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 55
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54 | Part 55 | Part 56 | Part 57 | Part 58 | Part 59 | Part 60 | Part 61 | Part 62 | Part 63 | Part 64 | Part 65 | Part 66 | Part 67 | Part 68 | Part 69 | Part 70 | Part 71 | Part 72
business and absolute ruin to his own undertaking. It was only a prompt realization of the service pic- torial art could render at that juncture of public affairs which averted disaster. The very day that Fort Sumter was fired upon Mr. Prang set to work on a lithograph map of Charleston harbor, and the next morning the newsboys were hard-pushed to fill the public demand for them on the streets. The right note had been struck. The harbor map was followed by other maps, pictures of generals and battle-grounds, and scenes of army life, all immensely popular at the time on account of their graphic portrayal of the men and the scenes that occupied public thought. As soon as the state of the time allowed, Mr. Prang turned his attention once more to pictorial color-printing, publishing, in the shape of small album-cards, rep- resentations of flowers, ferns, birds, and butterflies. The ready popularity of these in their turn en- couraged him to press on still further toward the realization of the long-cherished wish of his heart, the reproduction of oil and water-color paintings. In 1864 he revisited England, France, and Ger- many for the purpose of studying the work of Euro- pean lithographers. He found the art declining from the high position it previously occupied. In spite of all this Mr. Prang had faith to believe that the American public would appreciate the high class of pictures he desired to publish, and on his return to Boston he set to work to reproduce by chromo- lithography two landscapes in oil by A. T. Bricher. The technical execution of these publications was admirable, but the subjects did not appeal at once to popular taste, and the undertaking was not im- mediately successful. Following these he brought out the reproduction of Tait's "Chickens," which promptly took the public fancy and was a marked success. It was a new revelation to artists, to the trade, and to the people, that so perfect a reproduction of an oil painting could be brought within the means of the ordinary purse. It was evident that a new era had arrived in the history of pictorial art. Public interest in the Prang publica- tions steadily increased, and new subjects were con- stantly added to the publisher's lists. A name had to be found for these new creations, and Mr. Prang coined the word "chromos" for their trade designation. The popularity which he gained for this word soon brought it into use wherever color- prints were known, but the abuse made of it by unscrupulous competition brought it later into disre- pute. The products of the Prang presses soon became well known in England and on the Conti- nent. In 1870, visiting a picture store in Prague
-
٠
358
BOSTON OF TO-DAY.
.
(Bohemia), Mr. Prang had some of his own publica- schools of Massachusetts for some ten years, under the leadership of Mr. Walter Smith, a graduate of the South Kensington Art School. Mr. Smith established the Massachusetts Normal Art School and prepared several series of text-books in drawing, and Mr. Prang became early identified with these text-books as their publisher and the manufacturer tions pointed out to him as marvels of art-printing. For many years, before the springing up `of the English and German houses which have since come to do good work in somewhat similar lines, it was difficult to meet the large European demand for the Prang pictures. How the movement for the popu- larization of art grew and strengthened in our own . of models and examples for art study. It had, country will be remembered by all persons of the however, become evident that the study of drawing, in order to become a vital part of the educational system of the country, must be placed on a much sounder basis of pedagogical principles than it had hitherto known, and that more practical account must be taken of the condition of actual school- room work and of the relation of the study of draw- ing to the rest of the school curriculum. Mr. Smith's retirement from the undertaking left on Mr. Prang's shoulders the responsibility of bringing public-school work in drawing into harmony with these advanced ideas. He met the emergency with wisdom born of faith and foresight. He real- ized that no one person could possibly have a suf- ficiently broad grasp of the artistic, psychological, and executive problemis involved, and one of his first steps taken was therefore to associate with himself accomplished specialists representing vari- ous conditions of the educational idea in art. Mr. John S. Clark and Mrs. Mary Dana Hicks have thus for many years been co-workers with him in the cause of art education ; and the widening circle of which these three form the central point includes most of the well-known and honored public-school directors and teachers of drawing throughout the country, as well as directors of leading art and in- dustrial schools and schools for manual training. Here again, as in the popularization of fine art in the home, the work on which Mr. Prang had set his heart soon far surpassed in its thoroughness and real artistic character the best that had been done in the same directions in Europe. One of the leading German educational journals, the " Pædagogium " of Leipsic, recently published a critical review from the pen of a professor, in the University of Zurich, of the Prang course in form study and drawing, present generation who are interested in the subject. Every year public appreciation of the work grew broader in extent and more intelligently critical in character. In 1873 Mr. Prang made a large exhibit at the Vienna Exposition and received high honors from artists and technical experts. It was on the occasion of this exposition that he set the fashion of artistically ornamented business cards printed in colors. But the most remarkable evidence of public interest in his work was afforded by the continuous delight taken in his Christmas and other holiday cards. It was in 1874 that he began to publish Christmas cards. The first editions went to England, where they became at once a popular "craze." It was impossible to print the cards fast enough to satisfy public demand. The next season, better equipped for the task, he introduced Christmas cards into the United States. Here, as in England, the dainty things appealed at once to the public. The history of this branch of the work is a story of romance as well as of business success. Mr. Prang spared no pains and no money to secure the best thought and most exquisite fancy in the designing of the cards he sent out. At least half a million dollars went, during the reign of the Christmas card, to the artists, professional and amateur, who fur- nished the original sketches, and the clear eyes of the head of the house could see merit in the work of an unknown hand as well as in that bear- ing a famous signature, if the merit was really there. Many an artist now well known and pros- perous gained his first real recognition at Louis Prang's hands, and owes his first success to the faithful and sympathetic presentation of his work to a great public in the shape of some holiday card. Public exhibitions of accepted designs were several . and a comparison of its principal feature with those times held in New York, and prizes awarded both of the drawing taught in the continental schools. Mr. Prang has, for the last four or five years, been giving renewed energy to the completion of an old and beloved task, - the establishment of universally accepted color-standards and a universally intelligi- ble color-nomenclature. After numberless experi- mental attempts with the assistance of the best accessible color-experts, he now feels confident of a successful issue. Mr. Prang's business under- according to popular verdict and the judgment of professional critics ; and great interest was shown in these exhibitions by both classes of visitors. It was just at this time that Mr. Prang became responsibly identified with the educational de- velopment of art in America - that is to say, with art as a factor in common-school instruction. The study of drawing had been pursued in the public
4
-
359
BOSTON OF TO-DAY.
takings have been large, his business success solid ; but it is, after all, the type of the idealist rather than that of the man of affairs that best represents him and his share in the life of the times. His aim and purpose have always been to produce more and more perfectly, with the materials at hand, works of beauty in form and color, and to awaken in the public mind a constantly broader and truer apprecia- tion of beauty of form and color. It was a high aim, and it has been worthily achieved.
PRATT, CHARLES E., lawyer and littérateur, was born in Vassalborough, Me., March 13, 1845 ; son of Rev. Joseph H. Pratt, son of Nathan Pratt, merchant of Roxbury, son of Simeon Pratt, currier, who came to Roxbury in Revolutionary days, re- sided in the house still standing between the Nor- folk House and Hotel Eliot, and was one of the charter members and warden of the Washington Lodge of Masons. Charles E. Pratt was graduated from Haverford College, Pa., in 1870 ; finished his. branch of the Legislature. Both years he served law studies with Messrs. Jones & Otis, former as- sociates with Governor Andrew, and was admitted to the Suffolk bar in June, 1871, and to the United States bar in July, 1872. First in general practice of the law, he soon made a specialty of patent causes. In May, 1881, he became attorney and counsel for the Pope Manufacturing Company, a position which he still holds. He represented Ward 21 in the Boston common council five years, and was president of that body in 1881 and 1882. In politics he is Independent. He is a member of the Society of Friends, and was the first Quaker to hold office in Boston, and the first of that religious belief to speak on Boston Common since the execu- tion of Mary Dyer, which he did as orator for Post 113, G.A.R., on Decoration Day, 1882. He has long been engaged in literary work ; founded " The Bicycling World," was an early editor of "Outing," PRATT, MILLES, descended from Joshua Pratt, who came to Plymouth in the "Ann," in 1623, was born in Carver, Mass., Sept. 17, 1825. At an early date lands were granted to Joshua Pratt in that part of Plymouth which is now Carver, and from that time to the present one branch of the family has made that town its place of residence. David Pratt, the father of Miles, lived in Carver, and devoted the earliest years of his manhood to teaching school. Eventually, however, he carried on a foundry in the north part of his native town. He married Sarah, daughter of Thomas Barrows, of Carver, a decendant of John Barrows, who also received grants of land in Carver at an early date, and died in 1692. Miles Pratt at the age of fifteen entered upon the occupation of selling hollow-ware, the product of his is the author of "The American Bicycler," and other books. He projected the League of Ameri- can Wheelmen, a national organization, and was its first president. One of the earliest riders, a writer, speaker, and practical authority on the rights, privileges, and interests of bicycling as an art and an industry, he has been widely recognized as one of its chief defenders and promoters in this coun- try. Mr. Pratt is a member of the Papyrus, St. Botolph, and University Clubs of Boston, of the Société des Bibliophiles Contemporains of Paris, and of several other societies. In 1872 he was married to Miss Georgiana E. Folie, niece of Richard Ball, of Worcester, Mass. He resides in the Roxbury district.
PRATT, HARVEY HUNTER, son of Henry Jones and Maria (Hunter) Pratt, was born in Philadel- phia, Pa., Feb. 24, 1860. He was educated in the public schools of Abington, Mass. Upon leaving school he became the editor of the "Brockton Advance" and the publisher of the " Abington News." In 1880 he began the study of law, first with Keith & Simmons, of Abington, and then with Perez Simmons, of Hanover, and entering the Harvard Law School he graduated therefrom in 1883. Admitted to the bar in September of the same year, he formed a partnership with John F. Simmons, of Hanover. This association still con- tinues, the firm having offices in Abington and Boston. In 1881 Mr. Pratt was an unsuccessful candidate on the Democratic ticket for register of deeds of Plymouth county, and in 1886 he was nominated for the State senate from the First Ply- mouth District, but failed of election. In the two years following, however, he was elected to the lower upon the committee on the judiciary. In 1887 he was appointed assistant to Hon. Hosea Kingman, that year elected district attorney for the South- eastern District, and this relation continued until Mr. Kingman was made chairman of the metro- politan sewerage commission. In the fall of 1889 Mr. Pratt stood as the Democratic candidate for district attorney, and was again unsuccessful, being defeated by a few votes ; but the following year he was elected by a majority of two thousand eight hundred, that being the usual majority given the Republican candidates in that district. Mr. Pratt has held minor town-offices in Abington, where he has lived the greater part of his life, and has been a member of the Democratic State central, county, and senatorial committees. He is unmarried.
·
:
360
BOSTON OF TO-DAY.
. .
father's factory, and from that time until his death his career was one of active industry. About the year 1850, after having been with his father some years as a partner, he entered the store of B. W. Dunklee & Co., dealers in stoves, as salesman, and remained in their employ one year, when, with a son of Mr. Gould, an old president of the Blackstone Bank, he formed a partnership, under the name of Pratt & Gould, in the retail stove-business. In 1854 a new partnership was formed, under the name of Pratt, Weeks, & Co., with William G. Lincoln, Allen S. Weeks, and his uncles Thomas and John Jay Barrows as partners. At that time his father, David Pratt, having retired from business, the new firm engaged for a year in the manufacture of castings in Carver, while building a foundry in Watertown for the manufacture of cook and parlor stoves and stove-ware. In 1855 the new foundry was finished, and a considerable business was soon built up, mainly for the Eastern market and that of the Prov- inces. In 1857, owing to severe financial depres- sion, the firm dissolved, and, while its creditors suffered no loss, Mr. Pratt was deprived of the earn- ings of his previous years, emerging from the wreck of his firm a poor man, but with integrity and busi- ness vigor unimpaired. With a determination rarely exhibited in such cases he at once took a lease of the Watertown foundry on his own account, and carried on its business alone with marked success until the following year, 1858, when he formed a partnership with Luke Perkins, also a native of . Carver, under the name of Pratt & Perkins, with William G. Lincoln, one of his old partners, as a special partner. In 1863 Mr. Perkins left the firm, and that of Miles Pratt & Co. was formed, with Mr. Lincoln as the partner. In 1874 this firm was con- solidated with that of George W. Walker & Co., of Boston, under the name of Walker, Pratt, & Co., with Mr. Lincoln and Horace G. and George W. Walker as partners. In 1875 the company was incorporated, under the name of the Walker & Pratt Manufacturing Company, with George W. Walker as president and Miles Pratt as treasurer. After the death of Mr. Pratt, George E. Priest became treas- urer, and the company is still doing a large business, with store on Union street. Since 1863 Oliver Shaw, also a native of the town of Carver, has been the superintendent of the manufacturing business. Mr. Pratt married, in 1851, Sarah B., daughter of Zeb- ulon Chandler, of Carver, a descendant from Edward . Chandler, who appeared in Duxbury in 1633. Mrs. Pratt died March 25, 1858, leaving no children. On the 6th of October, 1859, Mr. Pratt married Ellen M. Coolidge, of Watertown ;
they have had one child, Grace, who married Frederick Robinson, of Watertown. Mr. Pratt died in Watertown on the 9th of August, 1882, and was buried at Mount Auburn. His death occurred at a time when his brain appeared to be in the fullest vigor, and when, with his difficulties, embar- rassments, and obstacles successfully surmounted, he was enjoying the fruits of his labors and indulg- ing in ambitious and well-founded hopes of en- hanced success. He permitted no outside schemes and enterprises to distract his mind, and accepted no office except that of trustee of the Watertown Savings Bank, of which he was the most active founder. Brought up in politics as a Whig, he pre- served his independence of speech and thought, and abandoned the party of his youth when he believed it untrue to the principles of human freedom. Afterwards a Republican, he was still independent, and recognized no authority binding him to its ranks when he believed it had outlived its usefulness and purpose. Nor in religious matters, more than in politics, was he bound by traditions. Born in the Orthodox Congregational Church and educated under its influences, he became in the latter part of his life a Swedenborgian, and died in that faith.
PRAY, WILLIAM, was born in Boston Oct. 24,
WILLIAM PRAY.
1852. He served his time as an apprentice with T. J. Whidden, and went into business as a mason
£
361
BOSTON OF TO-DAY.
and builder in 1876. In r878 he formed a copart- nership with Joseph L. Gooch, and established the firm of Gooch & Pray, which has become one of the leading building and contracting concerns of New England. Under his own personal supervision Mr. Pray erected the Boston Rubber Shoe Company works; the Fire Department repair-shops; the American Express Company's stables, the largest and most expensive stables in the country ; the Atlas and other storehouses ; the Real Estate Trust Build- ing, and other large structures in Boston; the Masonic hall in Malden for Mr. Yerxa; the Old Colony station at New Bedford ; cells, wards, etc., for the State Prison ; and other large works in the Eastern States. Mr. Pray is the president of the Builders' Adjustable Staging Company, and is an active member of the Master Builders' Association. He was married in Boston July 3, 1883, to Miss A. F. Allard. He resides in Malden.
PREBLE, JOSEPH H., was born in Canton, Mass., April 7, 1847. He came to Boston in 1863, and was for a number of years foreman for James P. Neal, who was a successful and substantial Boston builder for twenty-one years. After the death of Mr. Neal, who was accidentally killed on the Boston & Albany Railroad in 1880, his son Alfred J. Neal joined in partnership with Mr. Preble, and the pres- ent firm of Neal & Preble was formed and succeeded to the business of J. P. Neal. Their work is shown in a number of noteworthy buildings, among them the Park Building, corner of Boylston and Park square ; the Minot Building, on Devonshire street ; the Fay Building, on Court street and Franklin avenue ; the Phillips Estate Building, Nos. 7, 8, and 9 Hamilton place ; and the Hamilton Place Building. Among their alterations are included the Adams Buildings and the addition to the Globe Building. Mr. Preble is one of the active members of the Master Builders' Association and of the Charitable Mechanic Association.
PRESCOTT, CHARLES J., son of Edward and Catha- rine L. (Clough) Prescott, was born in Boston Feb. 15, 1838. He was educated in the Boston public schools, graduating from the English High School in the class of 1856. He was first employed as a clerk in the coal and wood business ; then in May, 1862, he became a partner in the firm of W. I .. & C. J. Prescott, and this association continued until 1887. From 1889 to 1891 he was one of the commission- ers of public institutions, appointed to that posi- tion by Mayor Hart ; he had previously served for five years (1876-81) upon the board of directors
for public institutions, under whose charge the in- stitutions were placed before the creation of the commission. He has been a member of the school board (from 1870 to 1875), an alderman (1874 and 1875), and a member of the lower house of the Legislature (1877, 1878, and 1879), serving as chairman of the committee on charitable institutions. In State and national politics he is Republican, and has served on the Republican ward and city commit- tee and State central committee ; in city affairs he is a non-partisan. Mr. Prescott was married in Thetford, Vt., Dec. 30, 1868, to Anna F. Hinckley, daughter of Judge Hinckley of that town ; they have had five children : Arabella, Edward Lyman, Charles J., jr., Anna Hinckley, and Samuel Cobb Prescott (de- ceased).
PRESTON, WILLIAM GIBBONS, architect, son of Jona- than Preston, is a native of Boston. He began his career as an architect in his father's office in 1861, after a long and careful training in Cambridge and Paris. The number and character of prominent buildings in different sections of the country de- signed by him are the best evidences of his taste and skill. He has erected, among other structures, the building of the Boston Society of Natural His- tory on Boylston street, the new Rogers Building belonging to the Institute of Technology, the Massa- chusetts Charitable Mechanic Association Building on Huntington avenue, the Mason Building on Kilby street, the unique Public Library Building in the town of Lincoln, the new John Hancock Building on Devonshire street, the Quincy Market Cold Storage Warehouse, six large buildings of the Boston Uni- versity, a large private hotel on the Back Bay, the Cadet Armory, the Brewer apartment-house, and many others in and around Boston. In the city of Savannah, Ga., he built the Cotton Exchange, the Court House, the Presbyterian Church, and the De Soto Hotel, besides many residences. In Columbus, Ga., he designed the office-building of the Columbus Investment Company ; and his plans were followed in the construction of eleven buildings for the Mas- sachusetts School for the Feeble-Minded at Waltham .and South Boston. The power-house and boiler- house of the West End Street Railway Company at Boston, and also those at East Cambridge, are his design ; and he has built many handsome residences in this city, Cambridge, and Brookline.
PRINCE, CHARLES ALBERT, son of Frederick (). and Helen (Henry) Prince, was born in Win- chester, Mass., Aug. 26, 1852. He was educated in the Winchester public schools, the Boston Latin
362
BOSTON OF TO-DAY.
School, from which he graduated in the class of ment of the University. He had also studied in 1869, and Harvard College, graduating in the class the office of Charles Tracy, of New York, and was admitted to the bar in that city in 1854, but con- tinued his studies until his graduation from the law school. He then began practice in Boston, in the office of Harvey Jewell. In 1862 Hon. William W. Warren, late member of Congress, became his part- ner, and the association continued until Mr. War- ren's death, in 1880. For four years after, Henry R. Brigham was associated with him, and this part- nership continued. until the death of Mr. Brigham. Since 1888 he has had as partners Eugene Tappan and Bentley W. Warren, son of his former partner. His office is at No. 31 Pemberton square. Mr. Proctor was a Republican until tariff issues were raised, since which time he has been independ- ent in his political views. Of late years he has affiliated with the Democrats, especially on the tariff question. He has never aspired to any politi- cal office. He is a member of the Union Club, and of the Eliot Club, Jamaica Plain, where he resides. His practice has been general in charac- ter, but he has large and valuable trusts in his charge.
CHARLES A. PRINCE.
of 1873. He studied law in the office of the late Sidney Bartlett, and was admitted to the bar in 1875. He at once began practice in Boston, and has since continued here, meeting with marked suc- cess. For several years he has been general coun- sel for the New York and New England Railroad. He is a public administrator for Suffolk county. He is prominent in club life, being a member of the Somerset, Union, Algonquin, Athletic, University, and " down-town " clubs in Boston ; of the Man- hattan and Lawyers' Clubs of New York ; the Coun- try Club ; and fishing-clubs in Maine and on Cape Cod. He is also a member of the Boston Bar Association. In June, 1881, he was married to Miss Helen Choate Pratt, a granddaughter of Rufus Choate ; they have one child, Helen Choate Pratt Prince.
.
PROCTOR, THOMAS PARKER, son of Daniel Proctor, a native of Chelmsford, and the sixth generation to reside in that town, and of Elizabeth (Parker) Proctor, a member of the well-known Parker family of New Boston, N.H., was born in Chelmsford, Mass., June 27, 1831. He was prepared for college at Phillips (Andover) Academy, entered Harvard, and was graduated in the class of 1854. Two years later, in 1856, he graduated from the law depart-
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.