History of Middlesex County, Massachusetts : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Vol. II, Part 25

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton) ed. cn
Publication date: 1890
Publisher: Philadelphia : J. W. Lewis & Co.
Number of Pages: 1226

USA > Massachusetts > Middlesex County > History of Middlesex County, Massachusetts : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Vol. II > Part 25

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The first twelve years of his life were passed at the paternal home on the Merrimack River's bank, and within sound of its many-voiced waters, and at the public schools of Lowell. In 1863 he went to St. Paul's School, at Concord, New Hampshire, under the Rev. Dr. Coit, and remained there four years. His father owned large numbers of shares of the cap-

1 By Hon. Charles Cowley, LL.D.

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ital stock of various manufacturing companies, some of which had suffered immense losses in consequence of the ignorance of their managers touching the methods and processes of their business. Mr. Ayer early adopted his father's views of the necessity of acquir- ing a practical knowledge of the details of any busi- ness in which he might be engaged, or in which lie might invest his capital. Upon quitting St. Paul's School, therefore, he cheerfully entered the employ of the Suffolk Mills as an operative, beginning with the picker in the cotton-room, and working his way up through the carding, spinning and weaving de- partments, sueeessively, to the machine-shop. Thus he can say, as General Banks has often said, "I have worked in every room in a cotton-mill from wheel-pit to belfry." Thus he acquired personal knowledge of every process through which cotton passes from the loose fibre to the finished cloth. Having learned all these processes in their order, he left the mill, and fitted for college at Cambridge, passing his examinations in the summer of 1869. For the last twelve years he has been a director of the Tremont Suffolk Mills.

In the month of July, 1869, with the co-operation of several other bright young men in Lowell, he or- ganized the Franklin Literary Association. As this association has since developed into two distinct bod- ies, both political, it is proper to say that the origi- nal Franklin Literary Association was wholly free from political character or political purposes ; it was simply a debating club. Its first meeting was held in the basement of Phineas Whiting's belting store, and in the absence of chairs its first president was installed upon the head of a barrel. At the meetings of this body, Mr. Ayer acquired a habit of no small value, "the habit of thinking upon his legs " (as Macaulay once defined it), and at the same time ex- .pressing his thoughts in a clear and orderly manner.

In 1873 Mr. Ayer graduated at Harvard College with honor. He then went to Europe with his father, combining study with his travels; and on his return in 1874 entered the Law School at Cambridge. After pursuing the study of the law there for two terms, he was admitted to practice as an attorney and coun- selor-at-law. In 1875, taking as his law partner Lem- uel H. Babcock, Esq., he opened an office in the Transcript Building, at the corner of Washington and Milk Streets, Boston, where the two friends practiced law with success under the firm-name of Ayer & Babcock. Ordinarily, a lawyer has neither the op- portunity nor the capacity to argue complicated ques- tions of law before a court of law with much satisfae- tion, either to himself or to his client, until after sev- eral years' practice before a single judge or before juries.

" The heights by great men reached and kept, Were not attained by sudden flight, But they, while their companions slept, Were toiling upwarde in the night."

But whatever Longfellow may have said or sung to the contrary, "the heights" have sometimes been

reached " by sudden flight." Lawyers have some- times sprung to the front at a bound by being ready to take advantage of "the occasion sudden." Mr. Ayer had an exceptional experience of this kind. It happened in this way. His father owned a control- ling interest in a company incorporated 'under the laws of New York for the purpose of supplying the city of Rochester with water from Hemlock Lake. Litigation arose between the company and the city. Notwithstanding the intricacy of the legal questions involved, Mr. Ayer, who was then at the Law School of Harvard University, took pains to study them thoroughly, and to make himself familiar with them ; not with any intent to participate in the argument of the case, but from an intelligent curiosity touching a matter in which his father had a great interest. Judge Henry R. Selden was his father's counsel, and when the case came on before the General Term of the Supreme Court, Mr. Ayer went to Rochester to attend the argument. He afterwards wrote the following modest account of the complete surprise which was there given him :

"I accompanied Judge Selden to the court-room, and when our case was called, without a word or look of previous warning to me, he arose and proceeded to introduce me to the court as his associate counsel from Massachusetts, announcing, to my gaping aston- ishment, that I would open the case. With thump- ing knees I faced the court-for the first time in my life-and stated the facts, arguing one or two points, talking about half an hour."

Notwithstanding the suddenness of this call, Mr. Ayer acquitted himself with much credit. The case was won, and his father was so well pleased at the re- sult, that he presented him with a check for $10,000. This was his first professional fee. This incident gave him an insight into the peculiar ways of senior counsel, which made him for some time shy of court- rooms. In 1876, in consequence of his father's health having broken down, he was obliged to abandon the practice of law to look after the lawyers. He re- cently wrote: "I am sorry to say I have never gotten entirely rid of the law. I have been more or less ex- tensively involved in it ever since, but, like Micaw- ber, 'principally as defendant on civil process.' My father's estate was left in a complicated and hazard- ous condition, and it took me some twelve years to extricate it from the dangers to which it was exposed. My time has been more or less largely occupied with this duty ever since the death of my father, in 1878."

On the 26th of October, 1876, the Town Hall of Ayer, the gift of Mr. Ayer's father to that town, was dedicated with appropriate services. In delivering to the town's committee the keys of this edifice, in behalf of his father, Mr. Ayer spoke with marked fe- licity, preserving his self-control under circumstances which might have unnerved another man. Very tender and impressive were his allusions to his father, whose life was then drawing to a close : "This cheer-

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ful hall, this large assembly, these bright faces buoyant with life, only serve to remind me bitterly, that he who raised this roof and these walls, and who so much an- ticipated this opportunity to join you hand iu hand, cannot be here. It was an occasion he had long looked forward to, with the abiding hope and iuteu- tion of being present himself to tell you the lasting obligations he is under to the good people of this town." His address, and others made on this oc- casion, were printed entire in Cowley's "Reminiscen- ces of James C. Ayer, and the Town of Ayer."

The justice and expediency of the doctrine that representative bodies, charged with political func- tions, should contain representatives of the minori- ties, as well as the majorities, of their constituents, have been appreciated by many of the best thinkers of our times. A little reflection will satisfy any im- partial mind that this principle is equally applicable to the government of manufacturing, mining and other joint-stock companies. Mr. Ayer was among the first to see the wisdom and expediency of minority representation and cumulative voting in industrial corporations. In 1885 a bill, embodying these prin- ciples was presented to the Legislature of Michigan. As a director of the " Lake Superior Ship Canal Rail- way and Iron Company," and of the "Portage Lake and River Improvement Company," and as a stock- holder in these and other joint-stock companies in that State, Mr. Ayer had large interests at stake, and he sub- mitted to the Michigan Legislature an argument in favor of the bill, which was simply unanswerable.

The bill became a law in Michigan. Similar meas- ures have been passed in other States and are agitated in many more. The brief of this argument, which has been printed and widely circulated, shows that, in the struggle between "the masses and the classes," the sympathies of Mr. Ayer are with the people at large.

The 14th of April, 1890, being the twenty-fifth anniversary of the formal restoration of the Federal flag over Fort Sumter, was celebrated by the Port Royal Society, by a reunion of military and naval veterans who served in the Department of the South and South Atlantic Blockading Squadron, in Hunt- ington Hall, Lowell. MIr. Ayer was present, with other invited guests, and made an address which was widely published. Old Bostonians remember well the surprise which Charles Sumner gave them in 1845 by his Fourth-of-July oration on the "True Grandeur of Nations." Instead of expatiating on war before the representatives of the army and navy, the State Militia and the city fathers there assembled, Mr. Sumner astonished them with an oration against war and in favor of universal peace. Mr. Ayer treated his audience to a similar surprise. "The heroes of the future," he said, " will not be found on the fields of slaughter, and the destruction of human life to settle national disputes will cease to be glory."

His speech on this occasion contrasted pleasantly with those made by the veterans of the war. They

dwelt on perils through which the country had already passed; Mr. Ayer turned his back upon the past and discoursed of perils which becloud the future. By his advocacy of universal peace, of the settlement of international difficulties by arbitration, of a life tenure of office for all deserving officers in the civil service, Mr. Ayer showed that he has the power to anticipate the future,

" Forerun his age and race, and let His feet milleniums hence be set In midst of knowledge dreamed not yet."

Very gratifying to his own friends and his father's friends in Lowell was the following passage in this address : "Lowell is always my home-I am only visiting New York. Lowell is all the more attractive to me when I come here from the crowded, noisy streets of that fretful metropolis. It affords me a world of pleasure to see you all face to face-to stand once again on the banks of the beautiful river where I wandered as a boy, and where my memory and affec- tion wander still."

The Literary Society of Ayer having presented their collection of books to that town as the nucleus of a public library, Mr. Ayer, in April, 1890, made a gift to the town of five thousand dollars to be ex- pended in the purchase of books-a sum more than sufficient to place their library upon a level with that of any other town of similar size in Massachusetts. On May 3d the people of the town, in public meet- ing assembled, extended to Mr. Ayer, by a resolution unanimously adopted, "the expression of their full appreciation and heartfelt thanks for his handsome and timely remembrance ; " recognizing in this mu- nificent act " a noble and loving tribute to the memory of the man whose name their town bears." This library will be formally opened before the close of the year, Mr. Ayer giving an address on that occasion.

The care of the vast properties left by his father in different States engrosses much of Mr. Ayer's time. Besides the companies already mentioned he is one of the directors of the Lowell and Andover Railroad, of the J. C. Ayer Company, and of the New York Tribune. But in the midst of all these enterprises and employments he has found time for generous studies. He has given much attention to various branches of economic science. He has opposed by voice and pen successive schemes for debasing the silver coinage and inflating the currency. He has advocated the reform of the tariff and the civil service and the maintenance of a sound currency re- deemable in coin.

C. I. Hood & Co., prepare Hood's Sarsaparilla, Hood's Vegetable Pills, Hood's Tooth Powder and Hood's Olive Ointment. Their laboratory on Thorn- dike Street, is of brick and is four stories in height, with basement. They possess machinery for produc- ing 75,000,000 books and pamphlets per annum, to be used for advertising. They employ 275 hands. The whole establishment is admirable for its system, neat-

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ness and adaptation to the extensive business of the firm. Mr. Hood is one of the most successful and en- terprising eitizens of Lowell. He was born in Vermont in 1845, and was apprenticed to Samuel Kidder, an apothecary in Lowell, at the age of fifteen years. Subsequently he became partner in an apothecary store at the corner of Central and Merrimack Streets. While in this store lie first offered to the public a new medieine, Hood's Sarsaparilla. The enterprise proved a success and the medicine became famous. The business was very rapidly extended, constantly out-growing its accommodations. At length, in 1883, the spacious laboratory now in use was ereeted. The building is constructed throughout in the most substantial manner. The massive tanks for the sarsaparilla have a capacity of 90,000 bottles. The firm does its own printing, and its advertising, has reached immense proportions. The character and quality of the artieles produced by the firm are of the highest order, and Mr. Hood, who is only forty- four years of age, is in the midst of his honorable and very successful career.

A. W. Dows & Co., Central Street, manufacture Dows' Cough Cure, Diarrhoea Syrup, Dows' Soothing Cordial, &e. The company started the business about 1877, being successors of A. W. Dows, Sr., who had been in the business for about thirty-five years. The firm consists of Charles N. and A. M. Dows, sons of A. W. Dows, who founded the business.

Lowell is said to be the birth-place of the modern soda-fountain. In 1861 Gustavus D. Dows, brother of A. W. Dows, received a patent for the marble soda- fountain, now so generally used, and the first fouutain made under this patent was set up in the store of liis brother, A. W. Dows, in Lowell. The inventor set up his business in England as well as in Boston. But he was pursued by disaster. The five-story building in Boston, in which was his drug-store, was blown up by an explosion, and soon after a bronchial affection ended the inventor's life, at the age of seventy-six years.

Geo. S. Mowe, South Loring and D Streets, manu- factures Dr. Mowe's Cough Balsam, used in Dr. Mowe's private practice fifty years ago, and for thirty years extensively used by apotheearies generally.

Dr. Daniel Mowe, the originator of this widely known medicine, was born in Pembroke, N. H., in 1790, came to Lowell in 1831, after having been a practicing physician in New Durham, N. H., for several years. In Lowell he was for twenty-nine years a highly respected physician. He died in 1860 at the age of seventy years.

The Moxie Nerve Food Company was orgauized in 1885. It manufactures a medieine ealled Moxie Nerve Food, after a recipe said to have been for several years in the possession of Dr. Augustin Thompson, of Loweil. The business has had a re- markably rapid development, and the medicine is al- rcady extensively known and sold throughout the country. The Highland Skating Rink, with a floor-

room of 19,060 fect, has been purchased for this manufactory, where 30,000 bottles of the medicine can be made in a day. Dr. Thompson is the general manager. The company employs fifty hands and five horses. It has a branch office in Chicago.

George S. Hull, on Merrimack, corner of John Street, manufactures Lyford's Magic Pain Cure, Harvard Bronchial Syrup, Hall's Veterinary Lini- ment ; also makes essenees, syrups, flavoring extracts, ete. This business was started by S. (}. Lyford in 1877. About 1880 George S. Hull entered the firm. At the present time George S. Hull is sole proprietor.

A. C. Stevens, Middlesex Street, is the originator and proprietor of Stevens' Sarsaparilla and Stevens' Dandelion Pills, and manufacturer of strengthening, porous, belladonna and rheumatic plasters, cough mixture and tooth powders, employing three hands. The business was started in 1875.

Dr. J. A. Masta, Varney Street, manufactures Dr. Masta's celebrated Cough Balsam. The business was established in 1854, the medieine having been used as early as 1852.

Tweed's Liniment for man or beast, prepared by the S. E. Tweed Company, Middlesex Street. This com- pany started about 1886, and was reorganized in 1890. It employs four men.

MISCELLANEOUS MANUFACTURES .- Whithed & Co., corner Middlesex and School Streets, manufacture hard, soft and mill soaps, and deal in hides and calf- skins, employing ten men. They are the succes- sors of Samuel Horn & Co., one of the oldest and most respectable firms of the city.

SAMUEL HORN .- In every populous city and thriving community in the New England States there is a elass of men, growing more numerous every year, who possess wealth and culture and an honorable name, who love their business and are known and houored in the social world, but who have no taste for public life. They are content with their elegant homes, their gardens and their lawns, their fruit-trees and shrubbery, their pleasant libra- ries and their shady walks. Such men are the bene- factors of society. They set a noble though silent example before the young, showing them that the highest happiness in human life is not to be sought in political honors or public display, but rather in the retirement of domestic life, and the humane and rational enjoyments of a cultured home.

To this class belongs the subject of this sketch, the venerable Samuel Horn, who, at the age of eighty- three years, still remains in vigorous health among us, an honored representative of that sterling class of business meu who are recognized as the founders of the city of Lowell. Samuel Horn was born on Dec. 31, 1806, and was the son of Windsor and Matilda (Nichols) Horn, of Southboro', Mass. He received his early education in the district schools of South- boro'. After leaving school he was engaged, until the age of twenty-two years, in the management of the'

Samuel Horn

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farm of Col. Dexter Fay, of Southboro,' in driving cattle to the great cattle market at Brighton, and iu other such employments as are wont to engage a thrifty young farmer. But resolved to seek a wider and more profitable field of enterprise, he came to Lowell in 1828, when the great manufactories, just starting, invited new laborers from the surrounding country, and having learned the art of soap-making, he formed a partnership, in 1830, with Orin Nichols, of Southboro', for' the manufacture and sale of soap in Lowell, and for dealing in tallow and candles, under the firm-name of Nichols & Horn. The place of business of this firm was on Central Street, on land now occupied by Tyler Street, the laying out of that street requiring the removal of their shop. After one or two years Otis Allen took the place of Mr. Nichols as partner, and the firm-name became Horn & Allen. About 1833 the business was removed to the corner of Middlesex and School Streets, where it continued for fifty-three years.

For fifty-eight years, with the exception of about fonr years, in which his health demauded a tempo- rary retirement, Mr. Horn carried on the soap busi- ness in Lowell, having had as partners, at various times, Orin Nichols, Otis Allen, Martin N. Horn, his brother, and Alfred S. Horn, his only son. During this long period Mr. Horn made all kinds of fancy, domestic and manufacturers' soap, supplying not only families and traders, but many private industries and corporations in Lowell. He also sent large quantities to other cities, having customers of fifty years' stand- ing.

He was also largely engaged in the purchase and sale of hides and skins. He shipped large quantities of tallow to Liverpool, where, on account of his high commercial standing and honorable dealing, he com- manded a higher price than other shippers. He also sent large quantities of candles to California, Cuba and other places. So high a reputation did he ac- quire in the commercial world, that, at one time, a counterfeit article was placed upon the market with the false label, " Horn's Tallow."

Mr. Horn, having been a citizen of Lowell almost from its origin as a municipality, has taken an active interest in its growth and prosperity. He was one of the founders of the Wamesit National Bank and of the Merrimack River Savings Bank, and has been, from the start, a director of one and a trustee of the other.

In 1839 he was a member of the City Government, devoting to the duties of the position much time which, he believed, should be given to his business. Accordingly, he has since refused all political and public office. In 1886 he retired from business, hav- ing accumulated an ample amount of property, and having reached the eightieth year of his life.

Mr. Horn is a gentleman of high character, of dig- nified bearing and commanding personal presence His elegant residence on Smith Street, in the suburbs of the city, with its shade-trees and walks, and its fine

lawn extending over several acres, affords a most eli- gible retreat for the repose of his declining years.

O. D. Wilder, Western Avenue, uses one run of stones, principally for grinding corn. He employs four meu. He started the business abont 1880, with Frank B. Sherburne as partner. Sherburne left the firm about 1881. The firm succeeded Sherburne & Morse.

P. M. Jefferson, Charles Street, manufactures fam- ily, laundry, ammonia, chemical, factory, scouring and soft soaps. He started the business about 1870.

The location of Mr. Jefferson's business has a his- tory. Adam Putnam, long known to the people of Lowell as a soap manufacturer and senior member of the well-known firm of Putnam & Currier, was born in Stow, Mass. He came to East Chelmsford (now Lowell) iu 1822 and took charge of a part of Hurd's Woolen-Mills. After several years in this service he became a dealer in paints, oils and glass, on Central Street. In 1846 he formed a partnership with John Currier in soap-making, which continued for twenty- two years, until the death of Mr. Putnam, in 1868, at the age of sixty-nine years. Addison Putnam, the son of Mr. Putnam, is a well-known and enterprising dealer in clothing in Lowell. John Currier, the ju- nior partner, was born in Amesbury June 10, 1810; came to Lowell December 4, 1830, and died Novem- ber 28, 1881, at the age of seventy-one years. His last years were spent in retirement from business at his elegant residence, built by himself, on Broadway.

W. A. Dickinson, Howard and Tanner Sts., manufac- tures mill soaps, making a specialty of scouring and milling soaps, and deals in alkalies and prime tallow, employing five men. Business was started about 1883.

The Lowell Crayon Company, Ford Street (Sam. Chapin, manager), manufactures colored chalk crayons expressly for use of cotton-mills and other mill supplies.

Wm. Manning manufactures corn-cakes on the cor- ner of Broadway and School Streets, using one hogs- head of molasses per day during the manufacturing season. He employs an average of thirteen men. He started the business in 1868, and has been engaged in the business iu Chelmsford, Billerica and Lowell for about forty years.

The Lowell Gas-Light Company was incorporated in May, 1849, Seth Ames, Ransom Reed and Samuel Lawrence being among the incorporators. The capi- tal, which at first was $80,000, is now $500,000.

Gas was first introduced into the city Jan. 1, 1850. Although this company has had a monopoly of the business, it has pursued a generous course, and has vol- untarily, from time to time, reduced the price of gas to the consumer as the increase of business and im- proved methods enabled them to do it. It is asserted, probably with truth, that the price of gas in Lowell is less than in any other city of New England. The price in 1850 was $4 for 1000 cubic feet; in 1889, $1.10.

A part of the work of this company in recent years has been the introduction of gas stoves into families for cooking purposes.

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By pursuing an enlightened and liberal policy the company has so far gained the confidence and trust of the community that it is now one of the most prosperous and influential corporations in the city. This company employs the West Virginia coal for manufacturing gas.

During the year ending Jan., 1889, this company has supplied 227,338,000 cubic feet of gas. It has 6500 meters in active use, and employs about 130 men. Its president is Sewall G. Mack. The manufacturing plant is on School St., and the office is on Shattuck St.

L. A. Derby & Co., electricians, on Middle Street. The business of this company was started in 1883 by L. A. & F. H. Derby, in a small shop on Prescott St. Later they moved to larger quarters in Central Block, on Central St. In 1888 they came to their present lo- cation on Middle St. It is the leading establishment in this section engaged in wiring for incandescent lights, gas-lighting, automatic fire alarms, watch-clocks, medi- cal batteries, etc. They employ eleven men.

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History of Middlesex County, Massachusetts : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Vol. II, Part 25

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton) ed. cn Publication date: 1890 Publisher: Philadelphia : J. W. Lewis & Co. Number of Pages: 1226

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton) ed. cn
Publication date: 1890
Publisher: Philadelphia : J. W. Lewis & Co.
Number of Pages: 1226