USA > Massachusetts > Biographical history of Massachussetts; biographies and autobiographies of the leading men in the state, 1911, vol 7 > Part 18
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He has been an active member of the following organizations:
WILBUR HOWARD POWERS
the United Order of the Golden Cross; the National Fraternal Con- gress; the Royal Arcanum; the Delta Kappa Epsilon; the Masons; the Society of Sons and Daughters of the American Revolution; the Boston City Club; the Colonial Club of Cambridge; the Waverly Club of Hyde Park; the Point Independence Yacht Club; the Dart- mouth Alumni Association; the Alumni Association of the Boston University School of Law; the Kimball Union Academy Alumni Association; the Republican Club of Massachusetts; and has held official positions as Chairman of the Committee on Laws from 1885 to 1895 and General Counsel for the Golden Cross since 1885; Presi- dent of the Waverly Club for many years; President of the Boston University Alumni Association 1905 and 1906; President of the Kimball Union Academy Alumni Association; and is the first Presi- dent of the National Fraternal Congress of America.
In addition to his professional, political and social duties he has. found time to enjoy recreation in various forms that would keep up the tone of his body and mind to the highest pitch. Fishing, sailing, and bridge whist are enjoyed by him, and he finds recreation in writing biographies, editorials, and humorous sketches.
May 1, 1880, he was married to Emily Owen, daughter of Frederick L. and Rebecca Chandler Owen, who was descended from John Owen who emigrated from Wales to Connecticut in 1664. The Owen family contains many lawyers, doctors and teachers. Two children have been born of the union, a son, Walter Powers, who has followed his father's footsteps as a lawyer, and Myra Powers, who is still a student. Mr. Powers was again married to Lottie I. (Mills) Koehler on May 17, 1914.
From his own large and successful experience Mr. Powers believes that young people should be taught the value of responsibility as a developer of character, and that honor, industry, honesty, self-control, frugality and politeness are the old-fashioned virtues that must be cherished and lived to insure success; he believes that pluck, patience and persistence are essential elements in the make-up of those who would reach any prominent position in American life; that a man should not only be loyal to his vocation but also be interested in social service, ministering to the public welfare as a kind neighbor, public- spirited citizen and loyal patriot.
Mr. Powers' career of large usefulness and public service illustrates the value of a splendid inheritance, early responsibilities, hard work, a high standard of honor, and consecrated devotion to the good of humanity.
JAY BIRD REYNOLDS
J AY BIRD REYNOLDS, a prosperous shoe manufacturer of Orange, Massachusetts, was born in what is now Brockton, but then known as North Bridgewater, May 2, 1854. The business of life began for him at a tender age, for he was only five years old when he began to help his father in making shoes, and later when he was not attending the district schools of the re- gion he worked hard in his father's shoeshop. At fourteen he gave up going to school, and for two or three years remained with his father. He then spent several years in the various Brockton shoe factories, and in 1874 set up in business on his own account. He bought enough leather to make five cases of shoes of thirty pairs each, and from this small beginning his business began to ex- pand, till it became needful for him to take as a partner Mr. Henry H. Tucker, of the neighboring town of Avon. The part- nership was dissolved within a year or two, and for a season Mr. Reynolds conducted business alone.
In May, 1887, Mr. Reynolds began manufacturing in Orange. His success under these conditions was very marked, and in 1897 the business was incorporated as the Jay B. Reynolds Shoe Company, of which he was made President and Treasurer. In the course of a few years, he unfortunately lost his hearing, and on this account he retired from active business in 1902.
Mr. Reynolds has always taken an interest in horses and cat- tle, and for several years managed a large cattle farm in Orange. In 1896 he removed to Athol, which is now his residence, although his business is carried on at Orange.
Mr. Reynolds is a member of such Masonic organizations as Paul Revere Lodge, A. F. & A. M., Satucket Chapter R. A. M., and Bay State Commandery, Knights Templar, all of Brockton ; and he is likewise a member of Aleppo Temple, Nobles of the Mys- tic Shrine, of Boston, and is a member of Lodge 1296, B. P. O. Elks, of Greenfield. The Poquaig Club of Athol, to which Mr. Reynolds belongs, includes very many influential men of Athol and vicinity. Politically Mr. Reynolds is known as a loyal Republican, and he is a firm supporter of no license principles.
Mr. Reynolds was married on November 6, 1878, to Mrs. Ellen M. Phillips Drake, but there are no children of the marriage.
Joy B. Reywohl
Sacher A20
Alexander Hamile
ALEXANDER HAMILTON RICE
A LEXANDER HAMILTON RICE was born in Roxbury (now a part of Boston), Massachusetts, August 29, 1875. His father was John Hamilton Rice, a successful merchant, a man of literary and scholarly tastes, and a great reader of books on science, history, biography, and travel. He was born July 6, 1849, and died in September, 1899, and was a son of Alexander Hamilton, and Augusta (McKim) Rice. Alexander H. Rice was a prominent man during the latter half of the last century, being a member of Congress from Massachusetts, 1859 to 1867, and Gov- ernor of Massachusetts, 1876 to 1879. Harvard College conferred the degree of LL.D. upon him in 1876. He was born in 1819 and died in 1895.
Alexander Hamilton Rice's mother is Cora Lee, daughter of John Theodore and Annette Arabella Collins (Lee) Clark.
Dr. Rice's ancestry includes many names well known in New England-Rice, Capen, Collins, Bradford, Lee, and Clark. The founders of all of these families came to America from England during the middle and latter part of the seventeenth century and settled in or near Boston. Among his ancestors of note may be mentioned Judge Collins of Danvers, Col. Arthur Noble, who dis- tinguished himself in the French and Indian Wars, and Charles Carroll of Carrollton, Maryland (1737-1832), who was the last surviving signer of the Declaration of Independence.
Alexander Hamilton Rice, as a boy, was much given to outdoor sports and to drawing and reading. He clearly showed his tendency towards the pursuit he entered upon in his young manhood-ad- venturous explorations and travels, which have brought him fame and no little honor. His reading was extensive and embraced sci- ence, travel and exploration, biography, philosophy, religion and also the works of English novelists of the eighteenth and nine- teenth centuries. He attended the public schools of Boston until the age of sixteen, when he entered the Noble and Greenough School to fit for Harvard College. He received his A.B. from Harvard in 1898 and on June 24, 1915, he received the honorary degree of A.M. from the same College. During his college course he kept up his outdoor sports, particularly rowing and football, being a mem- ber of his class crew and eleven. While an undergraduate he was a member of the Institute of 1770, the Hasty Pudding Club, the Delta Kappa Epsilon, and the Phi Delta Psi. During his univer- sity career he travelled extensively in North America and much in Europe, spending the long summer vacations in this manner. He
ALEXANDER HAMILTON RICE
did much of his travelling on foot, on one occasion, while touring Norway, walking from Bergen to Christiania, where he met Nansen, the noted explorer.
It was after graduation in 1898, that Dr. Rice began in earnest his exploratory travels. He first went to the far Northwest of this continent and walked and paddled by canoe thousands of miles through wild regions seldom visited by man. Next he vis- ited Asia and then Africa. During the several years he was en- gaged in making these explorations, he was also a student at the Harvard Medical School, from which he obtained the degree of M.D. in 1904. After receiving this degree he served a term as Surgical Interne at the Massachusetts General Hospital. South America had claimed his attention as being a continent contain- ing vast regions which were almost unknown to civilized races. During his medical course he had visited South America for a brief period and had made preparations for the extensive explora- tions he later carried out in the unknown wilderness of the Ama- zon's Valley and the Orinoco River. The main object of these explorations was topographical, but he also paid considerable at- tention to research along anthropological, ethnological, and medical lines.
Dr. Rice was the holder of a certificate of the Royal Geograph- ical Society School of Geographical Surveying and Astronomy, and the study necessary to obtain this certificate, combined with his previous practical experience in exploratory work, made him emi- nently fitted to undertake the difficult and hazardous explorations in South America. That he proved himself a master hand in his researches and topographical work is clearly evidenced by the fact that after making his first expedition to South American wilds he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society of London. Every year the King gives through this Society a gold medal for explorers. The recipient for this year-1914-selected by the Council of the Society and approved by the King is Dr. Alexander Hamilton Rice of Boston, Massachusetts. He was also awarded early in 1914 the gold medal of the Harvard Travellers' Club.
Dr. Rice has made three extensive exploratory expeditions to South America, besides a number of shorter trips. His experi- ences in 1906 were memorable and often thrilling. During that trip he travelled from Caracas to Bogota, with pack mules and ponies, the journey taking two months. He established for himself fame as a surgeon among the natives. In a village he passed through was a priest who had septic poisoning in his right arm,
ALEXANDER HAMILTON RICE
and learning that an American physician was in the village, he went to see Dr. Rice, who advised amputation of the arm. He did the operation on the following day under ether and the priest was very much surprised to find his arm taken off with scarcely any pain. News of this, to them, wonderful operation, spread fast among the native villages, and when he entered any village there- after during the trip, the head man had all the sick or injured inhabitants gathered together to be treated by Dr. Rice. On this journey, Dr. Rice crossed the Andes and was several times de- serted by his Indian guides and in dire danger of injury or death on the perilous heights of the mountain range. He fortunately escaped these dangers and returned home, after discovering the source of the Rio Uaupés and making several other important geographical discoveries.
In 1907 he began his second long trip to South America, his object being to explore the vast unknown region of the north- western Amazon's Valley, in Northern Brazil, and the southern tributaries of the Omicron River, in Southern Venezuela. This was a far more difficult and dangerous undertaking than was the 1906 expedition, for it necessitated going among the wild, fierce tribes inhabiting regions which white men had never pene- trated. Sometime later, when he was supposed to be in the wild fastnesses of Northern Brazil, or Southern Venezuela, word was received that he had been killed and eaten by natives; but his safe return several months later disproved the story. He returned in season to partake in the festivities of the Decennial Celebration of his class and receive the congratulations of his classmates. He was one of the speakers at the class dinner at the Hotel Somerset in Boston, on June 22, 1908.
Dr. Rice's discoveries in his various lines of research during this expedition were numerous; many of them, especially those of a geographical and topographical nature, were of almost inestimable value to the scientific world. These results of his journey he pub- lished, after his return, in a series of Monographs on the Results of Explorations in South America, in the Geographical Journal of the Royal Geographical Society, and with them was published a map of the Uaupés River. This map Dr. Rice plotted out and drew from his actual and accurate observations on the spot, and it forms a valuable increment to the geography of that portion of South America.
After concluding the publication of these monographs and maps, Dr. Rice began to prepare for a third extended exploratory trip to South America, the object to be further investigations
ALEXANDER HAMILTON RICE
in the northwestern Amazon Basin. So far as known, at that time, no white men had ever entered the portion of Colom- bia which he planned to explore, and it was in part uninhabited or inhabited only by tribes of semi-savage Indians. Again did his friends urge him not to risk his life, and an issue of a Bos- ton newspaper about six months after his departure had this to say about the chances of his returning: "Friends say that it will be absolutely necessary for him to be always on his guard, for the natives are especially hostile to white men. But, as the Boston explorer has time and again shown that he is not only most careful but is especially blessed with good luck, it is confidently be- lieved that he will return safe and sound to civilization."
Dr. Rice started on this third trip in January, 1912. While his primary object was exploration for the purpose of mapping out this unknown region, he expected to devote considerable time to the investigations of the natural resources and animal life of that region and also to making a careful study of the natives of the region to discover, if possible, their origin. They have heen classed by some as of part Mongoloid or other Asiatic origin; but Dr. Rice, from his observations in former trips, believed this idea was incorrect. He had found that the Indians he saw in previous expeditions were of brown or olive skin, and had their senses highly developed. He believed that they were an older race than Europeans. In his opinion they represented the highest de- velopment of evolution possible for them in the conditions under which they had always existed. To accomplish all these objects in a satisfactory manner would take many months, and Dr. Rice did not expect to return for about two years. Nearly twenty months elapsed between his departure and his arrival back at New York, bringing his garnered sheaves of scientific discoveries with him.
Dr. Rice has prepared a report of his expedition for the Royal Geographical Society.
On October 6, 1915, at Boston, Massachusetts, Dr. Rice was married to Mrs. Eleanor Elkins Widener.
Dr. Rice is a member of the Bath Club of London, the So- ciété Geographique de Paris, and the Travellers' Club of Paris. He belongs to the Tavern and Tennis and Racquet Clubs of Bos- ton, and the Harvard and University Clubs of New York. He is a Republican in politics. While his residence is in Boston, it is needless to say that that is the last place to look for him. Of late years he has spent little time in Boston and even his relatives and most intimate friends often find it difficult to locate him. He is a
ALEXANDER HAMILTON RICE
born traveller, a man of fine physique, strong and powerful because of the violent sports and exercise he has indulged in from his youth up.
Naturally the great European War attracted Dr. Rice with a power that could not be resisted; accordingly he became a member of the Surgical Staff of American Ambulance, Paris, France, from September, 1914, to June, 1915, and Surgeon of Hospital No. 72, Paris, from September, 1914, to January, 1915.
On his return to this country the honorary degree of Master of Arts was conferred upon him by Harvard University in June, 1915. In August, 1916, he became a member of the Consulting Board of Physicians and Surgeons of the Newport Hospital, New- port, Rhode Island, a position which he still holds.
Following is the advice he gives to young Americans, written by Dr. Rice for the readers of this work:
"First become inculcated with the spirit of Democracy-a de- sire to know all classes, creeds, colors, and races of people. The periphery of one's acquaintance should be bounded by the limits of the world only. Municipally know the slums as well as the so- cially best and strongest. The average form of patriotism is a narrow, bigoted, selfish assumption engendered by ignorance, arro- gance, and self-conceit.
"Never be satisfied with the mediocre, moderate, or modest ; only what is hardest, biggest, most difficult, and most extreme is worth while.
"Go at anything with a desire to be professional at it, or leave it.
"Understand one's self thoroughly. As much of human nature is learned subjectively as objectively.
"If the boy is to be truly the father of the man, he should be unrelentingly Spartan, in subjecting himself to cold, expo- sure, strain, fatigue, and setting himself physical tasks which can- not quite be accomplished. These measures breed physical cour- age, hardihood, endurance, pertinacity, and self-denial. The best horsemen learn to ride without stirrups.
"The best guides in the formative period are sympathetic and understanding fathers, good books, and the inspiring influence of older men who have achieved success along lines for which the young man has tastes, inclinations or habitual talents.
"The responsibility of parents to their issue is tremendous. The individual should strive for the developing of himself, not as an end for his own satisfaction but as a means of race improve- ment through his own progeny. Then there is reason and right in his having lived."
WILLIAM BALL RICE
O F the energetic leaders who have built up the great industries of New England, few have labored more wisely and effect- ively than the late William Ball Rice, for many years at the head of one of the largest boot and shoe manufacturing establishments in the world, and long one of the most honored and esteemed citizens of Quincy, Massachusetts. He was born in Hudson, then Feltonville, a part of the town of Marlboro, Massa- chusetts, on April 1, 1840. His father, Obed Rice, a shoemaker of rare energy and sterling honesty, born June 30, 1810, and died July 2, 1890, was the son of Ithamar Rice, born November 25, 1742, and died October 23, 1824, and Sarah (Dunn) Rice. His mother was Sarah Merriam Ball, daughter of Micah R. and Rachel (Lincoln) Ball, of Leominster and Princeton.
The Rice family is descended from Edmund Rice who emi- grated from Berkhamstead, Hertfordshire, England, and settled in Sudbury, Massachusetts, in 1639. It has supplied many men of prominence in the political, civic and industrial life of the nation.
Ithamar Rice rendered efficient service with the English at Halifax in the war with France in 1760, and was among the first patriots to resist British oppression at Lexington in 1775. The Ball family, prominent also in many ways, came from England in the seventeenth century.
The boyhood of William Ball Rice, like that of so many country boys of half a century or more ago, was one of toil and industry. His only schooling was in the district school of Feltonville, but he possessed a mind that never ceased to learn. At the age of seven he began to help his father, whose work was done at home according to a common custom among shoemakers of that time. At the age of nine he went to work on a farm several miles from · home. As a young man he showed a taste for debating societies and theatricals, doubtless acquiring from them some of the readi- ness of thought and expression which became so useful to him in
WILLIAM BALL RICE
after years. He was always foremost in the activities of the young people of his town, having a natural aptitude for leadership.
He early entered a shoe factory in Hudson, where he remained until he reached his majority, and by industry and frugality suc- ceeded in saving a small sum of money. This little capital he invested in a toy factory in Hudson with a fellow townsman named Houghton under the name of Rice and Houghton. Early in 1862 he opened a toy store on Hanover Street, Boston, for the sale of his Hudson product and other small wares. Disposing of this business, he enlisted as Second Lieutenant in Company E of the Fifth Massachusetts Infantry, serving among the one hundred days' men in 1863 in the Civil War.
He returned to the shoe business as traveling salesman for a Hudson Shoe Manufacturer. In October, 1866, he associated himself with Horatio H. Hutchins, of Hudson, under the firm name of Rice and Hutchins, and began the sale of shoes on com- mission. The firm's entire capital was less than five hundred dollars, part of which was loaned by a friend who had faith in Mr. Rice. They had unlimited energy and resolution, however, and the country's needs were great after the enforced privations of the Civil War, so that trade commenced briskly and increased very rapidly.
Early in their career they saw the advantage of manufacturing the goods they sold, and branding them with their own name and trade-mark. They first manufactured men's heavy split shoes and women's polish and polkas so much in vogue before 1880. They soon added their finer goods, and continued steadily improving their product and increasing its variety. To meet the increasing demand for their lines, factory after factory was opened until they had not less than seven of the best factories in Amer- ica, making all varieties and qualities of shoes for men, women, boys, misses and children. Each of these factories has specialized on a particular grade or style, that at South Braintree, on fine shoes for ladies; that at Rockland, fine shoes for men; those at Marlboro, medium priced men's, boy's and children's shoes ; and at Warren, Maine, low priced men's shoes.
Changing from their original method of selling exclusively through jobbers, in 1884 they began to establish wholesale agencies for the special sale of their products. In addition to their Boston office, they soon had special wholesale distributing stores in New
WILLIAM BALL RICE
York and Philadelphia, later opening agencies in Chicago, Cin- cinnati, Baltimore, St. Louis, Cleveland, Atlanta and Boston. From these centers their shoes have found a market in every part of the United States. For many years they have done a large foreign business and have sales-rooms in London, Berlin and other English and continental cities. From a beginning with practically no capital, Rice and Hutchins developed immense resources. With great expansion, a more permanent organization became essential, and the firm was changed in 1892 to a close corporation, with a capital stock of $1,000,000. In 1901 this was increased to $2,000,000, and in 1905 it was made $5,000,000.
Although expending his energies so lavishly in the upbuilding of this great industry, Mr. Rice gave much attention to other affairs, of a business, civic and social character. He was for many years Vice-President and director of the Continental National Bank of Boston, a director of its successors the Colonial Bank and the Commonwealth Trust Company, a trustee of the Boston Safe Deposit and Trust Company and of the Franklin Savings Bank. He was at one time President of the New England Shoe and Leather Association, and was always an untiring worker for anything that would advance the interests of his trade. He had been Vice-President of the Boston Boot and Shoe Club since its organization, and was a member of the Algonquin, Union and Merchants Clubs, and the Chamber of Commerce of Boston.
In politics he was an Independent Democrat though sometimes differing from his party and always acting independently. He believed in a low tariff and free raw material. Often urged to fill public office, he consented to become a candidate only once, and was then as a Democrat defeated for the Governor's Council by a small vote in a strong Republican district. On the death of the successful candidate, during his term of office, Mr. Rice was appointed by Governor Russell, in 1893, to fill the vacancy.
He had a keen interest in the welfare of Boston, his business headquarters, as well as those of the Commonwealth at large. Governor Greenhalge appointed him a member of the first Metro- politan District Commission of greater Boston, and he served as chairman. Active in organizing the Boston Associated Board of Trade, he was its first President and a delegate to it continuously until its dissolution.
WILLIAM BALL RICE
Mr. Rice was married October 25, 1860, to Emma Louise, daugh- ter of Simeon Cunningham of Marlboro, Massachusetts, a descend- ant from Robert Cunningham, who came from the north of Ireland to Boston and Spencer in 1717, and Mary Sanborn Cunningham who was the daughter of Moses and Lydia (Sherburn) Sanborn, of Kensington, New Hampshire.
Mr. Rice's death occurred at his home in Quincy on May 21, 1909, after a long illness from cerebral hemorrhage. He is sur- vived by his wife and by three of the four children that came to bless their happy union. Two sons, Harry Lee and Fred Ball, are associated in the shoe manufacturing corporation, living in Dover. A daughter, Mary Sanborn, is the wife of Homer L. Bigelow, and lives at Chestnut Hill near Boston.
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