Men of progress one thousand biographical sketches and portraits of leaders in business and professional life in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Part 15

Author: Herndon, Richard; Bacon, Edwin M. (Edwin Monroe), 1844-1916
Publication date: 1896
Publisher: Boston : New England Magazine
Number of Pages: 1036

USA > Massachusetts > Men of progress one thousand biographical sketches and portraits of leaders in business and professional life in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts > Part 15

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ALDRICH, SAMUEL NELSON, president of the State National Bank, Boston, and member of the Suffolk bar, is a native of Upton, born February 3, 1838, son of Sylvanus Bueklin and Lucy Jane (Stoddard) Aldrich. He was educated in the Worcester and Southington (Conn.) academies and at Brown University. After teaching school for a while in his native town and in Holliston and Worcester, he took up the study of law in the latter city, in the offices of Isaac Davis and E. B. Stoddard, finishing at the Harvard Law School. He was admitted to the bar in 1863, and at once began practice, opening an office in Marlborough. There he remained for eleven years, becoming prominently identified with local and other in- terests, and then removed his business to Boston, retaining, however, his legal residence in Marl- borough and his connection with its affairs. He was chairman of the Marlborough School Commit- tee for nine years, chairman of the Board of Se- lectmen four years, and several years president of the Marlborough Board of Trade and director of the People's National Bank. He represented

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his district, the Fourth Middlesex, in the State Senate in 1879 and 1880, serving on the commit- tees on taxation (chairman), on the judiciary, on

S. N. ALDRICH.

constitutional amendments, and on bills in the third reading; and, three years later (in 1883), was a member of the lower house of the Legislat- ure, where he served on the judiciary, and sev- eral other committees, and was instrumental in shaping important legislation. In the campaign of 18So he was the Democratic candidate for Congress in what was then the Seventh District, a Republican stronghold, making an earnest though unsuccessful canvass. In March, 1887, he became assistant treasurer of the United States in Boston, by appointment of President Cleveland, which position he held until January, 1891, when his successor was appointed by Presi- dent Harrison, having the month before filed his resignation to accept the presidency of the State National Bank to which he was then elected. He was president of the Framingham & Lowell Rail- road for several years before its absorption by the Old Colony, and is now president of the Central Massachusetts Railroad. His club associations are with the Algonquin, Athletic, and Art clubs of Boston. Mr. Aldrich was married September 15, 1865, at Upton, to Miss Mary J. Macfarland,

daughter of J. T. and Eliza A. Macfarland. They have one child, Harry M. Aldrich, a graduate of Harvard University and of the Harvard Law School, now a lawyer in Boston. Mr. Aldrich's winter residence has been in Boston since he es- tablished his law office there.

APPLETON, SAMUEL, of Boston, general agent of the Employers' Liability Assurance Cor- poration of London, Eng., was born in New York City in 1846, son of Samuel and Elizabeth (Gard- ner Smith) Appleton. He was educated in Bos- ton, in the public schools. His training for active life was as clerk in a prominent commercial house in Boston, begun immediately after leaving school, when a youth of sixteen years. Here he re- mained till 1868, when he entered the fire insur- ance business, with which he has ever since been connected. Beginning as a clerk in the insurance agency of Burge & Lane, he was early advanced to positions of responsibility. In 1870 he was made secretary of the Exchange Insurance Com- pany of Boston; in 1875 he became secretary

SAMUEL APPLETON.

of the Commonwealth Insurance Company of Boston ; three years later president of the latter company ; and in 1882 president of the Manu-

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facturers' Fire and Marine Insurance Company of Boston. He was established in his present po- sition as general agent of the Employers' Liabil- ity Assurance Corporation, Limited, of London, the leading liability insurance company in the world, in 1886. His field covers Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New Hampshire, and Vermont ; and his office in Boston is the chief office of the company this side of the Atlantic. Mr. Appleton is also a general broker in fire, life, marine, and accident insurance. He is a member of the Al- gonquin, Suffolk, Athletic, and Exchange clubs of Boston. In polities he is a Democrat. He was married June 14, 1869, to Miss Julia H. Kimball. They have one daughter : Maud Eliza- beth Appleton.

BABCOCK, JOHN BRAZER, merchant, senior member of the house of John B. Babcock & Co., Boston, is a native of Milton, born June 10, 1827, son of Samuel H. and Eliza (Brazer) Babcock. His father was a large woollen manufacturer and a well-known Boston merchant; and his mother was a daughter of John Brazer, for whom the Brazer Building on State Street was named. His education was acquired in Boston public schools, -- the old Boylston Grammar and the English High, from which he graduated in 1842 ; and he was well trained for business life. Soon after gradua- tion from school he entered the commission house of Read & Chadwick ; and under the tuition of their gifted book-keeper, the late Captain Joseph Murdock, he received a thorough knowledge of accounts and of office work in general. After- wards he engaged himself to the importing house of Smith, Sumner, & Co., with which he remained as partner, and of which he became successor, until 1860, when he founded the house of John B. Babcock & Co., commission merchants and manufacturers of ladies' straw and felt hats. (f this house his two sons, Samuel H. and John B. Babcock, Jr., who entered the business after grad- uating from the English High School, are now the junior partners. Mr. Babcock has also been for many years a director of the Mount Vernon National Bank of Boston ; was formerly a trustee of the Penny Savings Bank; is now a trustee of several private estates; and is a justice of the peace and notary public. He has had the settle- ment of many estates,-few other than profes- sional experts have had more,- both insolvent and deceased, and at present is administrator of

several, and holds a number of assigneeships. He was at one time president of the Mercantile Library Association, but the only local organiza- tion with which he is now connected is the Ancient and Honorable Artillery Company. He is not a

J. B. BABCOCK.

member of any of the numerous Boston clubs. In polities he is a conservative Democrat ; and, never having had any desire for office, he takes a deeper interest in the general welfare of the country than in party affiliations. Mr. Babcock was married July 26, 1849, to Miss Jane E. Broek- way. They have two daughters and two sons : Eliza, Samuel Howe, Ellen Sumner, and John Brazer Babcock, Jr.

BABSON, THOMAS MOCRATE, corporation counsel for the city of Boston, is a native of Maine, born in Wiseasset, May 28, 1847, son of John and Sarah (MeCrate) Babson. His pater- nal grandfather, John Babson, was a native of Gloucester, Mass., from which place he moved to Wiseasset about the year 1800, where he estab- lished a newspaper and a bookstore, afterwards engaging largely in building and owning vessels. His maternal grandfather, Thomas MeCrate, emi- grated from Ireland some time in the latter part

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of the eighteenth century, was a wealthy merchant in Wiscasset prior to the war of 1812, served as colonel of militia, guarding the coast of Maine in that war, and was collector of the port of Wis- casset under Andrew Jackson : Thomas Mc- C'rate's son, John D., was a leading lawyer and a member of Congress from Maine. His father, John Babson, was prominent in business and politics, both in Maine and Massachusetts, having been collector of the port of Wiscasset, United States treasury agent on the frontier of the United States and Canada, and United States shipping commissioner for the port of Boston from 1872 to his death in 1887. Thomas M. Babson was educated in the public schools of Wiscasset, at the Highland Military School of Worcester, Mass., and at Chauncey Hall, Boston ; and prepared for the law at the Harvard Law School, from which he graduated in 1868. He was admitted to the bar in 1870, and began practice in Boston. Soon after he went to St. Louis, Mo., where he was engaged two years in

T. M. BABSON.

the practice of his profession. Returning to Boston, he resumed practice here, devoting him- self especially to the trial of causes. He had at this time considerable practice in the admiralty branch of the United States courts, having been

admitted to the United States Circuit Court in 1873. He first became connected with the law department of the city of Boston in 1879, when he was appointed by Mayor Prince fourth assist- ant city solicitor under the late John P. Healy, then city solicitor. Two years later he was made second assistant, in 1885 first assistant, and in 1891 corporation counsel by appointment of Mayor Matthews. In 1876 and 1877 he was a member of the lower house of the Legislature, representing Ward 16 of Boston. As a member of the committee on elections in the session of 1877, he prepared many of the reports of that committee which have been published in Russell's Election Cases. He has also compiled the statutes affecting the city of Boston. Mr. Babson has probably tried more jury cases than any lawyer of his age at the Suffolk bar. He belongs to the Curtis and University clubs of Boston. He married June 30, 1890, Miss Helen Stevens, daughter of Joseph L. Stevens, of Gloucester. They have one child : a daughter. Elenor Babson, born September 4, 1891.

BIGELOW, SAMUEL AUGUSTUS, merchant, pres- ident of the Bigelow & Dowse Company, Boston, is a native of Boston, born November 26, 1838, son of Samuel and Anne Jane (Brooks) Bigelow. Hle is a descendant in direct line of John Biglo. one of the early settlers of Watertown, whose mar- riage, in the year 1642, was the first recorded in that town ; and on the maternal side a descend- ant of Joshua Brooks, of Concord, the ancestor of Peter C. Brooks and Governor John Brooks; con- nected also with the Lawrence and Prescott fami- lies of Groton. He was educated in the Boston public schools. He entered business when a lad of seventeen (in 1855), beginning with Eaton & Palmer, an old-time Boston firm in the hardware trade, and has remained in this trade ever since. In 1864 he became a member of the firm of Homer, Bishop, & Co., which continued until after the "Great Fire " of 1872, and was the nucleus of the present concern, of which he is the head. In 1873 the firm name was changed to Macomber, Bigelow, & Dowse, and so remained till the retirement of Mr. Macomber in 1886, when it became Bigelow & Dowse. The present corporation, under the name of the Bigelow & Dowse Company, was formed in 1894. Mr. Bige- low is president of the New England Iron and

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Hardware Association (first elected in 1893); a delegate to the Boston Associated Board of Trade (1894); and past president of the Anvil Club, an

S. A. BIGELOW.

association representing the leading hardware merchants of the principal cities in the United States. He is connected with the Masonic fra- ternity, master of the Lodge of Elusis (having passed through all the different offices in the lodge); is a member of the Bostonian Society, and of the Algonquin, Art, Athletic, Exchange, and Massachusetts Reform clubs of Boston. He was married November 7, 1867, to Miss Ella Har- riet Brown, daughter of Seth E. and Harriet (Evans) Brown. They have one child: Samuel Lawrence Bigelow.

BOWKER, WILLIAM HENRY, of Boston, presi- dlent of the Bowker Fertilizer Company, was born in Natick, July 3, 1850, son of Horace and Anna Maynard (Smith) Bowker. His ancestors on the father's side were farmers, and on the mother's side sea-captains. His early education was at- tained in the district and high schools of Phillip- ston and Templeton, and his collegiate training at the Massachusetts Agricultural College, Am- herst, where he was graduated in the class of

1871. While in college, he made a special study of chemistry. He also did much journalistic work, and immediately after graduation engaged in journalism as a reporter on city and coun- try press. Subsequently he taught school for a while, and then entered the employ of his brother, of the firm of H. L. Bowker & Co. of Boston, manufacturers of drugs and medicines. In January, 1873, he formed a partnership with L. A. Sparrow, a college classmate, under the firm name of Bowker & Sparrow, and engaged in the manufacture and sale of chemical manures. This was the foundation of the present business. The firm afterwards became W. 11. Bowker & Co., and in 1879 was succeeded by the Bowker Fer- tilizer Company, incorporated under the laws of Massachusetts with a capital of $125,000. It now has a capital of $600,000, and two factories with a capacity of fifty thousand tons annually, the business having grown from an output of one hundred tons a year to an output of one hun- dred tons a day. His success he attributes to the thorough and practical training which he re- ceived at the State College, especially in chem-

WM. H. BOWKER.

istry, and also to his training in journalism, which has been a great assistance to him in presenting intelligently and concisely the need and value of

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MEN OF PROGRESS.

chemical manures. His house was the pioneer in placing the fertilizer business on a scientific basis ; the first to introduce in this country fer- tilizers adapted to different crops or classes of crops known as special manures ; the first to urge the use of potash in mixed fertilizers ; the first to publish an agricultural chemical price list which listed many chemicals new to agriculture ; and first among the manufacturers to urge the adop- tion of the fertilizer inspection law as a protection to farmers and a safeguard to reputable manu- facturers. The Massachusetts law has since been made the basis of similar legislation throughout the United States. Mr. Whitaker, editor of the New England Farmer, in writing of the advance- ment of the fertilizer business and of the men who have been instrumental in bringing it about. said of Mr. Bowker that " he can claim the honor of having been one of the prime factors in the great change that has taken place both in public sentiment and in the uniformity and reliability of chemical fertilizer." And Herbert Myrick, edi- tor of the New England Homestead, wrote of him, "He has been a power in elevating the fertilizer business to the high plane of respectability and reliability that it now enjoys." He is much con- sulted by experiment stations, and supplies many chemicals for experimental purposes. Mr. Bow- ker is a trustee of the Massachusetts Agricultural College, appointed in 1885 by Governor Robin- son, and reappointed in 1893 by Governor Rus- sell; has been a member of the Massachusetts Board of Agriculture since 1890; member of the Board of Control Massachusetts Experiment Sta- tion since 1891 ; and member of the Gypsy Moth Commission since 1893. He is a frequent writer and speaker on agricultural topics. He has held no political or military offices. In politics he is Republican. He is a member of the University, the Exchange, and the Commercial clubs of Bos- ton. He was married September 7, 1875, to Char- lotte J. Ryder, of Barre. They have two children : Horace and Alice Bowker.

BRADSTREET, CHARLES WILLIAM, of Bos- ton, manager of the Ferd F. French & Co. (Limited), carriage-builders, is a native of New- buryport, born June 9, 1833, son of Charles and Sarah A. (Noyes) Bradstreet. His paternal grandfather was William Bradstreet, of Glouces- ter, ship-builder, and his maternal grandfather,

Samuel Noyes, of Newburyport, also a ship- builder. He was educated in the public schools of Newburyport, and began business life there, being first employed by C. W. Davenport, dry- goods merchant, in 1849, when a lad of sixteen. In September, 1850, he came to Boston, with E. T. Hardy, who opened a dry-goods store on Hanover Street. Here he remained till May, 1851, when he entered the employ of Sargent, Gunnison & Co., carriage-builders, No. 14 Sud- bury Street, with which concern and its suc- cessors he has since been identified. In January,

CHARLES W. BRADSTREET.

1862, he formed a copartnership with the late William P. Sargent, which succeeded Sargent, Gunnison & Co., and held for nearly a quarter of a century. Then, in July, 1885, Mr. Sargent retiring, and being succeeded by the Ferd F. French & Co. (Limited), he continued with that company, subsequently becoming its manager. He has long been prominent in the trade. He is connected with the Masonic order, a member of the Joseph Warren Lodge, St. Andrew's Chapter, and of the De Molay Commandery of Knights Templar, Boston. He is a member of the Cal- umet Club of Winchester, where he now resides. In politics he is classed as Independent. He was married March 6, 1867, to Miss Alprusia A.

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Walker, daughter of Colonel Benjamin P. Walker, of Claremont, N.H.

BRYANT, RALPH WALDO, business manager of the Boston Post, is a native of Lowell, born February 29, 1852, son of Daniel and Ruth Lovering (Gale) Bryant. His father was of Maine, and his mother of the Gale family of New Hampshire. He was educated in the Lowell public schools, graduating from the High School and McCoy's Business College. His parents in- tended him for the legal profession ; but, after

R. W. BRYANT.

reading law two years, he entered the field of journalism in 1873. In 1877 he took up his resi- dence in New York, and for thirteen years was an active and successful metropolitan newspaper man. For several years he was on the staff of the New York World, and in the capacity of a special correspondent for that paper he visited nearly every State and Territory in the Union. During the late eighties, in an extensive Western trip, he described in his letters the commercial and industrial development of Western cities, as well as the picturesque features of the country through which he journeyed, including the entire Pacific Coast from Vancouver Island to Mexico. In several instances his attractive descriptions

diverted the tide of Eastern travel to the places and sections described, and his matter was fre- quently reproduced in American and foreign papers. One of his Western trips, originally planned to cover six months, was extended over two years. Upon his return to New York, after a tour of the Southern States, overtures were made to him by the controllers of the Philadel- phia Daily News, and in 1890 he became the proprietor of that paper. The first year of his management was that in which Senator Quay ran Delamater for governor in opposition to Pattison, and he placed his paper squarely in opposition to this movement, fighting it day by day with the publication of a series of articles on the career and policy of Senator Quay in Pennsylvania poli- tics, which attracted wide attention. In the autumn of 1891, when the controlling interest of the Boston Post was purchased by Edwin A. Grozier, he came to Boston as business manager of that paper, and has since been identified with its conduct. Ile was married in October, 1874, to Miss Callie E. Simpson, of Lowell. They have one child : Fred K. Bryant.

BURDETT, EVERETT WATSON, member of the Suffolk bar, was born in northern Mississippi, April 5, 1854, son of Augustus P. and Mariann (Newman) Burdett. His parents were both Massachusetts folk who went South in 1852, and returned to Massachusetts in 1873. He was educated in private schools, and for a short time at Washington University, St. Louis, Mo. As boy and man, he has been a resident of Massa- chusetts almost continuously since 1867. He en- tered the Law School of Boston University in 1875, and was graduated in the class of 1877. The following year he was admitted to the Suf- folk bar, and has since been actively engaged in business in Boston. He began practice with the Hon. Charles Allen, now senior associate justice of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court, in whose office he had studied. Soon after, however, he was appointed assistant United States attorney for the district of Massachusetts, and served with success in that capacity for nearly three years, trying substantially all of the cases for the govern- ment during the latter part of his incumbency. He then resigned, and entered upon the general practice of the law, to which he has since devoted himself exclusively. He is now (1894) a member

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of the law firm of Burdett & Snow, with offices in the Ames Building. Though he has tried a large variety of cases, his present practice relates

E. W. BURDETT.

the industry was established in this State, and has sel for electric lighting interests almost as soon as chiefly to corporation matters. He became coun-

been the attorney of various lighting companies

since that time. He has also been the general

dence in the Medical School of Boston University; 1889. He is the lecturer on medical jurispru- panies of the State, since its establishment in thirty of the leading gas and electric light com- tric lighting companies, composed of more than attorney of the Massachusetts association of elec-

dett was married in Boston, April 15, 1885, to Curtis, and Athletic clubs of Boston. Mr. Bur- for 1894. He is a member of the Exchange, City Committee of Boston, declining re-election year 1893 he was president of the Republican tions. In politics he is Republican. For the pital, and a director in several business corpora- trustee of the Massachusetts Homeopathie Hos- Mercantile Library Association. He is now a chises." He was for two years president of the rated Companies operating under Municipal Fran- of an elaborate work on the " Law of Incorpo- and is a joint author of the Massachusetts section

Miss Maud Warner, of Boston. They have two children : Marion and Paul Burdett.

BURDETT, JOSEPH OLIVER, of Hingham, for three years chairman of the Republican State Committee, is a native of Middlesex County, and there began his professional career. He was born in Wakefield (then South Reading), October 30, 1848, son of Joseph and Sally (Mansfield) Burdett. He was educated in the public schools of his native town and at Tufts College, where he was graduated (in 1871) second in his class, not-

withstanding that he was absent nearly half of his senior year, earning money to meet his college expenses. Immediately after his graduation he took up the study of law in the office of Judge John W. Hammond, then city solicitor of Cam- bridge, and the same year entered the Harvard Law School. Admitted to the bar April 19, 1873, he began practice in association with Judge Hammond. In 1875 he opened an office in Bos- ton, where he has since practised. The year be- fore he established his residence in Hingham,

J. O. BURDETT.

and there early became prominent in local mat- ters. He has been a member of the Hingham School Board for more than eighteen years, its

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chairman fifteen years, and for some time con- cerned in a number of town improvements. He is now a director of the Rockland Hotel Com- pany, which owns the Nantasket and Rockland Houses at Nantasket Beach, and of the Wey- mouth Light and Power Company, which fur- nishes light to the towns of Weymouth and Hing- ham; and is also a large owner in and president of the Hull Electric Light and Power Com- pany, and the Hull and Nantasket Street Railway Company. In 1884 and 1885 he represented Hingham and Hull in the lower house of the Legislature, serving both sessions as chairman of the committee on public service, from which came the civil service bill now in the statutes, and tak- ing a leading part in the important debates on the floor of the house. In his second term he was also a member of the committee on the judi- ciary. He was first elected chairman of the Re- publican State Committee in 1889, after having served three years in the body, and was con- tinued in office the two succeeding years. Mr. Burdett was married in 1874, upon his removal to Hingham, to Miss Ella, daughter of John K. Corthell, of that town. They have three children : Harold Corthell, Edith Mansfield, and Helen Ripley Burdett.

BUTLER, JOHN HASKELL, member of the bar for a quarter of a century, is a native of Essex County, born in Middleton, August 31, I841, son of John and Mary J. (Barker) Butler. His early training was in the district schools, and he fitted for college in the Shirley High School and the Lawrence Academy of Groton. Entering Yale, he graduated therefrom in the class of 1863 with honors. After service in the United States Navy, he entered the law office of the late John Q. . 1. Griffin and William S. Stearns, of Charlestown, and in October, 1868, was admitted to the Middlesex bar. The same year and month he formed a copartnership with Mr. Stearns under the firm name of Stearns & Butler, which associa- tion continued to the first day of January, 1892, when Mr. Stearns retired from practice. In 1870 he established his residence in Somerville, and early became identified with the interest of that city. For twelve years (1876-88) he served on the Somerville School Board, in ISSo and 1881 represented his city in the lower house of the Legislature, and in 1884-85-86 was a member of

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Men of progress one thousand biographical sketches and portraits of leaders in business and professional life in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Part 15

Author: Herndon, Richard; Bacon, Edwin M. (Edwin Monroe), 1844-1916 Publication date: 1896 Publisher: Boston : New England Magazine Number of Pages: 1036

Author: Herndon, Richard; Bacon, Edwin M. (Edwin Monroe), 1844-1916
Publication date: 1896
Publisher: Boston : New England Magazine
Number of Pages: 1036