USA > Massachusetts > Massachusetts of today; a memorial of the state, historical and biographical, issued for the World's Columbian exposition at Chicago > Part 45
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New Bedford desires and welcomes new industries. It offers cheap land, water and coal, excellent trans- portation facilities by land and water, low taxes and a climate which, for manufactures as well as for general health, is nowhere excelled in this country. It has over thirty-five churches, a magnificent school system and three news- papers, the Journal, Standard and Mercury. Many fine buildings adorn its streets, and its private residences are unique.
357
NEW BEDFORD.
C HARLES SUMNER ASHLEY, mayor of the city of New Bedford in the years 1891 and 1892, is one of the youngest executive officers the city has had, but his administration promises to leave behind it a record of extensive work in the direction of im- proving and beautifying the city which will make it long memorable. Particularly will this be so in regard to the system of public parks now being laid out. These parks, three in number, and all of them finely located, will fill a "long-felt want " of a very real nature, and will add greatly to the attrac- tiveness of an already beautiful city. Mr. Ashley is now only thirty-four years of age. He is the son of Joshua B. Ashley, a well-known citizen of New Bedford. After he had gradu- ated from the gram- mar school, natural inclinations led him to enter at once on a business career. At the age of seven- teen he formed a copartnership in the market business, con- tinuing and increas- ing this after his partner's retire - ment, and down to the year 1889. In that year he disposed of the business, and later, with Stephen D. Pierce, opened a clothing and furnishing goods store, where he now does a very large business. He also conducts an extensive wholesale pork business. Mayor Ashley is a Democrat, and an earnest believer in the tenets of the Demo- cratic party. As the party gains in strength in New Bedford and vicinity, and it has recently gained greatly, his part in its battles is likely to be a prominent one. So far, however, Mr. Ashley has been more closely iden- tified with municipal than with State or national affairs,
CHARLES S. ASHLEY.
and in municipal affairs he has figured not as the Democrat, but as the citizen. His adherents in munici- pal affairs are men of all political parties, and they are now generally known as the "Ashley" party. The public service of Mr. Ashley commenced in 1884, when, at the age of twenty-six, he was chosen a member of the Common Council. In 1886 he was elected to the Board of Aldermen, being the only successful aldermanic candidate on his ticket, and polling more votes than the mayor elect. After another year as alderman, Mr. Ash- ley was induced to aim higher, and the two following years made unsuccessful fights for the may- oralty. The defeats were encouraging, however, and the third year brought victory by one of the largest majorities in the city's history. This was in 1890, and in 1891 the young mayor was again elected by a substan- tial majority. As mayor, Mr. Ashley has been untiring in his devotion to the city's interests. He is familiar with every detail of the city's work, and has given personal supervision to much of it, includ- ing the plotting of the city, a work of great value, which has been undertaken at his instiga- tion. His administrations have given great satisfaction to the citizens, regardless of party. Personally, the mayor is a prince of good fellows. He makes friends readily, and is known as a man who never fails to stand by them. His devotion to the duties of his office and the rare ability and tact he has displayed in fulfilling them make him one of the most valuable public servants New Bedford has ever had.
358
MASSACHUSETTS OF TO-DAY.
T THROUGHOUT the State of Massachusetts, and indeed throughout the country, no name is to-day more generally associated with New Bedford than that of the Hon. William Wallace Crapo. Mr. Crapo is the son of Henry Howland Crapo, who was for four years governor of Michigan. His father was a native of Dartmouth, near New Bedford, where Mr. Crapo was born, May 16, 1830. After passing through the public schools of New Bedford, he prepared for college at Phillips Academy, Andover. He was graduated from Yale -which has since conferred upon him the degree of LL. D -in the class of 1852. He studied law in the Dane Law School in Cambridge, and in the office of Governor Clifford in New Bedford. In 1855 he was admitted to the bar, and en- tered upon practice in New Bedford. Mr. Crapo's political ca- reer began in 1856, when he took the stump for John C. Fremont. In the same year, when only twenty-six years of age, he was elected to the Massachusetts House of Represen- tatives. In 1857 he declined a nomina- tion to the State Sen- ate. Mr. Crapo is most widely known through his service in Congress. He was elected to fill a vacancy in the Forty-fourth Congress, and was returned for three succeeding terms thereafter. In the Forty-fifth Congress he was a mem- ber of the Committee on Foreign Affairs. In the Forty- sixth he served on the Committee on Banking and Cur- rency, and in the Forty-seventh he was chairman of this important committee. In this capacity he won the ad- miration and confidence of the business men of the
WILLIAM W. CRAPO.
country by the ability and sagacity with which he car- ried through, against determined opposition, the bill to extend the charter of the national banks. By other legislative work he enhanced the national reputation thus acquired. His speeches, argumentative, calm, convincing, then, as now, commanded attention and stimulated thought. In recent years Mr. Crapo's name has on several occasions been brought before the Re- publican State conventions of Massachusetts in connec- tion with the nom- ination for governor. His attitude on these occasions has greatly increased the respect with which the peo- ple regard him. He has refused to be in any sense a self- seeker or to have used in his · behalf political methods which are often more effective than credit- able. He believes -- and lives up to his belief-that the office should seek the man, not the man the office. In the affairs of the city of New Bedford, Mr. Crapo has always been most deeply interested. An enthusiastic ad- mirer of its natural beauties, he has been, and is, an earnest and liberal supporter of all movements tending to its best development. As private and business lawyer, bank pres- ident, president and director of large manufacturing and railroad enterprises, and in many other positions of re- sponsibility, he has acquired the reputation of a financier of rare ability, a business man of sagacity, judgment and prudence and a citizen of kindly and generous tenden- cies. In New Bedford no man enjoys the trust and esteem of all sections of the community more fully than William W. Crapo.
359
NEW BEDFORD.
T' `HE family of which Governor John H. Clifford of Massachusetts was the head has been for sixty years past, and is to-day, most prominently identified with New Bedford. In 1827 Mr. Clifford came to New Bedford to study law, the profession in which he after- wards achieved such remarkable success, and which is to-day adorned by his sons. Thereafter this city was his home. He was at various times member of the State House of Representatives, member and president of the State Senate, district attorney for the southern district of Massachusetts, attor- ney-general (for seven years), and governor of the Commonwealth. He died, Jan. 2, 1876. Governor Clifford married Sa- rah Parker Allen, daughter of William Howland Allen, of New Bedford, who still survives. Mrs. Clifford is a direct descendant of Cap- tain Myles Standish of Plymouth, while the governor was a descendant of Gov- ernor Mayhew, of Martha's Vineyard. They had nine chil- dren, of whom the male survivors are Charles Warren and Walter Clifford, both distinguished mem- bers of the bar of Bristol County, and prominent figures in the public affairs of the State. Charles W. Clifford was born Aug. 19, 1844, graduated from Harvard in July, 1865, and stud- ied law. It was his chosen profession from his earliest years, and one for which experience has proved him eminently qualified. He was for many years associated with Hon. George Marston in partnership, and in the trial of important causes, and is now of the firm of Crapo, Clifford & Clifford. In 1876 he was one of the
JOHN H. CLIFFORD.
commissioners to revise the judiciary system of the Commonwealth, and in 1891 received the almost unani- mous support of the bar of Massachusetts for appoint- ment as judge of the Circuit Court. He holds many positions of honor and influence in the State and the city, and is largely interested in the most important financial and manufacturing enterprises of New Bed- ford. He married, 1869, Frances Lothrop, daughter of Charles L. and Elizabeth T. Wood, of New Bedford, who died in 1872. In 1876 he married Wilhelmina H., daughter of the late Governor Crapo, of Michigan. Walter Clifford was born Aug. 11, 1849, grad- uated in 1871 from Harvard College, and from Harvard Law School in 1875. He was associated with the office of Marston & Crapo from 1875 to 1878, and since then has been a member of the firm of Crapo, Clifford & Clifford. As mayor of New Bedford in 1889 and 1890, he made a splendid record, alike in valuable and enduring work ac- complished for the city, and in increas- ing popularity with the people. Mr. Clifford is an earnest and vigorous Republican. As a member of the Repub- lican State Central Committee he has taken a prominent place in the party councils. He was a delegate to the Minneapolis convention (1892). He is a sound lawyer, a capable business man, an able politician, an eloquent and graceful speaker, and a courteous and honorable gentleman. He married, in 1878, Harriet Perry, daughter of Congressman Charles S. and Sarah (Perry) Randall, and has four children.
360
MASSACHUSETTS OF TO-DAY.
F ROM New Bedford's earliest days, the Rotch family have been most prominently identified with its growth and development, seven generations having lived consecutively within its limits. It was Joseph Rotch, an enterprising merchant of Nantucket, who in 1765 came here and established himself in the whaling busi- ness, and gave to the little hamlet to which his arrival brought new life, the name of Bedford Village. Mr. Rotch's selection of this harbor as one especially adapted for the pros- ecution of the whale fishery was the first step in the develop- ment of a great in- dustry and an impor- tant city. Later generations have dis- played the same en- terprise, industry, and public spirit which characterized their ancestor, and to-day the Rotch family is still found at the front in efforts to develop the city and its industries. The senior member of the family is Hon. William J. Rotch. He is a son of Joseph Rotch (a great- grandson of the Joseph Rotch above named), and was born in Philadelphia May 2, 1819. In 1838 he was grad- uated from Harvard with his brother Ben- jamin, the brothers being the two marshals of the class. Soon after this, with his brother and Joseph Ricketson, Mr. Rotch founded the New Bedford Cordage Com- pany, which has developed into one of the most success- ful industries in the city. Of this company he was president for thirty-four years. The Rotch brothers were among the first to recognize the value of the Mckay sewing machine, which, under the able manage- ment of Gordon Mckay, has obtained world-wide fame.
Mr. Rotch is president of the Howland Mills Corpora- tion, the new Rotch Spinning Corporation and the Rotch Wharf Company. He is vice-president of the New Bedford Institution for Savings and a director of most of the important manufacturing and financial enterprises of the city, as well as of the Old Colony Railroad. In these and many other positions Mr. Rotch has won the confidence and esteem of all who know him. Mr. Rotch's career in public life has been limited only by his own in- clinations. In 1852 he was elected the second mayor of the city of New Bedford. Prior to this he had served two years in the General Court. He was a member of the military staff of Governor Clifford. But his ambitions were not eentered on political preferment, and he could not be induced to aim higher. He has, however, been a steadfast supporter of the Republican party since its for- mation. Mr. Rotch married, in 1842, Emily Morgan, daughter of Charles W. Morgan, of New Bedford. She died in 1861, leaving seven children, all of whom are still living. In 1866 he married Clara Morgan, and they have one daughter. Mr. Rotch's New Bedford residence is one of the largest and handsomest in the city. The grounds are alike beautiful and extensive, and within are all the comforts which wealth can bring. Here, surrounded by his family and the friends of a lifetime, Mr. Rotch is still actively engaged in the development of the many enter- prises with which he is prominently associated and which he has done so much to promote.
WILLIAM J. ROTCH.
361
NEW BEDFORD.
M ORGAN ROTCH is one of New Bedford's younger men of mark who has won distinction in her financial and political interests. A son of Hon. Wil- liam J. Rotch, whose life is sketched on another page, he was born in New Bedford in 1848. He was edu- cated at the Friends Academy in his native city, at the Phillips (Exeter) Academy, and at Harvard Col- lege, from which he was graduated in 1871. After leaving Harvard he spent a year in European travel, and then entered business in New Bed . ford, first as a cotton broker, and later as a stock and note broker. In the lat- ter capacity he now does a very extensive business, and his office is one of the financial centres of the city. Mr. Rotch is president of the New Bedford Manu- facturing Company, and his services are much sought after in the direction of the city's most important enterprises. He is now a director of the Howland Mills Cor- poration, the Rotch Spinning Corpora - tion, the Pierce Manufacturing Cor- poration, the South- ern Massachusetts Telephone Com- pany, the National Bank of Commerce, the New Bedford Cordage Company, the New Bedford Opera House Company the Pairpoint Manufacturing Company, and the Illinois Steel Company. His con- nection with the enterprises with which he is associated is always an active one, and it never fails to be for the benefit of the stockholders. In politics Mr. Rotch has had all the honors he has sought, and has refused more. He entered the Common Council of the city as a young man of thirty, and made his influence quickly felt.
MORGAN ROTCH.
Four years in succession (1885-88) he was elected to the mayor's chair, being returned on each occasion by majorities which attested his growing popularity. His administration was marked by the agitation and adop- tion of many much needed improvements, including extensive and beneficial work upon the streets, the con- struction of a new system of sewerage in a thickly populated part of the city, and the reorganization of the poor department. Since he left the mayor's chair Mr. Rotch has continued to be a prominent figure in municipal affairs, and as a mem- ber and first chair- man of the Board of Public Works, which has entire charge of the streets, he has done, and is doing, excellent work for the city. Mr. Rotch's
zealous work for the Republican party, of which he has always been a consistent adherent, was recog- nized by Governor Ames, who selected him as a member of his military staff. In 1891 he was elected to the State Senate, where he served with distinction for one term, refusing a re- nomination for busi- ness reasons. Mr. Rotch was elected president of the Bris- tol County Agricultu- ral Society in 1891, and his association with and work for it has given this society a new vigor. On Dec. 4, 1879, Mr. Rotch was married to Miss Josephine G. Grinnell, of New Bedford. They have two children. He is a member of the Wamsutta Club, New Bedford ; the Somerset, Country, and Athletic clubs, Boston, and the Union and University clubs, New York. In the social and financial circles of the two last-named cities Mr. Rotch is well known and very popular.
362
MASSACHUSETTS OF TO-DAY.
G EORGE F. BARTLETT was born in New Bed- ford, May 4, 1828. He is descended from the Rev. Ivory Hovey, who graduated at Harvard College in 1733 and died at South Plymouth (Manomet) in 1803, aged ninety years. Two pastorates covered his life-work at Rochester and Manomet. His grandfather was Deacon Abner Bartlett of Manomet, prominent in town and State councils. His parents were Ivory Hovey Bartlett and Betsy Clark, both of Manomet. He was educated in the pub- lic schools, graduat- ing at the high school, December, 1844. He attended Phillips Academy, Andover, during 1845, and the Friends Academy, in New Bedford, the winter terms of 1845-46. He is a Republican in politics, and wor- ships with the Ortho- dox Congregational Church. He entered his father's counting- room April 1, 1846, became a partner in 1854, and is the sur- viving partner of Ivory HI. Bartlett & Sons. He was elected director of the Merchants' Na- tional Bank in 1865, and a member of the board of public works in 1801 for three years, now serving in both. His business is whaling and commission. His firm has for fifty-two years been the purchasing agents for the London house of Langton & Bicknells, and in 1861 bought twenty- four whalers for the Stone flect. In 1852 he married Clara Gordon Nye, daughter of the late Gideon Nye and Sylvia Hathaway Nye, of Acushnet. They had eight children, three of whom are living. His eldest son, the late Frederick Carew Smyth, graduated from Har- vard College in 1875, and became a partner with the
distinguished law firm of Crapo, Clifford & Clifford. In 1877 he took passage for San Francisco in the ship "Syren." In 1878 he visited Europe, going from New Bedford to London docks in Norwegian brig, "Noatum." In 1882 he married Abby Gibbs Wood, daughter of the late James B. Wood. He died in 1886, aged thirty- three, leaving a widow and two sons, Geoffrey and Clif- ford. He was twice elected selectman, and to the State Legislature, from Fairhaven, and was serving at the time of his death. His second son, Gideon Nye, was a passenger in whaling bark "Ocean," in 1874, returning from Fayal in the " Fredonia." He visited, on busi- ness, the Sandwich Islands in 1875 and 1876, and the Arctic Ocean in 1878 as supercargo of ship " Syren" to St. Law- rence Bay, Siberia, where she took a cargo of oil and bone and returned to New Bedford, while he continued to the Arctic Ocean in whaleship " Rain- bow," Cogan, master, going as far east as Camden Bay, near Mckenzie River, and west to Herald Islands. He now is manager of the 'To- bin Whalebone Com- pany, New York. He married, in 1881, Stella May Smith, of San Fran- cisco, and has two children, George Gordon and Alice Church. His third son, the late George F., Jr., died in Mexico, in 1881, in the employ of Kidder, Peabody & Co., of Boston, at the Cusihuiriachic mining camp, after three months' residence there, aged twenty-four years. His youngest son, Clarence Hathaway, entered the employ of the banking house of Sanford & Kelley, of New Bedford, in 1885, where he is now book-keeper.
GEORGE F. BARTLETT.
363
NEW BEDFORD.
Nº man has been more prominently associated with the public affairs of New Bedford during the last half century than George B. Richmond. Mr. Rich- mond is a native of the city, and was born Nov. 9, 1821, his parents being Gideon Richmond, of Dighton, and Rebecca (Barstow) Richmond, of Scituate. He was educated at the schools of New Bedford and Middle- boro, and at Brown University, where ill health cut short his studies during the first term of his junior year. Returning to New Bedford, he entered on a business life, and immediately became identified with the public in- terests of the city. In 1851 he was elected to the State Legislature on the Whig ticket. In 1861 he was ap- pointed inspector, weigher, gauger and measurer in the New Bedford Custom House, and held that office till he re- signed in 1874. Mr. "Richmond was five times mayor of New Bedford. For twelve successive years, with a single excep- tion, he was before the people as the champion of pro- hibition and the en- forcement of the liquor laws, and he sat in the mayor's chair in the years 1870, 1871, 1872, 1874 and 1878. His administration won wide attention and was cited everywhere by temperance advocates as proving the efficiency of Prohibition liquor laws when honestly enforced. To this day the name of George B. Rich- mond makes the blood of a New Bedford liquor seller run cold. His administration of the city's affairs was also signalized by a new era in the extension of streets and by many other important improvements incidental
GEORGE B. RICHMOND.
to its development from a whaling to a great manufac- turing city. In State affairs Mr. Richmond has been most prominent. In 1873 he was appointed by Gover- nor Washburn one of the police commissioners of the Commonwealth, and remained on the commission till it was abolished. In 1880 and 1881 he represented his district in the State Senate, and was chairman in the latter year of the Committee on Public Charitable Institutions and the Liquor Laws. In 1883 he was appointed registrar of deeds for the Southern Bristol Dis- trict, to fill a vacancy, and he has since occupied this posi- tion by the choice of the people again and again expressed. Hle has been a trus- tee of Westboro In- sane Asylum since 1886 by appointment of Governors Robin- son, Ames and Rus- sell. For years Mr. Richmond has been a Republican leader. As member of the Republican State Committee, chair - man of the Republi- can City Committee, and in many similar capacities he has done invaluable work for his party. In 1888 he declined further election to these offices. But he is still as then an ardent Republican. Mr. Richmond is chairman of the Board of Trustees of the First Baptist Society, a member of the Baptist church, and was for five years superin- tendent of its Sunday school. He was for seven years president of the New Bedford Young Men's Christian Association. He is now one of the trustees of the Five Cents Savings Bank. Mr. Richmond has been thrice married and has had seven children, of whom five are living.
364
MASSACHUSETTS OF TO-DAY.
WILLIAM D. HOWLAND.
W ILLIAM D. HOWLAND is a prominent rep- resentative of the mill interests of New Bed- ford. As treasurer of the New Bedford Manufacturing Company, the Howland Mills Corporation and the recently organized Rotch Spinning Corporation, he directs the affairs of three of the most important manu- facturing enterprises of the city. Mr. Howland is the youngest son of Matthew and Rachel Howland, and was born in New Bedford in 1853. His family name is one which has always been prominent in the history of New Bedford, and his ancestors for several generations have held positions of honor in the community. His grand- father, George Howland, who was born in Fairhaven in 1781, was one of the old-time whaling merchants of New Bedford, and one of its most prominent and re- spected citizens. He was the first president of the Bedford Commercial Bank, now the National Bank of Commerce, one of the incorporators of the Insti- tution for Savings, and a pioneer in the movement which brought the railroad to New Bedford. His son, Matthew, the father of William D., also engaged in the whaling business. He was a director of the National Bank of Commerce, and was closely and liberally iden- tified with many efforts for the moral and religious improvement of the community. Mr. Howland was educated at the Friends Academy in his native city, and at Brown University. He entered, in 1879, the employ of the Wamsutta Mills Corporation. Four years later he organized the New Bedford Manufacturing Company for the manufacture of cotton yarns. In this project he was aided by many friends of the How- land family, who were probably led to interest them- selves in it more from personal than from business considerations. But before many months had passed they found that the investment was to prove a most
valuable one. Almost from the start the record of the concern has been one of constant growth and exten- sion. In the spring of 1886 a second and larger mill was built by the company. In 1888 the Howland Mills were erected by a new corporation composed largely of the same individuals. Soon a second Howland Mill was erected, and to this a large addition was made later. And now, in 1892, the Rotch Spinning Corpo- ration has been organized, and its fine new mill is al- ready partially in operation. The three concerns, though quite distinct, are yet closely allied. Their total capital stock is $2,000,000, and they have in all 1 36,000 spindles. The Howland Mill Village has acquired al- most a national reputation. This splendid collection of workmen's homes is the outcome of a plan formed by Mr. Howland in 1888 by which to secure and retain the best class of operatives. A large tract of land was laid out by the corporation, with wide, well-built streets, and some fifty or more model single houses, fitted with all modern conveniences, and surrounded by an abundance of ground, were built. These houses are let or sold outright on reasonable terms to the em- ployees, and effort is put forth to make them in every way as attractive as possible. The scheme was under- taken not from philanthropic but from the broadest economic motives. The result has been most encour- aging, and has shown that consideration for the welfare of the help proves mutually beneficial. Mr. Howland is also president of the Pierce & Bushnell Manufactur- ing Company, manufacturers of pastels, etchings, etc., a trustee of the New Bedford Institution for Savings, and a director of the National Bank of Commerce and the New Bedford Safe Deposit and Trust Company. He is a Republican in politics, and a strong believer in protection as a factor in the development of American industries.
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