USA > Michigan > Wayne County > Detroit > History of Detroit and Wayne County and early Michigan: A Chronological Cyclopedia of the Past and Present, Vol. II > Part 41
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on his return home some valuable animals for the stock farm.
In 1881, when the northern part of the Lower Peninsula was desolated by forest fires, over two millions of dollars were contributed to relieve the homeless and destitute people, and the Michigan Fire Relief Commission, one of the most stupend- ous relief associations ever organized in this country up to that time, was constituted to take charge of the distribution of this fund, with Governor Jerome as chairman. Upon Mr. Cottrell, who was the general manager and confidential agent of the com- mission, devolved the active work of distributing aid, and under his careful direction three thousand families were succored and relieved from distress. He received much credit for the prompt and effi- cient manner in which he conducted the work of the Commission, and his efforts did not receive an ad- verse criticism from a single paper of the State, a fact eloquent with praise and commendation.
In the winter of 1888-89 Mr. Cottrell conceived the idea of a permanent exposition for Detroit, and, in connection with a mutual friend, organized and carried out to a successful issue a venture that has conferred incalculable benefits upon Detroit, dis- pelled the idea of slowness that had been associated with her name, and demonstrated that she possessed the enterprise and energy of a metropolitan city. Upon Mr. Cottrell fell the vast mass of detail in- cident to such a great undertaking, the laying out of grounds, the supervision of plans, the arrange- ment of buildings, machinery, approaches, docks, etc. The able manner in which he carried out the work was testified to by Senator McMillan, Presi- dent of the Association, who, in his address at the opening of the Exposition, paid the following tribute to Mr. Cottrell :
"In all such enterprises there must be one man to take the lead, and that man was Eber W. Cott- rell, who, believing that the time had arrived for Detroit to have a permanent exposition, induced others to join him, and to his untiring energy and large experience we are largely indebted not only for the Exposition itself, but for the admirable ar- rangements both of the grounds and buildings."
Of the same tenor, and equally commendatory, were the comments of the press and citizens.
At the close of the Exposition Mr. Cottrell re- signed his position as Secretary to accept the office of Land Commissioner for the Detroit, Mackinaw and Marquette Railroad, which position he still holds.
Mr. Cottrell has two children living, namely, Willie, now thirteen years old, and Irene, who is three years old.
Mr. Cottrell is a member of the Detroit Club, the Michigan Club, the Detroit Commandery of the Knights Templar and other organizations.
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Perhaps the most prominent trait of Mr. Cottrell's character is his great energy. Once embarked in an enterprise, he never rests until it is accomplished. As a farmer and stock-raiser he was considered an expert on fruit culture, bee-raising, sheep, horse and swine breeding, and in the horse-marts of Europe his judgment was recognized as of the highest order. As a politician he took the lead in many campaigns, and was the trusted adviser of some of the most prominent of the Republican leaders. As a business man and manager, he demonstrated his ability by the successful manner in which he has carried out everything with which he has been con- nected. Possessing a mind extremely versatile in its range, and comprehensive in its grasp of details, together with an active judgment, quick resolution, and energetic nature, he is eminently qualified to carry out large enterprises, and to fill any position requiring executive ability. His approachable dis- position, together with his readiness to give a help- ing hand, has won for him a large number of friends, and under a brusque exterior beats a heart that quickly responds to every cause deserving of support and recognition.
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ALFRED A. DWIGHT is one of the prominent men whose lives have been spent mostly in Detroit, and whose resolute energy, persevering effort, and Christian integrity have not only brought to them- selves deserved success in business and honorable reputation among their fellow-men, but have also tended, in a high degree, to the growth and pros- perity of the city. He was born in the township of Thompson, Windham County, Connecticut, March 27, 1815, and comes from early New England ances- try, being the lineal descendant of John Dwight, who emigrated from England in 1636, and settled in Dedham, Massachusetts.
He is one of the three children of William and Lucia (Dresser) Dwight. His father was a mer- chant and a manufacturer of cotton goods during the most of his business life. The son received his early education in the common schools of New England, and at the age of fourteen years, became a clerk in a large mercantile firm in Sturbridge, Massachusetts, where he remained for the next six years, engaged in laying those foundations and acquiring that knowledge of business and of the principles upon which it should be conducted, which should fit him for future usefulness and success in life. While thus employed, his father, in 1831, migrated to Detroit, where he died shortly after. His death made it necessary that Alfred A., then just on the verge of manhood, should come here to care for the interests of his widowed mother and the other surviving members of the family. He therefore left his employers in Massachusetts,
and arrived in Detroit, October 30, 1833, on the steamer Henry Clay, after a stormy passage from Buffalo, lasting a whole week.
From that day Mr. Dwight has been a resident of this city, but in 1837 returned to his former residence in Sturbridge, Massachusetts, and was there united in marriage to Frances M. Wheelock, the daughter of his former employer.
Mr. Dwight was not to find his future work as a business man confined to the routine of the mer- cantile life in which he had hitherto been trained : a larger field of action was to open before him, well adapted to his energy of character, administrative ability, and sterling integrity, which were to bring the confidence of others willing to entrust him with the care and management of their pecuniary inter- ests.
Detroit was even at that time an old city, for it had been settled for one hundred and thirty-two years. It contained, however, only about three thousand inhabitants, and was without water-works, sidewalks, and sewers. It was almost on the west- ern border of civilization, beyond which there was but a very small white population, very sparsely spread over Michigan Territory. Most of the lower peninsula was then an unbroken forest, containing a vast amount of the choicest timber of every variety incident to this latitude, and constituting the material from which a large amount of wealth was to be reaped when the demand for timber should be increased, its price enhanced, and the facilities for conveying it to market largely multiplied and extended. The era of railroads had then scarcely dawned, and the number of steam and sail vessels on our great lakes was quite small, because a large demand for them as bearers of inland commerce had not yet arisen. Within three years after Mr. Dwight's first arrival, the population of the city and territory had so increased that Michigan was ad- mitted into the Union, and during the succeeding half century she has progressed with such gigantic strides as to become the seventh in population among the States of the Union. During the same period Detroit has become the metropolis of the State, and contains now a population of not far from two hundred thousand.
In this marvelous development Mr. Dwight has acted an important part. He purchased, at an early day, for himself and associates, large tracts of pine and other timbered land in several of our northern counties, built saw-mills, and manufac- tured and sold quantities of lumber, from the avails of which large profits have been honorably acquired. In his operations during almost forty years as the active manager of his firm, he has employed and personally directed the labor of a large number of men, and induced many of the most intelligent
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among them, with their families, to become pioneer settlers in the wilderness which he was engaged in opening.
Mr. Dwight has been eminently a man of affairs, and his efforts have brought to himself and his associates in business a good degree of pecuniary success; he has also aided largely in the growth and prosperity of the northern counties of the State, by the assistance which he has rendered in settling and organizing townships, draining and reclaiming low and wet lands, constructing State drains, roads, bridges, school-houses, and churches, and making the "wilderness blossom as the rose." In all this progress he has been a constant guide and helper, and his usefulness therein is widely known and cheerfully acknowledged. One township in Huron bears his name, and he well merits the honor and respect which is gratefully accorded to him in Northern Michigan, where the most of his life work has been done. In his home and social life in Detroit he has ever been esteemed as a man wise in counsel, genial and winning in manners, sympathizing with the unfortunate, and has always aided, according to his ability, in carrying on every good work.
Early in life he became a member of a Christian Church, and has been connected with the Jefferson Avenue Presbyterian Church in Detroit since its formation, and one of its ruling elders since the year 1867, ever respected and loved by all connected therewith.
Mr. Dwight has been twice married. His first wife passed away within two years after his mar- riage, leaving him one daughter, Frances Matilda, now Mrs. C. A. Moross of Chattanooga, Tennessee. In 1843 he married Laura A. Morse of Mount Vernon, Maine, a lady of rare cultivation and refine- ment, a true wife and mother, whose virtues are best known to those who have had intimate ac- quaintance with her. They have had two children, Charlotte Eugenia, now deceased, who married Joseph H. Berry of Detroit, and William M. Dwight.
Mr. Dwight still survives, after having more than filled up the measure of threescore and ten years commonly allotted to man. He is a worthy example of the typical American man of business, and of the courteous, Christian gentleman. Such men are the pillars which sustain and support our national insti- tutions.
ERALSY FERGUSON was born January 14, 1820, in Radfield, Oneida County, New York. When he was quite young he with his parents removed to Canada. In 1826 they went to Monroe, Michigan, and after about a year to Detroit. Here for several years his father kept a small hotel on Woodward Avenue near the river, and Mr. Ferguson
well remembers the various vessels then frequent- ing this port.
In 1829 his father removed to Oakland County, and settled on a farm. After remaining on the farm for two years, Mr. Ferguson returned to De- troit, and worked on the farm of Judge James Witherell until about the year 1838. During the winter months of this period, he attended school at the old Detroit Academy. Upon leaving Mr. Witherell's employ he received eighty acres of wild land in St. Clair County, and in the winter of 1839 commenced clearing it up; but, after two months of hard labor, he abandoned the idea of becoming a farmer, returned to Detroit, engaged in teaming, and in the following winter made three journeys with a team to Chicago, conveying passengers and freight saved from a Chicago bound steamboat, which was partly wrecked late in the season on Lake Huron. Each of these journeys took from nineteen to twenty-six days.
In September, 1844, Mr. Ferguson entered the employ of the Michigan Central Railroad, serving successively as night watchman, baggageman, freight conductor, and passenger conductor. He had charge of the first passenger train which ran into Chicago over the Michigan Central Railroad. He subsequently became depot and train master at Detroit, resigning the latter position in January, 1875, after over thirty years' continuous connection with the road. About three years previous to his resignation, at the request of James F. Joy, Presi- dent of the Michigan Central Railroad, he engaged in the transfer, receipt, and delivery of city freight, by means of trucks built especially for that purpose. The business increased to such an extent that he was compelled to retire from the employment of the railroad company, and since that time he has continued in this line of business, and was also for a few years subsequent to 1877, one of the proprie- tors of the Cass Hotel.
In his political sympathies Mr. Ferguson was at first a Whig and is now a Republican, but has never been an office seeker or held a political office of any kind. In 1837 he was commissioned by Governor Mason as First Lieutenant of a militia company, and during the "Patriot War" in the following winter and spring, his company was called into the service of the general government, to guard the Canadian frontier and protect the United States arsenal at Dearborn from a possible raid of the " Patriots."
By a wise management of his financial affairs, he has acquired a competency, and is esteemed as an upright and useful citizen.
He was married January 20, 1842, at Detroit to Miss Nancy Canfield, daughter of Lemon Canfield of Redford, Michigan. They have five children, all
Geo. J. Frost
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living : Martha E., wife of Wallis Goodwin of Detroit ; Julia C., wife of E. W. Cobb of Adrian, Michigan ; Frances L., wife of Rev. Harry S. Jen- kinson of Detroit ; Josephine E. and John G. Fer- guson.
MOSES WHEELOCK FIELD was born at Watertown, in the State of New York, on February 10, 1828, and is the second son of William and Rebecca (Wheelock) Field. He was educated in the public school and at Victory Academy, where he graduated.
In 1844 he came to Detroit and engaged in the large mercantile house of F. Moore & Co. In 1832 Mr. Field formed a partnership with John Stephens, under the firm name of Stephens & Field, and they opened a wholesale chandlery and grocery business on the northwest corner of Woodward Avenue and Atwater Street. After the termination of this co- partnership, Mr Field conducted the business alone until about 1880, when he retired from mercantile pursuits. He was always interested in public affairs. In early life he was a Whig, but afterwards sup- ported the Free Soil movement, and in 1860 voted for Abraham Lincoln. In 1872 Mr. Field was elected to Congress. In 1883 he was appointed by Governor Begole as a trustee of the Eastern Asylum for the Insane, for the term of six years, and in April, 1885, was elected one of the Regents of the University of Michigan, for the term of eight years.
He was especially active in organizing the Michi- gan State Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals in 1865, and was its first president .. To his efforts are largely due the passage of most of the State laws of Michigan relating to humane treatment of animals.
He was married on February 2, 1858, to Mary Kercheval, daughter of the late Benjamin B. Kerche- val, one of the pioneers of Michigan. He died March 14, 1889.
GEORGE SMITH FROST was born June 14, 1824, at Marcellus, in the State of New York. His ancestors were among the early emigrants from Great Britain, and several of them were engaged in the War of the Revolution. His grandfather, Josiah Frost, was born at Williamsburgh, Massa- chusetts, in 1763. His father, Josiah Frost, Jr., was born in Williamsburgh, January 28, 1791, and had eleven sisters and brothers. He was married May 20, 1814, to Hannah M. (Smith) Frost, who was one of the thirteen children of Ithamar Smith of East Hartford, Connecticut, and was born June 17, 1794. Josiah Frost, Jr., left Massachusetts with his father in 1803, and settled in Marcellus. He was a farmer by occupation. The family included seven children, five boys and two girls,
five of whom, including George S. Frost, are still living. Josiah Frost, Jr., died in Camillus, New York, July 31, 1828, and within seven years after his death the family removed to Pontiac, Michigan, where one of the children had preceded them, and there, in May, 1851, the mother died.
George S. Frost attended the district school and academy of his native place, and after his ar- rival in Pontiac, he attended, for a short time, the branch of the University, then located at that place. By the time he was fourteen years old, however, it seemed desirable that he secure employ- ment, and in 1838 he entered the hardware store of Horace Thurber, at Pontiac, and a year later was clerking for his brother, at Troy, and from there, in 1839, came to Detroit, and became a clerk in the store of Lyon & Phelps. Several changes took place in the firm, but Mr. Frost remained for six years, and proved so competent a salesman that his services were frequently sought by others. Mean- time, as early as 1842, he became a member of the First Presbyterian Church, and happened to occupy a seat near the one almost invariably occupied by General Cass, who, for some reason, seemed to feel kindly disposed towards him, and proffered his friendship; and when Mr. Frost, in 1845, gave up his situation in the store of Hiram Lyon, General Cass immediately engaged him to assist him in his office work. The same year, in the fall, the office of Surveyor-General, northwest of the Ohio, was removed from Cincinnati to Detroit, Lucius Lyon, being appointed Surveyor-General. General Cass immediately procured Mr. Frost's appointment as recording clerk in the office, and the next year he was appointed assistant draughtsman, and afterwards principal draughtsman, and just before the term of Mr. Lyon expired, he was made chief clerk. Mean- time, the important mineral region of the Upper Peninsula was surveyed, and Mr. Frost, as principal draughtsman, constructed a large proportion of the maps of that region from the field notes of the sur- veyors, and was sent to Washington with the maps. Through the influence of General Cass, then serving as Senator, he was kept in Washington during the Presidential term of James K. Polk, and was engaged in several of the departments of the Gen- eral Land Office, and also acted as private secretary to General Cass. He became, by invitation, a member of the household of General Cass, and continued as such until his marriage, in 1852, gave him a home of his own. Up to the day of his death, General Cass manifested the strongest af- fection for Mr. Frost ; hardly a day passed without his calling him to his side. and he was almost con- stantly with him during his illness. The intimate relation which Mr. Frost sustained to the General, brought him, while at Washington, into close pc :-
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sonal contact and acquaintance with all the leading statesmen of that period.
Mr. Frost's familiarity with land matters, espe- cially in Michigan, secured him the appointment, in 1852, of Land Commissioner of the Saint Mary's Falls Ship Canal Company, and he personally super- intended the selection of the seven hundred and fifty thousand acres of land to which that com- pany were entitled for building the canal, and retained his position until the company, in 1864, closed up its affairs by disposing of the unsold land at auction. With the added experience gained in the management of the hundreds of thousands of acres of lands owned by the canal company, Mr. Frost naturally continued in the business of buying and selling pine lands. His business has been solely on commission, and he has probably negotiated the sale of more lands than any other person in Michi- gan, many millions of acres having been transferred through his agency. His time, however, has not been given solely to business. In 1858 and 1859 he served as President of the Young Men's Christian Union ; in 1862 and 1863, as Alderman of the First Ward; from 1869 to 1871, as one of the Commis- sioners on the Plan of the City; later, as one of the trustees of the Detroit Medical College; and for a quarter of a century or more he has served as an elder, and during part of the time as trustee of the First Presbyterian Church.
He possesses a warm and kindly heart, and is eminently social in his nature. His willingness to serve and give always keeps pace with his ability, and if he had been less generous, it would doubt- less have been to his advantage. In business matters, he is cautious and methodical.
He married Ellen E. Noble, daughter of Charles Noble, on October 12, 1852. They have four chil- dren living, Rev. Charles Noble Frost, now at West Bay City; Caroline Noble Frost of Detroit; Rev. George Canfield Frost, at Three Rivers; and Conway Alonzo Frost, now in the Medical Depart- ment of the University at Ann Arbor.
J. HUFF JONES was born in Pittsburgh, Penn- sylvania, and is the son of Thomas J. Jones, one of the first settlers of St. Joseph County, whose ancestors at an early date lived in Albany, New York. Mr. Jones accompanied his parents to Michigan in 1831, moved to Detroit in the spring of 1846, and lived with and assisted his uncle, De Garmo Jones, in the management of various business enterprises until his death in November, 1846.
Since that time he has been engaged in business connected with the settlement of his uncle's affairs, and has also been the legal guardian of several other estates, involving the care and custody of
large fortunes, and in the performance of these trusts he has shown the best of judgment and busi- ness method, and exceptional faithfulness. He is a member of the Detroit Felting Company, Vice- President of the Detroit Motor Company, and one of the trustees of Elmwood Cemetery.
In politics he was formerly a Whig, but since the formation of the Republican party has been stead- fast in his allegiance to that organization, though he has never been active in party management nor held political position.
Since 1860 he has been a trustee of the Fort Street Presbyterian Church and active in promoting its financial interests. As a member of the Asso- ciation of Charities and of various philanthropic societies, he has ever been an important factor, but always in a modest, though none the less helpful manner. He is a bachelor, but enjoys society, has an extended social acquaintance, and is a pleasant and agreeable companion, genial, of refined and courteous manner, and well and worthily repre- sents one of the oldest and most highly esteemed families.
EDWARD LYON, for nearly a half century one of the best known hotel proprietors in Michi- gan, was born in the town of Shelburne, near the city of Burlington, Vermont, June 12, 1805, and was the son of Timothy and Mary (Hawley) Lyon. His parents emigrated to the town of Shelburne as early as 1795. Edward Lyon was educated in the district schools of his native town, and when but a youth began to gain his own livelihood. Nearly ten years of his early manhood were spent in steam- boating on Lake Champlain, on the steam packet Franklin, commanded by Captain R. W. Sherman, which plied between Whitehall, New York, and St. Johns, Canada. By fidelity to his duties, Mr. Lyon gained the confidence of his employers, and was frequently put in charge of the boat during the absence of the commander. While acting in this capacity, he transported thousands of people from St. Johns, who were fleeing from that place to escape the ravages of the cholera, which broke out there on its first appearance in America.
Moved with a desire to benefit himself, Mr. Lyon, in 1833, abandoned navigation, and settled at Cleve- land, Ohio, where he leased and kept the Franklin House, at that time the best hotel in the city. In the spring of 1836 he sold his interest in the hotel, to Benjamin Harrington, and moved to Detroit. He remained here, however, only a few months, and then removed to Ionia County, where he en- gaged in merchandizing and the purchase and sale of real estate, with considerable success. He founded the town of Lyons, on the present Detroit & Milwaukee Railway, and thus left a
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permanent memorial of his stay in that portion of the State.
In 1840 he returned to Detroit, and bought the National Hotel, then standing on the present site of the Russell House. He conducted the hotel successfully for six years, and then sold out, and purchased an interest in the Michigan Exchange, and by his admirable management of this house, for a period of nearly forty years, became well known throughout the country. Several additions were made to the dimensions of the hotel during his ownership, by which its capacity was increased three times its original size. He not only made the hotel popular and widely known, but so ably did he manage it, that he amassed a considerable fortune. In 188t he retired from active business, and sought the repose which many years of con- tinuous and arduous toil had justly earned, at his residence at Grosse Isle, where for many years he had spent the summer months. Having made considerable investments in Florida, he built him- self a winter home in Crescent City, where he spent several months of each year. He loved to recall the fact that he was an eye-witness of the great naval battle on Lake Champlain, during the War of 1812, heard the report of the first gun fired upon that occasion, and, although he was but seven years old, many of the incidents of that memorable en- gagement were indelibly impressed upon his mind. He acted with the Democratic party, but held no political position, except that of Alderman from the Fourth Ward of Detroit, in 1853 and 1854. For over half a century he was a member of the Protestant Episcopal Church, in which he took great interest. He was for many years the Senior Warden of St. Paul's Church, and a Trustee of St. Luke's Hospital, Church Home, and Orphanage. At the time of his retirement from the hotel business, he was probably the oldest hotel keeper in the State, and without doubt the best known. He was pecu- liarly adapted by nature for his business, possessing urbanity of manner, energy, and the tact so essential to the highest success. He was kind-hearted and generous. and his donations to charitable and bene- volent objects were freely and liberally bestowed. His integrity and business honor were beyond ques- tion, and he enjoyed the unlimited confidence of his business associates. He died while at his winter home in Florida, on February 29, 1884.
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