USA > Maine > Biographical sketches of representative citizens of the state of Maine > Part 1
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Gc 974.1 B52am 1762744
REYNOLDS HISTORICAL GENEALOGY COLLECTION
ALLEN COUNTY PUBLIC LIBRARY 3 1833 01085 7362
Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2014
https://archive.org/details/biographicalsket00newe
840
AMERICAN SERIES
OF POPULAR BIOGRAPHIES
MAINE EDITION
THIS VOLUME CONTAINS BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES OF
REPRESENTATIVE CITIZENS OF
THE STATE OF MAINE
" Who among men art thou, and thy years how many, good friend ? "- Xenophanes
BOSTON NEW ENGLAND. HISTORICAL PUBLISHING COMPANY 15 COURT SQUARE 1903
صـ
1762744
Emery OBeary
PREFACE
T HE Maine Edition of the American Series of Popular Biographies, herewith pre- sented, has been published in accordance with the expressed wishes of substan- tially all those directly represented in its pages, as a desirable means of pre- serving their personal and family records. The value of such works, when carefully compiled, as in the present instance. is now widely recognized. They present an epitome of contemporaneous human life that will be appreciated at its true value by succeeding generations. The life sketches herein published are mostly of those still privileged to " act in the living present,"- whose life records are not yet complete. We believe. how- ever, that, so far as they go, they will be found correct in outline, the biographical data in most cases having been obtained directly from their respective subjects and sub- sequently revised by them in proof. The genealogy they contain has been verified. when- ever possible, by comparison with the most authentic published records, and all obvious errors corrected. Certain of the articles, which we have indicated by an asterisk (*). printed immediately after the name of the subject, were not revised by the respective subscribers to whom proofs were mailed. They may, therefore, contain errors of which we have no cognizance, and for which we cannot be held responsible.
NEW ENGLAND HISTORICAL PUBLISHING CO.
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BIOGRAPHICAL.
ON. EMERY OLIVER BEAN, senior member of the law firm of Bean & Bean, of Readfield and Hallowell, and formerly Judge of Probate and Insol- vency, is now rounding out his sixtieth year of practice as a member of the Kennebec County bar.
He was born in Readfield, September 10, 1819, son of Colonel Oliver and Patience (Nickerson) Bean. The family is of Scottish origin. The particu- lar branch thereof in New England to which he belongs was founded by a seventeenth century immigrant, John Bean, who received a grant of land in Exeter, N.H., in 1660. Joshua+ Bean of the fourth generation, Judge Bean's great-grandfather, born in Brentwood, N.H., in 1741, removed to Maine with his family when he was nearly forty years old, settled at Readfield in 1783, and died there in 1814. Ilis eldest son, Elisha, who was born in Brentwood in 1764, married Olive Shepard, a native of Epping, N.H., and was the father of nine chil- dren, the fifth being Oliver, above named, whose title was derived from the rank to which he rose in the State militia.
Colonel Oliver Bean, born in Readfield, No- vember 15, 1797, died June 17, 1869. A farmer and mill-owner, like his father and grandfather, he was a citizen of influence in his day, being for about twenty years chairman of the Board of Selectmen, serving as Representative in the Maine Legislature, and also as State Senator. His military experience began in his youth, when he was a soldier in the War of 1812. His wife, Patience, daughter of Moses Nickerson, of Chatham, Mass., who was a soldier of the
Revolution, died in February, 1869. They had five children, four of whom attained adult age, namely: Emery Oliver, whose birth date is given above; Nelson Shepard, born Decem- ber 24, 1824, who died in his nineteenth year; Philura Ann, born in February, 1828, who mar- ried Joel Howard, of Presque Isle, Me .; and Evelyn Marilla, born in October, 1829, who married Stephen W. Caldwell, of Caribou, Me.
A farmhouse pleasantly situated near the head of Lake Maranacook was the boyhood home of Judge Bean. The farm afforded plenty of work, and the district school when in session gave him opportunity for study, and stimulated his desire for higher learning. A few terms at Maine Wesleyan Seminary, Kent's Hill, and at Monmouth Academy, were so well spent that at the age of seventeen he was engaged to teach his first school at Readfield. He continued to teach for five years, making that calling-as so many have done-a stepping-stone to the pro- fession of law. It was his good fortune to pur- sue his legal studies in the law office in Read- field of Timothy O. Howe, then a young prac- titioner and only three years his senior, who was later a resident of Wisconsin, serving as United States Senator and afterward as Post- master-General, being appointed by President Arthur in December, 1SS0. Admitted to the Kennebec County bar in 1813, Mr. Bean spent the ensuing year in Hallowell, beginning prac- tice in connection with Henry W. Paine, a law- yer of unusual ability, afterward of Boston. Returning to Readfield in 1844, he was received as a partner by the friend in whose office he had been a student. The law firm of Howe & Bean continued until Mr. Howe in the latter part of 1845 went to Wisconsin.
From that time till 1876 the former junior
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partner occupied the same office alone, work- ing diligently, liis practice and reputation con- stantly growing. In 1876 he admitted his son, Fred Emery Bean, as partner. Two years later the firm of Bean & Bean opened an office in Hallowell, and during the years 1890-93 they had a third office in Gardiner. In the meantime the elder lawyer had served four years in the eighties as Judge of Probate and Insolvency. A few years ago it was said, and it is probably as true at the present time, "The court records show the name of Emery O. Bean and the firm name of Bean & Bean to have been entered in a greater number of cases than any other attorneys now living in Kennebec County."
Judge Bean married October S, 1844, Eliza- beth H., daughter of Colonel John O. Craig, of Readfield. She died January 22, 1892. A large-hearted, liberal-minded woman, devoted to her family, but not neglectful of social duties, her departure was felt as a loss to many friends. Nelson Shepard Bean, the elder of the two sons who survived their mother, was born in 1845, and died in 1900. He resided in Malden, and did business in Boston. Fred Emery Bean, already mentioned as his father's partner, was born in 1853. He resides in Hallowell, Me., and has served as Mayor of that city. Judge Bean's present wife, daughter of James Packard, a native of Readfield, was before their marriage Mrs. Georgia C. Nickerson.
After the dissolution of the Whig party, to which Judge Bean belonged at the time of his election in 1851 as a member of the Maine House of Representatives and in 1856 as a State Sen- ator, he became a Democrat. Appointed in 1879 by Governor Garcelon one of the trustees of the Maine State College of Agriculture and Mechanic Arts, he served in that capacity seven years. His election as Judge of Probate and Insolvency in 1SSO, by a plurality of six hun- dred in a county strongly Republican, was strik- ing testimony to the confidence reposed in him by his fellow-citizens, regardless of political affili- ations. "No appeal from his decisions in pro- bate matters," it is said, "was ever sustained by the Supreme Court of Probate, and only one in insolveney proceedings." In religion Judge Bean, like his father before him, is of the liberal type of Christian believers, cherishing the cheer-
ful faith of Universalism, regarding ho one as shut out from the saving efficacy of divine love. He is a leading member of the Universalist church at Readfield, and is one of the trustees of the denominational school known as West- brook Seminary.
Learned in the law, possessed of good common sense, a cool, clear head, unfailing energy, and a power of close and continuous application, Judge Bean owes his success to hard work, to which he has given time and strength unspar- ingly, finding in his later years that "age is opportunity no less than youth itself."
HARLES MCLAUGHLIN CUMSTON, LL.D., of Monmouth, Me., son of Colo- nel Henry Van Schaick Cumston, of Scarboro, Me., was born in the latter town, January 12, 1824. At the age of ten years he moved from Scarboro to Monmouth with his father's family. In boyhood he ex- hibited the traits that have distinguished him in later life as a scholar and man of letters.
At the age of nineteen he had completed the courses of study at Monmouth Academy, Water- ville Institute, and Bowdoin College. During the winters of his college course he taught school in Monmouth and Litchfield, and soon after graduating from Bowdoin became the principal of Alfred Academy. On reaching his majority he went to Massachusetts and taught success- fully at Reading, Woburu, and Salem.
From Salen Mr. Cumston went to the Boston English High School. Here he passed through the grades of usher, submaster, and master to the head-mastership, being the successor of his friend, Mr. Sherwin, who died in 1869.
The position of head-master he held until 1874, when, to the great regret of the friends of the school and with the highest encomiums of the committee, the chairman of which was the celebrated Dr. Samuel K. Lothrop, he ro- signed, after twenty-six years of service in this one school.
Since his retirement to private life in Mon- mouth, Mr. Cumston has presented his town a magnificent opera-house and library building, designed and erected for him by his friend, Mr. Harry Cochrane. Cumston Hall, as it is called,
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is pronounced by experts one of the most elabo- rate and beautiful structures of its kind in New England.
Mr. Cumston spends a large portion of his time in Monmouth, where he enjoys a scholarly and well-earned leisure. From his Alma Mater, Bowdoin, he received, in 1870, the degree of Doctor of Laws.
ON. JOHN FREMONT HILL, M.D., born in Eliot, York County, Me., October 29, 1855, was the son of William and Miriam (Leighton) Hill. His ancestors on both sides were among the most conspicuous settlers, his mother, Miriam Leighton, being the eldest daughter of Andrew Pepperell Leighton, of Eliot, who represented his district several times in the State Legis- lature, being State Senator for a number of years. His father, William Hill, of Eliot, was in the sixth generation of direct descent from John Hill, of Dover, who was born in England in 1624, and came to this country about the middle of the century.
His grandmother, Sarah Catherine Odiorne, was a descendant of Sir John Mason, the orig- inal grantee of the Province of New Hamp- shire.
John Fremont Hill was educated in the public schools at Eliot, in Eliot and South Berwick (Me.) Academies, and in the Putnam School in Newburyport, Mass., and was graduated at the Maine Medical School, Brunswick, after which he completed his medical studies at Long Island College Hospital, Brooklyn, N.Y. Dr. Hill practised medicine for a time in Booth- bay Harbor, and in 1879, deciding to enter a more active business life, he joined the Hon. Peleg O. Vickery in the publication of peri- odicals, and soon after became a partner in a firm known as Vickery and Hill, which has branch offices in Boston, New York, and Chi- cago. In 1900 a substantial, fireproof build- ing, with all modern improvements, was erected at Augusta, to accommodate the constantly increasing business of the company.
As an outlet for his active mind, Dr. Hill became interested in electric railway develop- ment, and is now one of the foremost en-
gaged in Maine. He is also president of the Somerset Railroad. A business man of large and varied interests, he naturally holds im- portant positions in the Granite National Bank, the Augusta Trust Company, and other financial institutions at Augusta.
On May 19, 1880, Dr. Hill was married to Lizzie G. Vickery, daughter of the Hon. Poleg O. Vickery. Their only child, Percy Vick- ory, was born March 16, 1881. Mrs. Lizzie Vickery Hill died April 10, 1893.
Governor Hill has always taken a great interest in political matters, and is an active participant in the councils of the Republican party in Maine. He has more than once served Augusta as a Representative, Senator, and member of Governor Powers' Council. He was a Presidential Elector in 1896.
In 1900 he was elected Governor of Maine by a large majority. His inaugural address in January, 1901, was able and businesslike, and marked the beginning of a most success- ful administration of affairs of State, one not- able result being the payment of the large floating debt incurred during the Spanish War. All the finances of the State received special attention, and were in excellent shape at the close of his first term.
His administration received a handsome and significant indorsement by his re-election in September, 1902, to the same high office. The vote cast was one of the largest ever given in an off-year in the history of Maine.
On April 25, 1897, Dr. IIill was married in St. Louis to Mrs. Laura Liggett, widow of Iliram S. Liggett, and daughter of the Hon. Norman Colman, Secretary of Agriculture in the first cabinet of President Cleveland.
During his first term of office, Governor Hill and family resided in the mansion on Stato Street, in Augusta, which was for many years the home of the Hon. James G. Blaine.
In 1902 the Governor built of St. Louis brick and Maine granite trimmings one of the most beautiful residences in New England. It is palatial and dignified in its proportions, artistically furnished and decorated, and con- veniently arranged in every detail.
Governor Hill is a member of the Maine Historical Society, the Society of "Mayflower"
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Descendants, the Society of Colonial Wars, and several social clubs, among them the Annaki Club of Augusta, Me., the St. Louis Club and the St. Louis Country Club of St. Louis, Mo., and vice-president of the Pepperell Society, composed of descendants of the famous family by that name. He is a Mason, a member of Augusta Lodge and Cushnoe Chapter, Trinity Commandery, and Kora Temple Shrine. He is a generous contributor to the Universalist Society of Augusta, of which he is also a member.
ON. NELSON DINGLEY, A.M., LL.D., journalist and statesman, for many years a resident of Lewiston, Me., died in Washington, D.C., Janu- ary 13, 1899. Born in Durham, Me., Febru- ary 15, 1832, son of Nelson, Sr., and Jane (Lambert) Dingley, he was a descendant in the ninth generation of John Dingley, who came over from England in 1637, and in 1640 settled at Marshfield, Mass. Jacob2 Dingley, born in 1642, son of John1 by his wife Sarah, married Elizabeth Newton, and was the father of John,3 born in 1670, who married Sarah Porter. Their eldest son, Jacob,4 born in Marshfield in 1703, married Mary Holmes, and settled in Duxbury, Mass.
Jacob,5 born in 1727, son of Jacob+ and Mary, married Desire Phillips. William,6 son of Jacob5 and Desire, was born in 1749. He migrated to Maine before the Revolutionary War, and married at Cape Elizabeth, in 1771, Sarah Jordan. Their son Jeremiah, born in 1779, married May 12, 1805, Lucy, daughter of the Rev. James Garcelon, and was the father of nine children, the third being Nelson, Sr.,8 above named, born in 1809, who married in 1831 Jane Lambert, of Durham, Me. Deacon Isaac Lambert, father of Jane, removed to Durham, Me., from Abington, Mass. In 183S Nelson Dingley, Sr., removed to Unity, Wako County. A farmer and trader, he served as Selectman and for one term in the State Senate, being elected as a Whig. He had two sons. The younger, Frank L., now editor of the Lew- iston Journal, was born in Unity in 1840.
Nelson,? the elder son, the subject of this sketch, acquired his early education in the
public schools of Unity, entering the high school at the age of twelve. At seventeen he taught a winter term of school in China, Me., and after that he taught three other winter terms. His preparation for college he com- pleted at Waterville Academy. Entering Water- ville College (now Colby College) in 1851, he remained there a year and a half, and then finished his academie course at Dartmouth College, receiving his Bachelor's degree in 1855. He studied law in the office of Morrill & Fes- senden in Auburn, where his parents were then living, and in 1856 was admitted to the bar. In September of that year he bought one-half interest in the Lewiston Journal, a weekly news- paper, and in 1857 he became the sole owner. Its issue as a daily began in 1865. It became the leading Republican organ in the State, and Mr. Dingley continued as editor and pro- prietor until his death, his brother Frank being associated with him in its management from 1861. His connection with the temperance movement began at the age of sixteen, when he organized a society known as Cadets of Tem- perance. His first vote was cast for Anson P. Morrill, candidate for governor on the Free Soil and Prohibition ticket. In 1867 and 1868 he was at the head of the Maine State Lodge of Good Templars, and while in Washington he served as president of the Congressional Temperance Society. He was in the State Legislature as Representative from Auburn in 1861, 1862, and 1863, from Lewiston in 1864, 1865, 1868, and 1873, and was Speaker in 1863 and 1864. He was conspicuously active in debate and in the business of the Legislature, serving on important committees and soon becoming recognized as the leader of his party in the House. Elected Governor of Maine in 1873 and again in 1874 by an increased ma- jority, he declined a renomination in 1875. His first election to Congress was in Septem- ber, 1SS1, when he was chosen to fill out the unexpired term (forty-seventh Congress) of William P. Frye, who had become United States Senator. By successive re-elections he retained his seat in the national House of Rep- resentatives until his death, which occurred during the third session of the fifty-fifth Con- gress.
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His first speech in Congress, delivered April 25, 1882, was on "Protection to American Shipping." It has been well said of him that all questions relating to banking, currency, the tariff, shipping interests, and what may be called business politics, engaged Mr. Dingley's close study and attention through all his public life; and in the treatment of these matters his usefulness in Congress was universally ree- ognized. He was an influential member of the Committees on Banking and Currency, and American Shipbuilding and Ship-owning Interests, and on Merchant Marine and Fish- cries; and in 1897, as chairman of the Com- mittee on Ways and Means, he had charge of the bill which when enacted became the Dingley tariff law, now in force. The cabinet office of Secretary of the Treasury, which Presi- dent McKinley in 1898 was desirous that he should accept, was no temptation to him to resign his leadership in the House. He was subsequently appointed a member of the Joint High Commission on the controversies between the United States and Canada.
Mr. Dingley was a member of the Congre- gational church in Lewiston. The degree of Doctor of Laws he received from Dartmouth College and from Bates College.
He married June 11, 1857, Salome Me Kenney, daughter of Henry and Ruth (Parker) Mc- Kenney, of Auburn, Me., where she was born, December 3, 1831. Her father was born in Limington, Me., March 24, 1801; her mother, September 25, 1803. They were married De- cember 20, 1824, and became the parents of three daughters: Ann Maria, born in 1829; Salome (Mrs. Dingley); and Ruth, born Octo- ber 1, 1834. Mrs. Dingley's paternal grand- father, Joshua MeKenney, a lifelong resident of Limington, born January 16, 1775, died May 15, 1831. Her grandmother, Mrs. Salome McKenney, for whom she was named, was born in 1781.
Six children were born to Mr. and Mrs. Dingley, namely-Henry, Charles Lincoln, Ed- ward Nelson, Arthur Howard, Albert Grant, and Edith. Edward Nelson Dingley is a grad- uate of Yale College, and now (1903) is editor and publisher of the Kalamazoo Telegraph, of Kalamazoo, Mich. He married December 2,
1SSS, Miriam G. Robinson, of Neponset, Mass .. and they have three children living: Irene, born September 23, 1SS9; Nelson D., born Octo- ber 6, 1892; and Madeline, born June 13, 1900. Meriam, born January 15, 1891, lived only a few months. Albert Grant Dingley married October 2, 1895, Grace Darling Bean, of Med- ford, Mass., and has one child, Sadie, born in Denver, Col., in 1896. Edith Dingley mar- ried March 11, 1899, James C. Hooc, of Wash- ington, D.C., and has one child, Nelson Ding- ley Hooe, born in August, 1901.
EWIS APPLETON BARKER was born in Bangor, Me., January 15, 1878, son of Lewis A. and Margaret (Apple- ton) Barker.
That branch of the Barker family which he represents was founded by James Barker, a native of Suffolk in old England, who was one of the earliest settlers of Rowley, Massa- chusetts Bay Colony. Made freeman in Octo- ber, 1640, he received a grant of land for a house lot in 1643. Mr. Barker of Bangor is of the ninth generation, the line of descent being: James,1 Barzillai,2 Noah,3 Josiah,+ Daniel, Nathaniel," Lewis,7 Lewis Amasa,8 Lewis Appleton.9
Barzillai2 Barker, son of James1 by his wife Grace, married in 1666 Anna, daughter of Deacon Maximilian Jewett, of Rowley. Noah3 Barker, born in 1689, married Martha Figgett, of Ipswich, and migrated about 1718 to Strat- ham, N.H. Josiah+ Barker, born in 1727, mar- ried Mary Hurd, of Ipswich, and settled in Exeter, N.H. Daniel Barker, born in 1754, died in 1820. Hle married Anna Hill, and resided successively in Exeter, N.H., Limer- iek, Me., and Exeter, Me. Nathaniel" Barker, eldest son of Daniel, was born at Exeter, N. H., in 1785. He married at Exeter, Me., in 1807, Sarah Pease, daughter of Joseph Pease, who removed from New Hampshire to Parson- field, Me., and thence to Exeter, Me.
On March 18, 1823, while Nathaniel Barker was coming from Exeter to Bangor with an ox-team and a load of wood, in some way he fell under the sled, and was instantly killed. The story of the widow's struggles to bring up
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her family of nine children has long been famil- iar history in the Barker family, wherever their descendants are found. One of her sons was David Barker, the poet. She long sur- vived the tribulations of those early days, dy- ing on the old homestead January 6, 18SO, at the age of ninety-one years. Her children were: Noah, Melinda, Julia, Sarah, Nathaniel, David, Daniel, Mark, and Lewis.
Lewis' Barker, son of Nathaniel and Sarah, was born at Exeter, Me., February 18, 1818. He was educated in the schools of Exeter and at Foxcroft Academy. After teaching school for a few terms he began the study of law with Albert G. Jennett. continuing it with Kent & Cutting. Admitted to the bar in 1841, he set- tled in Stetson, where he remained a resident for thirty years, in 1871 removing to Bangor. Here, eventually, he was a member of the firm of Barker, Vose & Barker (composed of hinself, his son, Lewis A., and the Hon. T. W. Vose), which enjoyed a high 'reputation in legal cir- cles. A man of great force of character, he became a power in the community in which he lived, and a prominent figure in State and na- tional politics, being especially noted as an able and forceful stump orator. He repre- sented the town of Stetson in the House in 1864, in the Senate in 1865-66, and again in the House in 1867, when he was Speaker, and in 1870. He was a delegate to the Na- tional Convention of 1868, which nominated General Grant for the Presidency, and was one of a committee of three named to notify the general of his nomination. In 1880 he was a delegate to the National Convention which nominated Garfield, and he served on the committee which prepared the Repub- lican platform for the following campaign. In this year also and for several years after he served as a member of the Executive Council of the State. He was a member of the State Board of Health and of the commission to enlarge the State House at Augusta. He died in Bangor in October, 1890, from injuries received in being run over by a runaway horse.
Lewis Barker married Elizabeth, daughter of Colonel Francis and Elizabeth (Wasson) Hill, of Exeter, August 2, 1846. They had two children: Evelyn, born May 11, 1848,
who died November 3, 1872; and Lewis Amasa, born August 12, 1854.
Lewis Amasa Barker, after acquiring his general education in the public schools, the Castine Normal School, and the academy at Kent's Hill, Me., became a student at the Albany Law School, where he laid the founda- tion of a sound legal knowledge. He began the practice of his profession with his father. and was later a member of the firm of Barker, Vossa Barker. Inheriting much of his father's abli- ity as a campaign speaker. he early became a factor in Republican politics in this section of the State. In 1SS7 and 1SS9 he served in the Legislature, and participated in the historic three-cornered contest for the Speakership. in which he was defeated by Colonel Fred Dow. of Portland. The third candidate was Chief Justice Andrew P. Wiswell. Mr. Barker gained national fame for his brilliant defence of Stain and Cromwell, accused of robbing the Dexter Savings Bank and murdering the cashier. John Wilson Barron. It was the result of his work on this case that produced the brain trouble which resulted in his death, January 16. 1500. at the age of thirty-six years, in Boston, whither lie had gone for medical treatment.
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