Men of progress one thousand biographical sketches and portraits of leaders in business and professional life in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Part 95

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 95

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BIGELOW, GEORGE BROOKS, of Boston, mem- ber of the Suffolk bar, was born in Boston, April 25, 1836, son of Samuel and Anna Jane (Brooks) Bigelow. On the paternal side he is a descendant of John Bigelow from England, settled in Water-

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town in 1636, through the latter's son Joshua ; and on the maternal side he descends from Joshua Brooks, of Concord, ancestor of John Brooks,

GEORGE B. BIGELOW.

governor of the State from 1816 to 1826. His early education he received at the old Chapman Hall School in Boston, and he graduated at Har- vard in the class of 1856. His law studies were pursued first in the Harvard Law School, and afterward in the law office of James Dana and Moses Gill Cobb in Boston; and he was ad- mitted to the bar December 31, 1859. He has practised his profession successfully in Boston since that time, devoting himself mainly to office practice pertaining to mercantile interests, probate matters, and real estate. He has been counsel of the Boston Five Cents Savings Bank (one of the largest in the State) for over seventeen years. In politics Mr. Bigelow has affiliated with the Re- publican party, but is independent in his views. He is a member of the Bostonian Society, of the Boston Art Club, the Exchange Club, and the Boston Athletic Club.

BLAKE, GEORGE FORDYCE, JR., of Worcester, dealer and manufacturer, is a native of Medford. born February 9, 1859, son of George Fordyce

and Martha J. (Skinner) Blake. He is a de- scendant of William Blake, who came from Little Braddow. Essex, England, in 1630, first settled in Dorchester, and in 1636 removed with William Pynchon and others to Springfield, whose de- scendants, however, continued to reside in Dor- chester and Boston. Two of them were deacons in the church and selectmen, and one was a member of the General Court. Dr. Thomas Dawes Blake, the grandfather of George F., Jr .. long of Farming- ton, Me., was born in King (now State) Street. Boston, and educated in the schools of Worcester. Mr. Blake's maternal grandfather was William Skinner, of Lynnfield. George F. Blake, Jr., was educated in the public schools of Medford and of Belmont, to which town the family removed when he was a lad of ten, at Warren Academy in Woburn, and at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he graduated in the class of 1879. The year 1880 was spent in a trip around the world; and then he began business life in con- nection with the George F. Blake Manufacturing Company, steam pump manufacturers, and the Knowles Pump Works, of which companies his

GEO. F. BLAKE, Jr.

father was president. lle was with these con- cerns as draughtsman till 1884, when on the 28th of February he entered the iron and steel trade

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at Worcester, forming a partnership under the name of Blake, Boutwell, & Co. In October, 1891, his firm became George F. Blake, Jr., & Co. In May, 1893, an iron mill at Wareham was added to the business, and a store in Boston. Mr. Blake is also a trustee of the Worcester County Institution of Savings, and he was for three years a director of the Providence & Worcester Railroad Company. He is a member of the Worcester Board of Trade and of the Home Market Club. He belongs to several clubs in Worcester and Boston, -- the Wor- cester, Commonwealth, and Quinsigamond Boat clubs of Worcester (president of the latter for two years) and the Athletic and Art clubs of Bos- ton. He was married April 29, 1885, to Miss Carrie Howard Turner, daughter of Job A. Turner, treasurer of the G. F. Blake Manufactur- ing Company and the Knowles Pump Works. They have one child : Fordyce Turner Blake.

BLANEY, OSGOOD CHANDLER, of Boston, manu- facturer, is a native of Boston, born January 20. 1860, son of Irving and Annette (Chandler)

OSGOOD C. BLANEY.

Blaney. On the paternal side he is a descendant of William Blaney, who settled in Swampscott in 1751 ; and on the maternal side he descends from

William Chandler, one of the earliest settlers of Roxbury, coming in 1637. He was educated in the Boston public schools. The greater part of his business life has been devoted to the metal re- fining business, in which he has for many years been engaged with C. C. Blaney & Co. He is in politics an earnest Republican, and has been a member of the Republican city committee since 1888. He has served in the Common Council one term (1890), and is now sealer of weights and measures, having been appointed to that position in May, 1895. He is connected with the order of Odd Fellows, a member of Norfolk Lodge, No. 48, and is a member also of Upham Assembly, No. 61, Royal Society of Good Fellows. Mr. Blaney was married August 3, 1882, to Miss Eleanor Kieser. They have one child : Walter Clifton Blaney.

BOOTHBY, ALONZO, M.D., of Boston, is a native of Maine, born in Athens, Somerset County, March 5, 1840, son of Nathaniel and Martha M. Boothby. His father was a farmer, who settled in Athens in 1838. He was educated in the local schools, at Athens Academy, and at Kent's Hill ; and, early determining to become a sur- geon, he began at nineteen the study of medicine with Dr. Kinsman, then a leading physician in his native town. Subsequently he attended two courses of lectures at Bowdoin College, and in 1861 went to New York, where he continued his studies under Dr. David Conant, who had been a professor in Bowdoin. Soon after the Civil War broke out, he entered the Union service as a surgical dresser, acting as cadet, and, while pursuing this work, took a course in the George- town Medical College, D.C., from which he re- ceived his diploma in March, 1863. Later he became contract surgeon under Dr. Bliss, as- signed to Patent Office and Armory Square Gen- eral Hospitals, and in 1864 was commissioned first assistant surgeon to the Second United States Colored Regiment, with which he re- mained a year as principal surgeon. In 1865 on account of impaired health, the result of his severe labors in hospital and field, he returned to his home in Maine, and two days after was stricken with yellow fever, which he contracted in Key West, where it was raging when he left his regiment on sick furlough. Before he left on sick leave he tendered his resignation, the accept- ance of which was not received till some time

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after his return home. Upon his recovery he re- moved to Wilton. Me., and there practised his profession two years. Then he came to Boston,

ALONZO BOOTHBY

where he has been established since. In 1866, after giving to the theory much study, and after a personal experience, having found relief from malarial fever through its employment, he adopted homeopathy, and soon became prominent in its practice. He was first appointed a visiting phy- sician to the Homeopathie Dispensary, and was made a lecturer in the Boston University School of Medicine soon after its establishment in 1873. Further to perfect himself as a surgeon, he went abroad in 1883, and spent a year or more in the great hospitals of Berlin, Vienna, and Lon- don. Returning to Boston, he gradually relin- quished the general practice of medicine to devote himself exclusively to surgery. In 1889 he estab- lished his private surgical hospital on Worcester Square, now the largest private hospital in the city, continuing, however, his work as surgeon to the Homeopathic Hospital, with which he first be- came connected in 1878, and in other directions. In the Boston University Medical School he has been a demonstrator of anatomy, lecturer on anat- omy, professor of surgical anatomy, lecturer on chemical surgery, associate professor of clinical

surgery, and at the present time he is professor of gynæcology. He is president of the Massachu- setts Homeopathic Medical Society, past presi- dent of the Boston Homeopathie Medical Society, past president of the Massachusetts Surgical and Gynæcological Society, member of the Massachu- setts Homeopathic Medical Society and of the American Institute of Homeopathy. He has contributed various articles on his specialties to the medical journals. In early life he was promi- nent in the order of Odd Fellows : and he is now a Freemason, member of the Mt. Lebanon Lodge of Boston. Dr. Boothby was married April 1. 1863. to Miss Maria A. Stodder, daughter of Reuben Stodder, of Athens, Me. They have one son : Walter Meredith Boothby.

BOYNTON, JOSEPH JACKSON, M.D., of Fram- ingham. is a native of Vermont, born in Stowe, June 9. 1833, son of David and Melinda (Austin) Boynton. His education was largely attained through his own efforts and his persisteney in the pursuit of study while supporting himself. having

J. J. BOYNTON

left home at the age of thirteen and made his own way from that time. For more than thirty years he studied evenings, finding instructors among his

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acquaintances. He attended the district school until sixteen years of age, and then entered the People's Academy at Morrisville, Vt., where he spent a year. Afterward he taught school for three years. Meanwhile at about the time he en- tered the academy he had begun the study of med- icine, and walked eight miles to make his regular recitations to Dr. Huntoon, of Hyde Park, Vt .; and he never wholly dropped the study by himself until he decided to attend a medical school. He first took two courses of medical lectures in the University of New York, and next two courses in the University of Vermont, where he graduated June 26, 1878. He lived in Stowe until 1881, beginning practice there, and then removed to Framingham, where he has since been engaged in the successful practice of both medicine and sur- gery. Dr. Boynton served in the Civil War, en- listing August 18, 1862. On the 8th of Septem- ber following he was elected captain of Company E, Thirteenth Regiment, Vermont Volunteers ; and on May 5, 1863 was made major. He was discharged July 21, 1863. Subsequently he en- tered the State Militia and was elected captain of Company I), Second Regiment Infantry, Decem- ber 31, 1864. On the 10th of February the following year he was promoted to lieutenant colonel ; and March 27, 1867, to colonel, which position he held for one year, and then resigned. In both Stowe and Framingham he has served in public place, having held all town offices except that of treasurer, and been a school committee. man for more than twenty years. For two terms, 1865 and 1866, he was a member of the Vermont Legislature for Stowe. Dr. Boynton was married first, May 11, 1852, to Miss Vadica Maria Fuller, of Stowe. She died December 6, 1893. He mar- ried second, January 14, 1895, Mrs. Annie Itasca (Farris) Holland, of Boston. His children are : Alice Bingham (born October 30, 1855), Ada Delano (born March 31, 1860), Joseph Stannard (born May 23, 1863), and Elcie Maria Boynton (born August 9, 1871).

BRECK, THEODORE FRELINGHUYSEN, M.D., of Springfield, is a native of New York, born in the town of Vienna, July 29, 1844, son of Dr. William Gilman Breck and Mary (Van Deventer) Breck. He is a descendant in the eighth generation of Edward Breck, who came from Lancaster County, England, to this country in 1635, settled in Dor-

chester, Mass., and was subsequently a town officer. His great - great - grandfather graduated from Harvard College in 1742, and became a physician of prominence in Western Massachu- setts. His father, Dr. William G. Breck, was also a graduate of Harvard (1854), and practised his profession in Springfield for nearly forty years, being the leading surgeon of Western Massachu- setts, and dying at the age of seventy, very sud- denly, at the bedside of a patient in Chicopee, whom he had been called in consultation to see. Theodore F. was educated in private schools and at Williston Seminary, Easthampton. He studied

THEODORE F. BRECK.

medicine at the Harvard Medical School, and after graduation there, in April, 1866, went abroad, and continued his studies for two years, in 1867, 1869, in the hospitals of Vienna and Paris. In 1865 he served for some months in the Civil War as acting assistant surgeon, United States Army. Upon his return from Europe in 1869 he began regular practice, established in Springfield, as his father had been before him. Since 1870 he has been surgeon of the Boston & Albany Railroad, since 1877 medical examiner for the Second Dis- trict of Hampden County, and for some years surgeon of the Springfield Hospital. He is a member of the Massachusetts Medical Society, of

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the Massachusetts Medico-Legal Society, of the National Association of Railway Surgeons, of the Hampden District Medical Society (president in 1888 and 1889), and of the Springfield Medical Club. He is vice-president of the Nyassett Club (social) of Springfield. Dr. Breck was married April 18, 1872, to Miss H. Cordelia Townsend, daughter of the late Elmer Townsend, of Boston. They have a daughter and a son : Helen Town- send and William Gilman Breck.

BRODBECK, REV. WILLIAM NAST, D.D., pastor of Trinity Methodist Episcopal Church, Charlestown District, Boston, is a native of Ohio, born at Marietta, June 25, 1847, son of Paul and Katharine (Whitbeck) Brodbeck. His father was born in Germany, but came to this country when but twenty-five years of age, and remained a citizen of the United States until his death. His mother was born in Kinderhook, N.Y., and was a direct descendant of the Hollanders who early settled in that region. His early education was obtained in the public schools of Ohio. At the age of seventeen he entered upon a business career, which he successfully prosecuted for several years. After attaining his majority, he read law at Piqua, Ohio; but, before entering upon its practice, he was led to consecrate his life to the work of the ministry. He accordingly entered that of the Methodist Episcopal Church in the autumn of 1872, and has been continuously in active service up to the present. His first regular appointment was at Tippecanoe City, Ohio, where he was stationed two years. He was next placed in charge of Wright Chapel, Cincinnati, for a year. at the expiration of which time he was appointed to Avondale, Ohio, where he remained two years. He was then stationed at Trinity Church, Xenia, Ohio, where during a three years' pastorate a commodious parsonage was built. and other im- provements in the church property made. From Xenia he was sent to Springfield, Ohio, to take charge of a new enterprise ; and the result of his three years' labor there was the establishment of the present St. Paul Church and the erection of its beautiful edifice. He was next appointed to the First Church, Urbana, Ohio, where a great re- vival attended his ministry, in which more than three hundred persons were converted. At the end of his first year there, the bishop presiding at the Conference removed him to Walnut Hills Church,

one of the most important charges in the Cincin- nati Conference, where he remodelled the church edifice, and had a most successful pastorate of eighteen months. At the expiration of that time he was transferred by the authorities of the church to New England, and stationed at the Tremont Street Church, Boston, where he re- mained during the extended term of five years. He was next appointed to Brookline, where he re- mained three years, nearly completing during his pastorate what will be the finest church edifice of the Methodist denomination in New England. From Brookline he came to his present charge,

WM. N. BRODBECK.

Trinity Church, Charlestown, where he is having a most successful pastorate. While pastor of the church at Brookline, he was elected general secretary of the Epworth League, the officially recognized young people's society of the Meth- odist Episcopal Church, but declined the position because of the importance and extent of the work in which he was then engaged. During the year 1890-91 he was president of the Boston Metho- dist Preachers' Meeting, and during 1894-95 of the Evangelical Alliance of Boston and vicinity. He is also president of the New England Deaconess Home and Training School ; secretary of the Board of Trustees of Boston University;

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member of the executive committees of the Metho- dist City Missionary and Church Extension Society, and of the Evangelistic Association of New England ; and a director of the Methodist Ministers' Relief Association. He received the degree of D.D. from the German Wallace College of Berea, Ohio, in 1892, and from the Ohio Wesleyan University at Delaware, Ohio, in 1894. Dr. Brodbeck is well known throughout Metho- dism, East and West, and is in demand for the dedication of churches and the presentation of the great questions of the day before conferences and conventions. He was one of the leading rep- resentatives from New England at the last General Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church, and held important positions in that body. His ministry has been marked in every city by great religious awakenings. He has, by voice and pen, called the Church to aggressive work, and contrib- uted materially to the increase which has come to her fold. As a preacher, he is among the first of his denomination. A voice of much rich- ness, fine physique, deep evident conviction, and great personal magnetism enable him to win the people. Dr. Brodbeck was married November 12, 1872, to Miss Susan Boyd Carrington, of Piqua, Ohio. They have four children : Edith N., Bessie C., Paul E., and Mabel C. Brodbeck.

BROWN, CHARLES DENISON, of Boston, mill agent and manufacturer, is a native of Maine, born in Norway, February 16, 1836, son of Titus Olcott and Nancy (Denison) Brown. He was educated in the town school and at the Norway Liberal In- stitute (high school). He began active life as a clerk in a country store ; was next engaged in the sugar house of his uncle, the late J. B. Brown, in Portland, and then went into a paper mill, since which time he has been identified with manufact- uring interests. He is now vice-president and was one of the promotors of the Rumford Falls Power Company, Rumford Falls, Me .: is presi- dent of the Somerset Fibre Company, a director of the Kennebec Fibre Company, the Androscoggin Pulp Company, the Umbagog Pulp Company, and the Sebago Wood Board Company; and a stock- holder also in several other mills manufacturing pulp and wood pulp boards ; and treasurer of the Rumford Falls Woollen Company, manufacturing "Oxford " felts. He established the Boston house of Charles D. Brown & Co. (composed of himself

and his son Charles A. Brown), for the sale of the products of these and other mills and of paper- makers' chemicals and supplies, in May, 1892. As agent for some of the above-mentioned com- panies and also of the Uncas Paper Company, the American Straw Board Company, the " Ontario" canvas dryer felts, the house handles large quanti- ties of straw and wood pulp boards, soda and sul- phite fibres, wood pulp, news, vegetable parchment and Manila papers, and its business extends throughout the United States as well as abroad. Its offices and salesroom now occupy a large double store and basement on Congress Street. Mr.

CHAS. D. BROWN.

Brown is a member of the Cumberland Club, Port- land, and of the Exchange Club, Boston. In politics he is a Republican. He married Decem- ber 20, 1860, Miss Abba F. Shurtleff. They have one son : Charles Alva Brown.

BROWN, GEORGE ARTEMAS, M.D., of Barre, superintendent of the Private Institution for the Education of Feeble-minded Youth, was born in Barre, April 18, 1858, son of Dr. George Brown and Catherine (Wood) Brown. On the paternal side he is descended from Thomas Brown, ad- mitted freeman March 14, 1638-39, and settled

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in Cambridge, the line running as follows : Boaz Brown, born in 1641, lived in Concord : Thomas, born in 1667, died in 1739; Thomas, born in Concord, 1707, died in public service in 1766 ; Jonas, born in Concord, 1752, fought in the battle of Lexington, "and, though wounded, he pursued the enemy nine miles," commissioned ensign in the Continental army, and died in Temple, N.H., in 1834; Ephraim, born in Temple, N.H., July 12, 1790, died in Wilton, N.H., December 12, 1840; and George, father of George A., born October 11, 1823, died May 6, 1892, who built up the institution of which the latter is now the head, to its present position. On the maternal side Dr. Brown descends from William Wood, born in 1582, died in 1671, who came from Eng- land in 1638, and settled in Concord : Michael Wood, died in 1674; John Wood, died January 3. 1729 ; John Wood, born September 13, 1680, died July 2, 1746: Ensign John Wood, born March, 1716, moved to Mason, N.H., and died December 9. 1785 : Colonel James Wood, born November 4, 1755, died July 31, 1838 ; and Arte- mas Wood, born August 9, 1791, died June 30. 1866, who lived in Groton, and was a prominent man there. Dr. Brown was educated in the com- mon and High School, at Phillips (Andover) Academy, graduating in 1876, and at Vale, where he graduated in 1880. He then studied medicine. and graduated from the College of Physicians and Surgeons, New York City, in 1883. Associating himself with his father in the conduct of the Pri- vate Institution for the Feeble-minded, he was made assistant superintendent in 1883 ; and, upon the death of his father, May 6, 1892, he became superintendent, in association with his mother. Under the administration of the family, which began in 1850 when his father took charge, the institution, which was the first of its kind in the country (established in 1848), carly became cele- brated. It now consists of five houses or divi- sions for girls, boys, epileptics, and " custodials," -persons of intellectual ability, but unfitted to engage in business life or mingle in society be- cause of physical or cerebral infirmity,-and a farm department. It is arranged on the cottage plan, this system having, with the development of the institution, been adopted as best fitted to pre- serve the family type ; and the household is classi- fied in groups under the immediate supervision of experienced officials, who give their whole ener- gies to the well-being of the inmates. There are

within the grounds extensive stables, a gymna- sium, work-shops, bowling alley and rink. and conveniences for various outdoor games. The in- stitution is a purely private undertaking, without endowment or permanent funds. Dr. Brown has always lived in this work, and is thoroughly in- terested in its successful development. He has also been much concerned in movements for the benefit and improvement of his native town. He has been a member of the Town Library Commit- tee for ten years ; a director of the Barre Library Association for six years, and is now (1895) its president ; director of the Barre Village Improve-

GEO. A BROWN

ment Society for six years ; director and treasurer of the Glen Valley Cemetery Association for twelve years; for some time a member of the Barre Board of Trade, and its present president (1895); and is now president of the Barre Water Company. He was largely instrumental in start- ing the last-mentioned company, becoming one of its incorporators and its largest stockholder. The works are now under construction at an es- timated cost of twenty-five thousand dollars ; and the enterprise, a most important one for so small a town as Barre, is well under way. Dr. Brown is interested in church (Congregational) affairs. and has been clerk of the Congregational parish

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for ten years. He is a member of the Mas- sachusetts Medical Society, of the Worcester County Medical Society, of the New England Psychological Society, and of the Brookfield Med- ical Club. His social club affiliations are with the Winter Club and a church club. In politics he is a Republican, and was a delegate to the Republican State convention of 1894. Dr. Brown was married May 18, 1887, to Miss Susan E. Barnum, of Bethel, Conn. They have three children : George Percy, Catherine D., and Don- ald R. Brown.

BROWN, ORLANDO JONAS, M.D., of North Adams, is a native of Vermont, born in the town of Whitingham, Windham County, February 2, 1848, son of Harvey and Lucina (Fuller) Brown. His education was acquired in the public schools and at Powers Institute, Bernardston, Mass., where he spent several terms. He engaged in the occupation of school-teaching when but six- teen years of age, and so obtained the means for completing his academic training and fitting for his profession. He took the course of the med- ical department of the University of Vermont, and graduated there with the regular degree of M.D. in 1870, and devoted a year to study in the hos- pitals of New York. Then, settling in the town of Adams, this State, he began regular practice there in 1871. Removing to North Adams the following year, he has since been identified with that town, meeting with success in his professional work and holding various public positions. In order to become familiar with the newer and most approved methods of practice, he has taken sev- eral special courses in hospitals and medical schools in New York and Chicago, studying par- ticularly diseases of women and children, in the treatment of which he is notably successful. He has been one of the medical examiners for Berk- shire County since 1882, assistant surgeon of the Second Regiment, Massachusetts Volunteer Mili- tia, since 1878, and a health officer of North Adams the greater portion of the time since ISSo. In 1889 he represented the First Berkshire Dis- trict in the State Legislature, where he served on the committee on public health and did much creditable work. He is a member and ex-presi- dent of the Medical Association of Northern Berk- shire and of the Berkshire District Medical So- ciety, and member of the Massachusetts Medical

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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 95

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