USA > Massachusetts > Hampden County > Ludlow > The history of Ludlow, Massachusetts > Part 20
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CHARLES DEXTER ROOD
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BIOGRAPHIES
instrument, one of the wonders of the twentieth century, can be used for dictating purposes as well as recording telephonic conversations. registers the latter on a wire one-one hundredth of an inch in diameter - the finest piano wire-and retains it for years, or the record can be erased by using the wire for dictating again and again. The machine will be in the market in 1912, and the expectations for its success are very great.
Mr. Rood united with the Congregational Church at Indian Orchard when sixteen years old and still retains his membership. Mr. Rood married first. Anna S. Marble, daughter of Edwin S. Marble of New Haven, who died about a year later, leaving a little son, who lived to be nearly four years of age. Mr. Rood married second, Caroline Abbe, daughter of James T. Abbe, of Springfield. They have two daughters and one son. He is a member of both scientific and social clubs in New York, Philadelphia, and his own city of Springfield.
He has generously testified to his interest in, loyalty to, and affection for his native town Ludlow in donating, for various local purposes, a large sum of money to be disbursed by trustees appointed from the First Congregational Church at Ludlow Center. (See page 171.)
C. D. ROOD AND LITTLE FRIENDS The sleigh is over 150 years old
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HISTORY OF LUDLOW
J. DEXTER ROOD
J. Dexter Rood was born on the Newell place in Ludlow. February 22. 1815, the second son of Asahel and Asenath (Fuller) Rood. The family moved to the present Rood homestead in November. 1816.
At an early age Mr. Rood began working in the cotton mills owned by the Jenekses, in Jenksville. At the age of nineteen he was over- seer in the weaving room. He continued with the company until just before their failure in 1848, when, according to the Hampden County records, the Springfield Manufacturing Company gave a mortgage to Dexter Rood and thirty others for $30,000.
J. DENIER ROOD
MRS. J. DEXIER ROOD
After the failure Mr. Rood moved to New York City and engaged in business with his brother Horace for a year or two. Returning to Ludlow, he engaged in farming on his father's farm. In 1853 he became station agent at Indian Orchard on the Boston & Albany main line. In 1867 he went to Illinois, remaining two years there in business with his brother Horace. In 1869 he became station agent on the Boston & Albany at West Warren, where he remained until his death, May 12. 1889. terminating & service of more than thirty-five years. He married Clarissa .A. Walker. Charles D. Rood was their only child.
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DEACON AND MRS. ALVA SIKES
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BIOGRAPHIES
ALVA SIKES
Alva Sikes was born in Ludlow, March 19, 1796, the son of Jonathan and Mary (Montagne) Sikes. He received his early education in the district schools of Ludlow and pursued an advanced course in a private school in Springfield. He taught school for the sum of ten dollars per month, boarding among the parents of his pupils. During the summer he assisted his father on the farm which he eventually inherited.
Ile served the town with credit in several offices, as selectman, assessor, and as representative to the General Court in 1840.
Ile married Emilia Walker, the daughter of Captain James Walker. They had two children, Reuben and Harriet.
Alva Sikes died August 6, 1856. He was a member of the Congrega- tional Church and a deacon from 1839 to the close of his life. He was a man whose council was much sought.
REUBEN SIKES
Reuben Sikes, a prosperous farmer and prominent citizen of Ludlow. was born April 25, 1824. In 1853 he lived on the Rood farm, in the western part of the town, and, in 1854, removed to Granby where he resided for one year. He then returned to Ludlow and settled upon the old homestead, where he lived until 1874, when the property Was purchased by the City of Springfield for a reservoir. His next home was in North Brookfield, where he purchased the Dean farm and remained twelve years. Again he returned to Ludlow, bought land and built a house, living there until his death, July 22, 1901.
Mr. Sikes was a Republican from the time of its party formation. In 1871, he was elected to the state legislature. He was a selectman three years and an assessor four, in all of which capacities he served with distinction and honor. He was a deacon of Grace Enion Church at North Wilbraham. He married first, Ann Eliza Keyes, a native of Ludlow, and second, Juliette Walker of Belchertown. He had five children, two sons and three daughters.
THEODORE SIKES
Theodore Sikes was born in Ludlow in 1792, the oldest son of Benja- min and Catherine (Miller) Sikes. He was educated in the schools of the town, and was a teacher in them for a time. Later he became a farmer and carpenter, both of which trades he pursued for many years. He was keenly interested in the affairs of the town, and filled the various offices with success. His opinions and counsel were much sought. For years he was a justice of the peace, and in that period drew many wills, deeds, etc., as the records show He represented the town five consecu- tive terms in the Legislature at the time when one representative was
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HISTORY OF LEDLOW
accorded each town annually. To him belongs the distinction of having represented the town oftenest in the political assemblies of the state.
In 1816, he married Anna Stebbins, and they had one son, Theodore. Junior. Mr. Sikes and his family resided in Ludlow until about 1850, when they removed to Cuba, N. Y., where he and his wife died, but they are buried in the cemetery at Ludlow Center. He died May 1, 1879.
SOLOMON BLISS STEBBINS
{\ memorial notice read at a meeting of the Board of Trustees of the franklin Savings Bank, by Hon. James B. Richardson, member of the board, on October 31, 1910.)
Solomon Bliss Stebbins was born at Warren Massa. on January 18, 1830. He was a lineal descendant of Rowland Stebbins who settled near Springfield in this state early in the seventeenth century. By the death of his father he became dependent upon his own efforts in his boyhood. He had limited advantages for school education; but Nature, more just than she often seems, as if anticipating such an unfavorable condition, compensated young Stebbins therefor, by a large endowment of practical good sense, which did not fail him during a long, busy life. He accomplished what he did, and became what he was, by his own work, energy, industry, and rare integrity. He appears to have very early secured the confidence of others, for we find him, according to our information, in charge of the post office in Ludlow at the age of eighteen Years.
He came to Boston in 1850, and soon after that is found established in business as one of the proprietors of a public grain elevator at the North End, which is said to have been the first public grain elevator erected in that city. We find him soon taking an active part in public affairs, to which his taste and aptitude naturally led him. He became a member of the House of Representatives of the General Court in 1801; and he voted for the passage of the act, in March of that year, for the incorpora- tion of the Franklin Savings Bank. In 1864 and 1865, he was a member of the common council of the city of Boston. He was a delegate to the convention in Chicago in 1864 which nominated Abraham Lincoln as a candidate for the presidency of the United States, and he was a member of the committee of the city council of Boston, to represent the city at the funeral of Lincoln in Washington on April 16, 1865. In 1866, he was a member of the Massachusetts senate. He became a member of the board of aldermen of the city of Boston in 1873, and hekl that office for the years 1873, 1874, 1875, 1876, 1878, and 1879, and also the year 1882, seven years. He was chairman of the board of aldermen in the years 1878 and 1882. He was a candidate for the office of mayor of Boston
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BIOGRAPHIES
in 1879 and 1880. That he had the knowledge of and experience in the administration of the business of the city, the ability, integrity, and all other qualifications requisite for a successful performance of the duties of a mayor, no one then or since has ever questioned; but these qualifications both before and since then have sometimes failed of proper recognition in popular elections. He failed of election in 1880 by only 581 votes He took his defeat for the mayoralty with great magnanimity, without animosity or bitterness; and at the request of many citizens he became the candidate, in 1882, for election to the board of aldermen, was elected. and was chairman of the board for that year; he continued in his loyalty. and best service and devotion to the city as before
In 1885 he was appointed one of the three commissioners to take the land for and erect the new court house in Pemberton Square; and upon its completion was appointed custodian of the building, which position he filled acceptably for about twenty years, until his death June 8, 1910.
He was for forty-four years a member of the board of directors, and for twenty years president, of the Washingtonian Home. He was a trustee of the Mount Hope Cemetery, was one of the incorporators and founders of the Adams Nervine Asylum, and was an active member of the Boston Chamber of Commerce and its predecessors. He was elected trustee of this bank in 1861.
He was a useful member of many other organizations and societies, and gave a helping hand, to the extent of his ability, to many worthy causes. In all these various offices of honor and trust his character and record are clear. He never betrayed a trust, abused a confidence, violated his principles, or broke a promise. He was not a demagogue. To obtain office, he did not promise to do what he could not do, nor did he boast of things which he had or had not done. Opinions on subjects which many persons take by inheritance or accept on authority were with him the result of his own meditations. He could not accept for truth things which were contrary to facts, or what he thought to be so, or which did not harmonize with his sense of justice. This habitual self-reliance resulted in the formation of positive character, which when built up, as it was here, upon intelligence, honesty, integrity, and sin- cerity, is durable and abiding, not to be destroyed by popular breath or accident. And it is character after all, in the final analysis, which really impresses and interests us, for in it is to be found the man as he really was or is; other things are incidental. Mr. Stebbins lived an active, useful, unselfish, and honorable life, and we are the better for it.
Nature was also kind to him, in the bestowal of a uniformly benevo- lent, kindly, and companionable disposition, which continued beyond the allotted threescore years and ten. The frosts of eighty winters had not chilled the blood of a warm heart. Back of or beneath the public view of Mr. Stebbins and his work, existed a perfectly pure and spotless private life.
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HISTORY OF LUDLOW
JOHN EDWARD SIEVENS
John Edward Stevens, the third of a family of five children, was born in St. Petersburg, Russia, September 7, 1846. His father, Sidney Stevens, was the son of an English squire in the county of Hants, and his mother, Eliza Kennell, was of Scotch descent. His father went to Russia to engage in the manufacture of paper, in which he was very successful, and about 1850 be returned to England and leased a country estate near Croydon. Mr. Stevens was sent to a boys' school in Yorkshire, and there received his education. His father retained a large interest in the paper mill in Russia, and the failure of this resulted in the loss of his fortune, so that his son was obliged to leave school at the age of fourteen. He entered the machinery works of Fairbairn, Kennedy & Naylor, at Leeds, England. There he served an apprenticeship of seven years, upon the completion of which he went to Narva, Russia, as assistant superintendent of the large flax mills there. He remained one year. after which he returned to the Fairbairn works at Leeds. He traveled on the continent for them, and in 1871 first came to America as their agent. He traveled widely in this country in their interest. He married in 1873 Miss Harriet Louise Stevens of Dudley, Mass, and then went back to Russia to assume the position of superintendent of the Narva Flux Mills. After three years of life in Russia be once more returned to Leeds, remaining with the Fairbairn company until 1882 and represented them in Europe and America. He exhibited their machinery at Philadelphia Centennial in 1876.
In 1882 Mr. Stevens entered the service of the Ludlow Manufactur- ing Company as superintendent. Upon the death, in 1887, of the former treasurer and founder of the business, Charles T Hubbard, and the election of his son as treasurer, Mr. Brigham, the agent, resigned, and the plant then came under the management of Mr. Stevens.
For eighteen years the business was conducted by Messes. Hubbard, Wallace, and Stevens, and to their unity of administration is due the success of the business. This success may be measured by the statement that, of the twenty-five acres of mills and warehouses now standing, only three acres were in existence in 1887.
Mr. Stevens's success as a manufacturer was not only due to an acute and well-trained mind, but it was also due to the cordial relations which be maintained with his superintendents and overseers, and to the respect with which he was regarded by all the employees of the company.
John E. Stevens died suddenly in his ofice at the plant of the Ludlow Manufacturing Associates in Ludlow, Mass., October 5, 1905. He had been in unusually good spirits and health, having only recently returned from a vacation spent in Canada.
A doctor was summoned, but Mr. Stevens was dead before he arrived and the doctor pronounced his death as due to heart disease.
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The village of Ludlow itself is a memorial to Mr Stevens, and to associate more completely his name with his work for the people he so long served, the trustees passed the following vote:
"Voted: That the managing trustees be authorized to erect a building for club rooms and gymnasium, according to the plans prepared by the late John Edward Stevens, and approved by the officers of the Men's Club. That the building be located in the rear of the business block, the place selected by Mr. Stevens, and when completed, to be called the John Edward Stevens Memorial as a tribute to twenty-three years of loyal service to the people of Ludlow."
-Adapted from the Cordage Trade Journal.
II
HISTORIC REMINISCENCES
IN the last month of 1779, two young men, Jedediah Paine and Solomon Wright, living in the southeastern part of the town, went one Saturday to Springfield on business, driving an ox-team. Delayed in "town" until late, when they reached the fording-place at Wallama- numps, the shades of night had gathered about the stream, rendering the crossing dangerous. They tarried until morning light, and then availed themselves of its aid to accomplish the rest of their journey. But the Sabbath law was technically broken, and they had violated it. An eyewitness living near the ford complained of them, carrying the case to the county magistrates at Northampton. To this place the young men repaired upon summons, accompanied by some of their friends. Judgment was pronounced against them, and they were sentenced to pay fine and costs. John Jennings became surety for them, and they returned homeward. It was Christmas Day. While coming through South Hadley, over the fields, they undertook to cross a temporary pond on the new ice, but were so unfortunate as to lose their lives in the attempt. There was great lamentation in Ludlow over the melancholy event, some deeming it a judgment of God. Great indignation was felt against the informant, who received half the fees. An old lady used to exult at the recollection that two of the informant's children, born after- wards, were fools.
The following lines are attributed to a local bard, one Collins Hill, who was soon after warned out of town, though probably not because of the extent of his poetic talent. Indeed, while the committee were making inquiries respecting local traditions, a veteran lady informed them that she knew of no poetry on the matter, but " there was some zarses writ about it."
(Come all my friends and hear me tell Of two young men, what them befell) Two fmart young men who died of late 'Twill make the hardeft heart to ache. Thefe two young men to Springfield went, To trade it was their full intent; We hope and truft they want to blame, But every thing did them detain.
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HISTORY OF LUDLOW
The afternoon being almoft gone, They left the town and fo went on. Acrofs the river for to gain But dark commenced on Springhiekl plain For to go home they were debar'd, Not having money to pay their charge V cart and oxen they both had To erofs the river made it bad. This being the laft day of the week,
Which for their homes made them to feck.
They dropped their teams and ftayed that night.
And Started home by the morning light. They both went home we well do know , And to their bufinefs did go; Not in the leaft were they afraid.
But foon went where they were betray'd.
lle who complained was much to blame. But we fhall not declare his name; We hope repentance he will have, Before he comes down to the grave.
But to declare what Iintend, A fpecial writ for them was fent;
December the 23d day, They went to court, as many fay.
They were detained there that day.
Hlad both the fine and cofts to pay; But foon appeared there a man, Who gave his note for both of them; Thefe two young men fat out for home. Not thinking death would fo foon come They both were feen before 'twas night. Just as the fun went out of light : Like two young roes run down a hill And fteering right towards a mill, They left the bridge, we well may know It was before determined fo. The ice was thin, they both funk down. Young people hear the folemn found; Grim death did clafp them in his hand O, who is he can death withftand! Thefe young men's hats next day were found Which foon alarmed all the town; Ten in the morning they were found, Laid their cold bodies in the ground.
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HISTORIC REMINISCENCES
Solomon Wright and Jede. Paine,
So this is true thefe were their names; Thus in the heat of youthful blood, They perifhed in the flowing flood. Their fouls are gone to God the juft,
Who form'd them firft out of the duft.
In 1786, a grandchild of Capt. Joseph Miller was run over by a cart, this injury terminating fatally, and the body was the first laid in the old yard by the Congregational Church. In the following year Captain Miller's barn was burned, and in it a little two-year-old granddaughter.
A few months later a son of Isaac Brewer was taken away in the dawn of manhood, followed soon by his heartbroken father.
A singular accident occurred in 1794, an account of which we obtain from a notice penned soon after. On Friday, June 25, David Paine's son, who was riding on the top of a load of shingles, fell off, and the cart wheels, bound with cast iron, passed directly over the middle of his body. He was taken up for dead, but soon recovered, grew to a good old age, and was well known-the late Jonathan Paine.
The veteran David Paine was found, July 2, 1807, dead, in sight of his home, at the foot of Burying-Ground Hill, having fallen beneath his cart on returning from mill, and being crushed by the wheel.
But the most thrilling incident is that concerning the supposed Annibal murder. "In the year 1817, a man named John Annibal went from Belchertown to Connecticut to peddle wagons for Filer. On his return he was seen to enter Ludlow about sundown. Afterward his horse, with bridle cut, was seen in Granby, near Asa Pease's house. His portman- tean and saddle were found near Ezekiel Fuller's and blood was discovered in the road between these two points. Great excitement prevailed, as every one thought he had been robbed and murdered. An old woman who pretended to tell fortunes was consulted. She said he was murdered by a man with but one eye, living in a gambrel-roofed house, where three roads met. The house which answered the description was searched in the absence of the family, the doorsteps were removed and a large excavation made underneath them, but not the slightest trace of the missing man was found. The owner of the house was also searched as he was returning to his home, but no money was discovered about him. Then a pond was drained near the house of George Clark. In draining the pond it was necessary in one point to dig twenty-five feet deep. While the work of digging was going forward, camp fires were kept around the pond and sentinels with loaded muskets guarded the spot. When the ditch was completed, on Sabbath day, the water was drawn off, and a thousand people were supposed to be present; a line of men reaching from one side of the pond to the other held each other's hands, and waded through the soft mud. The pond covered
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HISTORY OF LUDLOW
nearly an dere of ground. No trace of the body was found. Search was then instituted in a smaller pond near by, the water being carried over the hill in pails. This effort also proved fruitless. Many then began to adopt another theory besides that of murder. His brother, who had been here and joined in the search for two days, said his business was such he could not possibly remain, and returned to his home. It was afterward learned that John Annibal had debts which he did not wish to pay, also that his marital relations were not the happiest. Some suggested that he might have spied a chance to kill two birds with one stone." ( From Dea. George Clark's description of the affair.)
A possible sequel to this account was the finding of a skull years later at one of the points where suspicion had rested.
A serious affair is supposed to have occurred not far from the year 1830. One Wright, a deaf mute, residing over the mountain, disappeared quite suddenly. He was believed to have had an altercation with one of the citizens living in another part of the town, and some suspected foul play. A melancholy interest was added to the reminiscence by the finding of a skeleton in an out lot long afterwards, which bore unmistak- able signs of identity with the frame of the missing man.
Chapman Kendall, while driving a yoke of oxen with a load of wood, on the road leading to Harris Mill from where Charles B. Bennett now lives, in some way fell beneath the wagon, which stopped with one of the wheels upon his neck. Gates Willey, noticing that the team had stood there for a long time, went to investigate and found Mr. Kendall dead. Beside the road is a stone monument, bearing the letters "C. K.," marking the spot where the accident happened.
Joshua Fuller lived on the Dorman farm. On a Sunday morning in June. 1796, while his father, Young Fuller, lay dead, the house caught fire and burned to the ground, necessitating the removal of the corpse to the orchard.
The following account of the death of Selectman Samuel White is taken from the Springfield Republican of May 17, 1875:
The quiet farming community of Ludlow, where so few unwonted events have marked the progress of a century, was saddened, Saturday, by the sudden, shocking death of one of her best citizens. Samuel White, chairman of the board of selectmen and nine years a town father. He was bitten by a boar so that he bled to death within a few minutes. Mr. White went out about 6 o'clock in the morning to feed the animal, and was attacked so suddenly that he could give no warning, but was able to crawl out of the pen, where he was discovered by one of his men when unable to speak. He was seized on the inner and upper part of the thigh, the brute's tushes tearing a hole in the flesh two inches long and severing the femoral artery. The men of the farm had complained of
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HISTORIC REMINISCENCES
the ugly temper of the beast, but Mr. White, a man of markedly resolute character, had thorough belief in his own ability to manage him -indeed, had been laughing, only the day previous, at his "help " for their timidity. Mr. White was no doubt taken entirely off his guard, these creatures being very quick and crafty of attack.
The man thus cut off was 57 years old, perhaps the most thrifty farmer in town, and in every way a representative New Englander, held in high esteem. A Granby boy, he began life by "working out" for Henry Dickinson, where he saved $80, with which he bought a working team and began clearing off some woodland for Jefferson Alden, giving the latter one fourth of the profits realized from the sale of the lumber. His own share went into better teams until he had additionally earned enough to buy half of a farm at what was then Ludlow City. He became a drover, and since has made considerable money by the sale of stock. He came to his present farm twenty-three years ago, and has made it the finest place in the township. He was what Massachusetts people call a "good calculator," always rugged, a hard worker, frugal and honest beyond a cavil, and withal a neighborly, Christian man. For five years he has acted as chairman of the board of selectmen, and was conscientiously faithful always to the public service; he was also a prominent member of the Congregational Church. He leaves a wife and two children-James White, a farmer in Ludlow, and the wife of E. Harris.
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