USA > Massachusetts > Suffolk County > Boston > Boston of to-day; a glance at its history and characteristics: with biographical sketches and portraits of many of its professional and business men, 1892 > Part 48
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E. V. Mitchell
Um H. Macy
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Market, Newton, Fisher Ames, and Algonquin Clubs. Colonel Mitchell was married in Medfield Oct. 13, 1885, to Miss Blanche E., daughter of Daniel D. and Ellen (Wight) Curtis ; they have three children : Granville Curtis, Edwin Searle, and Emlyn Vinald Mitchell.
MONKS, GEORGE HOWARD, M.D., was born in Boston in 1853. Fitting for college in the Boston Latin School, he entered Harvard in 1871, graduat- ing in the class of 1875 and receiving his degree of A.B. He then took a course in the Harvard Medical School, receiving his degree of M.D. in 1880. From 1879 to 1880 he was surgical house- officer at the Massachusetts General Hospital, and in 1880 was admitted a member of the Massachusetts Medical Society. He then went abroad to com- plete his professional education, studying in Vienna, Leipzig, Heidelberg, Dresden, Paris, and London, remaining at these places from 1880 to 1884. In the latter year he received the diploma of member- ship in the Royal College of Surgeons of England. Dr. Monks is assistant in clinical and operative surgery in the Harvard Medical School, instructor in surgical pathology in the Harvard Dental School, and instructor in surgery in the Boston Polyclinic. He is also surgeon to out-patients at the Boston City Hospital, and surgeon to the Carney Hospital. He is a member of the Boston Society for Medical Improvement and the Boston Society for Medical Science.
MOODY, WILLIAM H., son of Jonathan and Mary C. Moody, was born in Claremont, N.H., May 10, 1842. Upon both the father's and mother's side the long train of ancestry is traceable, back through the days of colonization of New England, to sturdy Saxon blood. Until sixteen years of age he was trained in the country schools ; and then, under George N. Farwell & Co., of Claremont, who em- ployed those simpler machines which were first used to supplement hand labor, he learned practically the business of manufacturing.all classes of foot-wear. At nineteen years of age, master of his trade, he came to Boston and entered the Washington-street shoe-store of John Wallace as a salesman. Here, however, he remained but a short time, obtaining a MORRISON, GEORGE W., was born in Alton, N.H., July 28, 1834. He came to Boston in 1851, and was employed by his brother Nahum M. Morrison, who was one of the most prominent builders of the day. For thirty or thirty-five years he was asso- ciated with his brother John W. Morrison, filling many responsible positions under him. Upon the better-paying position with Tenny, Ballerston, & Co. At the end of two years' service with this house he became buyer for Sewall Raddin & Son, which position he held for three years. Sewall Raddin & Co. succeeded Sewall Raddin & Son, and soon re- organized as McGibbon, Moody, & Raddin. When this partnership expired the firm of Crane & Leland death of John W. Morrison, in 1888, he formed a
became Crane, Leland, & Moody, and afterwards Crane, Moody, & Rising. Then Mr. Moody retired from active business for a time, unremitting labor having impaired his health. When thoroughly restored he organized the present great house of Moody, Esterbrooke, & Anderson, calling into the new concern former tried and experienced assistants. He has built in Nashua, N.H., the largest shoe- industry under one roof in the world. His only outside business connection is with the Shoe and Leather Bank, of which he is a director. In politics he is Republican. Mr. Moody makes Boston his winter home, occupying with his family a suite at Parker's, and Claremont his summer resi- dence. His estate there, which is well named " Highland View," is one of the finest in New Hampshire. A beautiful house, six hundred acres of broken upland, a private track, more than a hun- dred horses, and splendidly appointed barns are its features. To the American trotter he gives special attention. In Claremont he has perpetuated the memory of his mother by means of the Mary Moody parsonage, given to the Baptist church, of which she was for more than sixty years an honored member. Mr. Moody was married twenty-five years ago, to Miss. Mary A. Maynard.
MORRIS, FRANCES, M.D., was born in Trenton, N.J., June 15, 1851. Her early education was begun in Trenton and continued in Providence, R.I. For five years she was a missionary in South Africa under the American Board of Foreign Missions. Returning to Boston on account of her health, she soon began the study of medicine, and in 1885 graduated from the Boston University School of Medicine, M.D. She was resident physician at the Conservatory of Music for one year, and then went abroad, where she continued her professional studies in Vienna, Paris, and Freiburg. Again returning to Boston, in 1887, she has since remained here prac- tising her profession. Her present residence and office are at No. 138 Marlborough street. She is a member of the Boston Homoeopathic Medical Society and the Boston Hahnemann Society. Her specialty is gynæcology.
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copartnership with Lewis H. Bacon, an architect tics Mr. Morse is a pronounced Democrat, and and builder, and established the present firm of has performed conspicuous service for his party. Morrison & Bacon, succeeding to the business of John W. Morrison. The entire wood-work of the northerly portion of the new Court House is theirs, and their work is also shown in the interior of the Niles Building on School street, a large number of houses in the Back Bay district, St. Andrew's Church, a number of stations on the old Boston & Providence Railroad, and other prominent build- ings. Mr. Morrison is a member of the Master Builders' Association.
MORRISON, WILLIAM ALEXANDER, M.D., son of James and Jane ( McKay) Morrison, was born in East Boston Dec. 10, 1856. His education was attained in the public school. At the age of fourteen he began com- mercial life as clerk in a drug store. Here he re- mained until 1878, when he removed to Leadville, Col., and engaged in the drug business there. Re- turning to Boston in 1884, a year later he entered the Harvard Medical School. Immediately after graduating, in 1889, he began practice in East Bos- ton. While in college he took a great interest in all athletic sports, and won many cups and trophies, notably the cup for heavy-weight sparring. He is a man of remarkable physique. In 1884 Dr. Morri- son married Almira Reed ; they have two children : Jean and William Morrison.
MORSE, BUSHROD, son of Willard and Eliza (Glover) Morse, is a native and resident of Sharon, Mass. His parents were the descend- ants of a long line of New England ancestry. Among them were Prof. Samuel F. B. Morse, in- ventor of the magnetic telegraph, Dr. Franklin, and James Kent, chief justice and renowned com- mentator. He attended the public schools of his native town ; fitted for college in the Providence Conference Seminary and Pierce Academy, Middle- borough, during the years 1853, 1854, 1855, and 1856 ; entered Amherst College September, 1856, without conditions, but owing to ill-health was unable to complete his full collegiate course. He chose the profession of law, and studied in North Easton and Boston ; was admitted to the Suffolk bar in Octo- ber, 1864, and has practised in Boston ever since. He has, however, always retained his residence in his native town, on the old Morse homestead, near Lake Massapoag, a large and picturesque estate, which has descended to him and his brothers from their great-grandfather, Gilead Morse, an English soldier under General Wolfe, who purchased it on his return from the French war in 1764. In poli-
BUSHROD MORSE.
When questions of the public good simply are at issue, party lines fail to hedge him in or control his action. Mr. Morse has been chairman of the Sharon school board ; was a member of the lower house of the Legislature in 1870, 1883, and 1884, serving on important committees ; was chairman of the committee on probate and chancery, 1884 ; has been a member of the Democratic State cen- tral committee ; was a presidential elector in the Cleveland campaigns of 1884 and 1888; was a delegate to the National Democratic Convention at Cincinnati in 18So, which nominated General Hancock for President ; was a candidate for Con- gress in the Second District, against ex-Governor Long, in 1886 ; carried Norfolk county by two hundred and thirty-three majority, and was defeated in the district by only one thousand eight hundred and twenty-two votes ; was again a candidate in 1890, and received the highest vote ever cast for a Democratic candidate for Congress in his dis- trict. He has been a justice of the peace since
1864, when he was first appointed by Governor Andrew. Mr. Morse taught school, in his early manhood, for several years, thus earning money wherewith to meet his expenses while pursuing his preparatory studies. He is now devoted to the legal profession, an incessant worker and a good
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lawyer. On May 13, 1891, he was appointed by Governor Russell the first special justice of the District Court for southern Norfolk. While in the Legislature Mr. Morse always supported and ably advocated the passage of all measures calculated to advance the best interests of the working classes. , His addresses on the subject of tariff reform have attracted attention and been published in leading newspapers of the country.
MORSE, ELIJAH A., son of Rev. Abner Morse, was. born in South Bend, Ind., May 24, 1841. He belongs to an old New England family, whose founder, Samuel Morse, settled in Dedham as early as 1637. In early boyhood he came to Massachu- setts, and here his education was begun in the pub- lic schools of Sherborn. Later he attended the Boylston school here in Boston, and the Onondaga Academy in New York State. Having just left school, at the age of nineteen, when the Civil War broke out, he enlisted as a private in Company A, Fourth Massachusetts Infantry, and went to the front. On leaving the army, he reentered the business that he had started as a schoolboy, - the making and vending of stove polish. This business steadily grew and expanded until now his factory in Canton covers . four acres and has a capacity of ten tons a day. Mr.
ELIJAH A. MORSE.
Morse is an ardent Republican, and is also earnestly interested in the temperance cause, in behalf of
which he has made many speeches. He was elected to the lower house of the Legislature of 1876, to the senate of 1886 and 1887, to the execu- tive council and to Congress in 1888 and 1890. Mr. Morse was married Jan. 1, 1868, to Miss Felicia, daughter of Samuel A. Vining, of Holbrook ; they have three children : Abner, Samuel, and Benjamin Morse.
MORSE, GEORGE W., son of Peter and Mary E. (Randall) Morse, natives of Chester and Nashua,
GEORGE W. MORSE.
N.H., was born in Lodi, Athens county, O., Aug. 24, 1845. He attended Oberlin College, Ohio, one year ; studied in Haverhill, Mass., one year ; was at Andover one year : Chester Academy one year ; and Haverhill again another year. On May 11, 1861, he enlisted as a private in the Civil War, and was promoted through the several grades to first lieutenant, commanding his company of the historic Second Regiment Massachusetts Volunteers. He was mustered out July, 1865. After the war he spent another year at Phillips (Andover) Academy, and then entered the sophomore class of the Chand- ler scientific department, Dartmouth College, con- tinuing there two years. He began the study of law with Charles G. Stevens, of Clinton, and con- tinued with Chandler, Shattuck, & Thayer, of Boston ; and in 1869 he was admitted to the Suffolk bar. He was engaged in general practice
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for fifteen years, having a large amount of bank- ruptcy cases, such as the Boston, Hartford, & Erie litigation ; that of N. C. Munson, the great railroad- contractor, a failure involving three millions ; that of G. W. Gerrish, the builder, of Chelsea; of F. Shaw & Bros., tanners, the latter being the largest mercantile failure ever occurring in the country, involving eight millions of dollars; and in most of the dozen failures that followed in the wake. The years 1887, 1888, 1889, Mr. Morse spent in Europe with his family. Then he returned and resumed general practice, doing much corporation work, engaged, among other interests, as special counsel for the Thomson-Houston Electric Company. In politics Mr. Morse is Republican. He has repre- sented the Newton district in the lower house of the Legislature two terms (1881-2). He was president of the Newton Street Railway Company two years, for the purpose of attending to its legal and fiscal matters, and he is now a large stock- holder in the company. He is a member of Charles Ward Post, G.A.R., Newton, and of the Massachu- setts Commandery of the Loyal Legion ; is a thirty- second degree Mason, having taken all the York and Scottish Rite degrees ; and is a member of the Algonquin, Art, and Newton Clubs, and of the Boston Bar Association. Mr. Morse was married Oct. 20, 1870, to Miss Clara R. Boit, of Newton ; they have five children, two sons and three daughters.
MORSE, L. FOSTER, son of Ezra and Eliza Jane (Foster) Morse, was born in Roxbury Dec. 30, 1835. He is of the tenth generation from Samuel Morse, born in England in 1585, who settled in Dedham, Mass., in 1636; and on his mother's side he is descended from Thomas Foster, of Wey- mouth, who was made a freeman in 1640. He was educated in the public schools, and early began work as a boy in a store. That was in 1849. Six years later he started a market business for himself, which he continued until 1861. From 1866 to 1867 he conducted a business in Colorado Territory for Boston and New York interests, and in 1868 he entered the real-estate business in Roxbury, in which he has continued to the present time, his offices now being at No. 56 Warren Street. He has handled property in all sections of the Roxbury district, and the greater number of the present large estates there have been developed by him. He is intimately conversant with values, past, present, and probable, in the entire section. For a number of years, from 1869 to 1880 inclusive, and also from 1882 to 1884, he was a member of the board of assessors ; he was a member of the Roxbury city
council in 1860, 1861, 1862, 1863, and 1864; and of the Boston common council in 1868; he was one of the commissioners on the annexation of West
L. FOSTER MORSE.
Roxbury, Charlestown, Brighton, and Brookline in 1873 ; one of the commissioners appointed to assess betterments on the Stony-brook improvement ; and one of the commissioners on the high-water service in 1885. He is a trustee of the Institute for Sav- ings in Roxbury, and of the Forest Hills Cemetery : and he is a member of the Bostonian Society. Mr. Morse was married May 2, 1861, to Miss Annie Conant (descended from Roger Conant, who was at Nantasket in 1624) ; they have two children : Grace Eliza and Annie Conant Morse.
MORSE, NATHAN, son of Nathan and Sally (Gil- man) Morse, was born in Moultonborough, N.H., July 24, 1824. He was directly in the line of two of the oldest and best families of New Hampshire. The first thirteen years of his life were passed on his father's farm, attending public schools the usual time allotted to farm boys in country districts. At this time, a fire having destroyed all the farm build- ings, the family removed to the village, where his father was appointed postmaster, holding the posi- tion for twenty consecutive years. At the age of sixteen, Nathan, jr., was appointed assistant post- master, a position which he held until he came to Boston in 1843. In 1845 he entered the Harvard
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Law School, and devoted two years to study, graduating in 1846. During these years he was en- tirely dependent upon his own earnings for his sup- port, with the help of such sums as a friend was able to loan him toward the payment of his tuition fees. Soon after graduation he was admitted to the Suffolk bar. Entering at once upon the practice of his profession in Boston (in 1852), he formed a partnership with Ambrose A. Ranney, under the firm name of Ranney & Morse. This relation con- tinued for many years, and the firm became one of the most prominent in the State. Mr. Morse has long enjoyed a lucrative practice. His business is largely in the courts, as senior counsel in the trial of causes. He has declined to accept public office, with a single exception, --- that of common councilman in 1863, - his entire time and strength being given to his profession. He has for many years been a mem- ber of the Old South Church. He was married in Boston Nov. 18, 1851, to Sarah, daughter of Daniel Deshon ; they have two children : Fannie Deshon and Edward Gilman Morse.
MORSE, RANDALL G., son of Oliver and Nancy (Pitcher) Morse, was born in Friendship, Me., Oct. 6, 1825 ; died in Boston April 13, 1891. His father, also a native of Friendship, born in 1791,
scent. He obtained his general education in the country school, which he attended part of each summer and winter through his boyhood; and in early manhood he became a fine mathematician. He worked hard on the farm, lived in a large, roomy house, and had a pleasant home-life until he was eighteen, when he went to sea. He followed a seafaring life steadily from that time until 1869, during the twenty-six years visiting all the principal seaports of his own country and Europe, South American ports, Australia, and India. In 1845 he was captain of the " Mary and Adeline," later on of the " Chimborazo," and in 1858 of the " Mary E. Campbell." In 1859 he took the " Mary E. Camp- bell " up the Thames to London, the largest sailing- ship at that day that had ever been up the river. She lay in close proximity to the great steamship "Great Eastern," two things of beauty and attrac- tion, each receiving an equal share of admiration. . And the two captains were also admired, for they were both tall, distinguished-looking men, fine types of the energetic, superior sea-captain of the period. Captain Morse sailed only in ships built by and owned by Hon. Edward O'Brien, of Thomaston, Me. He owned in the ships he sailed, and also sailed on primage : chartered his ship, provis- ioned her, repaired her, disbursed her, and depos- ited her earnings to the credit of Mr. O'Brien. He was a driving, energetic, money-making, successful ship-master ; a strict disciplinarian; fed his men well, but exacted prompt obedience ; kept his ship trim and clean and in perfect order, and made quick voyages ; was honest in his dealings, and dis- tinguished for his fidelity to his trusts and responsi- bilities. While a ship-master he passed through two nautical schools, and had a master's certificate for the American and one for the English merchant service, - passing the English examination in 1864 and the American in 1869, so as to keep up with the standards of the day. After his retirement from the sea he made his home in Roxbury, and entered into partnership with Cook & Jordan, coal, wood, and building materials, at No. 498 Albany street, Boston, putting considerable capital into the busi- ness. The firm name then became Cook, Jordan, & Morse. In 1871 Mr. Cook retired from the firm, and until after the great fire of 1872 it was Morse & Jordan. Then in 1874 it became R. G. Morse & Co., and so has since continued. Mr. Morse was a Mason, a member of the Washington Lodge of the RANDALL G. MORSE. Roxbury district. He was married in 1858 to Miss Lavinia D. Debney, of London, Eng. ; they had was of French descent, the family coming from three children : Lavinia C., Frank D., and Wini- Normandy ; and his mother was of English de- . fred M. Morse.
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MORSE, ROBERT M., JR., was born in Boston Aug. II, 1837. He graduated from Harvard College in 1859, and among his classmates were ex-Governor Long, J. Lewis Stackpole, John C. Ropes, Rev. Joseph May of Philadelphia, and many other prom- inent men now living, and the late Robert D. Smith, Gen. Charles F. Wolcott, and others among the dead. After graduating he studied at the Harvard Law School, and was admitted to the bar in Janu- ary, 1860. Since that time he has been in practice in Boston. He rose rapidly to success in his pro- fession. For the last fifteen years he has been re- tained in a large proportion of the important causes which have come before the courts in this part of the State, including many in the United States district and circuit courts, and in the Supreme Court of the United States at Washington. His practice has embraced contests over wills, of which the Armstrong and Codman cases were conspicuous examples. He has also been retained in much im- portant litigation relating to the water-supplyt of cities and towns, and to insurance and other com- mercial contracts, and also in a great variety of tort cases, including actions of libel and claims for per- sonal injury. Mr. Morse has rarely undertaken any public work outside of his profession. In 1866 and
ROBERT M. MORSE, JR.
1867, however, he was a member of the State Sen- ate, and in 1880 of the House. In the former body he drafted and introduced the bill for the repeal of
the usury laws, which he carried through, and which subsequently passed the House in consequence mainly of the able speech of the late Richard H. Dana. He was also chairman of the special com- mittee on the subject of the prohibitory law, before which John A. Andrew made his famous argument ; and he subsequently drew the report of the com- mittee in favor of the repeal of that law. In 1880 he was chairman of the House. Mr. Morse is to- day one of the most prominent members of the legal profession, among the foremost as .a general counsellor and as an advocate.
MORTON, CHARLES, was born in Boston July 19, 1841. He finished his education in the Norwich University, Norwich, Vt., and was then employed on railroad work in Minnesota. In 1862 he came to Boston and was employed in the Back Bay sur- vey until 1865, when he was detailed at the city engineer's office, remaining there until that depart- ment .was separated from the surveying department. He continued in the latter office until 1887, when, on the removal of Mr. Mehan as superintendent of streets by Mayor 'O'Brien, he was appointed acting superintendent ; he was also acting superintendent under J. W. McDonald. In March, 1888, he was made general superintendent of the Boston Heating Company. In March, 1889, he was appointed su- perintendent of sewers, and in 1891 a member of the board of survey created that year. Mr. Morton is connected with many orders and societies, among them the Masons, Odd Fellows, and the Massachu- setts Charitable Mechanic Association.
MORTON, FRANCIS F., was born in Eastport, Me., April 27, 1834. He came to Boston in 1854, and in 1858 established business in partnership with William P. Chesley, under the firm name of Morton & Chesley. They have been heavy contractors and builders for years, employing in their large, well- equipped mill on Dedham street, in which they do no work except what is required to fill their own contracts, upwards of six hundred men. Their later work includes the interior of the Equitable Build- ing, the American Telephone Building, the entire work on the Beaconsfield Terraces in Brookline, and E. D. Jordan's houses on Corey hill, the Provi- dence and Lowell railway stations, the hotels Lud- low and Huntington, T wharf, - the largest fish- market in the world, - the City Hall, Providence, several churches in the same city, and over two hundred fine residences in the Back Bay district, including those of ex-Governor Ames and Mr. Cor- coran. In New York they have done an immense
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amount of work, in such buildings as the Equitable, the Morse, the Potter, the Mills, and the Washing- ton, the Dakotah flats, the new building for the Central Railroad of New Jersey, and the New York Central station. Mr. Morton is one of the active members of the Master Builders' Association and of the Massachusetts Charitable Mechanic Association. In 1858 he married Miss E. Richardson, of Boston. His home is on Chestnut Hill avenue.
MOSELEY, HERBERT, architect, was born in Derby- shire, Eng., in 1850. Five years later his family came to this country, since which time he has been a resident first of Needham and afterwards of New- ton. He took private lessons in architecture while following the trade of a carpenter and builder, thus obtaining a thorough and practical knowledge of the profession. He started in practice in 1884, and has designed churches in Needham, at Harvard station, and also many pretty private residences in Dorchester, Medfield, Wellesley, and the Newtons. His early training as a builder enables him to esti- mate accurately in lines of domestic work, and in this branch he has been remarkably successful. All of his plans for private houses are characterized by quiet refinement. Mr. Moseley was married in 1872, to Miss Sarah C. Smith.
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