USA > Massachusetts > Hampshire County > Northampton > Representative families of Northampton; a demonstration of what high character, good ancestry and heredity have accomplished in a New England town . > Part 12
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The O'Donnell Family
sions of pleasure at seeing him again before a superior court and hearing him deliver so excellent a plea."
The jury acquitted the prisoner.
Mr. O'Donnell married, November 25, 1869, Bridget T. Coughlin, daughter of Daniel and Honora Coughlin of Hay- denville. She died December 14, 1887, leaving five children - James C., George P., John B., Jr., Charles H., and Edward J. O'Donnell. Nine years later Mr. O'Donnell married Mary E. Fitzgerald of Worcester.
To be nearer his business Mr. O'Donnell, in 1894, re- luctantly moved from Florence to the Center, and he is now living on the northerly brow of Round Hill overlooking the valley. His home, without question, occupies the most sightly and delightful spot in the city. He has called his dwelling "The Lookout." He can, any fair day, enjoy a panoramic view of the whole basin and expanse of country within the surrounding mountains, with the majestic Connecticut River in plain sight flowing on its way to Long Island Sound. The house on Sugar Loaf Mountain in Franklin County is also in plain sight. Two views of his house are herewith published. The view from each of the three lower back piazzas is fine, but the view from the fourth, where the flag hangs, is magnificent. It cannot be equaled except from the mountain houses. Often the tops of the surrounding moun- tains can plainly be seen from his dwelling while the city is buried in fog. The famous Round Hill hotel of the "fifties" stood on the same ridge only a short distance from "The Lookout." The back piazza of the hotel was about on a level with the lowest back piazza of "The Lookout." Jenny Lind sat on the back piazza of the hotel viewing the gran- deur of the scene when she declared Northampton to be "The Paradise of America."
In the summer of 1915 Judge William P. Strickland of the
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District Court died. In looking around for his successor, Governor David I. Walsh learned that Mr. O'Donnell would accept the position, and he nominated him for the office. The Governor's Council, all the members of which but one were Republican, unanimously confirmed the nomination; and the appointment was generally approved by the people irre- spective of party. Mr. O'Donnell has now acted as the Chief Justice of the District Court of Hampshire for nearly a year, and so far as can be learned he has won universal approval.
Mr. O'Donnell, as has been said, has never sought politi- cal office; yet with the earnestness and sincerity of his nature, combined with natural executive ability of a high order, he has filled every office that he has taken to the satisfaction of the public and the pleasure of his friends.
When he was asked, once upon a time, if he could give from his experience any suggestions to young men which might be of value in the work of life, he replied:
"The boy should bend every energy to get an education, and in doing so take plenty of exercise to keep healthy. His parents should encourage him, of course. The young man on reaching maturity should weigh well and decide what business or profession he is best fitted for, build his goal in imagination as high as he thinks it possible for him to reach, then march and keep his mind and eyes on it, and bend every energy to reach that goal, eschew rum and tobacco as he would a rattlesnake, be honest, truthful, and courteous, and, ten chances to one, he will reach his goal."
It seems worth while, in closing this sketch, to refer briefly to the temperament of Judge O'Donnell, in his treat- ment of those who come before him in the District Court charged with various offences, particularly erring youth and those accused of drunkenness. In this connection, the Northampton Herald, of July 18, 1916, says:
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"Judge John B. O'Donnell of the District Court estab- lished a precedent when he contributed ten dollars to the Police Relief Association. This is the first time in the history of the association, which was established about fifteen years ago, that any outside person has contributed money to its treasury.
"The money was contributed by Judge O'Donnell in recognition of good work done by the members of the police department. During the week of July 4, the O'Donnell building on Market Street was the scene of damages inflicted by a party of boys. The judge, on hearing of the actions of the boys, notified Chief Gilbert and asked that something be done.
"He did not desire to prosecute the boys, but wanted work of that sort stopped. Captain M. J. Lyons was assigned to the case, and after a short investigation brought ten boys, ranging from seven to twelve years old, to the police depart- ment. The boys admitted that they were guilty, and Judge O'Donnell was notified. He stated that the damage would be covered by ten dollars, and the boys agreed to pay.
"Each contributed one dollar. This morning Captain Lyons went to the District Court to give the judge the money. Judge O'Donnell thanked the Captain for the fine work that he had done, and told him to keep the money as a contribu- tion to the Relief Association.
"The Captain expressed the thanks of the association to Judge O'Donnell and stated that the 'boys' would appreciate this gift very much. This morning the money was given to Cornelius Mahoney, treasurer of the association, and Judge O'Donnell now looms up big in the estimation of the police- men. His name will go down in the police annals as one who appreciates the good services of the police department.
"The versatile temperament of Judge O'Donnell is be- coming more and more apparent following each session of the
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District Court. It was only a short time ago that a young man was arraigned in court and the judge after hearing his case decided to let him go.
"The young man stated that he wanted to go to his home in New Jersey, but did not have the money to pay his fare. The judge was impressed by the boy's sincerity and ordered Chief W. G. Gilbert to buy a ticket for the boy and said that he would pay for it.
"The judge has proved to be a friend in need to many of the wayward in this city, and his lenient policy has brought excellent results. During his term as judge of the District Court he has acted in the capacity of advisor and friend, and his judgment has been very fair.
"His action in recognizing the policemen for the first time in the history of the city adds one more meritorious action to his already long record."
THEOBALD M. CONNOR
Attorney and Many Times Successfully-chosen Representative of the Democratic Party
T HE well-known Irish historian, O'Hart, in his "His- tory of Irish Pedigrees," tells a most interesting story about the rise of the Connor and O'Connor families in Ireland; how they took their name from Con, one of their chiefs, and from Ciar, their great ancestor, thus making the name Conciar, or Conchobhar, and, in its Anglicized form, Connor.
This family furnished many kings to Ireland, whose last king was Roderick O'Connor. The name Connor is the oldest known spelling of the family name since Conchobhar. The O'Connors, like the O'Neils and O'Meglachlins and a few other old families of Ireland, trace their histories back to many hundreds of years before the Christian era.
In this connection it should be mentioned that all Irish names originally had an O' before them, and while many keep it to this day, together with the Mc, the majority have dropped the prefix and remain simply Murphy, Kelly, or Sweeney, as the case may be. The name O'Connor, in its earliest days, was one to be proud of, too, for it signified a kind heart and a generous nature. The Connors and Conertys were really called "helpers," and did not belie their names, if history is correct.
From a portion of the ancient inheritance of this great family the present barony, Iraghticonnor, takes its name. The
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last king of Ireland, Roderick O'Connor, was of this family, who were kings of Connaught, and who also occupied a very large portion of the province of Leinster, called Offaly. Another branch of the O'Connor family were lords of Kerry. From this latter branch of the family Theobald M. Connor is descended.
Brian Connor, the eldest son of Nial Mor, was the first king of Connaught. He had as his coat of arms an oak tree, and while the American branch of the family have never boasted of any coat of arms, it is generally conceded, by good authorities in heraldry, that they could rightfully claim the crest of Brian Connor.
Theobald Mathew Connor is a son of Michael Hannifin Connor, who was born near Tralee, County Kerry, Ireland, in 1835, and of Margaret Foley Connor, who was born near Rathcormack, County Cork, Ireland, in 1838. His grand- mothers, before marriage, were Margaret Hannifin and Han- norah Connor. His father was of pure Irish Celtic stock, and his mother was of Norman, Welsh, and Irish Celtic stock. His father was by trade a machinist and tool maker, and came to this country with a relative in the early forties. He lived in Holyoke, Chicopee, and Springfield until his marriage, when he settled in Florence.
Mr. Connor's mother's family came to Florence about 1846. His mother, Margaret Foley, and her father, Bernard Foley, were the first to come. Later his grandmother and the remaining children of the family came and settled in Florence. Very few people dwelt in that section of Northampton then. It was just about the time that the "Old Community" settlement was breaking up. When the Foleys arrived there, the only other Irish family in the village was one by the name of Hennessey. Direct descendants of this family are still living in Florence. An Irish family named Hickey lived
Theobald M. Connor
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about a mile from the village on the road to Easthampton, and direct descendants of this family are also living in Florence today.
While these were by no means the earliest Irish families to come to Northampton-for at least a score of Irish came to the Center in the twenty years immediately following the settlement of the town-these three families, Hennessey, Hickey and Foley and another family by the name of Foley then living in "Shepard's Hollow" (Leeds), were the first Irish who settled in the western end of the town.
Mr. Connor's grandfather, Bernard Foley, went to Port- land, Connecticut, in search of work, shortly after arriving in Florence. He had been a school-teacher in Ireland. Teach- ers were then proscribed there among the Catholics, and he was driven from his own country by persecution. As he was unfitted for the heavy work which he was obliged to take up in Portland, he died in that village not long after going there.
The experiences of the Foley family in Florence are typical of those of all who lived in that village in the early days. It was one long hard struggle for the widow Foley and her little family to get on. They had a good friend in Mr. Samuel L. Hill, who helped them to build a home in what was then expected to be the center of the growing vil- lage, for the railroad projected from Northampton to Wil- liamsburg was to follow Mill River and have its village depot either at the foot or at the head of old South Street.
According to Mr. A. G. Hill, the best living authority on Florence history, there was no house on the south side of Mill River when the Foley homestead was built; but it is Mr. Connor's belief that the Dorsey house, so called, near the present Brush Shop bridge, was built before the Foley house on South Street. There were two houses out on the
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Easthampton road, the Child house and the Hickey house, about a mile away from the village. The great influx of Irish people into Florence, which had such a marked and benefi- cent effect on the life of the village, came in the two suc- ceeding decades from 1850 to 1870, and these people settled under Mr. Samuel L. Hill's kindly guidance and with his help mostly on the south side of Mill River, or on the Old Community Street, which is the present Nonotuck Street.
Many interesting things come down to us from this early period, most of them already chronicled. One of them, however, has not been mentioned, viz., the interest which Wendell Phillips, who lived several summers on the Lilly place, took in the people and especially in the children of the village. Many times he walked over Sandy Hill with Mr. Connor's mother, Margaret Foley, then a very young girl working in the mill. He talked to her, as he did to the other children, about history, inciting in them a desire to study and to learn. Largely because of this, Mrs. Connor became a keen student of history, and, for that matter, so did all her sisters and her brother. They, like others in the village, read and studied at night in the family circle. Perhaps next to the "Old Community" spirit, which had its source in Mr. Samuel L. Hill and the good men and women who were associated with him in the "Old Community" experi- ment, the influence of Wendell Phillips has had more to do with the strong leaning toward self education always shown by the people of Florence than any other cause. Several of the most successful business men of the valley came into Florence practically penniless to imbibe the Florence spirit and become prosperous, high-minded, clear-thinking, noble men.
In those early days there was no Catholic Church in this vicinity, and the few Catholic people living here had to depend for spiritual help on missionary priests, who came
Mrs. Theobald M. Connor
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through from Chicopee on their way to Brattleboro every two or three months. The most notable of these priests was Father O'Callaghan, who frequently said Mass before the church was established in Northampton in the widow Foley's house. He had been a tutor to the sons of a great English statesman and was something of a literary man as well as a good theologian. He clung to the old Biblical notion that money loaned should not earn interest, on the ground that interest is really usury. When he had finally an established church he refused to accept pew rent, and depended on the voluntary contributions of the worshipers.
He wrote three books, one on "Schisms," one on "Usury," and a third on "Free Lovers," which was then a subject much under discussion in this section of the country. He was a kindly man and left a very pronounced impression on the old Irish families of the western end of the city.
The kindly quality of this village spirit, and its real neighborliness, allowed for no religious or social intolerance. All worked and strove forward together. There never was, and there is not today, among those who are steeped in the old Florence spirit, any room for narrowness or bigotry. In that village, if anywhere in this broad land, were developed people of simple living and high thinking, people of marked modesty and marked success in life's struggles.
Michael and Margaret Connor, Mr. Connor's parents, had six children, Thomas, who died in childhood; John, who was a machinist and tool maker, and who died when about twenty-five years of age; Mary, who taught many years in the public schools of Northampton, and who died when about thirty-five years of age, and two young children who died in infancy, besides Mr. Connor, who is the only surviving member of his immediate family.
Theobald Mathew Connor was born in Florence, August
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6, 1874. He attended the public schools, and graduated from the Northampton High School in 1893. He then entered Yale College, and graduated there with honors in 1897, with the degree of B.A. While in college he specialized in econom- ics and history. He is a member of the high scholarship society, Phi Beta Kappa. He graduated from Yale Law School in 1889, being one of the five honor men of his class with the degree of LL.B. He was one of the commencement Townsend Prize Speakers of his year. While in the law school he became a member of Phi Delta Phi and Corbey Court.
Immediately after completing his studies he returned to Northampton and opened a law office. He soon obtained a good practice, but his manifest fitness for public service caused him to accept early calls in that direction. He was easily chosen city solicitor for his native city, and held the office for the three years, 1902, 1903, and 1904. He was elected mayor of the city in 1905 and 1906, and was the youngest incumbent ever honored with that office. His second election was by a phenomenal majority unapproached before or since. While mayor he was an active leader in several important public improvements-the establishment of the Public Gardens on Main Street, in the place of old resi- dence and unpleasant-looking business property, and the opening of a long-needed new approach to Maple Street, under the railroad tracks from Main Street.
In religious belief Mr. Connor is a Catholic and is an attendant at St. Mary's Catholic Church.
He is a prominent member of the Democratic party, and as such has been much honored in the last few years. He was chosen a delegate to the Democratic National Con- vention in 1916, and attended. He was temporary chairman of the Massachusetts Democratic State Convention in 1916. The same year, as candidate of his party for Congress
Youthful Descendants of (Connor) Irish kings
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Another Portrait of one of the Connor Children
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Theobald M. Connor
in his district, he made a magnificent but unavailing fight against the nominee of the opposite party and the predatory corporation class interests attached to that organization.
Mr. Connor married, August 21, 1906, Ellen Hedican Duggan, of Hartford, Connecticut. They have three chil- dren: Neil Anthony Connor (whose first name was derived from that of Nial Mor), born August 27, 1907; Margaret Foley Connor, born September 1, 1909; and Virginia Mary Connor, born July 15, 1914.
Mr. Connor is a member of the Massachusetts and Connecticut bars, and also of those of the United States courts in the first and second districts.
Mr. Connor was for fifteen years president of the St. Vincent de Paul Society of St. Mary's Parish. He has been for many years a director and treasurer of the People's Insti- tute of Northampton. For several years he was president of the Northampton High School Alumni Association, and he is a director of the Dickinson Hospital. He is a member of the Knights of Columbus, the Elks, and of the Northampton Country Club.
CHAUNCEY H. PIERCE
Business Man and Financier
C HAUNCEY H. PIERCE, one of the best known of the prominent business men in Northampton, is a native of the town of Amherst, where he was born May 16, 1848. He was the son of Chauncey and Florilla Cooley Pierce. Both of these parents were of distinguished English and Puritan descent. The father, Chauncey Pierce, was a descendant of John Pers, whose ancestor was prominent in the fifteenth century in England, and served his country in that time at the battle of Bosworth Field. Abraham, a lineal descendant (the first who came to this country, and who spelled the name in its present form) came to Massa- chusetts in 1633, lived in Plymouth, and paid taxes there in 1624. He had several grants of land from the government, and was a soldier under Miles Standish.
John Pers, a descendant of the same family, came from England in 1634 and settled in Watertown, Massachusetts, and his homestead still remains in the Pierce family.
Chauncey H. Pierce's mother, Florilla Cooley, was born in Sunderland, Massachusetts. She was a descendant of Benjamin Cooley, who settled in Springfield, Massachusetts,
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and who served thirteen years, at different periods, on the board of Selectmen of that town, a part of the time with Miles Morgan and John Pynchon. Chauncey Pierce, the father of the subject of this sketch, was a carriage-maker in Amherst.
The son, Chauncey H., came to Northampton from Amherst when twelve years of age, and started his business career in the bookstore of the late Joseph Marsh. He re- mained there about five years, and later entered the clothing store of Merritt Clark. He was afterward in the insurance office of Allen and Pratt for a time, and then started busi- ness on his own account. In 1870 he became a partner of A. Perry Peck, then the leading insurance agent of the town.
For ten years the partnership continued with unvarying success, but in 1880 Mr. Peck retired and Mr. Pierce was left to conduct the business alone. His work, however, has not been confined to insurance, but has comprehended the management of real estate and mortgages, while he has been interested also in many financial and manufacturing enterprises.
With Alexander McCallum, Mr. Pierce organized the Northampton Electric Light Company, and was for many years its manager and treasurer. He has likewise figured in the development of many other large business enterprises. He is now a director of the Northampton National Bank, president of the Cooley Dickinson Hospital, trustee of the People's Institute, member of the board of Park Commis- sioners, and a commissioner of trust funds of the city. He is also a trustee of the Academy of Music.
Mr. Pierce was never actively interested in politics, but has been an influential member of the Republican party since its organization. He was called on to serve the old town government toward its close, as a member of the last
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board of selectmen, and when the new city government was introduced he served as president of the Common Council for three years. In the Quarter-Millennial Celebration of the city, in 1904, he was prominent as a member of the finance committee, which had a difficult problem to handle with a somewhat restricted city appropriation.
He is a member of the First Church parish. On Octo- ber 13, 1870, he married Isabella D. Lewis of Northampton, a daughter of Lucius and Arabella (Warner) Lewis, both natives of Suffield, Connecticut. They have had two chil- dren, a son and daughter. The latter lives with her parents.
Mr. Pierce lost his father in childhood. His mother lived, with mental faculties unimpaired, to the great age of ninety-two years, and made her home with the subject of this sketch.
The Draper Family
VICIT
PEPERCIT
raper.
The Draper Coat of Arms
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THE DRAPER FAMILY
One of the Oldest and Most Respectable Families in America Descended from English Ancestry
T HOMAS DRAPER, of Heptonstall, England, was the ancestor of this family. He was born in the village of Fairfax, Yorkshire, and his kindred came of an ancient and numerous race. Thomas was a clothier by trade, and is said to have drawn his name from that occupation, just as most of the old English families took their names from the name of their occupation or trade.
The children of this English ancestor were Thomas, John, William, James, Mary, and Martha, and all were born in England. James crossed the Atlantic to settle in New England about the time he came of age, and, therefore, was the immigrant ancestor of the American Drapers. From 1640 to 1650 he was a pioneer and "proprietor" of the town of Roxbury. Such was his exceeding strict piety that he was known as "James, the Puritan." He was the owner of several looms and followed his trade, which had been that of a clothier in the old country. Here is an ancient rhyme, of interest, in connection with this family:
" 'What craftsman art thou,' asked the king, 'I pray thee tell me trowe?' 'I am a draper, Sir, by trade, Now tell me what art thou?' "
The rightful connection between the Drapers of Hepton- stall, England, and of James Draper and his descendants of
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Roxbury, Massachusetts, is thoroughly established, not alone by the English records, but by several affidavits made and proven by descendants of the family. Only one of these affidavits - the most interesting one - can be quoted here:
"John Draper, of Dedham, aged eighty-two years or thereabouts, under oath declares that he hath often heard his father and mother say that the deponent's grandfather was Thomas Draper, who lived in Heptonstall Brige or Bridge, in Yorkshire, and was a clothier by trade, and had sons Thomas, John, William, and James, the deponent's father. The three former died in England, never came into this country, and two sisters, Mary and Martha, also died there. The deponent's mother's surname was Stans- field, daughter of Gideon Stansfield, alias Steadfast, of the place in Yorkshire, near the said Bridge, blacksmith by same trade, who had only one son, that had not the use of speech, and the deponent's said mother, Miriam, and Abigail, who came together into this country, and who left their said father Gideon, in Yorkshire, and who had estate there, but the deponent knows not what became thereof."
New England, Province of Massachusetts Bay, Suffolk, ss Roxbury, Mass., 25th April, 1742.
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