USA > Massachusetts > Middlesex County > Cambridge > History of Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1630-1913 > Part 21
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Of new conditions; conquering civic wrong: Saving the state anew by virtuous lives; Guarding their country's honor as their own, And their own as their country's and their sons';
₹43
COOPER-AUSTIN HOUSE
BUILT IN 1657
guard against the perils which new conditions have evolved, the future of the city will be worthy of its honorable past. It will justify the prophecy of Richard Watson Gilder's verses:
"He speaks not well who doth his time deplore, Naming it new and little and obscure, Ignoble and unfit for lofty deeds.
Defying leagued fraud with single truth; Not fearing loss and daring to be pure. When error through the land raged like a pest They calmed the madness caught from mind to mind
By wisdom drawn from eld, and counsel sane; And as the martyrs of the ancient world Gave death for man, so nobly gave they life; Those the great days, and that the heroic age."
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Nurses' Home
Men's Ward
Administration Building
Women's Ward
Operating Building
THE CAMBRIDGE HOSPITAL IN 1906
" In " ..
ANDERSON BRIDGE WHEELWRIGHT HAVEN & HOYT ARCHITECTS ENGINEER
JOHN & RABLIN
ANDERSON BRIDGE
In memory of NICHOLAS LONGWORTHI ANDERSON, a graduate of Harvard College in the Class of 1858, Adjutant, Colonel, Brevet Brigadier and Major General, U. S. V., 1865. Erected by his son, a graduate of Harvard College in the Class of 1888, Captain and Assistant Adjutant-General and Ad- jutant-General of Division U. S. V. in the Spanish-American War, 1898.
The Anderson Bridge
The Anderson Bridge extends across the Charles River and connects Boylston Street in Cambridge with North Harvard Street in Boston, giving adequate accommodation for the traffic between Harvard Square and the Stadium. It is the gift of Larz Anderson, a graduate of Harvard in the Class of 1888, as a memorial of his father, Nicholas Long- worth Anderson. One of the conditions of the gift is that the inscription which is re- produced under the illustration of the Bridge shall be maintained in perpetuity by the city within whose boundary it occurs.
The Bridge, built of brick and concrete, corresponds in construction with the fence around Soldiers Field and also with the Weld Boat House, the latter a gift of the late George W. Weld (Harvard '60), the uncle of Mrs. Larz Anderson. The use of brick in the Bridge likewise carries out the Georgian spirit of the University buildings. The foundation is for the most part of concrete; but granite has been used for the base course where the structure comes in contact with the water and the ground. The concrete construction above the foundation is rein- forced with steel.
The Bridge itself consists of three arches. The one in the middle is 76 feet wide, and measures 16 feet at its highest point. Each of the two flanking arches has a span of 65 feet, with a maximum height of 14 feet. The arches, piers, abutments and balustrades have carefully designed embellishments of brick-work. The side-walks are built of granolithic separated by strips of granite; the road-bed is made of wooden-block paving. The side-walks are raised very little above the level of the road-bed, so that the whole width of the Bridge may be used by foot passengers whenever occasion requires. In- cluding the approaches, the Bridge is 440 feet long; and at the extreme end, with the ten- foot side-walk, 60 feet wide. A monumental staircase on the Cambridge side gives access to the parkway.
Nicholas Longworth Anderson was born in Cincinnati, Ohio, April 22, 1838, the son of Larz Anderson, and a nephew of General Robert Anderson, He was graduated at Harvard College in 1858, after which he spent
NICHOLAS LONGWORTH ANDERSON
about two years in study at the German universities. Returning to America in 1860, he began the study of law; but on the break- ing out of the Civil War he enlisted as a private. On April 19, 1861, he was com- missioned lieutenant and adjutant of the 6th Ohio Volunteers; on June 12, following he was made lieutenant-colonel, and in August of the succeeding year, colonel. He was with the Regiment in the West Virginia campaign, and shared in all the marches and long battles of General Buell, Rosecrans, and Thomas, being wounded at Shiloh, and again at Stone River and Chickamauga. On March 13, 1865, he was brevetted brigadier- general for gallant conduct at Stone River, and major-general for distinguished gallantry at Chickamauga. The war over, he completed his preparation for the bar, to which he was duly admitted at Cincinnati. Subsequently he removed to Washington. His death oc- curred at Lucerne, Switzerland, Sept. 18, 1892.
BIOGRAPHIES
REV. EDWARD ABBOTT, D.D.
ABBOTT, EDWARD, Rev. D.D., for nearly thirty years associated with St. James Episcopal Church, as rector and rector emeritus, was born in Farmington, Me., July 15, 1841. He was the youngest son of Jacob and Harriet Vaughan
Rev. EDWARD ABBOTT, D.D.
Abbott. He was prepared for college at the Farmington Academy and was graduated from New York University in 1860; this institution, moreover, bestowed upon him his doctor's degree in 1890. He was educated in theology at the Andover Theological Seminary and was ordained as Congregational minister in 1863. Prior to this, however, he spent some months with the Army of the Potomac, during the Civil War, in the service of the United States Sani- tary Commission. Dr. Abbott was twice mar- ried. His first wife was Clara Davis, by whom he had one son and two daughters. Of these
children, Mrs. Eleanor Hallowell (Abbott) Coburn of Lowell alone survives. Mrs. Coburn is a writer of short stories under her maiden name. In 1883 he married Katherine Kelley Dunning. Dr. Abbott organized the Stearns Chapel Society, as a Congregationalist, which has since become the Pilgrim Church in Cam- bridgeport. He retired from his duties there in 1869 to become associate editor of the Con- gregationalist; from 1877 to 1888, he was editor of the Literary World, serving in the same capacity again from 1895 to 1903. During his early Cambridge experience, he was a member of the School Board, and was chaplain of the State Senate. In the seventies, through a gradual change in his religious views, Dr. Abbott was confirmed in the Protestant faith and was ordained deacon by Bishop Paddock, January, 1879. In the following year, on the twentieth of January, he was made priest, and became rector of St. James Parish. Here was Dr. Abbott's life work.
When he began his rectorship, there was only the Greenleaf Chapel in Beech Street. In 1884 a commodious parish house was erected. It is believed to be one of the first, if not the first, ever built for an Episcopal Church. In 1885, under Dr. Abbott's supervision, the parish purchased the corner lot, and in 1889, the new church was built. Devoted as he was to his parish duties, Dr. Abbott nevertheless was the author of a number of books and stories among which are the following: "A Paragraph History of the American Revolution"; "Revolutionary Times"; "History of Cambridge"; "Memoir of Jacob Abbott"; "Phillips Brooks Memorial," 1900; "The Bells Own Story," 1901; "Mrs. James Greenleaf," 1902; "John Summerfield Lindsay, D.D."; "Memorial Sermon," 1904. His more important magazine articles were: "Lighthouses"; "The Galaxy," 1869; "The Parkman Murder," 1875; "Wellesley College," Harper's Magazine, 1876; "The Androscoggin Lakes," Harper's Magazine, 1877; and "Grand
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Manan and Quoddy Bay," Harper's Magazine, 1878.
In public life, Dr. Abbott filled numerous posts, such as "Visitor" to Wellesley College, Trustee of the Society for the Relief of Widows and Orphans of Clergymen; President of Asso- ciated Charities of Cambridge; President of Cambridge Branch of the Indian Rights Asso- ciation; Member of the Missionary Council of the General Church; Member of Provisional Committee on Church Work in Mexico; Presi- dent of the Indian Industrial League; President of the Cambridge City Mission.
Dr. Abbott spent a part of his early life in Cambridge in a house since burned, which he built in Channing Street. It was the first dwelling in that now well occupied thorough- fare; and because from its windows he could see across the meadows to the Charles River, he gave it the name "Long Look House." In later life he lived at 11 Dana Street, the home still occupied by his widow. The services of Dr. Abbott as pastor were sought from time to time by a number of parishes away from Cam- bridge. Among such calls may be mentioned that to be rector of Christ Church, Detroit, Mich., in 1885; the rectorship of Trinity Church, Columbus, O., in 1888; and the superintendency of the Boston City Mission, in the same year; in 1889, Dr. Abbott was elected by the General Convention of the Protestant Episcopal Church to be missionary bishop of Japan. All these calls were notable, and suggested the type of man to whom they were extended; in particular, the election to Japan opened a field of activity much to Dr. Abbott's liking; but he felt that his place was with his parish in Cambridge, and after careful consideration he declined the honor. Dr. Abbott resigned as rector of St. James Parish in June, 1905, but his resignation did not take effect until July 1, 1906, and even then was accepted with great reluctance by the Vestry.
His death occurred on April 5, 1908, but his memory is still green. Following a largely attended funeral in St. James Church on April 7, the burial service was held in Brunswick, Me., on April 8. His resting-place is within sight of the campus of Bowdoin College and of the Library building which contains his Memorial, the Abbott Room. In Brunswick, members
of his family had resided, and from Bowdoin, many of his ancestors had been graduated. In 1905, Dr. Abbott began the preparation of a history of St. James's from careful records which he had kept through many years. The manu- script was completed some time before his death and was published by the Vestry in 1909, under the title, "St. James Parish, Cambridge; Forty Years of Parish History." The picture of Cambridge as Dr. Abbott knew it-now nearly fifty years ago-is given briefly, but interest- ingly; and in all her growth and useful activities, Cambridge had no warmer friend than Dr. Edward Abbott.
WILLIAM ROBERT ADAMS
ADAMS, WILLIAM ROBERT, dry-goods merchant of East Cambridge for forty years, was born at Derry, N.H., in 1839, and at the age of fifteen years he came to Cambridge, where he resided up to the time of his death, which occurred February 6, 1910.
He was a veteran of the Civil War, having entered the army at the age of twenty-three years. He served in Company E of the 44th Regiment Massachusetts Volunteers for two years, being honorably discharged with the rank of corporal. In 1864 he re-enlisted for three months, at the end of which time he was honorably discharged and returned to his home in East Cambridge.
In 1870 he opened a dry goods store on Cambridge Street, East Cambridge. He changed his location after a few years, and located at 258 Cambridge Street, where he was located for thirty years. Altogether he was in business on that street for forty years, which was up to the time of his death.
He was prominent in Post 57, G.A.R., and for several years, until his death, served as chaplain and patriotic instructor. He had several times refused to become its commander. At the dedication of the Soldiers and Sailors Monument on the Boston Common, he took a very prominent part in the exercises. He was a member of the Cambridge Veteran Fire- men's Association, of Lechmere Council, Royal Arcanum, and of the Knights of Honor, of which he was chaplain. He was also a director of the East Cambridge Savings Bank.
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BIOGRAPHIES
At the Trinity Methodist church, of which he was a member, he was one of the leaders. He had been treasurer of the church for over twenty years, and was also class leader and a teacher in the Sunday school.
Mr. Adams was a very benevolent and genial man, and the residents of East Cambridge,
WILLIAM ROBERT ADAMS
where he was identified with the people's interests, will miss him, particularly the poor people of old Ward Three whom he always befriended.
ALEXANDER AGASSIZ
AGASSIZ, ALEXANDER, the son of Louis Agassiz, was born at Neuchâtel, Switzerland, December 17, 1835, his mother being Cecile Braun, a sister of Alexander Braun, Louis Agassiz's college friend. She was distinguished in many ways, but especially by her skill in drawing. Her father had already become known in the scientific world by his embryological investigations, and Humboldt advised him to visit America, which he did in 1846-alone, because his circumstances were limited and the venture doubtful. He was, however, at once invited to deliver a course of lectures on "Com- parative Embryology," at the Lowell Institute,
and soon saw that the opportunities he sought were to be found here, and he remained. In 1847[his wife died, and Alexander, a boy of eleven years, came to Cambridge to live with his father. Later his father married Miss Elizabeth Cary, and this riveted the bonds which bound the son to Cambridge, where he for nearly half a century resided.
Alexander prepared for Harvard, and gradu- ated in the class of 1855. Even then it was not made clear that he had his father's vocation, though he entered the Lawrence Scientific School for a course of engineering and chemistry, and got his B.S. in 1857. Meanwhile he assisted his parents in the girl's school which Mrs. Agassiz opened at the corner of Quincy Street and Broadway, for the times were hard and Professor Agassiz's investigations were costly and his professional income limited. After an extra two years' course in chemistry, Alex- ander Agassiz joined the Coast Survey, the great chief of which, Professor Bache, was one of his father's warmest friends. He was assigned to duty on the California coast, and found time to collect specimens for the Cambridge Museum in mines on the shore.
He spent the greater part of the winter of 1859-1860 at Panama and Acapuleo, collecting specimens for the Museum of Comparative Zoology at Cambridge. The next spring he resumed his work at San Francisco. After examining the mines in the interior of Cali- fornia in July, 1860, he returned to Cambridge, where he was appointed agent of the museum. He then took the full course in the zoological and geological departments of the Lawrence Scientific School. Previous to the absence of his father in Brazil in 1865, he had been ap- pointed assistant in zoology at the museum, of which he was in full charge at that time. In 1865, he also engaged in coal mining in Pennsyl- vania, additional to his work at home in Massa- chusetts.
In 1866 he was in the Lake Superior region as a mining expert. He was made treasurer of the Calumet, and the next year general super- intendent of both the Calumet and Hecla mines. He put in an immense amount of work for their development. People are accustomed to think of mining successes as windfalls, and certainly those who had a cue to go into the stock of the
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A HISTORY OF CAMBRIDGE, MASSACHUSETTS
discredited "coppers" and bought the shares for the price of waste paper had great luck, but it took Mr. Agassiz fifteen hours a day for months and months to make the properties what they are. Once, after a long and irrepressible fire in the mines had raged for months, he had the happy thought of extinguishing it by blowing in carbonic acid gas. He was fertile in his ex- pedients, scientific in planning, practical inexe- cution, and the millions that have enriched Boston, enlarged her charities and spread hap- piness all about the land were the direct gift of this man's wisdom and energy.
He afterwards went abroad to examine the museums of the leading countries of Europe. When in 1870 he returned to Cambridge he was made assistant curator of the museum. His father died in 1874, and Alexander succeeded him as curator. In that year he was also elected by the Alumni as one of the overseers of Har- vard. Four years subsequently he was chosen by the corporation one of its fellows. He re- signed the honor in 1885, on account of bad health. Mr. Agassiz retained his connection with the museum, which he enriched by liberal gifts, and was director of the University Museum at the time of his death. It is stated that in all he gave more than half a million dollars to Harvard University.
Mr. Anderson, the tobacconist, gave Profes- sor Agassiz an island in the Elizabeth group- Penikese for a summer school, and Alexander Agassiz had charge of it in 1873. Through lack of funds for its maintenance, the school was abandoned.
Alexander Agassiz is next found exploring the west coast of South America-Peru, Chili and Lake Titicaca-sending home tons of specimens to the Peabody Museum; and in England assist- ing Sir Wyville Thompson to arrange the treas- ures brought by the Challenger, and securing specimens for his own museum. Some results of his work in various parts of South America in 1875 are seen in the collection of Peruvian antiquities at the Peabody Museum.
Agassiz spent the winters from 1876 to 1881 in deep-sea dredging, the steamer Blake being placed at his disposal by the Coast Survey.
Alexander Agassiz was for many years presi- dent of the Calumet & Hecla Mining Company. The Academie des Sciences, Paris, awarded him a prize, and Cambridge University the
degree of LL.D. In 1910 he received the Vic- toria Research Medal. He was a member of many scientific organizations in America and abroad, and the author of numerous works on marine zoology.
He was married in 1860 to Miss Anna Russell. His three sons are Maximilian, George R. and Rodolphe L. Agassiz.
Alexander Agassiz died on March 27, 1910.
LOUIS AGASSIZ
AGASSIZ, LOUIS (1807-1873), a Swiss-Ameri- can naturalist, especially distinguished in ich-
=
LOUIS AGASSIZ
thyology and the study of glaciers, was born at Motier in the canton of Fribourg. He became in 1832 a professor at Neuchâtel. In 1839 he began his never-completed Historie Naturelle des Poissons d'Eau Douce de l'Europe Centrale, and published between 1833 and 1843 the five vol- umes of text (with five more of plates) of his Recherches sur les Poissons Fossiles. Between 1839 and 1845 he made (chiefly on the Unteraar Glacier in the Bernese Oberland) some of the earliest recorded observations on the motion of glaciers. Narrative accounts of their jour- neys were published by Desor in his two series of Excursions et Séjours sur les Glaciers (1844- 1845); and Agassiz embodied his scientific observations in his Études sur les Glaciers (1840)
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BIOGRAPHIES
and his Nouvelle Études (1847). His theory of glacier motion (dilation of water frozen in the crevasses) soon gave way, however, to that formulated by Forbes (gravitation plus plas- ticity). In 1847 Agassiz accepted the newly- founded professorship of natural history in the Lawrence Scientific School of Harvard University, a post which he held till his death, having in 1862 become a citizen of the United States. He made many scientific journeys in America (particularly one to Brazil in 1865), and in 1858 founded at Harvard the Museum of Comparative Zoology, which is especially rich in fishes. He assailed with great earnest- ness . Darwin's evolutionary theory, which to the end he refused to accept. Agassiz's memory is preserved in the Alps by the Agassizhorn (12,980 feet), in the Bernese Oberland; in Arizona by a peak 10,000 feet, near the Grand Cañon of the Colorado; in Utah by a peak in the Uintah range; and in North Dakota, Min- nesota and Manitoba by the basin termed Lake Agassiz.
Besides the works mentioned, his publications include Contributions to the Natural History of the United States (four volumes); The Structure of Animal Life (1874); A Journey to Brazil (1868). See his wife's Life and Correspondence of Agassiz (1886) and Marcou's Life, Letters and Works of Agassiz (1896).
FRANK AUGUSTUS ALLEN
ALLEN, FRANK AUGUSTUS, son of Horace O. and Elizabeth (Derby) Allen, was born in Sanford, York County, Me., January 29, 1835. He received his education in the village schools of his native town and in the Academy at Alfred, Me. His father died when he was two years old, and at the age of seventeen years he left home and worked as a bobbin-boy in the cotton mills in Biddeford. From the age of eighteen to twenty-one he was a clerk in a dry-goods store; and in the spring of 1856, when he was twenty-one years old, he began the dry-goods business on his own account, at Saccarappa, Me. A year later he removed to Portsmouth, N.H., continuing in the same business, and three years after he sold out his retail business in Portsmouth, and entered into the wholesale dry-goods business in Boston. In 1863 he removed his business to New York, at one time
employing more than five hundred persons and one hundred sewing machines in the manu- facture of ladies' garments. In January, 1868, Mr. Allen, having relinquished the dry-goods trade, returned to Boston and established the Oriental Tea Company on Court St. In July, 1910, after transferring his interest in this business to his son and other junior partners, Mr. Allen retired altogether from active business life.
While in Portsmouth, Mr. Allen was married to Miss Annie G. Scribner, of Gorham, Me.,
FRANK AUGUSTUS ALLEN
who died in 1865, leaving two children, Annie E. and Herbert M. In 1866 he married Elizabeth M. Scribner. Mr. Allen came to Cambridge in April, 1871. He served in the Common Council in 1876 and 1877, the latter year as president of that board. He was Mayor of the city in 1877, and a member of the Board of Sinking Fund Commissioners from January, 1878, until January, 1912, and chairman of the Board during the last ten years of this period of thirty-four years' service. Also a member of the Water Board from July, 1894, until June, 1899.
Mr. Allen is a member of the Prospect Street Congregational Church, and a No-license Re- publican in politics. He has always been promi- nent in all plans for the improvement and de- velopment of Cambridge.
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OSCAR FAYETTE ALLEN
ALLEN, OSCAR FAYETTE, son of Harry and Jane (Whitman) Allen, was born at Pomfret, Vt., January 20, 1843. His father was a
happy disposition, and never had an enemy. He was a Universalist; a Whig in politics, a Free Soiler, and later a Republican. He trained in the early militia. Jane (Whitman)
U
OSCAR FAYETTE ALLEN
farmer, a native of Pomfret, Vt., born May 13, 1814; died May 31, 1901, and was engaged in the farming business all of his life. He was a man of remarkable perseverance, had a very
Allen, mother of Oscar Fayette Allen, was born in Pomfret, Vt., April 23, 1919, and died June 6, 1888. Her father, William, was a farmer and served in the Revolution.
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BIOGRAPHIES
Oscar Fayette Allen received his education in the common schools and in the Green Mountain Institute at Woodstock, Vt., now the Green Mountain Perkins Academy. When he was nineteen years old he began to teach in his own district school, the first term. The second term he taught in the (Chedel) district, near his home, and the third term at the Broad Brook district in Royalton. He then taught the No. 9 district at Sharon, and at East Bar- nard, Vt., and the fifth term again in his own district. In the fall of 1867 he removed to Wauconda, Ill., where he taught a year in the primary and high schools. He then removed to Cameron, Mo., and taught in the public and private schools for eight years. Here he became identified with the Congregational church and sang in the choir, and was superin- tendent of the Sunday school. In 1876 he came to Boston, and later accepted a position as salesman in Dodge's Ninety-Nine Cent Store on Hanover Street. After two years with that establishment he entered the Cambridge Sav- ings Bank, where for seven years he worked as clerk and bookkeeper, and also served as paying teller. In 1884 he was elected treasurer of the institution, which position he now holds. He is also trustee and clerk of the corporation.
Mr. Allen resides at 39 Martin Street, in a beautiful home which he built in 1900. He attends the Unitarian church, which was the first church in Cambridge, being founded in 1633. He is a Republican in politics. He is a life member of Mizpah Lodge of Masons at Cambridge, joining May 13, 1889. He served as its Worshipful Master in 1900 and 1901, and also as auditor of the Grand Lodge of Masons of Massachusetts since 1901. He is a member of Cambridge Royal Arch Chapter of Masons, since November 13, 1891, and is also a life member of this body. He received his degrees of knighthood in the Boston Com- mandery of Knights Templars in Boston, April 15, 1903, and served as its treasurer in 1906 and 1907, although he has now resigned. He is a member of Signet Chapter, No. 22, of the order of the Eastern Star.
Mr. Allen is a charter member of the Cam- bridge Historical Society, which was chartered in 1905, and was treasurer of this society in 1905, 1906 and 1907; now resigned. He is a
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