USA > Michigan > Wayne County > Detroit > Compendium of history and biography of the city of Detroit and Wayne County, Michigan > Part 112
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line and has thereby contributed to the mate- rial and civic advancement of the city which has been the scene of his entire business career. He is energetic and aggressive and has done much to further the precedence of the old and popular real-estate firm of which he is a mem- ber. He is well known in both business and social circles and enjoys unqualified popularity in both. Mr. Wardell is aligned as a supporter of the principles and policies for which the Re- publican party stands sponsor, but the honors and emoluments of political office have never had aught of allurement for him. He has at- tained to the thirty-second degree of Ancient Accepted Scottish Rite Masonry, being thus identified with Michigan Sovereign Consistory, besides the four bodies of the York Rite and Moslem Temple, Ancient Arabic Order of the Nobles of the Mystic Shrine.
On the 20th of January, 1886, Mr. Wardell was united in marriage to Miss Catherine Pea- cock, daughter of James Peacock of Toronto, Canada, in which city she was born and reared. They have no children.
HARRY S. STARKEY.
Mr. Starkey has long been in service as an official of the municipal government of his na- tive city and is now general manager of the board of water commissioners of Detroit. He is a representative of one of the honored pio- neer families of the city and concerning the genealogy due mention is made in the memoirs dedicated in this work to his father and grand- father, Dr. Lewis F. Starkey, and Henry M. Starkey, respectively.
Harry Scovel Starkey was born in Detroit on the 26th of April, 1858, and in this city he has ever maintained his home, holding it in deep affection and appreciation. He is in- debted to the public schools of Detroit for his early educational training and he made good use of the advantages thus afforded. After graduation Mr. Starkey found employment in the local offices of the freight department of the Michigan Central Railroad, and later he
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was in active service with John F. Monroe, a civil engineer, acquiring an excellent knowl- edge of the work of this profession. In 1880 Mr. Starkey was appointed assistant city clerk, under Colonel Louis Dillman, and after the expiration of the latter's term as clerk he continued in the same office under Alexander Saenger. He continued to serve as assistant city clerk until 1884, when he was appointed assessor and collector in the employ of the board of water commissioners. The subject of this sketch assisted in the organization and systematization of the municipal water depart- ment, of which he had charge for some time. After the death of his father he succeeded to the latter's office as secretary of the board of water commissioners, and in 1900 he was made general manager.
Mr. Starkey upheld the military prestige of the family name by tendering his services as a soldier in the Spanish-American war. On the 26th of April, 1898, he enlisted as a mem- ber of Company K, Thirty-second Michigan Volunteer Infantry, and he was mustered into the United States service as first lieutenant of his company. His command was not called into active field service, but was in reserve camp for some time in Tampa, Florida. He contin- ued with the regiment on active duty until the close of the war in Cuba, when he was mus- tered out with his comrades, receiving his hon- orable discharge on the 9th of November, 1898.
Mr. Starkey's religious faith is that of the Protestant Episcopal church, of which he is a communicant. He has attained the supreme degree-thirty-third-in the Ancient Accepted Scottish Rite Masonry, and is one of the most prominent members of the fraternity in the state. He has been deputy grand master of the grand lodge of the state since 1889, and has served as an officer in his commandery and as potentate of Moslem Temple, Ancient Arab- ic Order of the Nobles of the Mystic Shrine. He is a bachelor. Mr. Starkey's circle of acquaintances in his native city and state is
exceptionally wide and representative, and he enjoys distinctive popularity in both a personal and official way.
CHARLES A. RATHBONE.
On other pages of this publication is entered a descriptive record concerning the Buhl Mal- leable Company, representing one of the many splendid industrial enterprises of Detroit. Of this concern Mr. Rathbone has been general manager since 1903, and he is at the present time incumbent of this office, as well as that of secretary and treasurer, being one of the pro- gressive and popular business men of the Michigan metropolis and having played an im- portant part in the upbuilding of the fine in- dustry with which he is so intimately identified.
Mr. Rathbone has the satisfaction of revert- ing to the old Empire state of the Union as the place of his nativity, having been born at Le- roy, Genesee county, New York, on the 4th of August, 1854, and being a son of William P. and Maria (Crane) Rathbone, both of whom were likewise born in New York state. The father came to Detroit in the early '40s and became one of the prominent and success- ful real-estate men of the state, having had perhaps more to do with the upbuilding of De- troit as a successful real-estate man than any one at his line in Detroit, placing on the mar- ket various plats and additions to the city and having been intimately associated for many years with William B. Wesson and Albert Crane, who were known widely as being among the most extensive and influential real-estate operators in the middle west. William P. Rathbone was a citizen who ever commanded the fullest measure of confidence and esteem and he continued to make his home in Detroit until his death, which occurred in September, 1883. His wife died at Clifton Springs, New York, in 1885. Both were devoted communi- cants of the Protestant Episcopal church, and Mr. Rathbone was one of the founders of St. John's parish, Detroit, contributing liberally to the erection of the beautiful church edifice, on
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Woodward avenue. He retired from active business in 1880, after having accumulated a large and valuable estate, mostly represented in city realty. After his retirement he and his wife passed considerable time in touring vari- ous European countries.
Charles A. Rathbone, the immediate subject of this sketch, was reared to maturity in De- troit, and his early educational training was here secured in the Patterson school, after which he continued his studies in Genesee Academy, Leroy, New York, his native town and one of which his grandfather, General Israel Rathbone, was an early settler. After leaving the academy Mr. Rathbone returned to his home in Detroit, and in 1870 he entered the employ of Buhl, Ducharme & Company, wholesale hardware dealers, with whom he re- mained three years, in the capacity of travel- ing representative and salesman. Thereafter he was engaged with the hardware firm of Black & Owen of Detroit, traveling three years and then having charge of the sample room and assisting in the management of the busi- ness. Upon the death of his honored father he assisted in the management of the estate. For a number of years he was manager of the Cass Farm Company, Limited, subdividing the Cass farm and looking after the Ledyard estate matters. In 1898 he went with the naval reserves to the Spanish war, on the United States ship "Yosemite." He is still largely in- terested in the real-estate business in Detroit, having been prominently concerned, in com- pany with his brother, in the building up of West Detroit. In addition to his connection with the Buhl Malleable Company, as fully in- dicated in the sketch of that concern, he is also a director of the Waterman Marine Motor Company, the Wabash Portland Cement Com- pany, and McCray, Roberts & Company, im- portant Detroit corporations.
In politics Mr. Rathbone is aligned as a staunch supporter of the principles and poli- cies of the Republican party, but has never been a seeker of public office. He is a com- municant of the Protestant Episcopal church,
is identified with various fraternal and social organizations, including the Detroit Club, of whose directorate he has been a member for many years, as well as the Country Club, the Detroit Boat Club, and the Detroit Naval Re- serves.
HENRY C. WIEDEMAN.
Standing well to the forefront among the upbuilders of the greater industrial Detroit and holding the well merited honors appertaining to large and definite accomplishment through individual ability and effort, Mr. Wiedeman is specially entitled to recognition in this volume, in which will be found similar consideration of many others of the representative business men of the Michigan metropolis. Mr. Wiede- man is general manager and a leading stock- holder of the Detroit Steel Cooperage Com- pany, of which specific description is given on other pages of this work, and was one of the organizers and incorporators of this important industrial concern.
Henry Charles Wiedeman views with un- mitigated satisfaction the fact that he is a na- tive of the state of Michigan. He was born in Fair Haven, St. Clair county, on the 26th of August, 1873, and is a son of Henry and Caroline (Seelbinder) Wiedeman. His father was born in Germany in the year 1828, and was reared to maturity in his native land, in whose excellent schools he received his edu- cational training. He learned the trade of locksmith in Germany, and in 1850, shortly after attaining to his legal majority, he sev- ered the ties which bound him to home and fatherland and immigrated to America. He landed in New York and soon afterward came to Detroit, where he found work at his trade, to which he here gave his attention until 1852, when he purchased a tract of land in St. Clair county, in what is now Fair Haven township, and there instituted the herculean work of re- claiming a farm from the virgin forest. He was one of the sturdy and honored pioneers of that section of the state, to whose development and progress he contributed his quota, and he
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eventually became one of the prosperous and influential citizens of his community. He was a Republican in his political allegiance but never a seeker or holder of public office, though he was every ready to lend his influence and co-operation in the furtherance of enterprises and movements for the general good of the community and was a citizen of marked in- telligence and impregnable integrity. Both he and his wife were zealous and consistent mem- bers of the German Lutheran church. Mr. Wiedeman continued to reside in St. Clair county until his death, which occurred in March, 1906, and his cherished and devoted wife still resides at Fair Haven, Michigan.
Henry C. Wiedeman, the immediate subject of this review, passed his boyhood days on the home farm, in whose work he early began to lend his aid, and he attended the public schools of his native county until he was thirteen years of age, when, in 1886, he came to Detroit and entered the employ of Dr. John E. Clark, a prominent physician and surgeon of this city. While thus engaged he attended night school, and finally he entered the Detroit Business Uni- versity, in which he completed a thorough and practical course, being graduated as a mem- ber of the class of 1890. Shortly afterward he secured the position of bookkeeper for the firm of F. Huetteman & Company, manufac- turers of marine engines and brick machinery. Upon the incorporation of the Huetteman & Cramer Company, as the successor of this firm, in 1894, Mr. Wiedeman was chosen secretary of the company, in recognition of his ability and his effective service with the original con- cern. In 1896 he also became treasurer of the company, in which he had secured a consider- able amount of stock, and in 1899 he was made general manager of the business, while still retaining the offices of secretary and treasurer. The rapid and substantial growth of the busi- ness of this company was in great measure due to his efforts and his wise executive policy.
In July, 1903, Mr. Wiedeman resigned his association with the Huetteman & Cramer Company, for the purpose of perfecting the
organization and incorporation of the Detroit Steel Cooperage Company, of which he became general manager,-an office of which he has since remained incumbent. This institution, a. most valuable addition to the industrial activi- ties of Detroit, is adequately reviewed else- where in this volume, and thus a further de- scription is not demanded at this juncture. It may be said, however, that the product of the concern is glass-enameled steel tanks, repre- senting the concrete results of ideas most suc- cessfully developed by Mr. Wiedeman. Be- fore he instituted the promotion of the incor- poration of the company he spent about two years in experimental work looking to the per- fection of the fine and essentially superior class of products now turned out by the company. The value of this preliminary labor to the brew- ing and distilling interests of the world, from both sanitary and commercial standpoints, is best illustrated by the appreciative and prompt action shown by these interests in equipping their plants with the tanks manufactured by the Detroit Steel Cooperage Company. As the controlling spirit in this institution from the time of its formation to the present, Mr. Wiedeman is justly deserving of recognition as one of the industrial builders of Detroit. He is still a stockholder and director of the Huette- man & Cramer Company, and is a director of the Detroit Automatic Sterilizer Company. He is a member of the Detroit Board of Commerce, the Peninsular Brewmasters' Association, the Detroit Association of Stationary Engineers, the Harmonie Society, the Detroit Turnverein, and Detroit Lodge, No. 34, Benevolent & Pro- tective Order of Elks. In politics he is inde- pendent, and he is known as a public-spirited citizen, progressive in his ideas, and as a young business man of distinctive ability and initia- tive. He has advanced himself through his own efforts, has shown executive ability of a high order, is a deep student of the problems affecting the equipment of breweries and dis- tilleries, and, specifically, is in full charge of the policy and conduct of the business of the Detroit Steel Cooperage Company, whose
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unique business is the result of his well directed labors as an industrial promoter and leader.
On the 4th of November, 1896, Mr.'Wiede- man was united in marriage to Miss Ida Pauli, daughter of the late Charles Pauli, of Detroit, and they have one child,-Mabel Lillian.
FRED WARDELL.
One of the representative real-estate men of Detroit, Mr. Wardell is the youngest of the three members of the well known firm of O. Wardell & Sons, of which individual men- tion is made on other pages of this work. He has been identified with business interests in his native city from his youthful days to the present and has made for himself a secure place in the confidence and regard of the people of Detroit.
Mr. Wardell was born in the city of To- ronto, Ontario, March 30, 1866. He is a son of Orrin Wardell, a sketch of whose career appears elsewhere in this volume, so that a repetition of the family record is not demanded at the present juncture. Mr. Wardell prose- cuted his studies in the public schools of De- troit until he had attained to the age of fifteen years, and in the meanwhile, in 1881, he en- tered the employ of his father, one of the pio- neer real-estate dealers of Detroit and the founder of the firm which now bears his name. The subject of this sketch was thus engaged until 1885, when he embarked in the retail shoe business, on Michigan avenue. He dis- posed of his interest in this enterprise in the following year and thereafter was located in New York city until the fall of 1887, when he returned to Detroit and became a member of the firm of O. Wardell & Sons, with which he has since continued to be identified and in which he has done much to forward the suc- cess of the enterprise which was established so many years ago and which stands to-day representative in its line,-in scope, facilities and methods. He now has entire charge of the sales department of the firm's business and has had an intimate part in effecting the sale
of a large amount of valuable realty in Detroit and its environs. Mr. Wardell was one of the organizers of the Eureka Vibrator Company, which was incorporated under the laws of the state in 1906, with a capital of ten thousand dollars. He was the principal promoter of the company and has been its president and gen- eral manager from the start. The company manufactures vibrating massage machines, and the enterprise has proved very successful, as its products have amply demonstrated their usefulness and their superiority over other de- vices utilized for the same purpose. The man- ufactory of this company is located on Larned street east, and the office and sales headquar- ters are at 1223 Majestic building. The main sales office is established at No. 1269 Broad- way, New York city, and the company is the largest concern of the kind in the United States. An agency is also maintained in the city of London and the foreign trade has reached large and substantial proportions. The company gives employment to forty per- sons in its factory, and here disburses in wages and salaries fully thirty thousand dollars an- nually. A. J. Stecker is vice-president of the company, and A. V. Maier, secretary and treasurer. Mr. Wardell represents the firm of O. Wardell & Sons on the Board of Commerce and the Detroit Real Estate Board.
Mr. Wardell has never dissipated his forces along the turbulent channels in which prac- tical politics course their devious way, but he is essentially loyal and public-spirited as a citi- zen and as such takes an interest in political affairs, being an adherent of the Republican party. He is affiliated with the Masonic fra- ternity, in which he holds membership in the following named bodies: Palestine Lodge, No. 357, Free & Accepted Masons; King Cyrus Chapter, No. 133, Royal Arch Masons; Monroe Council, No. I, Royal & Select Mas- ters; Damascus Commandery, No. 42, Knights Templar; and Moslem Temple of the Ancient Arabic Order of the Nobles of the Mystic Shrine. He is also identified with the De- troit Golf Club, and he and his wife are com-
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municants of St. Andrew's church, Protestant Episcopal.
On the 25th of January, 1893, was sol- emnized the marriage of Mr. Wardell to Miss Helen F. Williams, daughter of Captain Will- iam H. Williams, of the Ogdensburg Transit Company, a leading concern in lake-marine circles, with headquarters in Ogdensburg, New York. Captain Williams is a resident of Detroit.
WILLIAM J. UNRUH.
A native son of Detroit, Mr. Unruh has gained prestige as one of the progressive young men of this city, where he is stockholder of the Independent Brewing Company, of which he was secretary and treasurer until January, 1908, when he retired.
Mr. Unruh was born in the family home- stead on Dix avenue, Detroit, on the 28th of October, 1876, and is a son of Eli and Louisa (Bachman) Unruh, the former of whom was born in Hessen, Germany, and the latter in Germany. Eli Unruh was reared and edu- cated in his fatherland, where he served the required term in the German army and where as a youth he learned the trade of harness- maker. He immigrated to America and took up his residence in Detroit in 1868. Here he engaged in the work of his trade, and at the same time conducted a retail liquor business, having his headquarters at the corner of Dix and Infantry avenues. He retired from active business in 1902 and he and his wife still maintain their home in Detroit. He has long been known as one of the representative Ger- man-American citizens of Detroit, where he has ever shown a genuine public spirit. He is a stalwart supporter of the cause of the Re- publican party and served three terms as treas- urer of Springwells township, besides having been prominent in connection with school af- fairs in the city which has so long represented his home and in which he is held in unqualified esteem.
William J. Unruh was educated in the pub- lic schools of Detroit, and in 1891 he became
a clerk in his father's establishment, contin- uing to be employed in this line for a period of eleven years, at the expiration of which, in 1902, he succeeded his father in business, which enterprise he has since successfully continued. His place of business is located at the corner of Dix and Livernois avenues, where he owns a brick building, two stories and basement, and fifty by seventy-five feet in dimensions. These quarters he has occupied since October, 1907, and he controls a flourishing business. He was secretary and treasurer of the Inde- pendent Brewing Company from the time of its organization and incorporation, in 1906, until January, 1908, and is known as a pro- gressive business man and loyal citizen.
In his political allegiance Mr. Unruh is identified with the Republican party and for a number of years he has been active in public affairs in his ward. This is the eighteenth ward of Detroit, having thus been designated at the time when Springwells was annexed to the city. He served as township clerk of Springwells from 1902 until 1906, being in- cumbent of this office at the time when the annexation of the township occurred, thus ren- dering the position extinct. He is affiliated with River Rouge Lodge, No. 40, Independent Order of Odd Fellows, the Knights of the Royal Arch and the Century Club.
In June, 1903, Mr. Unruh was united in marriage to Miss Emma R. Kleaver, daugh- ter of August Kleaver, of Detroit, and they have two children,-Florence G., who was born in March, 1904, and Raymond F., who was born in May, 1907.
ARMOND H. GRIFFITH.
The honored and popular director of the Detroit Museum of Art is incumbent of a po- sition which makes him the immediate cus- todian of art treasures valued at more than a quarter of a million dollars, and the citizens of the Michigan metropolis feel that the in- terests of their beautiful museum have been signally conserved and fostered by him. It
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has been said with marked consistency that "his work requires business sense, tact and di- plomacy," and that the fact that he has made himself one of the most popular men in De- troit shows how well fitted he is for the re- sponsibility he now holds. The interesting story of his life was made the basis of the fol- lowing context, which was published in the Sunday News-Tribune of Detroit and which is well worthy of definite perpetuation in this volume. The original article, with a few eliminations and paraphrases, is here repro- duced :
Director Griffith's training has been at once literal and romantic. He started life in In- diana, met persons at various turns in the road, lived with them, saturated himself with their ideas, and on their suggestion traveled near and far. Without a thought of to-morrow, he has been able to centralize his yesterdays; without a plan, he has been able to build; with- out a purpose, he awoke one morning to find that the odds and ends of material collected in years past nicely fitted into his future. Men in the counting room used to take him aside, years ago, and say: "Why don't you stick to one thing?" Clergymen shook their heads at his manifest contempt for the practical side of life. Perhaps ten times in a short life he deliberately threw aside a good salary and an assured living for the indefinable pleasure of wandering to a strange town, among strange people.
Mr. Griffith became a rover early in life, and his travels took him to many parts of the world. Without a plan he toured Egypt; with- out a purpose, he wandered aimlessly about Germany; he lived with the gypsies in Spain, with the peasants in Bavaria, and with the art students in the Latin quarter of Paris. He went on the stage, he sold goods on the road, he painted scenery for theaters, he frescoed halls and shops, he decorated church ceilings- and he carried a camera on his back for an itinerant photographer through the Yellow- stone National park.
He walked the streets of London, and no
man took him by the hand and called him friend. He crossed and recrossed the Atlantic and, it seemed, without passage money. He painted pictures in Germany, he rode a bicycle through the south, and he even wandered as far as Mexico-and still he had no idea, no care beyond the rise and set of the sun.
Yet all this time he was unconsciously ab- sorbing the purposes of human life, in so far as these appealed to his temperament. He read few books, but he studied, piecemeal, the history of Germany as he toured the country on foot; it was so with the history of Spain, and so with that of every other land.
What appealed to him were tales and leg- ends. He was always looking for the human- nature element, the song, the story, the narra- tive, the touch of life-and in the course of time his brain became filled with these beauti- ful pieces of life.
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