USA > Massachusetts > Essex County > Municipal history of Essex County in Massachusetts, Volume III > Part 7
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On April 25, 1911, Judge Manning married Miriam T. Kerans, daughter of Charles P. and Elizabeth E. Kerans.
WILLIAM D. T. TREFRY-One of the names which the town of Marblehead has always delighted to honor, and which will long be remembered in the community, is that of William D. T. Trefry, who for many years ably filled positions of public trust in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, and was a leader in many circles in his native town. Mr. Trefry came of antecedents distinguished in the history of early American development, his mater- nal ancestors dating back to early Colonial times, and being noted for signal patriotism in the Revolu- tionary War. He was a son of Samuel Stacey and Rebecca (Wormstead) Trefry.
William D. T. Trefry was born May 10, 1852, in Marblehead, Massachusetts, and throughout his life- time was identified with the progress of his native town. His early education was received in the pub- lic schools of Marblehead, and after his graduation from Tufts College, in 1878, he returned to his home and became a permanent resident of this community. For several years he read law in the offices of Ives & Lincoln, and in the year 1882 was admitted to the Essex county bar. From that time forward Mr. Trefry was called to broad activity in the public service. First elected to the School Board of Marblehead, he was repeatedly re-elected, and for five of his ten years of service in this connection was chairman of the board. By political convic- tions a staunch Democrat, he was held in the most sincere respect by both parties. Chosen as Demo- cratic candidate for State auditor in 1889, 1890, and 1891, he was elected on his second candidacy, this being on the ticket with Governor William E. Rus- well, and Mr. Trefry thereby became the only Demo-
crat elected to a minor office in the State Govern- ment within a generation. In his third candidacy he was defeated by General John W. Kimball.
His services to the people in the office of auditor resulted in Mr. Trefry's appointment by Governor Russell, in 1892, as his term approached its close, as savings bank commissioner, succeeding Edward P. Chapin. Seven years later, in 1899, he was ap- pointed by Governor Wolcott tax commissioner and corporation commissioner. Reappointed in 1902 by Governor Crane, and by later gubernatorial execu- tives through all changes of administration, Mr. Trefry was retained in these offices until the winter of 1920-21, when his approaching disqualification on account of age forbade the completion of another term of service. Mr. Trefry's record was one of brilliant achievement and utter devotion to the pub- lic good. During his long service the revenue of the State from taxation increased from $4,000,000.00 to the sum of $35,000,000.00. His efforts were con- stantly toward the equitable distribution of public costs among those enjoying to the largest degree the advantages of public progress and economic se- curity. He was instrumental in placing upon the statutes of the State of Massachusetts the direct in- heritance tax law, the individual income tax law, and the law bringing corporations under the prin- ciple of the income tax. In all his work for the people Mr. Trefry was one of them. His attitude in this regard can best be set forth in his own words to a contemporary:
"From the outset of my work as a public servant it has been my settled policy to make myself as accessible to the people as it was possible for me to do. My latchstring was always out and it has always been as easy to see me at my office as it has been to see any of my clerks."
In every public office, and particularly in that of State tax commissioner, Mr. Trefry was not the seeker but the sought. His original appointment by Governor Wolcott was tendered by that official en- tirely without solicitation on the part of Mr. Trefry or his friends, and in spite of different party affiliations. It was the man, not the politician, who assumed the responsibilities of office, and through the twenty-one years of his tenure of the office as tax commissioner, he held the interests of the people a sacred trust.
Among other circles than those of a political na- ture Mr. Trefry is remembered with sincerest regret and esteem. He possessed the rare distinction of holding the thirty-third degree in the Masonic order, and was the only man in Marblehead during his life who could claim that honor. He was a member of Philanthropic Lodge, Free and Accepted Masons, and had passed through all the degrees of the York Rite. He was prelate of Winslow Lewis Command- ery, Knights Templar, at the time of his sudden death, on Tuesday, April 12, 1921, and was past master of his lodge. He had served as district dep- uty grand master of the Eighth Masonic District, and subsequently had served as deputy grand master of the Masonic organization of the State.
Mr. Trefry was honored by his alma mater in 1908, the institution conferring upon him the de-
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BIOGRAPHICAL
gree of Master of Arts. His college fraternity was the Phi Beta Kappa. He always kept broadly in touch with all advance in his native place, and for many years was a trustee of Abbot Public Library, of Marblehead. He was senior officer of St. Mich- ael's Episcopal Church, this office, which he had held for nearly twenty years, being next in rank to that of the rector, and he had, as usual, collected the offering at the Sunday evening service just prior to his death. He was a very close friend of Rev. Lyman B. Rollins, rector of St. Michael's, who col- lapsed at the news of Mr. Trefry's death.
Mr. Trefry married Maria T. A. Gardner, and Mrs. Trefry survives him, also three brothers: Sam- uel S., Benjamin B., and Walter C., and two sis- ters, all residents of Marblehead.
HORACE KENDAL FOSTER, M. D .- During forty years the residents of Peabody, Massachu- setts, have grown into a knowledge and appreciation of Dr. Horace Kendal Foster, who came to Peabody in 1882, and has given himself in continuous service to his townspeople.
Born in North Andover, Massachusetts, December 5, 1854, son of John Plummer and Sarah Ann (Pea- body)' Foster, his education began in the schools of North Andover, and he was graduated from the high school in 1872. In preparation for college he went to Phillips Andover Academy, for the next three years, and, upon finishing his studies there, entered Dartmouth College in 1875, being gradu- ated A. B. from the collegiate department in 1879, and from the Medical School in 1882, with the de- gree of M. D. After a summer of leisure he began, in October, 1882, his present medical practice in Pea- body. In the forty years that have followed, Dr. Foster has not only attained eminence as a physician, but has become a vital part of the life and vigor of the city. In 1896 he was appointed medical examiner of the Eighth Essex District, and has continued in office up to the present time (1922). He is also vice- president of the Warren Five Cent Savings Bank. Dr. Foster is a Republican in politics, a member of the Massachusetts Medical Society, the Massachu- setts Medico-Legal Society, and the American Medi- cal Association. He is a Mason, fraternizing with Jordan Lodge, Free and Accepted Masons, of Peabody; Washington Chapter, Royal Arch Ma- sons, of Salem; and Winslow Lewis Commandery, Knights Templar. His club is the Peabody. He is a member of the South Congregational Church.
Dr. Foster married, December 19, 1889, at Pea- body, Massachusetts, Florence Kendal Peabody, daughter of Stephen and Lavina (Hart) Peabody. Their children are: Kendall Peabody, born January 10, 1891; Chandler Hunting, born April 4, 1893; Rachel, born December 26, 1895.
HENRY M. BATCHELDER-For half a century Henry M. Batchelder, president of the Merchants' National Bank, of Salem, Massachusetts, has been connected with banking as a business, and for twenty-one years has held his present responsible position. He comes of an ancient Colonial family,
originally from England, where the name is found in registers of the thirteenth century. There were seven of the name that were early settlers in New England: Alexander, of Portsmouth; Rev. Stephen, of Lynn; Henry, of Ipswich; Joseph, of Salem; John, of Salem; William of Charlestown; and John, of Watertown. It is from the Rev. Stephen Batch- elder that the subject of this sketch is descended.
Henry M. Batchelder, of the Salem branch, son of Samuel Lang and Mary (Brown) Batchelder, was born in Salem, Massachusetts, February 11, 1852, and there was educated, finishing with graduation from Salem Classical and High School, class of 1870. School days over, he entered the banking business in 1870, and served in different capacities until 1883, when he was made cashier of the Merchants' Na- tional Bank, of Salem. For eighteen years he served that institution as cashier, 1883-1901, then was elect- ed president, a high office he has now filled for twenty-one years. He is also a member of the board of investment of the Salem Five Cents Sav- ings Bank; a vice-president and member of the finance committee of Essex Institute and Home for Aged and Destitute Women; director of Holyoke Mutual Fire Insurance Company, of Salem; and member of its finance committee. He was one of the original promoters of the Salem Electric Light- ing Company in 1881, and was its treasurer for twenty-eight years. He was the first president of the Massachusetts Bankers' Association, 1905-06. He is a member of the Second Unitarian Church and Salem Club.
Mr. Batchelder married, in Salem, June 5, 1877, Martha Osgood Horton, daughter of Nathaniel Augustus and Harriet M. Horton. Mr. and Mrs. Batchelder are the parents of four sons, born in Salem: Samuel Henry, of Salem, born February 19, 1878, now of the law firm of Peabody, Arnold, Batchelder & Luther, Boston; Nathaniel Horton, born June 13, 1880, now head master of the Loomis Institute, Windsor, Connecticut; William Osgood, born June 12, 1883, now of the General Electric Company, (Chicago) ; and Roland Brown, born July 31, 1891, now with the General Motors Acceptance Company, Chicago.
FRANCIS HASELTINE, who prepared the de- scription of the public schools of Lynn for this com- pilation, has been a schoolmaster since his twen- tieth year, and a resident of Essex county the most of his life. Born May 25, 1864, the son of Amos Haseltine, Jr. and Wealthy Jane (Foster) Hasel- tine of Ayers Village, Haverhill, Massachusetts, his forbears include also the West Haverhill Baileys and Websters, by which latter family he had direct descent from Hannah Duston through Thomas Dus- ton's "well beloved son" (in law), Nathaniel Web- ster.
When about fifteen years of age, living at home on the farm, his active participation in the village debating and literary club aroused in him the de- sire for a better education, leading him to do what no other boy in all the West Parish was doing at the time, viz., attend the Haverhill High School.
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Transportation was a difficulty, Ayers Village being five miles from the center of the city, and the trol- leys cars not then invented. The first two months he rode to school on the back of a recently broken Texan mustang, the rest of the four years he made the daily trip on "shank's mare," school keeping six days in the week. During those years there was never another high school boy living along that whole stretch of country road.
A valuable by-product of his weekly sixty-mile hike was a good physique. Needless to say, a boy who cared that much for his schooling made the most of his opportunities. He graduated in 1884, the president of his class, which numbered two other boys in its total of eighteen members. His excellent teachers, whom he always remembered with grateful appreciation, included Clarence E. Kel- ley, Albert L. Bartlett, and the Bartlett sisters, "Miss Mary and Miss Mira."
He had felt the call to be a school teacher, but various committee-men turned him down because he lacked experience. How could he get experience un- less some one gave him a job? He couldn't get into his new boots until he had worn them around a while to stretch them out. The oldtime district schools of New Hampshire gave him his chance, and at last he secured his first position to teach in the little red brick schoolhouse in the Greeley dis- trict of Londonderry. Here he lived in the old farm- house where Horace Greeley used to visit his boy- hood cousins during his summer vacations.
The school had twenty-three children, of all ages, and the weekly salary was $5.50, out of which he paid $3.00 for board. Almost as remunerative as being the janitor of the Ayers Village school house, where he had earned $1.25 per week for sweeping its two rooms and tending the fires. But in London- derry he was getting his experience and it was good. The short term of five weeks ended with its closing ordeal of "Exhibition Day" successfully passed to the satisfaction of visiting parents and school com- mittee. His written testimonials safely stowed in his pocket, he came home to face the Massachusetts committees again.
Then came a Teacher's Institute, held in Haver- hill by the State Board of Education. The announce- ment came to the teachers present that Dr. Stevens, of Boxford, wanted a teacher for his village school, to teach forty to fifty children, of all ages, from A, B, C's to Algebra, bookkeeping and French, all for $10.00 a week. While the other teachers pres- ent were commenting upon the large requirements and small compensation of the position, this novice was hurrying from the hall and hunting up Dr. Stevens. Result: The remaining six months of the year spent teaching in the beautiful country town of Boxford, mingling in the cordial home life of its people in the days when Professor Palmer and Alice Freeman Palmer spent their summers in its village. So there came more experience of a sort which no college or normal school has ever been able to provide.
This work was then varied by spending all next year in Millville in the town of Blackstone. There
the employees of the Woonsocket Rubber Company were on strike, and their children had become tur- bulent in the school. A' man was needed to restore discipline, and he did, having three other rooms be- sides his own under his care. Then he again packed his trunk and moved on, the richer by every failure or success. Now he begins stopping longer in each new position, three years being spent among the seafaring folk of Hull, where he varies the profes- sional activities of pedagogy by going fishing with his boys on Saturdays, or hauling lobster pots out- side Boston Light with his committee man, or in winter spearing eels through the ice. Then another jump takes him to the extreme western end of the State among the Berkshires, where three years are spent in the manufacturing town of Adams. Here he began housekeeping, taking with him from Hull his life-partner, Grace, daughter of Edward G. and Lizzie (Adams) Knight, their first home being at the foot of the Hoosacs, with Mount Graylock look- ing down upon them, the scenery and people all so different from those of Hull. In Adams he for- tunately was intimately associated with two sterling educators, Charles Herbert Howe, later principal of the Wakefield High School, and Dr. Walter P. Beckwith, afterward at the head of the Salem Nor- mal School, their influence being of great value in fitting him for his next promotion.
In Lynn, Henry L. Chase was for many years principal of the Ward Four Grammar School. When Master Chase died, Mr. Haseltine was elected his successor in the Whiting School with its 500 pupils, a position he continued to hold until within a few months of the twenty-seven year record of his pre- decessor. Then Lynn reorganized her schools, com- bining the upper grades in junior high schools, and the Whiting was changed to an elementary school, Mr. Hasteltine's services being recognized by pro- moting him to his present position of principal of the Western Junior High School. So in his forty years of teaching, the field of usefulness has broadened from that first little red school house with twenty-three children to this modern school with twenty-five teachers and more than 700 pupils.
This schoolmaster is principal, too, of the Lynn summer schools, a unique educational factor, in which he has exerted a guiding influence for more than a dozen years. More than 600 pupils, of all grades, including some from neighboring towns, pay $5.00 apiece for the privilege of attending these schools six weeks, three hours a day, in July and August. Grouped in classes averaging twenty pupils to a teacher, they are able to get strength for next year's work or a trial promotion or a double pro- motion, or to remove conditions or earn credits for promotion to higher grades, thus saving a year's time in their schooling or advancing a grade farther before they leave school.
Apart from school work, Mr. Haseltine has been an active member of the North Congregational Church, some years its superintendent of Sunday school, and many years its parish treasurer and chairman of finance committee. In civic affairs, his greatest activity was in local option times when he.
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BIOGRAPHICAL
was a prominent leader in the struggle for No- License. Lynn made a notable record for years in fighting the saloon, perhaps unequalled by any city of her size in the nation. His part in this warfare, in the councils of the league, on the stump during the campaign, and as chairman of his precinct dur- ing the. canvas, often drew the fire of the enemy, who claimed that schoolmasters had "no right to meddle in political matters." He was on the firing line, but escaped being "fired," solely because the saloon forces could not get control of the school committee.
One more field of social usefulness remains to be mentioned, the Lynn Educational Association, an organization by which, during more than a quarter of a century, Mr. Haseltine has been providing for the public of Greater Lynn a course of monthly entertainments, including concerts, lectures, and re- citals, clean in character and making for refinement and culture. Mr. Haseltine calls himself the gen- eral secretary of the L. E. A., but his friends joking- ly say that he is the L. E. A. The permanent mem- bers of this organization, 700 in number, pay a dollar for their annual course ticket to these gather- ings held in Classical High School Hall, nine or more programs being arranged, such as ordinarily cost from five to ten times as much. The purpose is to make the course safely self-supporting without taxing culture to make a profit, providing within the means of all a course that is uplifting as well as popular. With many such interests and activities under his care, it will be seen that this schoolmaster has never found time to be a "joiner" of fraternal organizations.
WILLIAM E. DORMAN, Esq .- Holding an as- sured position in the legal fraternity of Essex county and the Commonwealth, Mr. Dorman has long been prominent in public activities as well as in his per- sonal practice. Mr. Dorman was born in Lynn, June 23, 1875, and is a son of Benjamin Hallowell and Abby (Dupar) Dorman, both his parents also having been born in Lynn. In every line of descent, Mr. Dorman goes back to the first settlers of Essex county.
Receiving his early education in the public schools of his native city, Mr. Dorman prepared for college at Chauncey Hall School, graduated from Harvard College in 1898, and from the Harvard Law School in 1901. Shortly after his graduation, Mr. Dorman opened an office in Lynn, entered upon the general practice of the law, in which he has been more then usually successful, and continued until 1916, when he was offered the position of counsel to the State Senate by the present vice-president of the United States, Calvin Coolidge, then president of the Sen- ate, who had served with Mr. Dorman in the Legis- lature and was familiar with his aptitude in draft- ing legislation. Mr. Dorman served as chairman of the Lynn School Board in 1905 and 1906, and in 1907 he was elected to the State Legislature, his ser- vice covering the years 1907, 1908 and 1909, where he served on important committees and acquired a position of influence and leadership. His present
position of counsel to the State Senate is unique. Massachusetts is among the foremost states on the high quality of her legislation. The State has just established a system whereby the counsel to the Senate and House of Representatives, in addition to their usual services, are to have charge of the continuous consolidation of State legislation. Mr. Dorman is also just completing the index to the recent revision of the statutes. He is a past master of Mount Carmel Lodge, Free and Accepted Ma- sons; the East Lynn Lodge, Independent Order of Odd Fellows; the Lynn Historical Society, of which he was secretary for many years; the Sons of the American Revolution; the Swampscott Masonic Club, and the Massachusetts and the American Bar associations. He is a resident of both the northerly and southerly ends of Essex county, having a sum- mer estate of some forty-five acres in Georgetown.
On August 28, 1905, Mr. Dorman married Estelle E. Herrick, of Georgetown, Massachusetts, daughter of Samuel K. and Ella F. (Welch) Herrick. Mr. and Mrs. Dorman are the parents of five children, as follows: Benjamin Hallowell, Samuel Herrick, Priscilla Bradstreet, Lois Putnam, deceased, and William E., Jr.
GEORGE ELDEN Mac ARTHUR, M. D., came to Ipswich, Massachusetts, from the State of Maine, his home at Camden on the shores of Penobscot bay. The years that have intervened since his coming and the present have brought him high professional standing and the warm esteem of the community in which for thirty-seven years he has been minister- ing to the physical needs of so many in the homes comprising that community. He is indeed the "be- loved physician," and it would seem that his services were indispensable. His work in the schools and for the public health has been most valuable, and if his entire life of private professional service were obliterated his splendid record of public service would mark him as a most useful and valuable cit- izen.
George Dennis MacArthur, a veteran of the Civil War, serving in the Nineteenth Regiment, Maine Volunteer Infantry, married Mary Adaline Hosmer, and to them was born a son, George Elden Mac- Arthur, whose name furnishes the caption of this re- view. George Elden MacArthur, M. D., now and since 1888 a practicing physician of Ipswich, Mas- sachusetts, but prior to that year located in Boston and Winthrop, Massachusetts, his medical diploma bearing date of 1883.
George E. MacArthur was born in Camden, Maine, June 14, 1858, and he there attended public schools. He prepared at Waterville Classical Institute for admission to Bowdoin College, entering the Medical School of that college after studying under the direction of Dr. O. W. Stone, of Camden. He com- pleted his medical courses at the University of Ver- mont, receiving his degree, M. D., with the gradu- ating class of 1883. Since that year he has been a close student of matters pertaining to his profession, and in the hospitals of London and Paris has pur- sued courses of clinical and professional study. He
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began the practice of his profession in Winthrop, Massachusetts, in 1883, there continuing until 1887, when he moved to Boston, spending a year in that city before finding a permanent location in Ipswich, Massachusetts, in 1888.
During the near three and a half decades which have since elapsed, Dr. MacArthur has been con- tinuously in practice in Ipswich and has won high standing as a physician of learning and skill. He is now, in addition to his large private practice, attend- ing physician to Benjamin Stickney Cable Memorial Hospital, and is physician to Ipswich public schools. For two years he served with the rank of captain in the Medical Corps of the Massachusetts National Guard, serving in the military hospitals during the influenza epidemic of 1918 and through the strike of the police of Boston in 1919. Other public service rendered by Dr. MacArthur includes membership on the Ipswich School Committee for twenty-five years, and on the Board of Health for twenty years, he having been chairman of both boards. He is a member of the Masonic order, the Knights of Py- thias, and the Protestant Episcopal church. He also serves on the Ipswich Playground Commission and on the Community Service Board.
Dr. MacArthur married, in Newton, Massachu- setts, June 9, 1886, Isabel Gilkey Safford, who died January 27, 1919, daughter of James Philbrick and Mary (Gilkey) Safford.
HORACE HALE ATHERTON-At Lynn, Mas- sachusetts, the city of his birth, Horace H. Ather- ton continues his residence, being register of pro- bate and insolvency for the county of Essex, an office he has most capably filled for a full decade of years. He is the second of his name in Lynn, being a son of Horace Hale and Hannah Preston (Oliver) Atherton, both now deceased, his father a business man of Lynn, formerly an official of the town of Saugus, representative, State Senator, member of the Executive Council, and a trustee of Danvers In- sane Hospital.
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