USA > Michigan > Monroe County > History of Monroe County, Michigan : a narrative account of its historical progress, its people, and its principal interests Volume II > Part 31
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Politically, he is a Republican.
JOSEPH M. STERLING. Few names have been more conspicuously and worthily identified with the social and industrial history of Monroe county than that of the honored pioneer to whom this brief memoir is dedicated, and whose activities and influence made him one of the lead- ing citizens of Michigan from the territorial epoch in its history down through the years until he was summoned from the scene of his mortal endeavors, venerable in years and secure in the high regard of all who knew him. He was closely associated with other representative men of the pioneer days in southern Michigan and was well equipped for lead- ership in thought and action. His character was the positive expression of a strong and noble nature and no record touching the history of civic and industrial progress in Monroe county can be consistent if there be failure to give special recognition to this influential citizen who honored the state by his character and service. Mr. Sterling con- tinued to maintain his home in the city of Monroe until his death, which
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occurred on the 18th day of May, 1891, when he was nearly seventy- three years of age.
Joseph Marvin Sterling was born at Adams, Jefferson county, New York, on the 16th day of August, 1818, and was a son of one of the hon- ored pioneer families of that section of the old Empire state. The family is one of the most interesting ancestry, the founder of the house of Sterling in America having been William Sterling, of Haverhill, Massachusetts, but a native of England, born in London in 1637, of Scotch and English parentage. He was the founder of what was known as the New England branch of the Sterling family, and he came to the Colonies previous to 1660, settling in the little town of Bradford, Mass- achusetts. He was a ship builder by trade, and was the owner of a con- siderable land in the section of the country in which he settled. He was engaged in many Indian fights in his day, and was prominent in the life of his community as long as he lived. He was the father of nineteen children, and the direct line of descent from William Sterling, the first, down to William C. Sterling of the present day is as follows: Captain Daniel Sterling, the son of William Sterling, the founder of the family in America, was born in Haverhill, Massachusetts, in September, 1673, and married Mary Ely, the daughter of Richard Ely, of Lynne, Connecticut. His son, Joseph Sterling, was born in old Lynne, Connecticut, on June 30, 1707 ; he married Sarah Mack, daughter of John Mack, also of Lynne, on July 2, 1730, and his son, Capt. William Sterling, was born in Sterling City, Connecticut, May 28, 1743. He married Jemima Sill, on January 3, 1783, in Lynne, Connecticut. Joseph Sterling, his son, was born in Sterling City, November 25, 1786, and he married Emelia Cadwell in 1811, a daughter of Jeduthan Cadwell.
Joseph Marvin Sterling, the son of Joseph Sterling, representing the sixth generation of American Sterlings, was born in Adams, Jefferson county, New York, on August 16, 1818. He married Abigail Clark on January 27, 1847, a daughter of Walter Palmer and Abigail (Marsh) Clark, of Monroe, Michigan. She was born September 8, 1824.
When Joseph Marvin Sterling was seventeen years of age he came to Monroe, Michigan, making that city his home for the remainder of his life, and upon the waters of the bay, upon the commerce of the lakes, upon the docks, the streets, the homes, the schools, the churches of this city, in its canals and its railroads and in practically every big enterprise that was launched in Monroe county in his time, is written the history of his vigorous life.
Although the life of Mr. 'Sterling was one of untiring activity and worthy achievement, not lacking in incidents of important order, it has been impossible to gain more than meagre data concerning his long and useful career. He himself once stated that his school education was limited, but that his contact education had been both liberal and pleas- ant. Certain it is that through self-discipline and through long and active association with men and affairs he accumulated the equivalent of a liberal education and that he became a man of fine mental poise and sound judgment. His early educational advantages were limited to a somewhat desultory attendance in the common schools of his native state and in 1832 he there became a clerk in a mercantile establishment. In
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the following year he was sent by the firm of Fuller & Sons, of Water- town, New York, to open a branch store at Clayton, that state. In 1834 he became a salesman in the store of Bancroft & Davis, of Watertown, where he remained until the following autumn, when, without company and with financial resources summed up in five dollars which had been given to him by his father, he set forth for Michigan, to which territory . a strong tide of emigration was then moving from New York and the New England states. He made the voyage on the Great Lakes to Detroit, having taken passage on the steamer "United States," which was one of the first to be placed in commission for such service in the pioneer days. From Detroit he came to Monroe on the little steamer "Bradley," and he landed at LaPlaisance Bay on the 16th of October, 1835. The young easterner could have had at the time little realization of the fact that he himself was to become a prominent and influential figure in con- nection with lake-marine navigation and other lines of industrial enter- prise in the territory which was just putting forth initial efforts to gain admission to statehood. On the day following his arrival in Monroe, Mr. Sterling secured a clerical position in the grocery and provision store of J. C. Cole, and this pioneer establishment was changed to a general mer- chandise store in the following year. In 1837, the year of the admis- sion of Michigan to the Union, Mr. Sterling went to Petersburg, this county, to open a branch supply store, and in the following year he pur- chased the stock and business in that village, by the payment of twelve dollars in cash and assuming indebtedness for the remainder of the pur- chase price. He had received a salary of only fifteen dollars a month, and thus it may be understood that his available capital when he launched into independent business was extremely meagre. He had, however, a generous and adequate capital of energy, ambition, self-reliance and integ- rity of purpose, and to such valiant souls success is a natural prerogative. In the year which marked this initial business venture of independent order Mr. Sterling erected the first store building in the little village of Petersburg, and it is interesting to record that the same was later con- verted into a dwelling house, as such remaining one of the landmarks of the town for many years. In 1839 Mr. Sterling disposed of his busi- ness and building in Petersburg and returned to Monroe, where he became associated with his brother, William C. Sterling, and H. Lambert, in effecting a lease of LaPlaisance Bay warehouse and horse railroad, with incidental purchase of the cars and horses. The Monroe station or depot of this primitive railway was situated on Scott street, just east of the residence of General Spalding, and the eastern terminus was at the ware- house on the bay named, the road having been about four miles in length. Sidney D. Miller, who later became an influential citizen of Detroit, and Winfield L. Smith, later a prominent business man of Mil- waukee, Wisconsin, served for varying intervals as conductors on the passenger cars of this railroad, the trains of which ran more or less uncertain over the rails, which were straps of iron on continuous wooden base. When the canal was opened Mr. Sterling left La Plaisance Bay and became clerk for the firm of Cole & Disbro, at the Monroe docks. The day upon which he entered the service of this firm the schooner "United States" was sighted at the lighthouse and he acted as pilot in bringing the
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vessel to the docks, where he supervised the loading of the same with flour, this having been the first vessel to make the trip down the canal. The same year witnessed the establishment of several new business con- cerns, which availed themselves of the opportunities afforded in connec- tion with the improved facilities for lake-marine navigation at this point, and among these newly organized firms were a number that became promi- nent in this history of industrial advancement in Monroe, notably Mor- ton, Burch & Company ; D. Noble & Company ; Bronson & Colton; Morton & Wing; Morton & Walbridge; Disbrow & Grinnell; Harloston, Haff & Company, and others. The docks at that time were the scene of great business activity, and boasted a hotel, five saloons, and a bowling alley, with a daily line of steamers to Buffalo, Detroit and Toledo.
In 1843 Mr. Sterling entered into partnership with W. A. Noble and added to other interests a storage and commission business, and in the following year they built the famous warehouses known by sailors from one end of the lakes to the other. He became, with other representative citizens, interested in an extensive shipyard established at the docks, and in the same year the firm of Noble & Sterling purchased the schooner "Cambridge" and opened a transfer trade between Monroe and Oswego, New York. Mr. Sterling became the owner later of a number of other vessels of both steam and sailing types, and his enterprise in this con- nection proved extremely successful, notwithstanding the loss of the pro- peller "Sampson" and the schooners "Don" and "Noble." His initia- tive was on a parity with his aggressive enterprise, and he became a suc- cessful contractor in the construction of rail and plank roads, as well as in the handling of government, state and city contract work. He erected in Monroe many private residences and several public buildings, includ- ing the city hall and the passenger station at the Monroe port. He planted the first field vineyard in Monroe county and constructed and stocked the first carp pond. In 1847 he began bringing in coal for black- smiths and other artisans, the product being shipped on steamers and being transported in boxes and barrels. For many years he supplied the coal trade as far west as Goshen, Indiana, and he was veritably the pio- neer in this line of enterprise in southern Michigan. In the autumn of 1848 Mr. Sterling erected his first coal shed in Monroe, and this he stocked with forty tons of blacksmith's coal,-a supply which he deemed adequate for the supplying of his trade for a period of ten years. This department of his business activities, however, gradually assumed large proportions, and in 1888 he handled nearly ten thousand tons,-a fact which indicated in a measure the development and progress that had marked southern Michigan in the long intervening period of forty years, during which he had continued his operations in this one line of busi- ness enterprise.
From 1861 until his death Mr. Sterling served as president of the Monroe Gas Light Company, in the organization of which he was the prime factor, and during the last four years of his life he was president of the Monroe Democrat Printing & Publishing Company, besides being the executive head of the Sterling Manufacturing Company and other important enterprises. He had in early years secured a valuable tract of land in the county and he did much to foster the agricultural and live
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stock industries in this section of the state. In 1883 he stocked his farm with a fine herd of Holstein-Friesian cattle, and he was most zealous in raising the standard of the live-stock interests of the state. This is still carried on by his son Joe C. Sterling. He was for many years one of the most active and valued members of the Michigan State Agricultural Society, of the business committee of which he was chairman for twelve years. His influence and high civic standing did much to make this society an important force in fostering development and progress along industrial lines and he was one of the most prominent members at the time when its functions and influence were at their zenith.
Mr. Sterling took a lively interest in all that concerned the city, county and state of his adoption and was a leading member of the Mich- igan Pioneer Society, before which he presented a number of papers of great historic value, the same being preserved in the archives of the society. In politics Mr. Sterling ever gave a stalwart allegiance to the Democratic party and he was an effective advocate of its principles and policies, as well as an influential figure in the councils of the party in the state of Michigan. In 1862-63 he served as mayor of Monroe, and his administration was marked by the progressiveness and civic loyalty which were to be expected of a man of such fine business ability and distinctive public spirit. On several occasions he was urged to become his party's nominee for governor of the state, but he invariably declined to become a candidate for this office. In 1874 he was, without his con- sent, made the party nominee for state treasurer, and he made a phe- nomenal run, with a leadership of three hundred and forty-eight votes on the state ticket in his home county. It is certain that had the Demo- cratic state central committee properly supplied the Upper Peninsula of Michigan with tickets he would have been elected.
In 1847 Mr. Sterling became one of the organizers of Monroe Lodge, No. 19, Independent Order of Odd Fellows, and at the time of his death only two other charter members of the lodge were living.
On the 27th of January, 1843, was solemnized the marriage of Mr. Sterling to Miss Abby Clarke, who was born in 1824 and died in 1872, secure in the love of all who knew her. She was a daughter of Walter P. Clarke, one of the pioneer and representative citizens of Monroe county. Mrs. Sterling was survived by six children, as follows : William C., who is individually mentioned on other pages of this work, is well upholding the prestige of the family name as one of the prominent and influential business men and influential citizens of Monroe; Joe C. Sterl- ing, unmarried, born August 27, 1851, became interested in Michigan State Fair and was its secretary for a number of years, also secretary of the Monroe Gas Company, and superintendent of Monroe Water Com- pany. He was a partner with his father, at the time of his father's death, in farming and raising of thoroughbred cattle, which business he is still engaged in. Frank Sterling, born September 7, 1854; married May 12, 1886, Miss Sarah Yardley. He has been interested in a number of enterprises in Monroe. At one time with his brother William in the cedar business, also interested in raising of squabs, florist, etc. Walter P. Sterling, born November 29, 1856, unmarried. Manager of Monroe Lumber Co. and connected with several other business enterprises in
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the city. Martha Emelie Sterling, born March 26, 1848, married Lester O. Goddard October 25, 1871. Mr. Goddard was a prominent official of C. B. & Q. Ry. for a number of years and member of the firm of Custer, Goddard and Griffin, attorneys and counsellors, Chicago. Two children were born to them, Joseph Sterling Goddard and Emma Goddard. Emma Morton Sterling was born June 4, 1860, married Austin E. Wing January 31, 1883. Mr. Wing, in 1888, was appointed national bank examiner for Michigan. He is at the present time cashier of the Peoples State Bank, Detroit, Michigan, the largest bank in the state. They have one son, Walter Sterling Wing, now of Pittsburg.
In 1874 Mr. Sterling contracted a second marriage, being then united with Mrs. Cynthia ( Weed) Rice, the widow of C W. Rice of Buffalo, New York, and a daughter of Hon. Elias Weed of that city. Mrs. Sterling survives her honored husband.
WILLIAM CLARK STERLING. A representative business man of large and varied interests, William Clark Sterling has long been a dominating factor in connection with the industrial and commercial activities of his native city and county, and both by reason of his personal achievement and his high standing in the community he is entitled to especial recogni- tion in this publication. Further than this, he is a member of one of the honored pioneer families of Monroe county and he is a son of the late Joseph Marvin Sterling, who established his home in Monroe county sev- eral years prior to the admission of Michigan to the Union and who was long one of the most honored and influential citizens and most enter- prising business men of the state. To this sterling pioneer a special memoir is dedicated on other pages of this work, so that further review of his career and of the family history is not demanded in this article.
He whose name initiates this sketch is president of the W. C. Sterling & Son Company, dealers in cedar telegraph poles, fence posts, shingles, ties and hoops ; president of the W. C. Sterling & Son Coal & Ice Com- pany ; president of the Sterling Cedar & Lumber Company, of Charles, Michigan; president of the Monroe Lumber Company; vice-president and director of the Monroe Water Company ; trustee and manager of the Monroe Marsh Company ; a director of the Monroe Foundry & Furnace Company ; and an interested principal in other industrial enterprises, both in Monroe county and other parts of the state. This statement is sufficient evidence of his prominence in the field of industrial enterprise, and marks him as one of the aggressive and representative business men of his native state, and his career has been marked by the characteristics of progressiveness, liberal and public spirited views in his civic attitude, and similar qualities which make for large and worthy results in the course of a lifetime of activity. He has done much to further the devel- opment and advancement of his home city and county, the while his influ- ence has been potent in the furtherance of civic and industrial interests pertaining to the state at large. He has accounted well as one of the world's productive workers and it is gratifying to be able to present in this work a brief review of his career thus far.
William Clark Sterling was born in Monroe, Michigan, on the 17th of September, 1849, and he is the eldest of six children of his parents,
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Joseph M. and Abby (Clarke) Sterling. He was educated in the public schools of his native city and in Notre Dame University, at South Bend, Indiana. He has ever led a busy life, as became the son of his father, one of the most active and ambitious men that was ever identified with the history of the state. Upon his return to Michigan, following his university course, he entered the Mayhew Business College in the city of Detroit, it being the idea to thoroughly prepare him in the theories of business administration, in preparation for his career in the actualities of business life in connection with his father's immense interests in Michi- gan. After the completion of a thorough course of study, he returned to Monroe, and there, in 1867, he became associated with his father as a member of the firm of J. M. Sterling & Son, and became manager of the business, being associated as well with other industrial enterprises of which his honored father was the head. Mr. Sterling has, in fact, been identified with practically all the industrial enterprises and movements in the city that have helped to make it what it is in recent years, and no man has played a more important part in the growth and develop- ment of the city than has he. In 1880 he established the cedar pole, post and tie business now conducted by him and his son, William C, Jr., he being the president of the firm. This company has shipped telegraph and telephone poles all over the United States and Canada, and even to Egypt and South America. In 1906 Mr. Sterling organized the Sterling Cedar & Lumber Company of Michigan, of which he is the president. This company has immense holdings in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, owning many thousands of acres of standing timber and operating a large lumber, shingle and lath mill at Charles, Michigan, where they own the town site on Lake Huron. The W. C. Sterling & Son Company main- tains sorting yards at Monroe, Bay City, West Branch, Alpena, Omer, Boyne Falls, Onaway and Millersburg, Michigan, and thus its supply resources and distributing facilities are of the best order. Mr. Sterling is a stockholder in a number of banks in this district, in the Monroe Foundry and Furnace Company and the Elkhart Manufacturing Com. pany, and is president of the Monroe Lumber Company. He has con. tinued the coal and ice business established by his father in 1848, the business being conducted under the firm name of W. C. Sterling & Son. He helped establish and in some of the following companies was director or officer : The Detroit Sugar Company, the New State Telephone Com- pany, the Detroit Switchboard Manufacturing Company, the Michigan Cedar Company, the Sterling Manufacturing Company, the Monroe Pier & Park Hotel Company, the Monroe Produce Company, the Holihan & Steeley Mercantile Company, of Millersburg; F. S. Sterling & Company cedar products, Sterling & Wahl Ice Company, Monroe, Michigan; Augres River Cedar Company, Augres, Michigan; Omer Stave & Head- ing Manufacturing Company, Omer; Squires & Sterling Mercantile Com- pany of Omer, Michigan. In fact, it would be difficult to name a con- cern of solid worth in Monroe county, in the launching of which Mr. Ster- ling has not been conspicuous, and which has not been aided and furthered by his influence. Every public movement of interest to the community has felt his support, both morally and financially. He donated the first block of paving laid in Monroe, and he has ever been
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the friend of street improvements. He was a stockholder in the Monroe Gas Company, which his father built, and with General Spalding he built the Monroe Water Company, which was much needed and did a vast deal to build up the city. It was a losing proposition for more than twenty years, but by furnishing funds, the stockholders were able to pull the enterprise through to a successful point. With his son he assisted in the establishing of the present telephone exchange in the city and county, which is still under the general management of his son.
Mr. Sterling has always been the premier sportsman of his com- munity, and in 1880 he bought the Monroe marshes and organized the Monroe Marsh Club, which still controls the marshes made famous for their duck shooting, fishing, lotus bed and muskrats. Practically all the members of the club are eastern men. He has been a great yachtsman for years and all over the Great Lakes is known as Commodore Sterling. He was vice-commodore of the Inter-Lake Yachting Association, and declined the office of commodore; commodore Monroe Ice Boat Club 1905. During his last trip to Europe he joined the Airship Club of Germany, and on August 28, 1912, with his son-in-law, Alfred Muller, of Erfurt, made his first flight in the Zeppelin airship "Victoria Louise," five hun- dred and fifty-two feet long. They sailed from Gotha to Frankfort, Ger- many, a distance of over two hundred miles, fifty miles of the trip being made in less than an hour. The trip took five and three-quarters hours because of the loss of the forward buckets while one mile up in the air, it being necessary to attain that height to go over the mountains.
Among distinguished relatives of Mr. Sterling are late J. Sterling Morton, secretary of agriculture, under President Cleveland; he was a son of Mr. Sterling's maternal aunt. Joy and Mark Morton of the Mor- ton Salt Company of Chicago, and Paul Morton, secretary of the navy, and president of the Equitable Life Insurance Company, were cousins of Mr. Sterling, also.
Mr. Sterling has always been a Democrat, but in line with traditions of his family, has held no office nor showed any inclination to public ser- vice, in any official capacity. He is a member of the Trinity Episcopal church of Monroe, and is most liberal in his religious views. He is espe- cially generous in his attitude towards the Catholic faith and has demon- strated his friendship by his liberality toward the St. Francis Orphans' Home, which he has aided in many ways in the line of his benevolent work.
On February 21, 1871, Mr. Sterling was married at Monroe, Michi- gan, to Miss Ada E. Calhoun, a daughter of Erastus R. Calhoun, born in Williamstown, New York, in 1818, and died in 1888. Her mother was Lucinda Newton, born in Palmyra, New York, in 1824, and the mar- riage of her parents occurred in 1844. Mr. Calhoun was the proprietor of a prominent hotel in Toledo, Ohio, in the sixties, known as the Collins House, and at one time was a large land owner in the West Indies. Mrs. Calhoun's ancestors were very prominent in England, and in colonial days, Major Israel Newton, her great-grandfather, was active in the inter- ests of the colonies. Mrs. Sterling was educated in eastern schools. They have children as follows: William Cadwell Sterling, Jr., born in Mon- roe, April 7, 1872; in December 26, 1894, married Emma L. Spalding,
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