Men of progress one thousand biographical sketches and portraits of leaders in business and professional life in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Part 23

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 23

Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).

(Vt.) Academy. While teaching, he studied law, and later, coming to Boston, read in the law of- fice of Ranney & Morse. Admitted to the bar on the first of May, 1855, he at once began prac- tice in Boston ; and he has confined himself exclu- sively to his profession since, without interruption and with success. Beyond one term in the Gen- eral Court (1876) as a representative from Med- ford, he has held no public place, having declined all offices, positions, and work not in the line of professional pursuits. He has, however, occa- sionally written for magazines and the newspaper press, and delivered a few public addresses on literary and educational themes. In politics he is a Republican. He is a member of the Boston Bar Association, of the Masonic order, and of the Medford Club ; and he has been a trustee of Middlebury College since 1882. He was married August 26, 1851, to Miss Charlotte H. Hough, of Lebanon, N.H. They have had four children : Edward Baxter (now a pianist in Boston), Cora G. (now the wife of Charles A. Hamilton, of New York), George H. (now partner in the firm with his father), and Edith C. Perry.

PETTENGILL, JOHN WARD, member of the Suffolk bar, was born in Salisbury, N.H., Novem- ber 12, 1836, son of Benjamin and Betsey (Petten- gill) Pettengill. He is of Puritan ancestry, a de- scendant of Richard Pettengill who came from Staffordshire, England, to Salem, in 1628, and there married Joanna, daughter of Richard Inger- soll. He was educated in the public schools, and in the Franklin, Salisbury, Northfield, and Hop- kinton academies. He was fitted for college by that eminent teacher, Professor Dyer H. Sanborn, and in 1854 was about to enter the sophomore class of Dartmouth when he was prevented by a severe bronchial trouble, which for a long time impaired his voice to such a degree that he was unable to speak. For the next two years, how- ever, he pursued the college studies at home under the direction of his father and a private tutor. In 1856 he became connected with the editorial department of the Independent Democrat at Concord, and while there began the study of law, reading in the office of Judge Asa Fowler. Early in 1858 he came to Massachusetts, and entered the office of John Q. A. Griffin and Alonzo W. Boardman, in Charlestown, as a stu- dent, and in March, 1859, was admitted to the

169

MEN OF PROGRESS.

Middlesex bar, on examination, by the Hon. George P. Sanger, judge. Hc practised in Charlestown till the annexation of that city to Boston, in 1874, when he moved his office to the city proper, where he has since been established. He was a special justice of the Police Court of Charlestown for several years immediately preced- ing annexation, and in August following was ap- pointed justice of the First District Court of Eastern Middlesex, with jurisdiction in Malden, Melrose, Medford, Everett, Wakefield, Reading, and North Reading, which position he still holds.

JOHN W. PETTENGILL.

In his practice he has been especially successful in criminal cases. During the administration of the late Charles R. Train as attorney-general he secured verdicts of acquittal for his clients in three capital cases; and in the case of the Com- monwealth 7. Orne, indicted for burning a school- house in Charlestown, in which he was counsel for the defendant, four trials were necessary before the government could secure a conviction. He has also been successful in the conduct of civil suits involving important questions of law. For many years he has resided in Malden, and has been prominent in the affairs of that city. He was elected a trustee of the Malden Public Library Fund in 1878 for the term of three years,

and declined a re-election in 188 1, after the library was established and in satisfactory condition. He was a member of the Board of Aldermen for 1891, but declined a re-election in 1892. He was elected again in 1893, but positively declined a nomination for 1894. In politics he has usually been a Republican, and at one time was active in party work, frequently speaking on the stump; but of late years he has devoted himself almost wholly to his professional work, with occasional addresses on some social science topic. He is president of the Malden Board of Trade, an association which is interested in matters pertaining to the encour- agement of all legitimate business enterprises, and organized to collect and disseminate information respecting Malden as a manufacturing city and a place of residence. He is also a member of the Middlesex, the New Hampshire, and the Kernwood clubs, and of the Deliberative Association, a liter- ary club of Malden. Mr. Pettengill was married April 25, 1866, in Watertown, by the Rev. John Weiss, to Miss Margaret Maria Dennett, daugh- ter of John Richard and Mary Dennett, of Lan- caster, England. They have one child : Margaret Betsey Pettengill, born September 29, 1867.

POWERS, WILBUR HOWARD, member of the Suffolk bar, is a native of New Hampshire, born in Croydon, January 22, 1849, son of Elias and Emeline (White) Powers. He comes of an ancient family which bore originally the Norman name of Le Poer. The first ancestor known was an officer under William the Conqueror, whose name appears in Battle Abbey as one of the survivors of the battle of Hastings ; and the first ancestor in this country was Walter Power, who settled on a tract of land near Concord, now in the town of Little- ton, Mass. His sons added the letter " s" to the name. Elias Powers, the father of Wilbur H., was a farmer, widely known in the community for in- tegrity and hospitality. On the maternal side he is of Saxon descent, from Elder John White, set- tled in 1632 in New Towne, now Cambridge, the site of whose farm is in part covered by Gore Hall, Harvard. His early education was attained in the district schools. Then he entered Olean Academy at Olean, N.Y., and subsequently Kim- ball Union Academy at Meriden, N.H. Graduat- ing from the latter in 1871, he entered Dart- mouth, and there was graduated in the class of 1875, taking prizes in oratory and in English com-

1 70

MEN OF PROGRESS.

position, and having as his part for commence- ment a philosophical discussion which won for him the highest commendation of the Faculty. His legal studies were pursued in the Boston Uni- versity Law School; and, graduating therefrom in 1878, he was soon after admitted to the bar. The expenses of both his collegiate and law school education were defrayed by his own efforts. He began professional work in Boston on January 22, 1879, and has been established there since, en- gaged in an extensive practice. He has been counsel in many important cases in the courts and

WILBUR H. POWERS.

before committees of the Legislature. He was receiver of the Guardian Endowment Society, ap- pointed by the court in 1893, and succeeded in closing up its affairs promptly and satisfactorily. He served three terms in the General Court (1890-91-92) as a representative from Hyde Park, from the first among the leaders, and dur- ing his third term the official and acknowledged leader, on the Republican side, upon the floor of the House. He was in large measure the author of and responsible for the passage of the bill of 1892, redividing the State into Congressional Dis- tricts, on a plan which he maintained was non- partisan. The bill passed a Republican House, a Senate equally divided between the two parties,

and was signed by a Democratic governor. He made an effective speech in its defence, which gained the commendation of those who were bit- terly opposed to him. He was also the author of a bill in the interest of education, aiding more particularly the poorer municipalities, and endeav- oring to make a more equitable distribution of the corporation tax. He was elected a member of the first Board of Park Commissioners for Hyde Park for 1893-94, and was active in advocating the taking of Stony Brook Reservation for park purposes, which was accomplished, the board join- ing the Metropolitan Park Commission in the transaction. He has been for many years a mem- ber of the Republican town committee for Hyde Park, holding successively the positions of secre- tary, treasurer, and chairman ; and since 1893 a member of the Republican State Committee. He is connected with the Masonic order, which he joined before graduating from college; also with the Royal Society of Good Fellows ; and has been a prominent member of the Golden Cross, and counsel for the order at large for twelve years. He belongs to both the social clubs of Hyde Park, the Waverly and the Hyde Park clubs,-president of the Waverly in 1894. In college he was a mem- ber of the 1). K. E. Society. He was married May 1, 1880, to Miss Emily Owen, of Lebanon, N.H. They have two children : Walter (born August 3, 1885), and Myra Powers (born May 22, 1889).

PREBLE, WILLIAM HENRY, member of the Suffolk bar, is a native of Charlestown, born August 11, 1856, son of Jeremiah and Elizabeth (Freeman) Preble. His parents were both natives of Maine, the father of York and the mother of Mt. Desert ; and he is of English descent. His education was acquired in the Charlestown public schools. After his graduation from the High School in 1874 he went to work as a clerk in a law office, devoting his evenings to study. He read law in the offices of George E. Smith and F. Hutchinson, and in ISSo was admitted to the Massachusetts bar. Four years later he was ad- mitted to the bar of the United States Circuit Court. He began the practice of his profession in Boston, where he has been established since, his present offices in the Sears Building. His practice has been confined to the civil side of the court, consisting mainly of commercial litigation and probate and insolvency cases. In politics he

17I

MEN OF PROGRESS.

is a Republican, active in his party. For eight years he was prominent on the Republican city committee of Boston, and he is now a member of

WILLIAM H. PREBLE.

the Republican State Committee. He was a mem- ber of the lower house of the Legislature in 1888 and 188g, serving both terms on the committees on elections (chairman) and on probate and insol- vency (clerk) ; and he had a hand in shaping some of the most important legislation of the session. He is connected with the Masonic and Odd Fel- lows orders,- a member of the Henry Price Lodge, Masons, of Scottish Rites bodies, and of the Mas- sachusetts Consistory ; is a past grand of the Bunker Hill Lodge Odd Fellows, and member of the committee on the judiciary of the Grand Lodge. He is also a member of the order of Red Men, and of the Nine Hundred and Ninety- ninth Artillery Association of Charlestown. He was married December 8, 1880, to Miss Amy Bertha Nash, of the Charlestown District. They have five children : Florence L., Elsie May, Grace .A., Winnifred L., and Gladys Preble. Mr. Preble still resides in the Charlestown District.

PROCTOR, JOSEPH, tragedian, whose profes- sional carcer has covered upwards of half a cen-

tury, is a native of Marlboro, born May 7, 1816, son of Nicholson Broughton and Lucy (Bond) Proctor. He received his early education in the local schools, and graduated from the Gates Academy in Marlboro. His parents intended him for the ministry, but his bent was strongly towards the stage; and at the early age of seventeen, hav- ing found his way to Boston and enlisted the sym- pathies of William Pelby, then the manager of the Warren Theatre, he made his first bow before a theatrical audience. This was on the evening of November 29, 1833 ; and the part he essayed was Damon in " Damon and Pythias," the Pythias being Edmond Connor, recently deceased (1894). His success was so marked that he was called upon to repeat the performance three times, one of the three at a benefit of Mrs. Anderson (Ophelia Pelby). Shortly after he appeared at the Tre- mont Theatre as Rolla in " Pizarro," and as Car- win in John Howard Payne's drama " Therese, the Orphan of Geneva," once a great favorite with Edwin Forrest ; and his next attempt was as Macbeth. This ambitious selection was made to meet the wishes of his parents, who had given

JOSEPH PROCTOR.

their reluctant consent to his adoption of the pro- fession of an actor on condition that he should appear in some prominent character, "they, good

172

MEN OF PROGRESS.

souls that they were," as he has said, "trusting from the bottom of their hearts that failure would prove the result, and my aspirations for a stage life be fully satisfied." His success was so great that he took a stock engagement with Pelby, and applied himself to a careful study of the rudiments of the profession. At the close of his season in Pelby's company he moved westward, and for the next three years appeared at various theatres in general characters, from " utility " to leading busi- ness. His first engagement of this period was at Albany, where he spent a year, playing with many of the dramatic notables of the time, James Sher- idan Knowles and Thomas Apthorpe Cooper among the number. Then he joined a company which Charles R. Thorne and wife brought to Albany on their way West, and went with it to Buffalo, Toronto, and a number of Western cities. At Columbus, hearing from home that his mother was dangerously ill, he left the company and started East, travelling by stage over the Allegha- nies, as there were then no railroads. . \t Phila- delphia, having received word of his mother's recovery, he rested, and, finding E. S. Connor, (who had played Pythias at his first appearance in Bos- ton,) at the Walnut Street Theatre, he made an engagement there for the remainder of the season. This was the winter of 1836-37. The season was divided between Philadelphia and Pittsburg, in both of which cities he became a great favorite. After this he starred some time, in the west, and then, engaged by Thomas Hamblin for the Bowery Theatre, New York, appeared in the "Nick of the Woods," presented for the first time on the evening of the 6th of May, 1839, playing the Jibbenainosay, the part he subsequently made famous abroad as well as in his own country. This performance was received with great favor, and the play had a long and profitable run. The following season it was brought out in Boston, at the National Theatre, and the New York success was repeated. The next year Mr. Proctor spent mostly in starring tours. He travelled South and West, visited the Bahamas and other parts of the West Indies. Again coming East, he filled engage- ments in Philadelphia, New York, Boston, Port- land, and Bangor, and made repeated successful trips in various directions. In 1848 he returned to Boston, and took the management of the then unprosperous Beach Street Museum, which he conducted for about a year with a fair measure of success. Thence he went to Portland, opening

there the new theatre built for him by the Hon. F. O. J. Smith, in the early autumn of 1849. Here he continued as manager for a couple of years, during this time also playing frequent star engagements in the more prominent cities of the country. In the autumn of 1851 he left for a professional tour in California, where he remained till March, 1854. His return to Boston was fol- lowed by a succession of starring engagements in the principal cities. Then in May, 1859, accom- panied by his wife, he sailed for Europe, and after a summer holiday trip on the continent made his first appearance before a London audience at the Royal Standard Theatre. This was an immediate and pronounced success; and the prosperous en- gagement continued through ten successive weeks, terminating only with the holiday season. An ex- tended tour of leading cities in the north of Eng- land, Ireland, and Scotland followed, with similar success, after which he returned to London for a series of farewell performances, the opening of which was thus announced in the local press : " Reappearance of the pre-eminent tragedian, Mr. Joseph Proctor, whose great success in his pro- longed engagement of seventy nights in London, and recent triumphs in the north of England, in Scotland, and Ireland, have won for him the golden opinion of the press and public. He will appear as Macbeth. Locke's celebrated music will be sung by the English Opera Company." His stay abroad covered about two and a half years, during which he played in various rôles of the Shakspearian and standard range, and fre- quently in the Jibbenainosay, winning warm praise from the English critics. During this period, when playing a star engagement at the Theatre Royal in Glasgow, he first met Henry Irving, then a member of the supporting company, and was so impressed by his work and his evident de- termination to master every detail of the man- ager's as well as the actor's art, that he felt assured of the young actor's future, and told him so. Years after his words were most agreeably re- called by Irving when in Boston, who, at a little supper after the play, referred to Proctor as the kindest man he ever knew,- " a man enveloped in a kind and gentle spirit, whose encouraging words spoken to me when many years younger than I am to-night were more hopeful than this good man supposed they would be when, impelled by his inherent goodness of heart, he uttered them to a young actor struggling to reach his ideal in

173

MEN OF PROGRESS.

his profession." Upon returning to America, Mr. Proctor repeated his starring trips over the coun- try. While filling an engagement at the Howard Athenaeum in Boston in 1865, he played Macbeth to Charlotte Cushman's Lady Macbeth at the Bos- ton Theatre in a performance for the benefit of the Sanitary Commission. Late in the seventies he played a series of successful engagements in Colorado. In 1885 he practically retired from the stage, and established a school of dramatic art in Boston, which he has since directed during the winter months, resting summers at his country place at Manchester-by-the-sea. He has occa- sionally given performances with his pupils in New England towns, before lyceums, and once since his retirement has appeared at a benefit performance in Boston,- at the Globe Theatre, April 8, 1890, in aid of the fund for the Mrs. J. R. Vincent Hospital, when he played Macbeth. Mr. Proctor was first married in 1837, to Miss Hester Willis Warren, daughter of William Warren, and sister of William Warren, the long-time favorite Boston comedian. She died in Boston, December 7, 1841. He married second Miss Elizabeth R. Wakeman, daughter of Bradley Wakeman, of Bal- timore, in February, 1851. His wife and daughter, Miss Anna E. Proctor, and self are the surviving unities of his last alliance.

RENO, CONRAD, member of the Suffolk bar, is a native of Alabama, born in Mount Vernon, December 28, 1859, son of Jesse Lee and Mary B. B. (Cross) Reno. He is of French descent on the paternal side, and of English on the maternal side. His father, a graduate of West Point in 1846, served through the Mexican War, and in the Civil War was a major-general of United States Volunteers, in command of the Ninth Army Corps, when he was killed in the battle of South Mountain, Md., on the 14th of Sep- tember, 1862. Conrad Reno was educated in the schools of Baltimore, in Shortlidge's Media Academy of Media, l'enna., and at Lehigh Univer- sity, where he spent two years. Then he came East, and studied law two years in the Harvard Law School and one year in the Boston University Law School, graduating in 1883. He was ad- mitted to the bar in September of that year, and, after three or four months in the law office of the Hon. Henry W. Paine, began practice on his own account in Boston, where he has since been

established. Among important cases in which he has been engaged was that of Eliot 7. McCor- mick, Mass. Reports, vols. 141 and 144, now regarded as a leading case in Massachusetts and in other States, in which it was decided that a judgment against a non-resident defendant, with- out personal service of process or voluntary appearance, was null and void, and that certain State statutes which purported to authorize the rendition of a judgment upon notice by publica- tion were unconstitutional : this decision over- ruling a long line of Massachusetts cases and

CONRAD RENO.

reversing the practice of the preceding hundred years. And another was Eustis 7. Bolles, Mass. Reports, vol. 146, and United States Supreme Court Reports, vol. 150, in which it was decided that the Composition Acts of Massachusetts were unconstitutional as applied to pre-existing con- tracts, and that a creditor waived his right to object to their unconstitutionality by accepting a dividend under the composition proceedings. The Supreme Court of the United States held that it had no jurisdiction to review this decision of the Massachusetts court. He has spent a large part of ten years in the study of constitutional law, and of the law of " non-residents and foreign cor- porations," and has published a number of works

174

MEN OF PROGRESS.

on these subjects. He has also written much upon economic and labor questions. His publica- tions include : two papers on "Judgments by Default against Non-resident Defendants " (Amer- ican Law Review, 1887 and 1888); papers entitled "Ogden 7. Sanders Reviewed" (American Law Register, 1888), "Impairment of Contracts by Change of Judicial Opinion " (American Lar Review, 1889), " Extra Territorial Effect of Limita- tion Bar" (American Law Review, 1890), "The Wage Contract and Personal Liberty" (Popular Science Monthly, 1892), " Arbitration and the Wage Contract" (American Law Review, 1892), " Pro- tective Tariff Laws and the Commerce Clause " (American Law Review, 1893), "Individual Liabil- ity of Non-resident Stockholders " (American Lawe Review, 1894); a pamphlet entitled " State Regula- tion of Wages " (Boston : B. Wilkins & Co., 1891,); and an elaborate work on "Non-residents and Foreign Corporations," treating of the fundamental rights, remedies, and liabilities of such residents and corporations, both under State law and Federal law, the first and only work covering these sub- jects (one volume; Chicago : T. H. Flood & Co., 1892). Since January, 1893, Mr. Reno has been an instructor in the Boston University Law School, on the subject of theses. He is a member of the Loyal Legion of the United States, in November, 1892, elected secretary of the committee on his- tory of the Massachusetts Commandery; a mem- ber of the Aztec Club ; of the Sons of Veterans, and other military organizations ; and of the An- cient Order of United Workmen. In politics he is of the People's Party. He attended the first national convention of the party in July, 1892, as a delegate from Massachusetts, and on September 6, 1893, was nominated for attorney-general of Massachusetts on the People's Party State ticket. He was married April 13, 1887, to Miss Susan Moore Eustis, daughter of the Rev. William T. Eustis, D.D., of Springfield. They have no chil- dren.

ROLLINS, JAMES WINGATE, member of the Suffolk bar, is a native of New Hampshire, born in Rollinsford (formerly Somersworth), April 19, 1827, son of James and Sally (Wingate) Rollins. He is a descendant in the seventh generation of James Rollins, who came from England with the Ipswich settlers in 1632, and a few years after removed to Dover, N.H .; and, on the maternal side, of John Wingate, who came to Dover in

1660. His father, James Rollins, was born on the memorable July 4, 1776. James W. was fitted for college at the South Berwick (Me.) Academy, and graduated at Dartmouth in 1845, at the age of eighteen years. His law studies were pursued with the Hon. John Hubbard and

JAMES W. ROLLINS.

William .A. Hayes, of South Berwick ; and he was admitted to the bar in Vork County, Maine, early in 1850. In May of the same year he was admitted to the bar of Massachusetts, and has practised his profession in Boston since that time. He had a large practice in the courts till about 1880, when, on account of increasing deafness, he was obliged to devote himself almost entirely to office practice. The only civil or political offices he has ever held were those of chairman of the School Committee of the town of West Roxbury (now part of the city of Boston) from 1868 to 1870, and member of the Board of Selectmen of the town. He has been a director of the Mas- sachusetts Central Railroad Company, and was for some years president of the Boston, Halifax, and Prince Edward Island Steamship Line. In politics he has always been a Republican, but he has not engaged actively in political work, having attended strictly to his professional business. He was married November 22, 1845, to Sophia

175

MEN OF PROGRESS.

Atwill (born Sophia Webb Hutchings), and has living four children : Mary H. ; James W., Jr., now a well-known civil engineer of Boston ; Alice S., wife of Edwin T. Brewster, of Cambridge ; and Edward A. Rollins, engaged in manufacture.

SAUNDERS, CHARLES HICKS, of Cambridge, largely identified with the progress and develop- ment of the university city during the past forty years, was born in Old Cambridge, November 10, 1821, second son of William and Sarah ( Flagg) Saunders. His ancestors came to New England from Old England as early as 1635, and on his maternal side some have always resided in Cam- bridge since that date. One of these, John Hicks, the great-grandfather of Mr. Saunders, was killed in Cambridge by the British troops retreat- ing from Lexington on the memorable 19th of April, 1775, while he was busily engaged, musket in hand, with a company of his friends, in picking off the redcoats. The city of Cambridge, in 1870, erected a monument to their memory in the old burial-ground in Old Cambridge. Charles H. Saunders received his education in the public schools of Cambridge, and was partially fitted for college in the Hopkins Classical School ; but, preferring a business career to a professional one, he early engaged in mercantile pursuits. After occupying a position in the Suffolk Bank of Bos- ton for a short time, he entered the hardware business in that city, and continued in it until the year 1863, when, at the age of forty-two, he re- tired. While in business, he made considerable investments in real estate in Cambridge, which he developed by the opening of streets and the erec- tion of houses; and, since relinquishing the ac- tive care of business, his time has been largely occupied in interests of that character. He has always stood in the foremost rank of those advo- cating the carrying out of all improvements that should increase the attractiveness of his native city. In politics Mr. Saunders was first a Whig, and upon the disintegration of that party allied himself with the Republican party, of which he has always been an active and zealous adherent. He was early called to fill the various offices of the city. He was elected a member of the Common Council for the years 1853 and 1854, and of the Board of Aldermen for 1861 and 1862. In all the events of the Civil War he took the deepest inter- est, and aided all measures for its active prosecu-

Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.

Men of progress one thousand biographical sketches and portraits of leaders in business and professional life in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Part 23

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