History of Middlesex County, Massachusetts, with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Vol. III, Part 164

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton) ed
Publication date: 1890
Publisher: Philadelphia, J. W. Lewis & co
Number of Pages: 1278

USA > Massachusetts > Middlesex County > History of Middlesex County, Massachusetts, with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Vol. III > Part 164

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TRUSTEES OF PUBLIC LIBRARY .- William J. Underwood, 1873 -; J. Varoum Fletcher, 1873 -; Leonard S. King, 1873; Rev. Harvey C. Bates, 1874-76 ; Thomas W. Davis, 1877 -; William E. Stowe, 1883 -; John M. Brown, 1883 -; Frederic Dodge, 1889 -.

REPRESENTATIVES IN GENERAL COURT .- In 1863 Winthrop W. Chenery represented the district in- cluding Waltham and Watertown. The redistricting after the incorporation of the town did not take place till after the State census of 1865. Since 1866 Water- town and Belmont have formed a representative dis- trict. The Belmont representatives from this district have been :

Henry M. Clarke, 1867-68 ; George W. Ware, Jr., 1882; Edward Whitney, 1876-77 ; Rev. Daniel Butler, 1883 ; J. Varnum Fletcher, 1885-86 ; J. llenry Fletcher, 1890.

J. Varnum Fletcher was State Senator from the Second Middlesex District in 1887 and 1888.

BIOGRAPHICAL.

COL. THOMAS LIVERMORE.

Among the oldest families of the ancient town of Watertown is that of the subject of this sketch, Col. Thomas Livermore, a descendant in the sixth gener- ation of John, who landed on these shores from Eng- land in 1634. The homestead of the family for many generations has been on what is now School Street in the northeastern part of the old town, in the vicinity of Fresh Pond. llere they appear to have planted themselves at an early day, and not unlikely cleared the primeval forest to found a home. Two Amos Livermores, son and father, together with Oliver,

Daniel and Samuel, reach back from Thomas to John, the original settler. They chose a fertile tract of country sloping gently from west to east, and termi- nating on the verge of the Pond. In this sheltered and sunny place five or six generations of Livermores have cultivated and improved the land until it has become rich in orchards and gardens, and is dotted here and there with pleasant, comfortable homes.

Thomas was born May 30, 1798, on that portion of the original tract now owned and occupied by his children, in an old house which was burned in his boyhood and replaced by his father with the present spacious dwelling.

His advantages of education were limited to the district school, then open but a few months in the year and often taught by young collegians in the win- ter term, more anxious to earn a few dollars than to properly instruct and guide the young. The work and responsibility of the farm, intercourse with men and acquaintance with practical affairs formed his chief means of education. Thus he grew up to man- hood used to hardship, in habits of patient indus- try and careful economy. Early in life he united with the First Congregational (Unitarian) Church of the town, then under the ministrations of Rev. Converse Francis, afterwards professor in the Divin- ity School of Harvard University. It shows in what estimation he was held by his pastor and associates that he was chosen a deacon of the church in his twenty-fourth year, an office which he held for more than a half a century. Thomas Livermore and Sarab C. Grant were united in marriage April 20, 1824. She was the daughter of a neighboring farmer, like himself used to care and responsibility, and throngh the nearly fifty years of their married life a most faithful and devoted wife. Mr. Livermore early be- came a member of the Watertown and Waltham Ar- tillery Company, of which he was chosen lieutenant in 1821 and rose to be captain, major, lientenant-col- onel and colonel during the following eight or ten years. His tall, erect, commanding form made him especially conspicuous as a military officer, and he always retained something of a military air and man- ner, due no doubt to his early training in the Artil- lery. To the Ancient and Honorable Company of Boston he was elected an honorary member. He seems never to have lost his interest in military parades, and long after he had withdrawn from the company used to attend the trainings and musters. Col. Livermore was deeply interested in politics. In early life an ardent Whig, he remained true to that party until the great struggle for freedom in Kansas, when he became identified with the Free-Soil party and afterwards with the Republican. In 1844 he was elected on the Whig ticket to the House of Represent- atives of the State Legislature. But when that party broke up on the slavery issue, he took his stand on the side of freedom and ever after gave his vote and influence to sustain the good cause. In the War of

Sacola HetTinger

Geo J. Blake

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BELMONT.

the Rebellion he was a stanch supporter of Lincoln and the army, and rejoiced heartily in the downfall of slavery and the triumph of the Union.

In municipal affairs he was active and faithful in securing efficient management. For several years he was elected on the Board of Selectmen in Watertown, and for two years a member of the School Committee.

In 1859, when Belmont was incorporated, that portion of Watertown where he resided was annexed to the new town, and his interests were transferred to its growth and prosperity. Here he became identified with a new church and a new community, and served them as willingly as he had served the old. He was soon chosen on the Board of Selectmen and on that of the assessors, and through the remainder of his life he gave his sympathy and influence to the wel- fare of Belmont.

From this sketch of the life of Col. Livermore, it is evident that he was a man in whose integrity his fellow-townsmen had entire confidence. They trusted in his judgment, they relied upon his honesty, they regarded him as one who was above all crooked and self-seeking ways in his management of public affairs. Plain, unpretending, straightforward, firm and faithful in what he believed was right, such is the record of his life and such the character which he sustained among his fellow-men. Col. Livermore was in feeble and failing health for some months be- fore his death. Of his ten children, seven had passed on before him, and three remained in the old home to cheer his declining days. The end came on March 28, 1873, at the age of seventy-five years, and the stalwart form, that had borne so well the toil and burden of life, was laid at rest in the peaceful shades of Mount Auburn. Mrs. Livermore passed a serene and cheerful old age, surrounded by those who tenderly ministered to her needs, and in her eighty- seventh year rejoined him in the immortal world.

JACOB HITTINGER.

Jacob Hittinger was a descendant of an old French family and was born in Roxbury, March 10, 1811. His father died while abroad five years later, having previously removed to Charlestown, where young Hittinger received his education. In 1825 he entered the employment of George Pierce as a gardener, and five years later engaged in the produce business in Boston with William E. Otis & Co. Of this firm he was a member for several years, being actively inter- ested at the same time in the firm of Hill & Hittin- ger, whose husiness was cutting and shipping ice from Spy and Fresh Ponds. The firm of Hill & Hit- tinger was dissolved in 1841, and was succeeded by the firm of Gage, Hittinger & Co., of which the only surviving partner is Hon. T. T. Sawyer, of Charles- town. It was to this firm conjointly with John Hill, Mr. Hittinger's former partner, that the merchants of Boston were indebted for the notable enterprise dis- played, when, 1844, the harbor being frozen, a passage

was cut from the wharf at East Boston, through which the Cunard steamer could proceed to sea on the day appointed for her sailing. A failure to accomplish the work would have seriously affected the future of Boston as a commercial port. Mr. Hittinger's interest in the firm of Gage, Hittinger & Co. was disposed of a few years later, but he continued to furnish ice to its suc- cessor, Gage, Sawyer & Co., and was interested in the early shipments of ice to the Barbadoes by Lombard & Whitmore. In the closing years of his business life he carried on the trade in his own namc.

Mr. Hittinger's first wife was Mary Wilson. At her death she left a daughter, who became the wife of Charles Davenport. He married again, April 30, 1846, Mary Elizabeth King, a younger sister of Rev. Thomas Starr King, whose name is borne by the oldest son of this union, Thomas S. Hittinger, superintendent of the Fresh Pond Ice Company, of which company Mrs. Davenport's son is the treasurer. Soon after his second marriage Mr. Hittinger bought a large tract of land adjoining the old Cushing Estate, within the limits of the present town of Belmont. With the exception of a few months spent in Charles- town, this place was his residence until the end of his life. His intelligent management redeemed from the marshes all that part of the estate which is now occupied by three of his sons as one of the largest market gardens in the vicinity of Boston. Of the seven sons of the second marriage six are living, the fourth in order of age, Daniel Webster Hittinger, having died at Belmont, October 28, 1875. Mrs. Hittinger continues to reside in the house standing on the estate at the time of its purchase.

Mr. Hittinger's interest in the town of Belmont was shown by his leadership for four successive years of the petitioners for the incorporation of the new town and his devotion of time, infinence and money to their interests. For many of the necessary ex- penses incurred he neither asked nor received any recompense. He was a member of the first Board of Selectmen, chosen in 1859; was re-elected in 1860 and 1861, and was an influential citizen until the last years of his life. Pecuniary difficulties, arising in the critical business years of 1873 and 1874, left him a poor man. Though he never recovered his financial standing, he could look with pride upon the stalwart sons whose filial attention ministered to the comfort of his dying hours, and feel that they were ready to take up and hear successfully the burdens which old age removed from his shoulders. He died at Bel- mont, April 4, 1880, leaving behind him the record of a life of activity and integrity, and of an influence exerted for the permanent advantage of the commu- nity in which his lot had been cast.

GEORGE FORDYCE BLAKE.

The subject of this sketch is descended from one of our oldest New England families, and one that has an

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HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.

honorable record. His ancestor, William Blake, came to this country from Little Baddow, Essex, England, in 1630, the year that Governor Winthrop and the Massachusetts Bay Colony came over, and settled at Dorchester, Mass. In 1636 he removed, with William Pynchon and others, to Springfield, Mass., but his de- scendants for three generations continued to reside at Dorchester and Boston, where they were highly es- teemed, two of them having held the office of deacon of the church and selectmen of the town, and one was a member of the General Court. At the period of the outbreak of the War for Independence we find In- crease Blake living in Boston, on King (now State) Street, near the scene of the Boston massacre, and en- gaged in the manufacture of tin-plate goods. His public-spirited refusal to supply the British with can- teens, which he had furnished for the provincial troops, aroused the retaliatory spirit of the Tories ; his shop and other property were destroyed, and after the Battle of Bunker Ilill he found it expedient to remove to Worcester, Mass. His son, Thomas Dawes Blake, the father of the present representative of the family, was born in Boston in 1768, and was educated in the schools of Worcester. He was en- gaged for a few years in teaching, then studied medi- cine and later settled at Farmington, Me., where he continued in the practice of his profession until his death, in 1849.

George Fordyce Blake was born in Farmington, Me., May 20, 1819. At the early age of fourteen he was apprenticed to learn the trade of house-carpen- try. In 1839 he left his native town to start in the world for himself. He first went to South Danvers (now Peabody), where he remained seven years, work- ing at his trade. From that place he went to Cam- bridge to take the position of mechanical engineer at the brick-yards of Mr. Peter Hubbell, with the general charge of the works. There he manifested that fidelity, thoroughness, intelligence and inventive talent which have contributed so largely to his suc- cess. Naturally modest, never over-sanguine, that success seems to have surprised him more than those who knew him best. While thus employed, he de- vised a water-meter for which he received his first patent, in 1862. After the removal of the brick- yards to Medford, it was found that the clay obtained there could not be worked with the ordinary machin- ery, and Mr. Blake planned and constructed a new machine for pulverizing the clay, which was patented in 1861. In order more efficiently to free the clay- pits from water, he invented what is perhaps his greatest achievement-the Blake Steam-Pump-and thus laid the foundation of his fortune. The practical testing of his pump, at the yards, proving its great capacity, he, in company with Mr. Job A. Turner and his former employer, Mr. Peter Hubbell, com- menced in 1864 the manufacture of steam-pumps and water-meters in a building on Province Street, Bos- ton. The business grew so rapidly that several suc-

cessive removals to better quarters were necessary, and in 1873 the firm purchased and occupied the large building on the corner of Causeway and Friend Streets. Their foundry for large castings was at East Cambridge. In 1874 a joint stock company was in- corporated under the title,-"The George F. Blake Manufacturing Company," with Mr. George F. Blake as president. In 1879 the company purchased the large plant of the Knowles Steam-Pump Company, at Warren, Mass., thus greatly extending their facilities. But even with this increase of capacity it was found necessary, in 1890, to remove the Boston manufactory to East Cambridge, where extensive works were erected, covering four acres, with a main building 400 feet long by 100 feet broad, with every convenience for the successful prosecution of the work. The busi- ness has been recently sold to an English syndicate for the sum of $3,000,000, though Mr. Blake still re- tains an interest.

In the course of his successful career Mr. Blake has given unremitting attention to his business and has brought his intelligent judgment to bear upon all its various details. For a long time, until the growth of the business made that an impossibility, all the plans and drawings for the special adaptation of machinery were made under his personal supervision. The re- sult is seen in the vast business that has grown up. The Blake pumps have gone to all parts of the world and have been adapted to every conceivable use, some of them, constructed for supplying cities with water, having a capacity of 20,000,000 gallons in 24 hours.

In 1869, Mr. Blake removed to Belmont. His beautiful home stands on a breezy hill overlooking a wide stretch of country to the northward and west- ward of Boston, and is surrounded by fine trees and well-kept lawns. While his busy life has kept him from much direct participation in public affairs, he has always taken a deep interest in all public ques- tions, especially such as pertain to the moral well- being of the community, and, when free from the ex- acting cares of his business, has found true delight and recreation in his library among his favorite books.

HION. J. V. FLETCHER.

A sketch of the town of Belmont would be in- complete which did not contain extended mention of a family so thoroughly identified with its inception, birth and growth as that of Ilon. J. V. Fletcher. He was one of the active workers in securing the act of incorporation, became a member of the first Board of Selectmen, and scarcely any matter of public interest and benefit has appealed to the citizens for support that has not received from him material encourage- ment. The people have endorsed his actions by assigning him the duty of representing their interests in the General Court, and a wider constituency has ratified the local verdict by electing him to a seat in the Senate Chamber.

8. 4amm. 2 .Fletcher

RESIDENCE OF WM. L. LOCKHART, BELMONT, MASSACHUSETTS

W L. Lockhart

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BELMONT.

Jonathan Farnum Fletcher is a descendant in the seventh generation of the Robert Fletcher who came from England to Concord, Mass., in 1630, and became prominent in the affairs of that town, which was in- corporated five years later. His son William removed to Chelmsford. Joseph, the grandson of William, settled in Westford upon his marriage in 1715, and here, a hundred years later, February 28, 1812, the subject of this sketch was born. Of his early years Mr. Fletcher says little, but the fact that he is the owner of the ancestral home at Westford, delighting to steal a day now and again from business cares to visit it, and that it has become under his hands a Mecea of pilgrimage for members of a large and widely- scattered family, sufficiently indicates the pleasant associations clustering about the spot in which he spent his boyhood. He is a trustee of the Westford Academy. Before attaining his majority he engaged in the provision business in Medford, at the age of twenty-four he took to himself a wife, and in the following year, 1837, he established the business in Boston with which his name has been associated for more than half a century, and in which he is still actively engaged. During most of this time he has been the occupant of two stalls at the very centre of Quincy, better known as Faneuil Hall market, and he is now the senior tenant of the building. Two additional stalls have recently been added, to accommodate an increasing business.

In 1851, when the Faneuil Hall Bank was chartered by the Legislature, Mr. Fletcher was one of the three parties named in the act of incorporation. After be- ing a director of the bank for nearly forty years, he became its president upon the death, in 1888, of Mr. Nathan Robbins, who was also one of the original corporators. He is also vice-president of the newly- established Hammond Packing Company.

In the town of Belmont Mr. Fletcher held the office of selectman in 1859,'60 and '61, and was again elected in 1867. Since that time he has held no town office, except the position of trustee of the Public Library, which he has filled continuously since 1873, the year in which the board was created. He was one of the building committee of the town-hall, and two marble clocks in the main audience-room, and in the reading-room, are the souvenirs of his connection with the building. In 1885 and 1886 he was representative from the district comprising the towns of Belmont and Watertown, and in November, 1886, was chosen Senator from the Second Middlesex District. During his service in the Senate, in 1887 and 1888, he was chairman of the Committee on Banks and Banking, and discharged other important com- mittee work. His son, J. Henry Fletcher, is the present representative (1890) of the Sixteenth Middle- sex District.

Upon a charter being obtained, largely through his instrumentality, for the Belmont Savings Bank, Mr. Fletcher resigned his trusteeship in the Charlestown

Five Cent Savings Bank, to become president of the new institution, and his closest supervision is given to its affairs.

Mr. Fletcher married, in 1836, Marcy Ann Hill, of West Cambridge. Their golden wedding was pleasantly observed by a large gathering of personal friends and business associates of Mr. Fletcher.

They resided in Charlestown for about twenty years, during which time Mr. Fletcher was for two years a inember of the Common Council, and four years al- derman of that city. The residence in Belmont was built shortly before the incorporation of the town, upon the estate which had been for many years oc- cupied by Mrs. Fletcher's father. Mrs. Fletcher died October 31, 1888. "Her children rise up and call her blessed." A beautiful window in the new Unitarian Church at Belmont is her husband's tribute to her memory.

Mr. Fletcher's duties as the head of the Fanenil Hall Bank tend to draw him away from the active life of the market, in which he has so long been a central figure, and are a preparation for the rest from physical exertion which he has earned by so many years of well-directed, successful toil.

In his home at Belmont, and elsewhere, as occasion offers, he enjoys exercising the privileges of hospital- ity. His first dinner to his associates in the Faneuil Hall and Belmont Banks, after becoming president of the two institutions, was marked by a feature worthy of the highest commendation and repetition, the pres- ence at the tables of the clerks and other employees as well as the directors and trustees. It is a pleasure to see wealth bestowed upon those who can use it aright. In business enterprise, in hospitality and in charity, Mr. Fletcher has shown himself worthy, and when he chooses to resign the helm of his vessel, he has the satisfaction of knowing that the sons and daughters whom he has trained will be his fit sue- cessors as trustees of the goods which the Lord has bestowed.

WILLIAM L. LOCKHART.

William L. Lockhart, whose portrait accompanies this sketch, is easily at the licad of the manufactur- ing undertakers of this section of the county. His life is a striking illustration of what can be accom- plished by a strong, resolute will, joined to business tact and devoted to the development of a special line of trade. As his name indicates, Mr. Lockhart is of Scotch ancestry, belonging to a family which came to Nova Scotia in the early years of its occupa- tion by English-speaking people. He was born July 20, 1827. In boyhood he assisted his father, who followed the occupation of a ship-carpenter, and acquired a love for the sea, which he has never lost. At the age of eighteen he shipped as cook for a voy- age along the coast. Evidently the duties were not as agrecable as he had anticipated, for he left the vessel at Eastport, walked to Machias, and thence

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HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.

continued his journey to Boston, where he endeav- ored to find a place to learn a trade. Not being suc- cessful, he returned home, but in a few months came to Boston again and engaged as an apprentice at fifty dollars a year and his board. Having learned the carpenter's trade, he pursued it for a while, but, with a foresight that indicated his business sagacity, decided to devote himself to a specialty, and with this in view entered the employ of John Peak, a leading coffin-maker, and spent four years in learning every detail of the business. At the age of twenty- seven, with a capital of $300, which represented the industry and patient economy of years, he began for himself at Cambridge, not far from the Court-house. In 1860 nearly all that he had made was swept away hy fire, but, undaunted, he at once proceeded to re- establish himself, and to erect a building near the railroad station at East Cambridge, which, with its additions and extensions, he has occupied to the present time, although his offices and sales-rooms are in a fine building constructed from his own plaus, at the corner of Staniford and Causeway Streets, in Boston. His establishment is, in all its appointments, the most complete in New England, if not in Amer- ica, and all those to whom the need common to hu- manity comes, " to bury their dead out of their sight," have reason to appreciate the provisions made to remove all responsibility from the mourner and place in professional hands the cares incident to such oc- casions. Every detail of the business is conducted under his direct and personal supervision. During the earlier years of his business life Mr. Lockhart's residence was in Cambridge. He has lived in Bel- mont about twelve years, having purchased, in 1878, the estate of the late Winthrop W. Chenery on Com- mon Street. A view of the mansion has appeared in these pages. Its exterior is unchanged from the days of its earlier owner. The apartments within con- form to the critical tastes of the present occupant, who is assisted by his estimable wife in dispensing hospitality to the friends who meet beneath his roof- tree. Mr. Lockhart's delight in the beauties of nature is shown by the enjoyment he finds in the sur- roundings of his residence, in the care with which he has maintained and developed his forest, garden and field. His early bent for the sea is gratified by his ownership of the well-known yacht " Alice," and the months he spends from season to season upon the coast of the Southern States. He has never been an aspirant for public office, though taking a deep inter- est in matters relating to the public welfare, feeling that one's best service to the world can be rendered in faithful attention to the work which has been set for his hands to accomplish.

CHAPTER XLV.

WALTHAM.

BY NATHAN WARREN.

THE history of a New England town is full of interest and is an object-lesson in the fundamental principles and practice of our government. The rise and progress of such an institution for self-government is that of a little Commonwealth conducted by its own citizens under the purest and simplest form of de- mocracy. The town in New England is a miniature Commonwealth. Its Legislature is the town-meet- ing; its legislators are the voters in their individual capacity. The development of such a government in its political and material affairs, in all matters pertain- ing to its social and educational welfare and in its religious character, so far as religion was in former times more intimately connected with the body politic, is a study of more importance than the mere recital of events and the growth of wealth and popu- lation. Whether the town remains practically at a standstill for a hundred or more years, like some of our towns-yet prosperous in all that makes happy homes, a well-ordered community-and insures a fair competence to its people in their walks of life, or whether under the impetus of manufactures or trade, or from a fortunate position for enterprise or residence, it shows great progress in business and population and all that belongs to municipal impor- tance, its course is governed by the same elements of republican characteristics and the same principles of popular jurisprudence.

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History of Middlesex County, Massachusetts, with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Vol. III, Part 164

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton) ed Publication date: 1890 Publisher: Philadelphia, J. W. Lewis & co Number of Pages: 1278

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton) ed
Publication date: 1890
Publisher: Philadelphia, J. W. Lewis & co
Number of Pages: 1278