USA > Kentucky > Daviess County > History of Daviess County, Kentucky, together with sketches of its cities, villages, and townships, educational religious, civil military, and political history, portraits of prominent persons, biographies of representative citizens, and an outline history of Kentucky > Part 20
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CHAPTER IX. AUTHORS AND ARTISTS.
JAMES WEIR.
One of the oldest members of the Daviess County bar, and a prominent business man of Owensboro, was born in Greenville, Ky., June 16, 1821. His father, James Weir, was born near Charleston, S. C., and belonged to a Presbyterian family of Scotch- Irish descent, that emigrated to America from the north of Ireland. His mother, Anna Rumsey, was born in Virginia, and was a niece of James Rumsey, who is justly entitled to the claim of being the first to apply steam as a means of propelling boats. His father came to Kentucky toward the close of the last century. He first adopted the business of surveyor, and afterward exchanged this for a mercantile career, and his business extended over a wide ex- tent of territory. He carried on, and managed, under his own supervision at the same time, stores at Equality and Shawneetown in Illinois; at Henderson, Morganfield, Madisonville, Greenville, Lewisburg, Hopkinsville and Russellville, in Kentucky, a at Gallatin, in Tennessee. Although a large amount of capital was necessarily involved in this extensive and wide-spread business, it was his boast that he never borrowed a dollar, nor failed to meet a debt at its maturity.
James Weir, the subject of this sketch, was educated at Centre College, at Danville, Ky., one of the oldest institutions of the State. After graduating here he entered the law school of Tran- sylvania University, in Lexington, where he prepared for the legal profession. March 1, 1842, he married Miss Susan C. Green, daughter of Judge John Green, of Danville. Mr. Weir settled in Owensboro in 1848, and devoted himself to the practice of law, gaining a high standing at the bar as a chancery lawyer. He found time, however, to give to literary pursuits, and in 1849-'50 three novels appeared, of which he was the author.
During his residence in Owensboro, Mr. Weir developed busi- ness qualities of no ordinary character, and when the Deposit Bank was organized in 1859, he was chosen its President, and still
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continues in that position. To his management is chiefly due its present high standing among the banking institutions of Ken- tueky. He was the first President of the Owensboro & Russell- ville (now the Evansville, Owensboro & Nashville) Railroad. This offiee he retained from 1869 till the latter part of 1878.
Mr. Weir has never mingled in polities, nor has he ever been a candidate for any public office. He has attended strictly to his professional business, and since 1850 has had little time to indulge liis inclination for light literature, or at least to no greater extent than to be the anthor of some fugitive pieces which have appeared from time to time in the popular magazines of the day. His ample means have not had the effect of making him selfish or il- liberal. He has taken part in every publie enterprise which prom- ised to be of benefit to the community. In 1880 he opened a large factory for the manufacture of carriage material, a more full account of which is given in the history of Owensboro. Mr. Weir's charities have been wide, but unostentatious. While his abilities as a financier have been of service in building up his own fortune, they have also been exerted for the promotion of the interests of the city and county of which he is a resident.
Mr. Weir's residence is one of the most magnifieently frescoed buildings in this part of the world. The work cost over $12,000, and was done by an ex-officer of the Confederate ariny, of foreign birth and education. The elegant historie paintings on the ceiling of the library, in the groupings and combinations, are a constant source of study and pleasure.
Mr. Weir demonstrated his capacity as a literateur when com- paratively young. Before he was thirty years of age he wrote and published three stories, which were bound in book form and sup- plied to the regular trade by the chief publishing house of Phila- delphia, Lippincott, Grambo & Co. The works are the following :
1. SIMON KENTON. This is a novel in which it is designed to give a sketch of the habits and striking characteristics of the popu- lation of the western portion of North Carolina immediately fol- lowing the war for independence, and in it to introduce Simon Kenton, the great seout and Indian fighter, and also his constant opponent and enemy, Simon Girty, the tory and renegade. In this volume the character in which Kenton was interested and con- nected came off victorious.
2. THE WINTER LODGE is a sequel to Simon Kenton, and trans- ports all the characters to Kentucky in an early day when first set-
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tled; and in it are introduced many of the most striking characters of that period, and many incidents in the early history of Ken- tucky, with sketches of scenery, the Mammoth Cave, etc., and also the battles in which Simon Kenton and Simon Girty were en- gaged, and the habits and marked characters of the early pioneers. The name "Winter Lodge" is derived from the name of a cabin erected by Kenton for the hero and heroine of these two volumes, and ornamented with carpets of buffalo hides, lined with furs.
Mr. Weir intended in his younger days to write a sequel to this volume, running down to the War of 1812, and the death of Ken- ton and Girty, but increasing business on his hands prevented him. In Collins' History of Kentucky there is a sketch of the life and times of .Kenton, and Girty was a desperado who figured largely among the pioneers of Kentucky and Indiana.
3. LONZ POWERS; or, the Regulators : A romance of Kentucky, based on scenes and incidents in this State. This interesting story was published in two duodecimo volumes, 319 and 364 pages, in the year 1850, by Lippincott, Grambo & Co., Philadelphia.
HON. GEORGE H. YEAMAN,
now a resident of New York City, but formerly of Owensboro, wrote and published a work on the " Study of Government," while he was a resident at Copenhagen, Denmark, as a United States Minister. A biographical sketch of Mr. Yeaman appears in the chapter entitled, " Sketches of Public Men."
COLONEL ROBERT SCOTT BEVIER,
President of the Owensboro & Nashville Railroad, was born at Painted Post, Steuben Co., N. Y., April 28, 1834. His father, Benjamin W. Bevier, was a farmer of that place, and about one year afterward moved to Michigan, and then to Kentucky. The family, whose name originally was De la Baviere, came from France, at the time of the " Massacre of St. Bartholomew's Day," which event compelled them to seek refuge in Holland, where they remained about 100 years, and until they emigrated to this country with the New York Patroon, Van Rensselaer. After re- ceiving a liberal education he commenced the study of law under the direction of John Todd, Esq., of Russellville, a distinguished lawyer of Logan County, and continued it at the law school at Lebanon, Tenn. On the completion of his studies, and his admission to the bar in 1852, he went to Bolivar, Polk Co., Mo., and commenced the practice of his profession.
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In the winter of 1855 he went to Kansas as Prosecuting Attorney' and while there became engaged in the " Wakarusa war," and in the various conflicts with John Brown and his followers. In 1856 he located at Keokuk, Iowa, but in consequence of the strong Republican tendencies of that vicinity, he soon removed to Bloom- ington, Macon Co., Mo., where he continued to reside until the breaking out of the late civil war, having met good success in the practice of his profession. During that time he was selected as local attorney for the Hannibal, St. Joseph & North Missouri R. R., County School Commissioner, Douglass Elector for his district, in 1859, and was appointed division inspector, by Governor Jack- son, with the rank of Colonel. He was unanimously elected to the command of the regiment from Macon County, and, joining Henry Sterling Price, was soon engaged in the struggle, partici- pating in the battles of Drywood, Elkhorn, Farmington, Iuka, Corinth, Grand Gulf, Port Gibson, Champion Hills, Big Black, and through the sieges of Lexington, Vicksburg, and Richmond. His regiment becoming greatly reduced in numbers by hard ser- vice and casualties, he was ordered to Richmond, as General Military Agent for the State of Missouri, continuing there until the close of the war, with the exception of the time consumed in a mission of carrying foreign dispatches to Cuba, in the accomplislı- ment of which he was obliged to run the famous blockade. At the termination of the war he returned to his old home at Russellville, Ky., being prevented, by reason of political disabilities, at that time existing, from returning to Missouri. He again resumed the practice of law, and was elected Vice-President and General Agent of the Owensboro & Russellville Railroad.
Mr. Bevier possesses fine literary qualities, and contributes to various magazines. While a resident of Russellville, Ky., he prepared a very fine history of the First and Second Missouri Con- federate Brigades; also a "Military Anagraph," being a journal of his experiences in the army, " From Wakarusa to Appomattox." The two accounts are published together in one volume of a little more than 500 octavo pages, by Bryan, Brand & Co., St. Louis, Mo., in 1878. The work is ably written, being prepared with great carc, and is illustrated with very fine steel portraits of General Sterling Price, Senator F. M. Cockrell of Missouri, Dr. J. M. Allen, and of himself. The volume concludes with a list of survivors of those brigades, with present (1878) residence and occupation.
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GEO. V. TRIPLETT,
editor of the Saturday Post, is a witty, original writer. "His An- nals of the Bachelors' Club," published in the Post in the autumn of 1882, are rich and racy. The following poem has gone the "rounds of the press," and finally found its way into the play of the "Jolly Pathfinders," now so well known [throughout the nation.
SONG OF THE HAMMOCK.
I.
Shady tree, Babbling brook, Girl in hammock, Reading book. Golden curls, Tiny feet,
Wishes maiden Back again. Maiden also
Thinks of swing,
Wants to go back, Too. Poor thing. III. Hour of midnight, Baby squalling,
Girl in hammock Looks 80 sweet.
Man rides past, Big mustache,
Man in sock-feet Bravely walking.
Girl in hammock Makes a " masb."
Baby yells on, Now the other
Twin, he strikea up Like hie brother.
Mash is mutual, Day is set, Man and maiden Married get. II.
Paregoric By the bottle, Emptied into
Baby's throttle.
Naughty tack Pointa in air,
Waiting some one's Foot to tear.
Man in sock feet, See him-there,
Cheeks all burning, Eyes look red,
Girl got married- Nearly dead.
Biscuits burn up, Beefsteak charry, Girl got married, Awful sorry. Man comes home, Tears mustache,
*
Mad as blazes, Got no hasb,
Thinks of hammock In the lane,
Raving crazy Gets his gun, Blows his head off. Dead and gone. IV. Pretty widow With a book, In a hammock By the brook. * * Man rides past, Big mustache, Keeps on riding, NARY MASH.
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Married now One year ago, Keeping house On Baxter Row. Red-hot stove, Beefsteak frying, Girl got married, Cooking trying.
Holy Moses, Hear him awear!
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A short biographical sketch of Mr. Triplett appears in the chapter on the "Press."
REV. B. F. ORR,
a Methodist minister of Owensboro, a short time ago wrote and published a work entitled "The Papal Power in Politics; or, Rome against Liberty." It was a duodecimo of 256 pages, written for popular reading, and from the standpoint of the citizen. It is not a work for the learned only, but for the masses. The paper and type are very fine, and no doubt every citizen of Daviess County is or ought to be interested in this great question.
PROF. J. H. GRAY,
son of Thomas W. and Susan (Fry) Gray, both natives of Vir- ginia, was born in Elkton, Todd Co., Ky., April 9, 1824. His father was a merchant and farmer. When nine years of age his parents moved on a farm; remained two years and then went to Louisville, where his father became a merchant. He died in 1842. J. H. attended school at Louisville, and also at George- town College, Kentucky. Took up teaching near Frankfort; then had charge of an Academy in Burlington; went back to Louis- ville, taught in thet neighborhood seven or eight years; then went to Russellville, Ky., and taught mathematics in Bethel College seven years; then came to Owensboro in 1869 and took charge of Central Baptist Institute, now the Upper Ward school building, for two years; sold out to the town, on account of graded public schools. He was engaged as Superintendent of Public Schools, which he organized and conducted two years. He then taught a private school here one year, and returned to Bethel College and taught mathematics eight years. Returned in the summer of 1882 and started a private classical school on Bolivar street. He has thirty eight scholars, and is doing well. He was married May 8, 1861, to Miss Fannie Wirt Fry, daugliter of W. W. Fry, of Louis ville, Ky. They had eiglit children, four living-Fannie W., Leslie Walker, Herbert S. and Engenia D. Prof. and Mrs. Gray are both members of the Baptist Church. Politically he is a Democrat.
A request to Mr. Gray, for a review of his system of teaching grammar, clicited the following reply:
Swinton, in the preface of his grammar, says that "at the time of its first publication (1872), it had become a conviction in the minds of many thoughtful teachers and others that English gram- Digitized by Microsoft®
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mar, as set forth in books and taught in schools, was failing to accomplish its avowed end, namely, 'to teach the art of speaking and writing the English language with propriety.'" He then says that his "Progressive Grammar was an attempt to break loose from the shackles of purely technical grammar-to strip it of fruit- less formalism, and to introduce the constructive element. The experience of the school-room led the author to believe that a method of language-training quite different from that mainly in vogue was necessary; there arose, in fact, the thought of language as one thing, and grammar as another thing."
I believed fully in this general failure in teaching grammar, but not in the implied cause, "The shackles of purely technical gram- mar," nor in the proposed remedy, "Language as one thing and grammnar as another thing;"-by which is meant that the correct use of language should be taught rather by empirical practice, than by a logical examination of its structure. No grammar is freed from "technical shackles," and Mr. Swinton's is as fall of them as the rest. The plan applied for their removal is to anticipate or supplement them with endless respective written exercises. It is but eking out by rote the failure of clear analytic comprehension. It is falling upon what is called, in opposition to the analytic, the " natural" method, so much in vogue in teaching the modern languages. In my Report of the Owensboro Public Schools (1872) occurs the following language :-
"A word upon the much praised natural methods in teaching. The correct name is infantile methods, or animal methods, sensi- tive methods, rote methods, repetition methods, versus rational or logical methods. It is the method of the French phrase book, by which young ladies learn to repeat a number of polite expressions, and call it the knowledge of the French language. If there is any thing which seience means, it is the acquisition of knowledge through the medium of its organie laws and relations; it is the proposition that the human mind is competent to grasp the princi- ples, and from these elaborate the formal modes of the subject- matter. It means that we do not learn all things else, as we learned to babble our mother tongue; that we have not to become infants at the threshold of each new subject which we wish to learn, but by the unfolding of our rational powers, we can avail ourselves of rational conditions and methods."
Education is the exercise of the judgment, rather than the memory; and the acquisition of the knowledge of a principle is
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the comprehension of a thousand facts, in their essential import and relation. Grammar is the science of the structure of language, and if it fails to teach its correct use, it is because it is not under- stood, or is willfully disregarded.
The causes of failure in teaching it are:
1. The cumbrous absurdities of the Murray system in treating the English as an inflected language-on the basis of the Latin.
2. False nomenclature and definitions conveying indistinct and indiscriminate ideas of its principles.
3. The inconsistencies and obscurities of its analysis.
4. The presumptive use of technical verbiage previously to its explanation.
5. The pedantry of the author and the presumed erudition of the pupil in making the examples a copious expression of the gems of literature-as intelligible and cogent as if they were written in Latin.
6. The address of the expression, the notes, the well-pointed remarks to the literary public, instead of to the comprehension of the common school-boy who has to learn the meaning from the words.
7. The presumption of an accurate knowledge of elementary grammar, philosophy, etc., in the reckless abruptness of the more advanced grammars-rendering them incomplete and impracticable as independent books for mature pupils.
8. The obscure and intricate culling of one element at a time in empirical exercises obscured by the ignorance of the pupil of the other elements of the sentence-especially the erudite sentences of those advanced grammars which are presumed to teach the science of language.
9. Big books crammed with incidentals that the boy need not know.
In my own teaching I have generally used some one of the popular grammars, -floundering as best I could in the midst of its intrica- cies, -skipping, doubling, reversing in many ways to lead (not load) the mind of the pupil along a clear and consistent course. In organizing the Owensboro Public Schools, I recommended one for use, and had no thoughtof resorting to singular methods of instruc- tion, only so far as the exigencies of the case should require. It was in endeavoring to remove the difficulties of the teachers that I suggested what I conceived to be a systematic course, an adequate nomenclature, and exhaustive analysis. I believe in the minimum
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use of text-books; and that in a graded school, the best plan is to teach grammar simply by diagrams and discussions, without the use of a book. But this was left to the teacher, and if my analysis had gone no further than the teachers' meetings, it would have served my purpose, if the teacher did not need it in the school- room. The object was to teach the pupil the knowledge of the language, and not to introduce any special system of grammar.
In the expression of the analysis of the language, two general methods present themselves, -the one a descriptive analysis with- out technical nomenclature, which may be easily done; the other a technical notation of each principle. In my own teaching I might hesitate as to which I should adopt. In a casual suggestion to others-a mere synopsis, -a collection of diagrams and defini- tions, the use of nomenclature fixes and recalls the analysis. In chemistry the nomenclature is of great service in expressing the character and relations of the elements and compounds. In the midst of their multiplicity, the seemingly confusing terms and formulas really give a succinet expression of the principles which could hardly be otherwise so simply presented. This must be the case in a thorough grammatical notation. A single illustration will exhibit the method:
Case was defined, in the books, to be the relation of the noun to other words in the sentence. Then we had the nominative case, "independent " or "absolute," implying and asserted to be with- ont relation. Then we had the expression, O, thon good boy !- no sentence at all, but the nonn havinga case, and the independent nominative having a relation to other words. The nominative was said to be generally the agent, actor or doer, and then we had the nominative equally prominent as the reverse of agent or actor. It was said to be always the subject of the verb (Pinneo), and then it was predicate and not subject. The nominative in apposition was annexed for emphasis or explanation of the subject-contra-distin- guished in the mind of the pupil, from the subject. We had the objective case as the object of action, contrasted to the nominative; then the nominative as subject and object of action; the objective case as agent, with the nominative as object. We had the general definition of the nonn as the name of an object, yet one was sub- ject and the other object-an objective case because it was the tobject, and when it was not the object, and though an object, and he object of the verb yet not the objective, but the nominative. And all these intricate " relations " were but two cases. They are
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very clear to you-and so is Greek when you understand it. But it is terrible Greek to the boy. A nomenclature which would eluci- date all this, would have to bear the charge of introducing new and multiple cases; but it might, by calling distinct things by relatively distinct names, discriminate them and their relations to the strng- gling mind, and stamp with a term an idea which would save the endless repetition and circumlocution of rote parsing.
The verb is as barbarously mangled as the noun. It expressed action, being or state. The word action expresses action, and is not a verb; the word being or existence expresses being, and is not a verb; the word state or condition expresses state, and is not a verb. The potential mode denotes not only power, but will, obligation, permission, etc. The imperative mode is used by the beggar, and by man in invoking his Maker. The infinitive mode is not infinite, the indicative mode does not " simply indicate."
Such are some of the beauties of most of the grammars. The teacher in such case should use every endeavor and device to re- move the obscurities, and not thrust the senseless jargon into the unwitting memory of the child. If the verb be defined as the term employed to assert or make the statement, or affirm in the sense of making an affirmation,-in whatever mode declarative; and a sentence be defined to be a statement about some object, with which others may be subordinately associative or otherwise illustrative; and a preposition be termed a relative; then the distinctions of nominative and objective may be expressed as:
AFFIRMAL.
SUB- AFFIRMAL.
Affirmate=subject.
Sub-verbal.
Affirmant=predicate.
Sub-relative.
Co-affirmal-apposition.
Mine == Pass-affirmal.
Vocal=independent. Poss-snbverbal, etc.
The above is sufficient to suggest the general method. Having been engaged in the exclusive teaching of mathematics for the last eight years, no further interest was felt in the system. The fol- lowing diagram will illustrate the simplicity with which its princi- ples were discussed:
GRAMMAR-DISCUSSION 1 .- IMPORT.
1. An Element is one of the kinds of parts of which anything is composed.
2. A Relation is a (special) kind of connection.
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3. A Principle is a law of relations-depending on the nature of things.
4. Science is the explanation of principles-an explanation of the laws of the kind of connection, depending on the kinds of parts of which anything is composed.
5. Art is the application of the principles of science.
6. Definition may give the meaning, dependent on the elements or constitution of anything; or its import, which is its meaning in relation to something, from which it may be discriminated.
7. Language: we all know the meaning of this term.
8. Grammar is the science of language, and the art of correctly applying its principles.
JOHN FRANCIS ALLEN, PAINTER.
John F. Allan, born March 4, 1852, in Daviess County, Ky., is a son of Benjamin S. and Rebecca (Evans) Allan, natives of Jet- ferson County, Ky. His father came to Daviess County in 1851, and located on a farm eight miles from Owensboro, on the Hardin- burg road. He lived there nine years and then sold it, and bought another seven miles east of Owensboro, where he still lives. John F. was the eldest of six children. He attended the district school of his neighborhood, known as the "Pleasant Valley " school, and afterward spent three years at school in Louisville.
His earliest delights were connected with pictures, and his high- est aspirations to be an artist. His visit to the Centennial in 1876, that sublime vista of art treasures, only impressed him the more with a higher appreciation and respect for that which he ever had a fondness-the fine arts. And though for a time his productions were undervalned by the community, scarcely obtaining for him- self a subsistence, yet he was content to dwell in simple retirement, believing that labor would bring its own reward. The love of the beautiful was the law of his being; the beautiful in nature and art, his chief joy. It is said the sight of the mountain and sea moved him with unutterable thought. And that years ago, while on a visit to St. Louis, Mo., he became so interested and forgetful of self and his surroundings in the study of a statuette, he was un- conscionsly robbed of his watch, which was never captured. While Mr. Allen's portraits possess not the finish which are given by other artists of more experience, yet he is remarkable in securing a trne likeness, and his productions seem to flow from his hand with freedom. He says while he neither expects profit nor
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