USA > Maine > Men of progress; biographical sketches and portraits of leaders in business and professional life in and of the state of Maine > Part 45
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and attending the district school, a mile and a half (listant, until the spring of 1853, when he went to Waterville to learn the trade of sash, blind and door manufacturing. He followed that occupation until the succeeding fall, attended the fall term of Water- ville Academy, and taught school the following winter. During the spring and summer of 1854 he was teamster in a shipyard at Thomaston. In the fall of that year he attended the High School at Liberty, taught school during the next winter, and completed his preparatory course for college at Waterville Academy, defraying the expenses of his academic course, as also his subsequent collegiate course by teaching. After graduating from college
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R. W. BLACK.
he taught the High School at Meredith Village, New Hampshire, in the fall of 1860, and was Pre- ceptor of Guilford (New Hampshire) Academy the winter, spring and summer following, during which time he commenced the study of law with Judge Hibbard of Laconia. He was thus engaged when President Lincoln issued his call for troops, and he at once raised a company of which he was elected Captain, but was unable to accompany his command to the front by reason of his school engagements. Upon the close of the summer term, however, he went to Boston and enlisted in the regular army. He served in the United States Cavalry, Army of the Potomac, for three years, from August 1861 to
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August 1864, most of the time on special service and detached duty, never asking or receiving leave of absence during his term of service. At the close of his army service he came to Augusta, and after completing his legal studies in the office of Sewall Lancaster, was admitted to the Bar in September 1866, and entered upon the practice of his profes- sion in the Capital City, in which he has since been successfully engaged until within about two years. In connection with his practice as an attorney, Captain Black, as he is familiarly known, has been largely engaged in the prosecution of claims before the Government Departments at Washington. In March 1894 he received from President Cleveland the appointment of United States Pension Agent for the District of Maine, in which position he has served to the present time. This is one of the most important federal offices in the state, involv- ing an annual distribution of more than three million dollars, and requiring keen executive ability. In this position, as in his professional practice in their behalf, Captain Black has been an indefatigable worker in the interest of the veterans of the late war, by whom he is universally esteemed and honored. In the discharge of his official duties he has practiced the same methods of transacting busi- ness that have characterized him through life, and it is said, without any disparagement to his prede- cessors, that he has devoted more hours to the work, and acquired a greater and more thorough knowl- edge and mastery of its details, than any previous incumbent of the office. Believing that a "public office is a public trust," he has since his appoint- ment given up his professional practice and devoted his entire time to the duties of his office. In poli- tics, Captain Black was a Republican until 1877, since which time he has been an active Democrat. He was the Democratic candidate for County Attorney of Kennebec County in 1880 and again in 1886, and although both times defeated, the oppos- ing party having a very strong majority in the county, yet he ran largely ahead of his party vote. In 1888 he was a District Delegate to the Demo- cratic National Convention at St. Louis. From 1872 to 1876 he held the office of City Clerk of Augusta, under successive Republican administra- tions. Captain Black is a prominent member of the Grand Army of the Republic, and at the present time is Commander of Seth Williams Post of Augusta. He is also a Templar Mason, was Com- mander of Trinity Commandery of Augusta for the years 1874-6, and in 1895-6 was Grand General-
issimo of the Grand Commandery of Maine. He was a member of the Delta Kappa Epsilon frater- nity while in college, and delivered the oration before his chapter at its anniversary in the summer of 1860. Captain Black is unmarried.
BRIDGHAM, CHARLES BURR, M. D., Cohasset, Massachusetts, was born in Buckfield, Oxford county, Maine, May 1, 1841, son of Sydenham and Lucretia Bell (Shepard) Bridgham. He comes of medical ancestry, being a great-grandson of Dr. William Bridgham, a surgeon in the Revolutionary
C. B. BRIDGHAM.
Army, who afterwards settled in New Gloucester, Maine ; and grandson of Dr. William Bridgham, Jr., who practiced medicine in Buckfield for over sixty years. Dr. William Pinkney Bridgham, son of Dr. William Bridgham, Jr., and uncle of the subject of this sketch, was a graduate of the Bowdoin Medical School at Brunswick, Maine, in 1844, and is still practicing medicine in Buckfield at the age of eighty years. Charles B. Bridgham acquired his early education in the public schools of his native town, and after studying medicine under the instruction of his uncle, Dr. William P. Bridgham, in Buckfield, pursued his professional training at the Medical School of Harvard University. Before
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completing his medical course, November 9, 1861, he entered the United States service as Hospital Steward in the Second Regiment of Berdan's United States Sharpshooters. Subsequently he became Acting Assistant-Surgeon of that regiment, and while serving in that capacity at the Second 'Battle of Bull Run was taken prisoner. He was paroled, and returning home, resumed his studies in medicine and graduated at Bowdoin Medical College in the class of 1863. About that time he was exchanged, and consequently released from his parole ; and at once receiving a commission as Assistant-Surgeon in the Fifty-fourth Massachusetts Regiment, he resumed active army duty and remained in the service until July 1864, when he returned to Maine and entered upon practice in his native town. In the spring of 1887 he removed to Cohasset, Massachusetts, where he has since resided, in the enjoyment of a large and lucrative practice. Dr. Bridgham is a member of the Massa- chusetts Medical Society and of the American Med- ical Association, and is. Surgeon of Henry Bryant Post, Grand Army of the Republic. He is also a member of the Masonic, Odd Fellow and Golden Cross fraternities. In politics he is a Democrat. He was married March 22, 1864, to Miss Addie Williams, of Buckfield, Maine. They have three children : May Frances, wife of H. T. P. Bates of the Boston Herald ; Addie Ellen, wife of H. H. Withington of the Boston Journal; and Paul C. Bridgham, a student in the Osgood High School, Cohasset.
BROWN, SIMON STRATTON, Lawyer, Waterville, was born in Clinton, Kennebec county, Maine, July 6, 1833, son of Luke and Polly (Gilman) Brown. He fitted for college at Waterville (Maine) Academy under Principal J. H. Hanson, and in 1854 entered Waterville College (now Colby University), from which institution he graduated in 1858, among the first in his class. Studying for the legal profession with Judge Willis B. Snell, he was admitted to the Bar in Kennebec county in 1859. In 1864 he com- menced the practice of law in Fairfield, Maine, and continued there until his removal to Waterville in 1881, where he has since practiced and resided. Mr. Brown served as a member of the Board of Education for several years, both in Fairfield and Waterville, and upon the organization of the City of Waterville, in 1838, he was elected Chairman of the Board of Aldermen, in which capacity he served for
five consecutive years. In 1892 he was elected and served as Representative to the Legislature. He was a member of the Governor's Council in 1879. For seven years he was a member of the Democratic State Committee, being four years its Chairman, and in ISSo and ISS4 he was a member of the Demo- cratic National Conventions. In college Mr. Brown was a member of the Zeta Psi fraternity. He was married June 30, 1861, to Miss Hepsie B. Wiggin, of Freedom, Maine ; they have four children : Frank E., William Wirt, Jennie Irving and Caddie Hall Brown. The first-named daughter is the wife of Alpheus W. Flood of Waterville. and the last-named
S. S. BROWN.
is the wife of Lewis A. Burleigh of Augusta, son of Ex-Governor Edwin C. Burleigh.
CLARKE, AUGUSTUS TUPPER, M. D., Calais, was born in Canning, Nova Scotia, June 16, 1849, son of John H. and Elizabeth (Tupper) Clarke. He is descended from an English family that came to Rhode Island at an early period. His immediate ancestors were residents of Kings county, Nova Scotia. His general education was received mainly at Acacia Villa Seminary, in Grand Pré, Nova Scotia, and at Mount Allison in Sackville, New Brunswick. Graduating at Harvard Medical School
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in 1870, he practiced his profession in Nova Scotia from 1870 to ISS9, coming in 1890 to Calais, where he has since resided in active practice. Dr. Clarke is a member of the Canadian, the New Brunswick and the Nova Scotia medical associations. He was
Lesbleusde
AUGUSTUS T. CLARKE.
married in 1875 to Hattie F. Ryerson, daughter of the late Sir on Ryerson of Lubec, Maine.
CARY, GEORGE, M. D., Houlton, was born in Houlton, August 29, 1837, son of Shepard and Susannah (Whitaker) Cary. He is a descendant of John Cary, who came from Somersetshire, near the city of Bristol, England, about 1634, and joined the Plymouth Colony, settling in Bridgewater, Mas- sachusetts. Additional facts relating to his family history are given in the sketch of Theodore Cary, his brother, on a preceding page of this work. He acquired his early education in the common schools and academy of his native town, fitted for college at North Yarmouth (Maine ) AAcademy, and entered Bowdoin College in 1856, graduating from that in- stitution in the class of 1860. In October 1861 he enlisted in the Civil War, as a private in the First Cavalry Regiment of Maine Volunteers ; was pro- moted November 2 following to First Lieutenant of Company K in the same regiment, and was com-
missioned Captain of that company in December 1862. As First Lieutenant, he commanded his company during the greater part of his time of ser- vice. He was present at the battles of Cedar Mountain, Second Bull Run, Fredericksburg and other engagements in which his regiment partici- pated. Resigning his commission on account of shattered health, in January 1863 Captain Cary returned to his home, and soon after entered upon the study of medicine with Dr. Frank B. Merrill in Alfred, Maine. The year following he attended a course of lectures at the Georgetown Medical College in Washington, District of Columbia, and subsequently pursued his studies at the College of Physicians and Surgeons, New York city, from which he received the degree of M. D. in March 1866. Returning to his native town, Houlton, in August of that year, he entered upon the practice of medicine, which he has continuously and actively followed to the present time. Dr. Cary has long
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GEORGE CARY.
enjoyed an established reputation as one of the leading and most skillful physicians and surgeons of Aroostook county and Eastern Maine. In IS79 he was appointed and served as Assistant Surgeon- General on the staff of Governor Garcelon. He has been a fellow of the American Academy of Medicine for many years, and is also a fellow of the
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American Academy of Political and Social Science, a companion of the Military Order of the Loyal Legion of the United States, and a member of the Delta Kappa Epsilon Society of Bowdoin College. In 1867-8 he represented Aroostook county in the Maine Senate. In politics Dr. Cary is an Inde- pendent. He cast his first Presidential vote for Stephen A. Douglas, in 1860, but voted the Repub- lican ticket during the war and afterwards up to and including the election of President Hayes. Since then he has usually acted with the Democratic party, but voted for Mckinley and Hobart in the late Presidential election. He is a believer in the gold standard as the measure of value, in civil ser- vice reform, and in a tariff for revenue only. He is unmarried.
DASCOMB, JAMES B., President of the First National Bank of Skowhegan, and of the Skowhegan Savings Bank, was born in Bloomfield (now Skow- hegan), January 4, 1813, son of Brooks and Sarah (Brown) Dascomb. He acquired his early educa- tion in the common schools of his native town, and at Bloomfield Academy. Shortly after graduation from the latter institution he won an appointment to the United States Military Academy at West Point, but because of his parents' objection to his adopting a military career, he reluctantly aban- cloned this opportunity, and learned the trade of blacksmith. From this vocation, which he followed with success for many years, he retired about twen- ty-five years ago, since which time he has been chiefly occupied with discharging the multifarious duties of various public and quasi-public offices. Between the years of 1846 and 1884 Mr. Dascomb served as a Selectman of his town for twenty-six years - a longer period of service than that of any other man in Skowhegan - and at one time and another he has held all the town offices. In 1849 and I851-2 he was a member of the House of Rep- resentatives in the Maine Legislature, and in 1855 represented his county in the Senate. He was County Commissioner of Somerset County in 1854, County Treasurer four years, 1865-8, and Judge of Probate from 1868 to 1872. In December IS84 he was elected President of the First National Bank of Skowhegan and President of the Skowhegan Savings Bank, which positions he has since held to the present time. He has been a Director of the Skowhegan Bank (now the First National ) continu- ously since 18 18, and has also served as President
of the Board of Trustees of Bloomfield Academy for the last eighteen years. In politics Mr. Das- comb has always been a Republican. He was mar- ried January 16, 1840, to Eunice Bigelow, of Skow- hegan ; they have a daughter: Emma F., married
JAMES B. DASCOMB.
in 1874 to Joseph P. Partridge of Fort Fairfield, Maine.
DREW, FRANKLIN MELLEN, of Lewiston, Judge of Probate of Androscoggin County, was born in Turner, Androscoggin county, Maine, July 19, 1837, son of Jesse and Hannah Gorham (Phillips) Drew. His father, who was a prominent citizen of the state for many years, was the son of Stephen and Anna (Bisbee) Drew. He is a descendant of John Drew, the emigrant, of Plymouth 1660, who was the son of William and grandson of Sir Edward Drew of Eng- land. The Drew family of England descended from an early noble Norman, and the line is traced back through centuries. He received his early edu- cation in the common schools and at Hebron (Maine) Academy, and graduated from Bowdoin College in the notable class of 1858. Among his classmates were General J. P. Cilley, Judge Nathan Cleaves, General Francis Fessenden, Judge Lysander Hill, General Ellis Spear and others of equal promi- nence in public and professional life. Adopting the
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profession of law, he was admitted to the Kennebec Bar, April 3, 1861, and in the following June coin- menced practice at Presque Isle, Aroostook county, Maine. In August 1861 he was nominated for County Attorney, but declined the nomination. In the succeeding October he enlisted in the War for the Union, as a private in Company G, Fifteenth Regiment, Maine Infantry Volunteers. Upon the organization of the company he was commissioned Captain, and in September 1862 was promoted to Major of the Regiment, in which capacity he served until mustered out by reason of expiration of term of service, January 25, 1865. He served in Louisi-
FRANKLIN M. DREW.
ana, Florida and Virginia, and was brevetted by the President as Colonel of Volunteers, for " faithful and meritorious services " during the war. At the close of the war he settled at Brunswick, Maine, and practiced there until January 1868, at which time he was elected Secretary of State, and removed to the State Capital to assume the duties of that office. He remained in Augusta until October 1878, when he came to Lewiston and resumed the practice of his profession, in which he has continued to the present time. Mr. Drew's first experience in public life was as Assistant Clerk of the Maine House of Representatives, to which office he was elected in 1860 and re-elected in 1861. Subsequently, 1866-7,
he served two terms as Clerk of the House of Rep- resentatives. He served as Secretary of State four terms, 1868-71, and in 1872 he was appointed by the President United States Pension Agent at Augusta, which office he held, by re-appointment in 1876, until it was consolidated with the office at Concord, New Hampshire, in July 1877. In 1888 he was elected judge of Probate for Androscoggin County, was re-elected in 1892 and 1896, and still holdis that ofice. He was elected Secretary of the Board of Trustees of Bowdoin College in 1865, and held the office continuously until Commencement in 1894, when having been elected Treasurer of Bates College and Secretary of the Board of Fellows of that institution, he resigned the former con- nection, having served continuously for twenty-nine years, and never missed a Commencement during that time. Judge Drew is a Mason and a Knight Templar, and is a prominent member of the Grand Army of the Republic, having served (1889) as Department Commander for Maine. He is also a member of the Maine Historical Society, and of the Congregational Church. He was married January 3, 1861, to Araminta B. Woodman, youngest daughter of General Merrill Woodman of Naples, Maine ; they have had one child : Frank Newman Drew, born November 24, 1862, died September 29, 1864.
FORD, RADCLIFFE HALL, of Biddeford, Ex- Consul of the United States at Leghorn, Italy, was born in Biddeford, June 27, 1852, son of Horace and Maria L. (Davis) Ford. His father was a well- known citizen, and at the time of his recent death was a member of the Board of Police Commissioners, of Biddeford. The son attended the public schools of his native city, and after completing the regular course of study at the Biddeford High School in 1869, entered the Maine Wesleyan Seminary at Kent's Hill, Readfield, where he was graduated in 1872. It was his intention to pursue a collegiate course, but changing his mind he accepted the appointment of Assistant Postmaster of Biddeford under President Grant's administration, and served with ability until the spring of 1875. For the next two years he was a member of the firm of Leighton & Ford, in the drygoods business, selling out his interest in 1877. During the year 1878 he served as a member of the Board of Assessors, and in IS79 was appointed Assistant Bond Clerk in the Boston Custom House under Collector Beard. but resigned
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that position a few months later. In 1880 he was bookkeeper for Emery, Newbert & Holmes, boot and shoe manufacturers of Biddeford, and a year later he accepted the position of travelling salesman 1 r Lord, Haskell & Company, boot and shoe job- bers of Portland, with whom he remained for two years. . In 1883 he established himself in the retail boot and slioe business in Biddeford, continuing the same until 1889, at which time he was appointed by President Harrison to the important post of United States Consul at I.eghorn, Italy. Mr. Ford conducted the duties of that Consulate during his term with marked ability and credit to himself. He was instrumental, after a long contest with the
RADCLIFFE H. FORD.
State and Treasury Departments, in causing a radi- cal change in the manner of enforcing the quaran- tine laws of the United States at foreign ports, and has every reason to be proud of his record in the consular service. He continued in charge of the Consulate at Leghorn until July 1893, when he returned to Biddeford and accepted the position of head bookkeeper for Deering Brothers, wholesale dealers of dressed beef and provisions, Biddeford, with whom he has since remained. Mr. Ford is Chairman of the Board of Registration of the City of Biddeford, having been appointed to that position by Governor Cleaves in 1895. Since attaining his majority he has been a member of the Republican
party, which he supports with activity, having been for many years a member of the Republican City Committee of Biddeford, and serving as Chairman of that body for the years 1878, 1894. 1895 and IS96. He served upon the County Committee in IS78, 1879 and 1880, being its Treasurer during the last years of his membership, and served by proxy upon the Republican State Committee in the latter year. For several years he was Secretary of the York Republican Club and a member of the Execu- tive Committee. He is connected with Dunlap Lodge Free and Accepted Masons, and Mavoshen Lodge Knights of Pythias, being a Past Chancellor in the latter organization and also a member of the Grand Lodge. In the latter part of 1886, the class of 1869 of the Biddeford High School organized an Alumni Association of the School, of which Mr. Ford served as a member of the Executive Committee for three years, and in 1894 was elected President. Mr. Ford was married November 17, 1874, to Constance H. Littlefield, youngest daughter of Elijah Littlefield of Biddeford ; their only child, Mabelle C., is now attending the Biddeford High School.
GOODWIN, FORREST, Lawyer, Skowhegan, was born in Skowhegan, June 14, 1862, son of George E. and Hannah S. (Pollard) Goodwin. He ac- quired his early education at Bloomfield Academy in his native town, and prepared for college in the Skowhegan High School, from which he graduated, with the distinction of Class Orator, in June 18SI. Entering Colby University in 1883, he graduated from that institution with honors, again as Class Orator, July 4, 1887. Engaging in the study of law, he pursued his legal training at the Boston University Law School, where he took a three- years course in one year, and graduated with honors June 4, 1890. In the meantime, October 14, 1889, he was admitted to the Bar of Somerset County, Maine, at Skowhegan. For a year and a half fol- lowing graduation from law school he was engaged in Washington as Parliamentary Clerk to the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Hon. Thomas B. Reed, in the Fifty-first Congress. Returning to Skowhegan in December 1891, he at once entered upon active professional practice, in which he has continued to the present time. In 1892 Mr. Good- win was appointed Postmaster of Skowhegan, the duties of which office he discharged from April of that year to February 8. 1806. He served for three
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MEN OF PROGRESS.
years as a member of the School Board of Skow- hegan, and in 1888-9 was a Representative from that town to the State Legislature. In politics Mr. Goodwin has always been an active Republican, and has frequently done effective campaign work in the interest of his party on the stump. He is a member of the Masonic fraternity to and including .. `the Knights Templar degree, is also an Odd Fellow, a Knight of Pythias, and a meniber of the order of
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FORREST GOODWIN.
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Foresters. He was married June 3, 1893, to Matie E. Smith, of Cornville, Maine; they have no children.
HAMLIN, CHARLES, . of Bangor, United States Commissioner, and Reporter of Decisions of the Supreme Court of Maine, was born in Hampden, Penobscot county, Maine, September 13, 1837, son of Hannibal and Sarah Jane (Emery) Hamlin. He comes of Revolutionary ancestry, his paternal great-grandfather, Eleazer Hamlin, serving as a Major in the War for Independence, and enlisting three of his sons in the same company. The family is of Norman descent, and the American progenitors came from England and settled in Barnstable, Massachusetts. Hannibal Hamlin, father of the subject of this sketch, Vice-President
of the United States during the first administration of President Lincoln, and one of the most eminent politicians and statesmen that the State of Maine has produced, was born in Paris, Oxford county, Maine, August 27, 1809. He acquired his early education in the district school and at Hebron (Maine) Academy, in the meantime working on the farm and in the printing office of The Jeffer- sonian at Paris. After a course of legal study in the office of Judge Cole of Paris and Fessenden & Deblois of Portland, he commenced in 1833 the practice of law at Hampden, at that time the most important town in Penobscot county, where he con- tinued until his removal to Bangor in 1861, shortly after his election to the Vice-Presidency. In the early years of his professional life he was almost continuously in the State Legislature, and was Speaker of the House in 1837 and again in 1839- 40. In 1842 he was elected to the Twenty-eighth Congress, was re-elected to the Twenty-ninth Con- gress, and from 1848 to 1857 was a member of the United States Senate. Thus far in his public life he had been allied with the Democratic party ; but being unable to accept the policy and attitude of that organization toward the slavery question, he severed his connection with the party, and resigned his place as Chairman of the Committee of Com- merce in the United States Senate, to accept the Republican nomination for Governor of Maine. Two months after assuming the office of Governor in 1857, he resigned to again resume his seat in the United States Senate, to which he was elected as a Republican member. In 1860 he was elected Vice- President on the ticket with Abraham Lincoln, and served during Mr. Lincoln's first term. He again entered the Senate in 1869, and continued to repre- sent Maine in that body until 1881, when he volun- tarily retired at the expiration of his term, having served on the floor and in the chair for an almost uninterrupted period of thirty years. During the year 1866 he was Collector of Customs of the Port of Boston, but resigned, being unwilling to support Andrew Johnson. In 1881 he was appointed by President Garfield United States Minister to Spain, which was the last public office he held, and resigned at the close of the year. He died at his home in Bangor, the Fourth of July, 1891, at the age of nearly eighty-two years. Hannibal Hamlin's first wife, to whom he was married in 1833, was Sarah Jane Emery, daughter of Stephen Emery of Paris, Maine, District Judge, and Attorney-General in 1839-40 ; she died in 1855, leaving five children,
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