USA > Michigan > Genesee County > History of Genesee county, Michigan. With illustrations and biographical sketches of its prominent men and pioneers > Part 37
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own efforts, and such was the confidenee he inspired in the directors that the institution was almost entirely intrusted to his management.
" The bank, finding its capital not sufficient for the grow- ing wants of the city and county, in June, 1872, increased it to $200,000. In 1875, finding their quarters rather in- convenient, and being of the opinion that they should own their banking-house, they purchased the building of the Walker Bros., on the northwest corner of Kearsley and Saginaw Streets, and proceeded to fit up their present cle- gant quarters. Their president, Ferris F. Ilyatt ( who suc- ceeded Mr. MeQuigg in 1875), and the cashier, Mr. Brown, were careful that the vault should be made in the best pos- sible manner, and after an investigation of the subject, and an examination of the several plans submitted, adopted that of Mr. E. W. Fowler, the Chicago agent for Terwilliger & Co.'s Safe-Works of New York City. The vault is a euri- osity, and seems to be absolutely impregnable. It is five by seven feet in dimensions, its sides, top, bottom, back, and front being composed of steel railroad bars of double thick- ness, with the bases, out and in, laid crosswise in the form of lattice-work, but close together, the flat bottoms of the rails making a smooth surface inside as well as out. The top, sides, and bottom are eight inches thick, also of rails. The back is twelve inches thick (three layers), all bolted together with five one-inch bolts through each rail at the door, the rails being serewed from the inside to the frame. The outside course of rails in the front about the doorway, over the top and two sides, and around the back, are of rails bent in the form of the letter U, and, being entire, com- pletely encircle the vault. After building the iron-work, there was laid up an eight-inch wall of brick, one inch from the iron, and the space between this brick wall and the iron, and the spaces between the rails, were filled up solid with the best cement that could be made, which long before this has become harder than any sandstone. The vault took nearly a year to become thoroughly dry. The door is of Terwilliger & Co's. best make, is nearly four inches thick, and, together with the frame in which it hangs, weighs 6200 pounds, there being in the vault some 27 tons of steel rails. Mil this is protected by a thirty-two-inch covering of brick as a fire protection The counter spoken of is an artistic affair, the counter proper being composed entirely of marble, of which there are five different varieties, the top, or shelf, being of Tennessee marble, the base of Cumberland, the panels of Italian, and they again paneled with two varieties of colored marble. The wood-work on this is of mahogany, trimmed with rosewood, and filled with plate glass. The whole was built for a Chicago bank, at a cost of something over $6000, but was bought by this bank at a bankrupt sale for much less than the original figures."
The bank under the various managements has been uni- formly successful, and, as the cashier avows, has never yet disappointed its stockholders on the semi-annual dividend- day. During the panic of 1873, for two or three days there was a slight run on the bank as on others, but nothing of consequence occurred, and in a week it was forgotten. As an instance of the alarm a panic occasions some people, the following incident is related. During the second day of the run a good farmer's wife rushed to the teller's desk, and
130
FLINT CITY.
called out to him, " I want my money." He asked, "What money do you want ?" " My money in here," she an- swered. " Where is your certificate of deposit ?" he asked. She searched in vain, and finally gasped that " she must have left it at home." The teller assureil her she need not be alarmed, but might send it down or bring it when she was next in town, and that the money was safe until she should come again. She remarked that she " hoped it was," and left the office. A few minutes before closing that day she came again with the certificate, and as the teller paid it he asked her where she found it. She answered she " had been home after it." He then asked her where she lived, and she answered, " Just beyond the School house," naming a school-house twelve miles from Flint. The certificate was for $25. On another occasion an individual called to pay a note held by the bank which was not for some time due. The cashier expressed his in- debtedness for the favor, when the man responded, " I don't propose to have this bank best and hold my note."
THE CITIZENS' NATIONAL BANK OF FLINT
was organized Jan. 10, 1871, by the election of the follow- ing gentlemen as directors: Ilon. Wm. M. Fenton, Alex- ander MeFarlan, J. B. Atwood, Henry Stanley. Col. Wm. B. McCreery, Wm. Hamilton, and J. W. Begole. with a capital of $50,000, and commenced business March 1, 1871.
Wm. M. Fenton was elected president, Wm. Hamilton vice-president, and W. L. Gibson was made cashier.
This banking institution commanded the confidence and esteem of the publie from the very first day of its existence. The gentlemen having its management were widely known as among the first in the county of Genesee for probity and integrity, and within a period of three months from the time its doors were thrown open to the public the capital was increased to $100,000, and still further augmented the following year to $125,000.
The sudden death of Col. Fenton in May, 1871, resulted in a change of some of its officers. Wm. Hamilton was made president, and Alex. McFarlan was made vice presi- dent, and Mr. J. Van Vleet was added to the board of directors.
In January, 1876, at the annual meeting, a still further change in the management was made by the election of Alexander McFarlan as president, and Col. Wm. B. Mc- Creery (who at the time held the honorable position of State treasurer) was made vice-president, and still later (1879) cashier in the place of Mr. Gibson.
THE GENESEE COUNTY SAVINGS-BANK
was organized in 1872, and opened its office for business on the first day of May in that year, with a capital stock of 850,000, sixty per cent, of which was paid in on that day, and the balance on the Ist of May, 1873, in accord- ance with the statutes of the State of Michigan bearing upon the subject. Its first officers were Ilou. J. B. Walker, President ; G. 1. Denham, Vice- President ; Ira II. Wilder, Cashier. The officers remained the same until November, 1877, when a vacancy was occasioned by the death of Mlr. Walker, after which Russell Bishop was elected president. In July of 1377 the capital stock was increased to $100,000.
In connection with the savings department, a general bank- ing business is conducted. The present officers are Russell Bishop. President ; William A. Atwood, Vice-President ; Ira II. Wilder, Cashier.
SCHOOLS.
Mr. Daniel ()'Sullivan, " the Irish schoolmaster," arrived in the Flint River settlement in July, 1834. Hle at first took up his residence near the Thread mills, and labored upon the Saginaw road. Having been prostrated by a severe attack of bilious fever, he soon after removed with his family to the house vacated by Elijah N. Davenport, and there, during the fall of 1834, taught the first school, at the rate of ten cents per week for each pupil. The house, a small rude log cabin, stood upon the site of William Ilamilton's mill. The scholars, some twelve in number, were the sons and daughters of John Todd, James Me- Cormick, Rufus W. Stevens, James W. Cronk, Lyman Stow, and his own.
In 1835, Aaron Hoyes taught a school in the same cabin. Among his pupils was William R. McCormick, now of Bay City, who recalls the fact that during the ill- ness of the master, Mr. Hoyes, his place was temporarily taken by a young lady,* who, among her personal adorn- ments, wore an exceedingly high comb. The pupils of that early day were not altogether amenable to discipline, espe- cially when enforced by one of the weaker sex, and forth- with rebelled against the authority of the schoolnistress. A scene ensued, in which the lady received rough handling at the hands of young McCormick and one of his friends, and the crowning glory of her head, the towering comb, was shattered. This terminated any further efforts on the part of the lady as instructress. The scholars of that date were as follows: Leander, Albert, and Zobedia Stevens ; Corydon, Walter, and Abigail Cronk; Edward Todd ; Adaline and Emeline Stow; William R., Ann Elizabeth, and Sarah MeCormick.
During the year 1836, Messrs. Stage & Wright erected a small shanty for school purposes, which was situated on the corner now occupied by the Fenton Block. The first school in this building was presided over by a Miss Over- ton (now Mrs. William Chambers, of Bay City), who was employed by the above-mentioned firm, and for whom her friends claim the distinction of having taught the earliest school in the village. She taught two quarters, and received as compensation $1 per week, and made her home while here with Mr. and Mrs. Todd, who welcomed her as one of the family. From the well-authenticated facts already set forth, there seems no reason to doubt that schools existed in the village two years prior to the time Miss Overton be- gan teaching, although she may have taught the first dis- trict school.
THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS OF FLINT.
" The early accessible records of the educational interests of Flint are very meagre. The first authentic record that we find relative to public schools is that of the organiza- tion of School District No. 1, at a meeting of the school
$ Mtr. James O'Sullivan, son of Daniel O'Sullivan, gives the name of this lady-teacher as M'ss Lucy Riggs.
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HISTORY OF GENESEE COUNTY, MICHIGAN.
inspectors held April 11, 1837 ; Ephraim S. Walker being chairman and Orrin Safford clerk.
" The first official report of the school inspectors was made Oct. 20, 1838; from which report we learn that the whole number of scholars attending was 60; of whom 39 were between the ages of five and seventeen years; the number under five and over seventeen being 21. Dura- tion of school, six months. Amount raised by tax was $586, of which $499 was for building a school-house, and 887 for the support of schools. This house must have been the frame building which formerly stood at the corner of Clifford and First Streets, on the site now occupied by Mr. Browning's house. Although the publie school was thus legally organized, there were many and formidable ob- staeles to its success. Hard times soon eame on, and money was scarce, and the teachers often doubly earned, by delays and duns, the pittanee which they received. But the greatest obstacle was want of faith in the free-school sys- tem, and hence the attempt to run the mongrel system, hampered with rate-bills, which so long vexed the souls of cdueationists. The rate-bills were often very onerous, cs- pecially on the primary department, offering a temptation to parents with large families of small children to tolerate, if not encourage, absence from school ; and, as each absence inercased the burden on those remaining, the evil grew in a constantly inereasing ratio, until, sometimes, the school was brought to a premature close. After struggling thus for several years without recognizing the real impediment in the way, the friends of education made a rally on the union-school system, as a sovereign remedy for all scholastic ills. That portion of the district lying north of Flint River having been set off as a separate district, those remaining purchased an entire block and proceeded to erect the house at present used in the Second Ward. But here, at the out- set, a most egregious and irreparable blunder was perpe- trated. The lot at that time was covered with a fine growth of young oaks, which were most carefully exterminated ; whereas, had they been left to grow, they would by this time have formed one of the finest groves in the county. This house, which is a two-story wooden buikling sur- mounted by a eupola, which is not remarkable for its grace or artistie effeet, contains four commodious rooms. It has done good service for thirty years, and having a solid frame, with contemplated renovations, will be serviccable for many years to come.
" On the completion of the house a union school was inaugurated in the fall of 1846, under charge of Mr. N. W. But's, with an ample corps of teachers. Years passed on, and many a faithful teacher did valiant service, though often with a depressing consciousness of Egyptian task- work in attempting to make scholars of pupils who attended at random. As an illustration of the extent of this evil of irregular attendance, we cite a report for the term end- ing August, 1853, as follows : whole number enrolled, 64; average attendance, 18; average absences, 46. The total result, under this ineubus of the rate-bill, was not very sat- isfactory ; the panacea had failed, and a new remedy must be tried.
" Accordingly, we find that at the annual school-meeting held in 1855 the following resolutions were adopted, pre-
faced with a preamble, setting forth that the experience of ten years had demonstrated the failure of the union- school system to give any adequate return for the expense incurred, while it completely excluded four-fifths of the children of the distriet from any participation in its ques- tionable benefits; and believing that the great interests of education would be advaneed, the burden of taxation dimin- ished, and the harmony of the Second and Third Wards improved by a frank and open abandonment of the present system, and the division of the district ; Therefore,
"' Resolved, That the union system as adopted, so far as it goes to establish the academic department in said school, he and the same is hereby abandoned.
". Rexo'red, That we have ten months of school the coming year in this house. That we have one male an 1 two female teachers qualified to teach the primary and English branches of education.
" ' Rexofred, That, in the opinion of this meeting. the great interest of e.lueation in our city would be advanced by a division of Union School District No. 1, so that Saginaw Street should be the dividing line.'
" In accordance with this expression of publie sentiment, upon petition of the parties interested, the division was made by the school inspectors, and District No. 3, embrac- ing the Third Ward, was formed. But, the disintegration having commenced, another division was called for and made, forming District No. 4, of that portion of the Third Ward lying north of Court Street.
" The old district, No. 1, was now left in an anomalous position, for, as might have been expected, with the adop- tion of the foregoing resolutions, no provision was made for sustaining a publie school, the customary assessment of one dollar per scholar being ignored, with the following eurions result : From the report of 1855-56 it appears that the whole amount of teachers' wages was $1235, of which the amount assessed on rate-bills (8646.47) was more than one- half, while the moiety of less than one-fifth ($214.82) was derived from the primary-school fond and mill-tax, and $343.52, more than one fourth, was received from non-res- idents, a proportion unparalleled in the history of our schools, and an evidence of the popularity of the teacher then in charge, Prof. M. B. Beals.
" This was certainly bringing the free publie school to its lowest terms, and a continuance of the same policy must soon have led to the total abandonment of the whole system. But the people were not ready for such a catastrophe, and ever after, at the annual meetings, voted as liberally as the law allowed for the support of schools, and would gladly have anticipated, by a decade, that release from the thral- dom of rate-bills which the Legislature ultimately gave. So far from abandoning the academic course, it was made still more prominent. Prof. William Travis, an accom- plished teacher, was placed in charge for three years (from 1856 to 1859), and by his ability, culture, energy, and enthusiasm gave a new impetus to the cause of education which left a lasting impression. At the annual meeting in 1859, it was voted unanimously to organize a graded school under the act of the Legislature approved Feb. 16, 1859, and the following board of trustees were elected, viz. : Levi Walker and Daniel Clarke for three years, S. N. Warren and Grant Decker for two years, John Delbridge and C. N. Beecher for one year.
CHAUNCEY S. PAYNE.
The name which stands at the head of this brief biographical notiee is that of one who was among the earlier settlers in Genesee County, and who was an enterprising, public-spirited, and honored citizen of Flint for a period of forty years.
Chauncey Smith Payne was born at Schodack, Rensselaer Co., N. Y., on the 16th of November, 1795. Having lost his parents by death while yet a child, he was reared and edu- cated by his grandparents until he was about seventeen years of age, when his active temperament and spirit of enterprise led him to leave the seclusion of his early home, to seek his fortune in the neighboring city of Albany. There he entered into a partnership with his cousin, Hiram Payne (also a young man), in the watch and jewelry business. At the end of three years this partnership was dissolved, and he entered into other business connections, continuing to the close of the war of 1812-15, at which time, believing a Western venture would prove profitable, he purchased the entire stock of his former partner, and, with a part of it, proceeded to Detroit in 1816, journeying through Canada with a team. As it was just after the close of the war, the national feeling and prejudice still ran high, and it was only by his coolness and determi- nation that he was able to pass through the Canadian terri- tory without molestation, and to reach Detroit in safety.
Having disposed of his goods very advantageously, and being encouraged by his success, he returned, by Lake Erie and Buffalo, to Albany, in the spring of 1817, and in the following July reappeared in Michigan with a large stock of merchandise, which he took to Mackinac.
His second venture proving as successful as the first, he again proceeded to Albany, and in 1818 brought out his third stock of goods, and located in Detroit in permanent business as a merchant, having also a branch at Mackinac. His part- ner in Detroit was the late Levi Brown, with whom he remained in very successful business connection for more than twenty years.
In 1824 he married Miss Louisa L. Smith, of Detroit, daughter of Jacob Smith, the well-known trader, who had made the first improvements upon the site of the present city of Flint, in 1819. Immediately after the death of Mr. Smith, in 1825, Mr. Payne made his first visit to Flint River, to look after the affairs of the deceased, and to take formal possession of the landed property owned here by his wife and the other children of Mr. Smith. This visit, however, was but tem- porary, and he soon returned to Ohio, where just previous to his marriage he had established a lucrative business.
His location in that State was first at Cleveland, but he soon after removed to Willoughby, Ohio, where, in addition to his merchandising, he was engaged in milling and various other enterprises. He had also a branch of his business in Akron, Ohio, where he built the first of the large stone business blocks which adorn that city. Upon the formation of the Portage Canal and Manufacturing Company at Akron, he
beeame an active member and a large stockholder, and was at different times the treasurer of the company, and its fiscal agent in New York City, with almost absolute discretionary power in its financial concerns.
In 1835 he elosed his affairs in Ohio and returned to his business in Detroit, but remained there only two years, and in 1837, at the solicitation of a number of the prominent people of Flint, he removed to that city, to spend (as it proved) the remainder of his long life. Having always been pros- perous in his business affairs, he had, at the time of his settle- ment here, in addition to the landed estate of his wife, a large amount of ready money, and with this he engaged in trade and in banking at Flint. He also built extensively, and contributed to the progress of the city in various ways, one instance of which was his furnishing of the money to start the publication of Flint's first newspaper, the Flint River Gazette.
Although Mr. Payne had already been engaged in active business in other places for a full quarter of a century before he came to make his home in Flint, he yet passed half his whole life (lacking only a few months) here, and hecame a citizen of such prominence as to make his name inseparable from the annals of the city.
Fle died at his residence in Flint, Jan. 31, 1877, aged eighty-two years.
The Citizen, of Flint, in its next issue after the death of Mr. Payne, said of him : " His dust and his memory are all that remain of one who for nearly half a century filled one of the foremost places in the history of this county and city. ยท
He was uncommonly generous of the goods with which fortune had endowed him. As instances of this spirit may be mentioned that he donated to the Catholies an aere of land, as the site of their present church ; also a tract of land on Detroit Street, for a burial-ground ; likewise to the Baptist church and the Garland Street Methodist Episcopal church the lots now occupied by those societles respectively ; and not long since a lot, valued at five hundred dollars, for the benefit of the new Episcopal church. Ile was a man of remarkable kindness of heart, amounting to alinost womanly tenderness on witnessing distress ; of the highest integrity of character, and of broad literary culture, with a great love for books. He was a religious man, though not a professor of religion in any denomination."
Mr. Payne was, at the time of his death, one of the oldest members of the Masonic Fraternity in the State, having become a Mason in Detroit, in 1818, in what was then known as Zion Lodge, No. 62, of the Territory of Michigan. When Washington Chapter, No. 15, was instituted at Flint, he was one of its charter members, and its first King. Subsequently he received the orders of the Red Cross, Knights Templar, and Knights of Malta. He was also one of the original, and the last surviving member of the Mechanics' Institute of Detroit.
1-11
FLINT CITY.
" It would be impossible in the limits of this sketch to note all the teachers whose faithful labors have done so much to lay the foundation upon which the reputation of our schools is being built ; but we cannot forget the patriot scholar, Capt. Simeon (. Guikl, who, at the call of his country in the hour of her peril, left the charge of his school for the tented field, where he gave his last and noblest lesson, that of chivalrous devotion to his country, when he laid his young life, so full of the promise of fu- ture usefulness and renown, upon her altar, falling a victim in the affair at Fort Wagner, where ' somebody blundered.'
" From the length of the period that he labored here, nine years (from 1865 to 1874), as well as by his ability and peculiar adaptation to the work before him,-that of organization and drill,-no one has done more for our schools than Prof. Z. Truesdel.
" April 3, 1869, is a most important date in the educa- tional history of Michigan, and worthy a centennial re- membrance, as being the day when No. 116 of the acts of the Legislature for that year, by virtue of which rate-bills were finally abolished and the free public school really es- tablished, was approved by the Governor and became the law of the State.
" This event gave new vitality to the cause of education, which, together with the constant growth in population and wealth, soon placed this school on a much higher plane than it occupied before the division, and the overcrowded school-house again brought up the ever-recurring question as to how the want could be best supplied.
" Before noting the solution of that problem, we will call attention to the colonists who went out in 1855.
" District No. 3, which contained the most territory and largest number of scholars, with the least taxable property, proceeded to ereet a brick house on Oak Street, in the Third Ward. This house, which is a two-story building, neither commodious nor elegant, originally contained two school rooms and a small recitation-room, and has since been enlarged by a two-story addition with a school-room on each floor. The location is a beautiful one, in a grove of primitive oaks, at one of the most prominent points in the city; but it is to be regretted that more land was not obtained at a time when it could have been done at a moderate expense.
" In the absence of any records, we can only say that able and faithful teachers labored here, and did their part in advancing the great work of education.
" District No. 4, which contained the least territory, with the smallest number of scholars, and a larger proportion of taxable property, instead of building, purchased an unfin- ished dwelling-house on Grand Traverse Street, known as the Blades House, and, fitting it up as an apology for a school-honse, kept up a school here for several years. It was not a very successful educational enterprise, and an effort was made in 1861, by petition to the board of school inspectors, to have it united with No. 3, but, being opposed by a remonstranee, the inspectors declined to act, referring the subject to the voters of the Third and Fourth Districts at their annual meeting; and in 1863, there being a de- cided expression of public sentiment in favor of the meas- ure, and the formal consent of the district officers in writing
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