- slavery Reunion Committee, through whose management for several succeeding months, assembled as a reunion in June, 1874, one of the most important gatherings ever held in Chicago. His main public service, however, was rendered during the great fire in Chicago, in October, 1871. He was appointed by the authorities of the city to take chief control of the organization for the relief of the burned-out and suf- fering population, and was invested with plenary powers, a large executive force of soldiers and police being placed at his command. The object of the appointment was to pre- vent extortion and robbery, and to compel the use of all AYNE, THOMAS, was born in Montgomery county, Kentucky, on October 4th, 1814. His father, William Paync, was a Virginian, and fol- lowed agriculture. His mother, Kitty (Bolton) Payne, was also a native of Virginia. Until four- teen years of age he lived on the home farm, availing himself of the meagre advantages of the village school of that day during the winter season. When in his available means for the efficient aid of the sufferers without regard to private interests. His wise use of these absolute and dictatorial powers fully justified the confidence of his fellow-citizens. Within twenty-four hours of his appoint- ment he had secured the provision of food and shelter for the mass of men, women and children, who had been driven by the destruction of their homes to wander through the suburbs of the city ; bringing in all who could be found to the fifteenth year he was apprenticed to learn the saddlery trade,

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and after two years of close application, his spirit of inde- pendence, combined with a strong desire to assist his parents, prompted him to leave his master and seek employment where his labor would enable him to carry out those desires. Accordingly he repaired to Cincinnati, where he worked successfully at his trade for about one year. Then returning to his home, he engaged in the business on his own account, and continued in it for about two years. Leaving Ken- tucky in 1834, he emigrated to Illinois, locating on Movestar creek, about four miles from Jacksonville. Here he fol- lowed his trade for two years, and also engaged in farming. After remaining there two years, he moved to Adams county, Illinois, where he has since resided. At the end of a year he entered into general mercantile pursuits in Marselline, in which he continued for about ten years. In 1846 his wife died there. She was Liza Trimble, whom he had married in 1832 in Kentucky. During the same year he transferred his mercantile pursuits to Quincy, but, owing to ill-health, relinquished that business entirely at the end of two years, and returned to his farm at Marselline, on which he has since continucd. Starting with nothing but a good stout

heart and a pair of willing hands early in life, Mr. Payne has accumulated quite a competence. He possesses to-day at least 2000 acres of real estate in Illinois, and is also largely interested in town property. IIe is also interested in banking enterprises, being a stockholder in the Union National Bank of Quincy. As a man of integrity and sound business capacity Mr. Payne is well and thoroughly known. IIe was married a second time to Rosalthe IIcberling, in February, 1847, who lived only a few years thereafter. Hc was again married, in 1857, April 17th, to Mary Frances Denson, of Illinois, who is still living.

ASTMAN, ZEBINA, Journalist, and outranked in early connection with the press by only one or two persons in Chicago, was born in Amherst, Massachusetts, in 1815. Hc is the son of Dea- con Elijah Eastman. Left an orphan at an early age, he was brought up in the family of Israel Scott, his guardian. His father was a prominent man of the town, and his reputation is even now cherished in the neighborhood for his works of Christian usefulness. While yet young, Zebina acquired a love for reading which was stimulated by perusing the literary magazines and journals of the day, and he early in life determined to make journal- ism his profession. At fourteen years of age he went into the Amherst College printing office, managed by J. S. & C. Adams, to learn the art of printing. While in this office his associations with students and others further promoted his taste for literary matters. One of the friends he then made was Isaac C. Pray, who afterwards became distinguished as a writer of both prose and verse, and was connected with the New York Herald. Mr. Eastman, having remained in

the printing office eighteen months, realized the need of better education for the profession he had selected, and con- sequently left the Adams firm for a collegiate course. He fitted for college at the academy in Hadley. One of his fellow-students here was young Joe Hooker, since known as " fighting Joe Hooker," and Fred. D. Huntington, now Bishop of New York. As close study did not agree with his health, he abandoned the college coursc, and went to Hartford, and found his friend Pray, then editor of the Hartford Pearl, and put himself directly under his tuition as an editor, and wrote literary articles for the Pearl. While still a mere boy, and possessing some means, he was in- vited by a man of mature years to join him in the publica- tion of a newspaper in Vermont. This proved an unfortu- nate business investment, as was forcseen by his partner, who abandoned him and the enterprise after the specimen

number of their paper was issued. He thus, at the age of eighteen, became the sole editor and proprietor of the Vermont Free Press, of Fayetteville, Vermont. The paper only existed one year. He remained two or three years in Vermont, and became a correspondent of several literary papers and magazines, and resumed for a timc his connec- tion with his early friend, I. C. Pray, who had in the mcan- time removed to Boston, where he issucd his paper under the name of Boston Pearl. A series of Eastman's tales printed in this paper, called " Traditionary Tales of New England," attracted considerable attention at that time. While in Hartford, at his boarding-house, he made the ac- quaintance of the celebrated Myron Holly, who was after- wards the father of the Liberty party. He sat by his side at the table, and hearing his discussion of the questions of the reforms of the day, his future life was no doubt shaped by the acquaintance which then sprung up. His ambition was changed from literature to reformatory problems, and he felt a strong desire to engage in political discussions. In this transition state and before leaving Vermont for his final residence in the West, he had occasional connection with several political papers. In speaking of this period he said that he found that he could consistently write upon either side, and more generally could condemn both. The murder of Lovejoy at Alton, in 1837, for his anti-slavery principles, was the final cause which led him to resolve to devote him- self to that cause. In 1837 he moved West, first stopping at Ann Arbor, Michigan, and arriving in Chicago in the spring of 1839. Thence, after a short period in Chicago, he went to Peoria and worked on the Peoria Register, edited by Samuel H. Davis, and at the same time wroic for other papers. Under the advice of Mr. Davis he joined Benjamin Lundy, at Ilennepin, Illinois, in printing the Genius of Universal Emancipation. Lundy dying after a few months, he succeeded to the paper in 1839. In 1840 he issued, in connection with Hooper Warren, as its suc- cessor, the Genius of Liberty, at Lowell, Illinois. In 1842 he removed to Chicago and commenced the Western Citizen, which in a few years had the largest circulation of any

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paper in the West. It was an advocate of the anti-slavery eause, and aided in founding the Liberty party, the fore- runner of the Republican. This paper was followed by the Free West, and sustained the reputation of the leading paper of the Liberty party, until that organization was merged in the Fremont party, and a distinctive organ being no longer required, he transferred his subscription list to the Chicago Tribune. Since that time Mr. Eastman's connection with the press has been but occasional and as a contributor only. In 1861, as a reward for his anti-slavery labors, he was ap- pointed by Lincoln as Consul to Bristol, England, which position he occupied for eight years. While editor of the Western Citizen, he was also interested in other reforms. He was for many years an advocate of the Peace cause and the League of Universal Brotherhood. In connection with the Peace cause he went to the Peace Congress at Frankfort in 1851, as a delegate for Illinois. He was an intimate friend of Elihu Burritt, and was the first to hail the publica- tion of the Christian Citizen, which he regarded as named in compliment to his own paper, which was then well known throughout the country as the Western Citizen of Chicago.

ARGE, WILLIAM, Lawyer, was born in Arm- strong county, Pennsylvania, February 26th, 1832. His parents were John Barge, who was of French, and Jane (Elliott) Barge, of Scotch, descent. While quite an infant his parents removed to the State of Ohio, to a point about fifty miles south of Cleveland, in what is now Ashland eounty. They remained there about four years, and from thence went to Wooster, in Wayne county, where his father died in 1850. In this latter town he received his education, which was such only as could be obtained at the common school. In the summer of 1851 he removed to Illinois, together with his mother and two sisters, travelling the whole distance-about 500 miles -by tcam. They finally halted at the city of Rock Island, on the Mississippi, where he occupied himself partly with teaching school, and at the same time reading law under Judge Ira O. Wilkinson, then judge of that circuit, but since well known as a prominent lawyer in Chicago, and also under Judge Pleasants, the present (1875) circuit judge of Rock Island. In 1854 he again changed his location, going to Dixon, in Lee county, where he followed the occupation of a teacher, and organized the first graded school ever formed in the county, of which he was the principal for more than five years, occasionally also teaching mathematics in Dixon College. In the fall of 1859 he took charge of the high school at Belleville, Illinois, in the vicinity of St. Louis, where he continued his study of the law under the eminent lawyer, Hon. William H. Underwood. While here, of his own import and without any instruction, he prepared a brief in an important railroad-land case in which Judge Underwood and Governor Koerner were counsel, which

was accepted by them, and upon which the case was suc- cessfully tried. In 1860 he returned to Dixon, and in No- vember of that year was admitted to the bar, after an exami- nation by Judge Corydon Beckwith, Hon. Norman B. Judd and Hon. Ebenezer Peck. The following year, 1861, he began the practice of his profession in Dixon, in partnership with H. B. Fouke, under the firm-style of Barge & Fouke. In 1865 this was dissolved, when he associated himself with Dwight Heaton, with whom he continued until 1869. In this year he received an offer of partnership from Judge Eustace, of Dixon, which he accepted, his brother-in-law, Sherwood Dixon, becoming at the same time a member of the firm, under the style of Eustace, Barge & Dixon. This partnership continued until 1874, when he removed his office to Chicago at the solicitation of the Hon. W. W. O'Brien, with whom and Sherwood Dixon he then formed a new copartnership, under the name of O'Brien, Barge & Dixon. In 1872 he became one of the attorneys for the Chicago & Northwestern Railroad Company, and in that capacity has tried all that company's cases in twelve coun- ties. He has always been prominently connected with railroad litigation, and has had as extensive a practice among this class of cases as any lawyer in the State. Both the study and the practice of the law has ever been with him a labor of love, and he is devoted to it not merely from motives of interest, but from those of strong natural inclina- tion. He is a particularly successful lawyer both in civil and criminal practice, and especially so in the defending of the latter class of cases. He has defended many capital charges, and on each occasion procured the acquittal of his client. Indeed it may be said that during his whole prac- tice in all the courts of record in every county north of the Illinois river, in the Supreme Court of the State, and in the Federal Courts of Chicago, no lawyer has been more generally successful, or has won more cases. He was mar- ried in 1856 to Elizabeth Dixon, daughter of James P. Dixon, and granddaughter of the venerable John Dixon, the well-known pioneer of the Northwest, from whom the town of Dixon is named, and who still ( 1875) survives, cn- joying the affectionate reverence of the people of all that section of country.

ILSON, WILLIAM G., M. D., was born in Ilar- ford county, Illinois, January 2Ist, 1827. His father, Dr. Joshua Wilson, is a practitioner in Harford county, Maryland. His mother, Rc- becca Wilson, was the daughter of Ralph Lee and Alice Lee, of the same county. He acquired his preliminary education in his native county, at the Hal- lowell School, in Alexandria, Virginia. After completing his allotted course of studies, he commenced the study of medicine under the instructions of his father, and graduated in 1852 from the medical department of the University of Maryland. He then engaged in the practice of his profes-

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sion in Harford county and in the county adjoining until 1855, when he removed to Missouri and settled in St. Charles county, where he was professionally occupied dur- ing the ensuing three years. He subsequently practised in Green county, in the same State, until 1862. He then re- turned to Maryland on a visit, which was extended to 1864, when he moved to Illinois, and established his office in Shelbyville, where he has since resided, possessing an ex- tensive practice and the esteem of the general community, who respect him as a practitioner of undoubted merit. He is President of the Shelbyville Medical Society, and a mem- ber of the District Society of Central Illinois. He was married in 1867 to Frances A. Lee, of Harford county, Maryland.

HEELER, HIRAM, Merchant, was born in the town of New Haven, Addison county, Vermont, August 20th, ISog. He is a son of Preserved Wheeler and Esther (Bacon) Wheeler. His grandfather, Peter Wheeler, was killed in the massacre at Wyoming, Pennsylvania, near the present city of Wilkesbarre. His education was obtained at the district school in his native place; and on leaving school, when he was about fourteen years of age, he went as clerk into the store of an elder brother, who was a tanner and general merchant at Vergennes, Vermont. He remained here some three or four years, and then removed to New York city, where he became clerk in the wholesale grocery house of Stephens, Lippincott & Co., of which the well- known John L. Stephens was the senior member. After- wards he was engaged in the dry-goods establishment of J. WV. & R. Leavitt, where he remained until the fall of 1832. In October of this year he went West to Niles, Michigan, where a brother of his, Tolman Wheeler, was occupied as a general merchant. Early in 1833 he returned to New York, but after a short stay there he went back to Niles and settled there, becoming a partner with his brother, Tolman Wheelcr. In the summer of the same year (1833) he and his brother built a store at Laporte, Indiana, to which he removed in January, 1834. Tolman Wheeler retired from the business in 1836, but the Laporte house was continued by Hiram Wheeler for several years. In 1843 Hiram Wheeler was admitted into partnership in the firm of Tolman Wheeler & Porter, which had been established in 1839 by his brother and J. F. Porter, and was engaged in the forwarding, commission and transportation business at the town of St. Joseph. This was carried on successfully until the spring of 1849, when the completion of the Michigan Central Railroad to New Buf- falo having affected their tradc they sold their boats to this company and removed to Chicago. In anticipation of such a change, a warehouse had been previously (in 1848) se- cured by the brothers in Chicago, below Clark Street Bridge, and in July of 1849 they established a grain business there, under the name of H. & T. Wheeler. Their operations

consisted in the buying and selling, but not the storing, of grain, which they handled in the old way by means of horse-power. Their transactions were considered extensive even in those days, though trifling when compared with their present trade. In 1854 Tolman Wheeler retired from the firm, and in 1856 Hiram Wheeler relinquished the grain business, and became engaged in the lumber trade, which he carried on for some three or four years. About the spring of 1859 he sold out of this business and returned to the grain business, renting an elevator and commencing the elevating and storing of grain, which has since developed to such enormous proportions. This trade he continued alone until the fall of 1863, in September of which year the present firm of Munger, Wheeler & Co. was established, which has been ever since so intimately connected with the important interests of the grain trade of Chicago. The house, like so many others, suffered severely in the great fire of 1871, all their elevators being destroyed. They have, however, been restored, and are working with increased efficiency and capacity. As carly as 1838, while at Laporte, Indiana, Mr. Wheeler had been engaged in the grain trade ; buying for others and shipping it to Rochester, New York, and to a large number of Eastern millers. In the same year he became one of the originators, in Michigan City, of the Michigan City Branch of the State Bank of Indiana, of which he was a Director for several years. He was Presi- dent of the Chicago Board of Trade in 1855. He was mar- ried in 1833 to Julia Smith, daughter of Francis Smith, merchant, of New York.

OWLER, REV. CHARLES HENRY, D. D., LL.D., President of the Northwestern University, at Evanston, Illinois, was born in Busford, Upper Canada, August 11th, 1837, and is the second son and youngest child of Horatio Fowler and HIar- riett (Ryan) Fowler. The family emigrated to America at a period cotemporaneous with the passage of the " Mayflower." His father, a Canadian rebel and refugce, prominent in the revolutionary movements in Canada in 1837, was of English descent, and traced back his remote ancestry to a Highland chief of the eighth century. His mother was the daughter of a zealous Methodist preacher named Henry Ryan, from whom arose a sect sometime known as the Ryanites, now merged, however, in the Methodist Episcopal Church. She was a relative of Daniel Webster, a woman of great mental power and of exalted piety, and from the earliest days stood before her children as an admirable example of high intellectual culture coin- bined with earnest work. In 1841 his father removed with his family to Newark, Illinois, and there engaged in farm- ing. In this placc, where he was reared, he obtained his elementary education. In 1854 he attended the Rock River Seminary, at Mount Morris, in Ogle county, and in

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the spring of 1855 entered the Gencsce Wesleyan Seminary, at Sima, New York, where, however, he kept but one term. In the same year he began his college career in the Genesec College, and graduated valedictorian in 1859, taking Jater his degree of M. A. Also in 1859, he went to Chicago and commenced the study of law. Antedating this step, how- ever, while in his boyhood he had experienced the convic- tion of a call to the ministry, but, backsliding for a time, yielded to his ambition, which urged him to become a learned and brilliant lawyer. Within a few months, however, he abandoned this course of legal studies, and, his religious impulses dominating his being, he felt impelled to devote himself to the work of the Christian ministry. On a Christ- mas night, at twelve o'clock, after seven days and nights of earnest internal struggle, he came to a fixed decision to preach. With this end in view hc became a student of theology in March, 1860, in the Garrett Biblical Institution at Evanston. ITere he soon won distinction, and graduat- ing in November, 1861, took the degree of Bachelor of Di- vinity. He then united himself with the Rock River An- nual Conference, and was shortly afterward stationed at the Jefferson Street Methodist Episcopal Church in Chicago, where he remained two years, which was the full extent of the time ordained by the old Conference regulation. So youthful was his appearance when his initiatory pastoral call placed him in the position of spiritual guide that it elicited the remark : " Such a green-looking boy !" In the fall of 1863 he became the pastor of the Clark Street Methodist Episcopal Church of Chicago, "the oldest church in the city," where he served three years. He there presided over a full church. In 1866, when but twenty-eight years of age, he was elected President of the Ministry, and in 1867 had conferred upon him the degree of D. D. In 1865 he returned to the pastorate of the Jefferson Street Church, the members of which had in the meantime sold their church building and adopted the name, "the Centenary Methodist Episcopal Church." They worshipped temporarily in the Second Universalist Church, and met on Sabbath afternoons only. Prior to his relinquishment of the Clark street pas- torate he preached a sermon relating to the Lincoln memo- 'rial, which elicited favorable comments from many quarters, and was widely cited as a masterly effort. Through the earnest efforts of both pastor and people the new Centenary Church, on West Monroe street, was specdily erected, and the communion removed thither. In the early part of 1868 he again made a change, and accepted the charge of the Wabash Avenue Church, where he continued his labors during 1868-69 and 1870. In the latter year he returned to his earliest charge, the Centenary Methodist Episcopal Church, and remained there until 1872, when he accepted his present position of President of the Northwestern Uni- versity. IIe continued, however, to perform pastoral duties at this church for about six months after the commencement of his presidency. He had already in 1866 received the unanimous election to this important and honorable position ;

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The biographical encyclopedia of Illinois of the nineteenth century, Part 114

Author: Robson, Charles, ed Publication date: 1875 Publisher: Philadelphia, Galaxy Number of Pages: 770

Author: Robson, Charles, ed
Publication date: 1875
Publisher: Philadelphia, Galaxy
Number of Pages: 770