Compendium of history and biography of the city of Detroit and Wayne County, Michigan, Part 77

Author: Burton, Clarence Monroe, 1853-1932
Publication date: 1909
Publisher: Chicago H. Taylor & Co.
Number of Pages: 858

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ARNOLD A. SCHANTZ.

There has not, nor can there be for all time, a more important port on the entire Great Lakes system than is Detroit, through whose beautiful river ride the stately fleets which rep- resent the greatest of marine traffic on the lakes. Here have been founded and fostered many gigantic enterprises in the way of pas- senger and freight traffic, but no company has ever taken precedence of the Detroit & Cleve- land Navigation Company, which dates its in- ception back more than half a century and which is most consonantly made the subject of a special descriptive article on other pages of this work. Data concerning the company is also to be found in the memoir to the late David Carter, who was for many years its secretary and general manager. The succes- sor of Mr. Carter in the office of general man- ager is Arnold A. Schantz, who has ably car- ried forward the great work of his predecessor and has continued his policies in such manner as to bring to the Detroit & Cleveland line still greater prestige, through his energy and pro- gressiveness. He also holds a similar office with the Detroit & Buffalo Steamboat Com- pany, an allied line.

Mr. Schantz is of staunch German ancestry in the agnatic line, as the name implies, and the family was founded in America about the year 1840, the original ancestors in the new world having settled in Ohio. Mr. Schantz was born in Galion, Crawford county, Ohio, on the 10th of April, 1861, and is a son of John and Bar- bara A. (Buckingham) Schantz, the former of whom was born in Lingerfelt, Bavaria, Ger- many, and the latter in Ohio, a repre- sentative of one of the old and honored fami- lies of the Buckeye commonwealth. John Schantz took up his residence in Mansfield, Ohio, about 1864, and became one of the lead- ing merchants and influential citizens of that place, where he was also, for many years, man- ager and one of the proprietors of the Miller opera house. He is still living and his wife died in 1902.

The immediate subject of this sketch was about three years of age at the time of the family removal from Galion to Mansfield, and to the public schools of the latter place he is indebted for his early educational discipline, which was supplemented by effective study under the tutorship of Professor W. A. Tor- rence, who was a member of the faculty of Hayesville Academy, Ohio, and who was a personal friend of the Schantz family. Mr. Schantz became familiar with the practical du- ties and responsibilities of life when a mere boy, and his entire career has been marked by indefatigable energy, ambition and definite ac- complishment. At the age of fourteen years he became the Mansfield agent for the Cincin- nati Enquirer and the Cincinnati Star, for each of which he built up a good circulation in his home town, making his deliveries with scrupu- lous punctuality and care. During his in- cumbency of the position noted he also held a clerkship in the general store of A. W. Remy & Company. In 1877, at the age of sixteen years, he secured a position as general-delivery clerk in the Mansfield postoffice, and one year later he was promoted to the office of super- intendent of carriers. While in tenure of this position he also secured the local agency of the

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Detroit & Cleveland Steam Navigation Com- pany. During his vacation in 1880 he organ- ized a party and conducted the same over the Detroit & Cleveland line of steamers to Macki- nac island, and in the following year he per- sonally secured a much larger company to make the same delightful lake voyage. So marked was his success in this connection that he gained special recognition from the Detroit & Cleveland Company, whose officials were thus moved to tender him the position of trav- eling passenger agent of the line. He ac- cepted this office and at once applied his ener- gies and initiative ability to the furtherance of the interests of the company. Appreciation of his efforts was not denied, and he won rapid promotion. In 1881 he was made traveling passenger agent, and in 1883 became general western traveling passenger agent for the line. In 1886 he succeeded E. B. Whitcomb as as- sistant general passenger agent, and in 1887 he was promoted to the office of general passen- ger agent. In 1901 occurred the death of the company's honored secretary and general man- ager, David Carter, and shortly afterward Mr. Schantz was elected general superintendent and passenger traffic manager. This dual office he retained until 1905, when he was inducted into his present office of general manager of the company, shortly after the death of William C. McMillan, who had been president of the com- pany. In 1901 was organized and incorporated the Detroit & Buffalo Steamboat Company, with essentially the same interested principals, and Mr. Schantz from the start held the same positions with this as with the Detroit & Cleve- land Navigation Company, of both of which he is now general manager.

In connection with his executive duties and responsibilities in handling the passenger busi- ness of the two lines Mr. Schantz has origi- nated and developed for them a most effective system of advertising, his productions in this important field being recognized as the best ever evolved in exploiting the attractions and facilities of any marine transportation line. He was the first passenger manager to put into use

an eight-sheet advertising poster, and the at- tractive notices of the opening and closing of the navigation seasons of his companies were. originated by him and have gained the most unequivocal commendation and appreciation on the part of those actively concerned with navi- gation interests as well as on the part of the general public. To him is primarily due the great expansion of the passenger business of the two companies and also, incidentally, of the freight business, since the popularity of the former department implies an equivalent ap- preciation of the latter. As general manager he is making an admirable record, holding the inviolate confidence and esteem of the officers and stockholders of his companies and through his invariable courtesy having gained the high regard of the patrons of the lines. Mr. Schantz has not relied upon influence or fortuitous cir- cumstances in his business career, but has worked his way upward through his own ef- forts, being distinctively worthy of the valued American title of self-made man. He is essen- tially progressive and public-spirited, is an in- defatigable worker and an able administrative officer, and he is a prominent and popular fig- ure in lake-marine circles of the most repre- sentative order. He is a valued member of the Great Lakes & St. Lawrence River Associ- ation, of which he served as president in 1889, and he also holds membership in the Passenger Association of the United States, of whose executive committee he is a member and of which he was president in 1901-2-3. The latter organization covers the passenger business of all coast, sound, lake and river lines in the United States and Canada. He is also a mem- ber of the American Association of General Passenger & Ticket Agents, touching all rail and water lines of North America and Mexico.

Though not active in the field of practical politics, Mr. Schantz is a stalwart supporter of the cause of the Republican party, and follow- ing is a brief record concerning his social and semi-business associations in Detroit : He is a member of the Detroit Club; the Detroit Yacht Club; life member of the Fellowcraft Club;

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member of the Detroit Light Guard; Detroit Lodge, No. 34, Benevolent & Protective Order of Elks; president of the Ohio Society of De- troit; member of the Transportation Club, of which he was president for the first two terms of its existence; member of the Detroit Board of Commerce, the Commercial League, and the Newsboys' Association, in the work of the last of which he has been very active and of which he was a director for three years; and he at- tained the thirty-third and supreme degree in Scottish Rite Masonry, September 15, 1908, being a most appreciative member of the various bodies of this time-honored fraternity.

On the 15th of July, 1906, Mr. Schantz was united in marriage to Miss Lila R. Rankin, daughter of Chester Rankin, who was a pio- neer of St. Clair county, Michigan, and whose widow resides in the village of St. Clair.

CHARLES F. BIELMAN.

Prominent among those conspicuously iden- tified with lake-marine interests in Detroit is Mr. Bielman, who is secretary and traffic man- ager of the White Star Line of steamers, sec- retary and treasurer of the Stewart Transpor- tation Company, and ex-president of the De- troit Board of Commerce. He is known as one of the progressive and public-spirited busi- ness men of the Michigan metropolis and has a wide and representative acquaintanceship in marine circles.

Charles Frederick Bielman is a native of Detroit, and a member of one of its well known and highly honored families. He was born on the 20th of April, 1859, and is a son of Frederick and Ellen C. (Daley) Biel- man. To the public schools of Detroit he is indebted for his early educational discipline, and while still a boy he initiated his connection with the line of enterprise along which he was destined to attain so much of success and pres- tige. At the age of fourteen years he went to Marine City, where he entered the employ of John J. Spinks, dealer in general merchan- dise, postmaster and local agent of the Star Line steamers, which ran between Detroit and

Port Huron, and of which the present White Star Line are successors.

Mr. Bielman was thus engaged for a period of seven years, within which time he gained a thorough and discriminating knowledge of the details of lake-marine traffic. In 1882 he became clerk of the steamer "Evening Star," owned and operated by the Detroit & Cleve- land Steam Navigation Company, and he re- mained with this vessel until 1883, when he was transferred to the "City of Mackinac," of the same line. In 1889 occurred a merging of the operating interests of the Star and the Cole lines of steamers, which had previously been in competition in the passenger and freight traffic, and the interested principals in the new combination requested David Carter, then general manager of the Detroit & Cleve- land Steam Navigation Company, to select for them a competent manager for the business of the Star-Cole Line, representing the consoli- dated interests. His appreciation of the serv- ices and ability of Mr. Bielman was at this time shown in a most significant way, for he warmly recommended the subject of this sketch as a most eligible candidate for the position in question. Mr. Bielman had been in the employ of the Detroit & Cleveland Com- pany for a period of six years, and had amply demonstrated his executive and technical abil- ity, as evidenced in the selection made by Mr. Carter. In March, 1887, Mr. Bielman en- tered upon the duties of his new office, and the following year he returned to the Detroit & Cleveland Line steamer "Alpena." In July, 1888, he became associated with the late Darius Cole in securing control of the Star line, Mr. Cole already owning the line which bore his name, and the two continued the operation of what was designated as the Star- Cole Line, one of the most important of those having virtual headquarters in the city of De- troit. Mr. Bielman became secretary and treas- urer of the company, and he has since been conspicuously identified with the passenger and freight traffic of the lake system. In 1893 he became associated with Aaron A. Parker,

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Captain James W. Millen and John Pridgeon, Jr., in the purchase of the Red Star Line, and he was made secretary and traffic manager of the same. In 1896 the White Star Line was incorporated under the laws of the state and assimilated the interests of the Red and White Star lines. Mr. Bielman was chosen secre- tary and traffic manager of the new corpora- tion and has since served in that capacity. A description of the White Star Line is given on other pages of this publication.

The building up of the flourishing business of the White Star Line has been largely due to the indefatigable energy and marked ad- ministrative ability of Mr. Bielman, and the company now operates four large and thor- oughly modern passenger steamers. From 1889 until 1896 the Red Star, Star-Cole and White Star lines were operated conjunctively, under a pooling arrangement, and Mr. Biel- man had charge of the traffic interests of the combination. Since 1892 he has been secre- tary and treasurer of the Stewart Transporta- tion Company, engaged in the freight trans- portation business. Mr. Bielman is a member of the American Association of General Pas- senger & Ticket Agents, the International Water Lines Association, the Great Lakes & St. Lawrence River Association, and the Cen- tral Passenger Association. His dictum con- cerning marine traffic is authoritative and he is specially well fortified in his knowledge of all details of the business.

Mr. Bielman is one of the wheel-horses of the Republican party in Detroit and has been an active worker for the party cause. His name has several times been brought forward in connection with candidacy for the office of mayor of his native city, but this fact does not indicate that he is imbued with office-seeking proclivities. Mr. Bielman served as the third incumbent of the office of president of the Detroit Board of Commerce, to which office he was elected in 1906, and he not only gave a most effective administration, loyal and pro- gressive, but his selection for the office shows the estimate placed upon him by the repre-

sentative business men who are banded to- gether for the development of the larger and greater Detroit. He holds membership in the Detroit Club, the Harmonie Society, and the Detroit Whist Club, as well as the Michigan Whist Association, of which he was elected president in 1907.

On the 22d of January, 1890, Mr. Bielman was united in marriage to Miss Katherine Bar- lum, daughter of Thomas Barlum, of whom individual mention is made in this volume. Like her husband, Mrs. Bielman is one of the ardent devotees of the game of whist, being recognized as an adept in the same. They have two children,-Florence C., and Charles Frederick, Jr.

In 1895 Mr. Bielman leased the steamer "Florence B." to the United States govern- ment for collection and delivery of mail to passing traffic on the Detroit river. Since 1896 he has held the contract for operation of this service,-the only one of its kind in the coun- try. In 1907 Mr. Bielman built for this serv- ice the new steel steamer, named "C. F. Biel- man, Jr.," at a cost of $15,000. The contract expires in 1909. His interests in a business way are confined essentially to lake-marine traffic.

WILLIAM T. DE GRAFF.

For more than forty years has Mr. DeGraff been identified with banking interests in the city of Detroit and he is now incumbent of the responsible and exacting office of cashier of the Old Detroit National Bank, whose history is related in adequate detail on other pages of this work. His career as an executive has been continuously with the present institution and the two which figure as its lineal prede- cessors, and he holds precedence as one of the well known and able bank officials of his native state.

Mr. DeGraff initiated his banking career when a youth of seventeen years. He at that time secured a position as messenger for the old-time banking house of C. & A. Ives, with whom he remained two years. June 6, 1865,

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he assumed the position of junior clerk in the counting room of the Second National Bank, and in 1867 he was promoted to the office of paying teller in that institution. In 1882 he was made assistant cashier, serving as such until the expiration of the bank's charter, in the following year, and then being chosen incum- bent of the same office in the succeeding insti- tution, the Detroit National Bank. January 14, 1892, he was elected cashier of the bank, as successor of Clement M. Davison, who had re- signed. His long service and thorough tech- nical knowledge fully qualified him for the onerous duties of the office to which he was thus called, and he continued cashier of the Detroit National until the expiration of its charter, in November, 1902, when a reorgani- zation took place and the institution was re- incorporated as the Old Detroit National Bank. Mr. DeGraff was continued in the office of cashier and he has done much to further the interests of the business with which he has so long been identified in an executive capacity. He has a wide circle of friends in the business and social circles of his native city and is re- garded as one of its representative citizens.

William T. DeGraff was born in Detroit, September 27, 1846, the homestead in which he first opened wondering eyes having stood on the site of the present Penobscot building, on Fort street west. He is a son of Harmon and Mary (Vernor) DeGraff, both of whom were born in the state of New York, and the former of whom was of staunch Holland Dutch lineage. Harmon DeGraff became a promi- nent and influential business man of the fair "City of the Straits," whither he came in an early day. As a member of the firm of DeGraff & Townsend, he established himself in the retail hardware business and later he be- came a member of the firm of DeGraff & Ken- drick, which operated a foundry and well equipped machine shops. He was one of the founders of the Detroit Locomotive Works and was otherwise prominently concerned in early enterprises of important nature. He was one of the pioneer firemen of Detroit, having

become captain of Company No. 2, when the service was still of volunteer order. He died in the city of Detroit and his wife survived him by many years. They became the parents of four sons and one daughter, all of whom are deceased except the subject of this sketch and his sister, Miss Margaret DeGraff, who still resides in Detroit.

William T. DeGraff, whose name initiates this article, was reared and educated in De- troit, and here he has attained to success and prestige through his own well directed efforts. His business career has already been outlined. He is a Republican in his political allegiance, is a member of the Bankers' Club, and he and his family are communicants of St. John's church, Protestant Episcopal.

In 1872 was solemnized the marriage of Mr. DeGraff to Miss Anne L. Hutchings, who was born in the city of Buffalo, New York, a daughter of John Hutchings, who was a promi- nent steamboat man on the Great Lakes. Mr. and Mrs. DeGraff have two children: Will- iam H., who was graduated in the department of mechanical engineering in the University of Michigan, as a member of the class of 1907, and Bessie L., who is the wife of Edward L. Warner, of Detroit.

ROBERT E. FRAZER.

One of the representative legists and jurists of the state of Michigan was Judge Robert E. Frazer, who presided on the bench of the Wayne county circuit for a long term of years and who was thereafter engaged in the practice of his profession in the city of Detroit until his death, which occurred on the 9th of May, 1908.

Robert Emmett Frazer was a scion of one of the sterling pioneer families of the Wolverine state, where his entire life was passed. He was born at Adrian, Lewanee county, Michi- gan, on the 2d of October, 1840, and was a son of Thomas and Sarah (Wells) Frazer, the former of whom was born in county Down, Ireland, and the latter in Chelsey, England.

Robert E Frazer

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Thomas Frazer was reared to maturity in the fair Emerald Isle, where he had only a few months of specific schooling, but through his own efforts and his experience in connection with the practical affairs of life he became a man of broad knowledge and strong intel- lectuality. He became a skilled civil engineer while still a young man and in his native land was identified with important work in the line of his profession, including assistance in com- pleting a government topographical survey. In 1837 he immigrated to America and came to Michigan, which was admitted to the Union in that year. He first located in Monroe, which was then a commercial and civic rival of De- troit, and there he found employment in the work of his profession, principally through the kindly consideration of that honored pioneer, Dan Bramble Miller, who was at that time of- ficially connected with the Lake Shore & Michi- gan Southern Railroad, then in process of con- struction. Incidentally, it may be stated in this connection that specific mention of Dan B. Miller appears in the sketch of the life of his son, the late Sidney D. Miller, of Detroit, on other pages of this work. Thomas Frazer ar- rived in Monroe with a financial reinforcement of but five dollars, and was accompanied by his wife and their one child, so that he had no de- sire for or opportunity of enjoying any period of sybaritic ease after his advent in the new commonwealth of Michigan. As a civil engi- neer he was identified with surveying and con- struction work on the line of the Lake Shore & Michigan Southern for nearly three years, having been thus engaged during the building of practically the entire line between Monroe and Chicago.

After his retirement from this work Mr. Frazer took up his residence in Adrian, Michi- gan, where he continued to make his home until 1841, when he removed to Detroit and entered the employ of the Michigan Central Railroad Company, with whose construction work he became prominently identified in a professional capacity, having been superintendent of con- struction and also having served in various

other official or executive capacities. With the incidental survey work as well as that of con- struction he was associated with Colonel John M. Berrien, chief engineer, during the building of the line through from Kalamazoo to Chi- cago, being assistant engineer, and after this work was completed he returned to Detroit and entered the permanent engineering department of the company, giving his attention to the su- pervision of bridges and to allied work. About the year 1845 he met with an accident on the railroad, and this incapacitated him for farther active work. He was then given the office of general ticket agent for the company in Detroit, being the first to fill this position, which he re- tained for several years. He finally resigned the office to give his attention to his private business. He introduced the coupon railroad ticket, of which he was the originator, and he continued to reside in Detroit until his death, which occurred in 1902. His first wife, mother of the subject of this memoir, died in 1849, and later he married Miss Cecilia Clancy, of De- troit, who preceded him to the life eternal by several years. Of the four children of the first marriage two died in childhood, and of the two who attained to maturity Judge Frazer was the elder; his sister, Charlotte B., resides in Detroit. Four children were born to the second marriage,-Thomas C., Georgiana, Lucius W., and Allen H.,-and all are living except Thomas C.

Robert E. Frazer was about five years of age at the time when his parents took up their abode in Detroit, and the major portion of his life was passed in this city, where he rose to a position of distinctive prominence and in- fluence, both in his profession and as a citizen. He was afforded the advantages of the public schools of Detroit, and supplemented this dis- cipline by study in private schools both in this city and at Grosse Ile. In 1855 he was matriculated in the literary department of the University of Michigan, in which he was grad- uated in June, 1859, with the degree of Bach- elor of Science; he was not yet nineteen years of age at the time of his graduation. At the

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opening of the next university year he en- tered the law department, which had recently been established, and he was graduated as a member of its second class,-that of June, 1861,-which was of itself a distinction, as was also that implied in the fact that he had not yet attained to his legal majority when he thus received his technical degree of Bach- elor of Laws. In October, 1861, Judge Frazer was admitted to the bar, in Washtenaw county, and there he initiated the active practice of his profession, appearing in a case presented be- fore the circuit court in the same session in which he had been admitted to practice by that court. He built up a good business and con- tinued in practice at Ann Arbor until 1882, when he went to Jackson, having been re- tained as one of the leading counsel for the defendants in the famous Crouch murder case, a cause célèbre in the history of criminology in the state. His client, Daniel Holcomb, was acquitted, and the identity of the murderers of the Crouch family has never transpired to the present day.

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Compendium of history and biography of the city of Detroit and Wayne County, Michigan, Part 77

Author: Burton, Clarence Monroe, 1853-1932 Publication date: 1909 Publisher: Chicago H. Taylor & Co. Number of Pages: 858

Author: Burton, Clarence Monroe, 1853-1932
Publication date: 1909
Publisher: Chicago H. Taylor & Co.
Number of Pages: 858