Compendium of history and biography of Minneapolis and Hennepin County, Minnesota, Part 64

Author: Holcombe, R. I. (Return Ira), 1845-1916; Bingham, William H
Publication date: 1914
Publisher: Chicago : H. Taylor & Co.
Number of Pages: 1190

USA > Minnesota > Hennepin County > Minneapolis > Compendium of history and biography of Minneapolis and Hennepin County, Minnesota > Part 64

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Mr. Castner obtained a common school education in Iowa, and came with his brother-in-law to Minneapolis, working in sawmills in the summer and at carpenter work in the fall and spring. During the winter months he attended the Minneapolis Academy, and became a teacher in the St. Croix Academy at Afton, where his brother-in-law was principal. He taught two years at Lake Johanna, just east of Min- neapolis, in Ramsey county. He bought land in Mound View township of Henry Weeber, who still lives there, and engaged in farming on a small scale, finally selling the land at the establishment of the New Brighton stock yards.

When he quit teaching Mr. Castner resumed work in the sawmills, attending the scientific department of the State University in the winter for two years. Only the main build- ing and the chemical building were then erected at the Uni- versity; but it was even then a vigorous and influential insti- tution. After working in the mills and at the carpenter trade for eight or nine years he was graduated from the law depart- ment of the University in June, 1893, having covered in less than two years the full three years' course. In the meantime he had passed more than a year in New Mexico working at his trade and in a storc earning the money with which to pay his last tuition, and completed the course with a residue of $10 in the bank.

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HISTORY OF MINNEAPOLIS AND HENNEPIN COUNTY, MINNESOTA

Ile was admitted to the bar in 1893, and at once began the practice, soon getting business in the line of collections for Edwin Cooley, an old merehant, and whose influence brought him other clients. Ilis first suit was a case for Mr. Cooley, which became locally renowned because of the principle which it established, which was that a prior chattel mortgagee cannot dispose of mortgaged property without accounting in full to a second mortgagee. Judgment was against him in the District Court, but was reversed in the Supreme Court. He has had a fine general practice, and has taken many cases to the Supreme Court, where his contentions have generally been sustained. He was also instrumental in having the case through which the street car company's franchise was limited to 1923, instead of being terminated in 1937, carried to the Supreme Court of the United States, which reversed Judge Lochron's decision in the U. S. Circuit Court.

Mr. Castner became interested in Northeast Minneapolis several years ago, erecting a number of residences in that section. From 1905 to 1909 he served in the council, and was instrumental in having the old and unattractive Maple Hill cemetery converted into the present Maple Hill park, and "Long Jolm's Pond," an eyesore to the 'community, made over into Jackson Square park. He is acknowledged to have been the father of the principle involved in the ordinance' restricting the gas company to a reasonable income on its investment. He always took the position that public service corporations should be subject to public control and limited in their charges to a reasonable return on the physical value of their property used in the public service. The Supreme Court of the United States had held that a railroad was liable for bridges, viaducts or their safety devices where it crossed a public highway already traveled. In the celebrated Twenty- ninth Avenue Northeast case the ground was taken by Mr. Castner that it made no difference which was built first, that the railroad was liable, and the case being carried to the Supreme Court of the United States that principle became established, the Supreme Court of Minnesota being affirmed.

Fraternally, Mr. Castner belongs to the Masonic order, the Ancient Order of United Workmen, the Foresters, the Wood- men, and the Independent Order of Odd Fellows. In the Order of Odd Fellows he has passed the chairs, has been Grand Master for Minnesota, and is at present the Grand Scribe of the Grand Encampment and representative to the Sovereign Grand Lodge. He is a Methodist in religious faith, and a member of the St. Anthony Commercial club. He was married in April, 1882, to Miss Minnie E. Van Valkenberg, a native of Anoka. They have five children: Melvin L., a contractor and builder; Florence E., the wife of John H. Stater, of Minneapolis; Mary I., a student at the St. Cloud Normal School; Theron S., in the State University, class of 1914, and Leah, also a St. Cloud Normal School student.

WILLIAM WOODBRIDGE McNAIR. 1

When William W. McNair eame to old Saint Anthony in 1857 to make his home, he found twin villages whose men and women leaders seem almost to have been endowed with the gift of prophesy. It was in the formative period of the city that was to be, and though Nature had furnished the reason for being, it was a time that called for indomitable pur- pose, that "seeing eye" which must be the attributes of builders

for the future. But these were qualities never lacking among the men and women of Saint Anthony and Minneapolis. They were men and women of high intellectual standards; they were pioneers with more than the ordinary pioneer's stamina, for they had come out of the cultured, educated homes of the East not merely to settle but to develop in keeping with its promise the rich and potent West. Among them were such men as John B. Gilfillan, S. H. Chute, William Lochren, C. H. Pettit, Eugene M. Wilson, the Sidles, the Harrisons, Charles M. Loring, W. D. Washburn, W. W. Eastman, C. E. Vander- burgh, George A. Braekett, W. S. King, and a score or more of others-a company imbued with public spirit and strong pur- pose characteristic of eity-builders which they became.

It was by these men that the financial and manufacturing as well as the commercial foundations of the city were laid; and it was by them. too, that beginnings were made in the finer things of life, which are not measured by material stand- ards. It was a community of intelligent progressiveness, and Mr. McNair, coming to the city to begin the practice of his profession of the law, speedily demonstrated his right to fel- lowship by taking his place among its leaders. All were men who comprehended the city's future, and gave of their best selves to realize it. None was more active, none more eager to co-operate, than Mr. McNair-and it was that spirit of eo- operation that while it made a city, likewise made men.

William Woodbridge McNair was born in Groveland, Living- stone county, New York, on January 4, 1836. His father, William W. McNair, was of Scotch-Irish descent; his mother, Sarah Pierrepont, was of that Pierrepont family whose mem- bers, counting their descent from the time of William the Conqueror, numbered among themselves a founder of Yale and not a few doers of deeds that stood out in high relief on the tablets of American history. Mr. McNair's youth was passed in the environments of culture and education which marked society in Genesee and Canandaigua. There it was natural that he should develop the taste of a student, the attributes of a leader. It was the "seeing eye" that pene- trated the opportunities which the West held, and it was the intellectual tendency that spurred him to take up at the age of 19 years, not in the East but in the West, the study of law in the office of Judge J. P. Doolittle, of Racine, Wisconsin. That was in 1855, and two years later he came to old Saint Anthony-then young Saint Anthony, by the falls-to gain admission to the bar and begin practice.

The bar of the young villages on opposite banks of the Mississippi was even then a body of brilliant men. Indeed, it is doubtful if, in the years that have passed since the found- ing of the city there have since been so remarkable a body in the bar of the community as in the first fifteen years. In the period preceding 1865 there came to Minneapolis, as contemporaries and colleagues of Mr. McNair, such men as Cornell, Atwater. Washburn, Stewart, Wilson. Vanderburgh, Lochren, and E. S. Jones, and they figured among the fore- most factors in every movement in the community. Because it was a pioncer community, the eontact of its eitizens was perhaps more intimate, but regardless of this phase of life it i's eertain that the mental attainments of the members of the bar shone with a brillianee which must endure in the history of the city and indeed of the state. Among these men none was more prominent than William W. MeNair. Perhaps the most notable fact, however, in connection with this body of men is the part they played in the industrial and eommer- cial as well as the eivic advancement of the eity. They were

WM.W.MºNAIR

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HISTORY OF MINNEAPOLIS AND HENNEPIN COUNTY, MINNESOTA

lawyers, and men of large affairs, and for the most part laid the foundations for the great business enter- prises of today. Their names loom large in milling, finan- cial institutions, transportation, and what has since be- come the wholesale and manufacturing business of the West.

Less than four years after Mr. McNair arrived in St. Anthony, he formed a partnership with the late Eugene M. Wilson, under the firmn name of Wilson and McNair, which continued until Mr. Wilson's election to Congress in 1868. Then Mr. McNair and William Lochren became associated, and later J. B. Gilfillan joined the firm, which was for many years recognized as the leading law firm of the city. The associa- tion continued in force until 1881, when William Lochren was appointed to the district bench. For three years Messrs. McNair and Gilfillan were partners, and then Mr. Gilfillan was elected to Congress and Mr. McNair retired from active prac- tice on account of failing health. His active career in the law was thus marked by a noteworthy attitude. Political con- siderations entered into his various partnerships, all his part- ners becoming at one time or another members of the bench or of Congress. Yet Mr. McNair held aloof from public office except as he yielded to the importunings of friends and ac- cepted a place in the public service at home out of a sense of duty to the community. He was mayor of St. Anthony for the last two years of that village's separate identity, in 1869 to 1872. For four years prior to 1863 he was county attorney. In 1868 he was one of the school directors of St. Anthony. Only once, and then reluctantly, he was on a ticket as nominee for higher office than those just named. In 1876 he received the Democratic nomination for Congress, and his hold upon the regard of the community is shown by the fact that, in a Republican electorate, his vote greatly reduced the Republican majority in the district. A large number of friends urged him in 1883 to accept the tender of the Democratic nomination for governor, but he firmly declined.

All these years Mr. McNair was connected with most of the important litigation of the times. In addition he had become interested in some of the successful enterprises of the city. He figured as one of the stockholders in the first street railway company, organized to construct traction lines, especially a line connecting the flour mills with the lower levee. This latter project was abandoned, and only a few of the original incorporators remained in the company. In the establishment of the Minneapolis Gas Light company Mr. McNair was likewise one of the original incorporators. And when the Minneapolis and St. Louis railway company was formed to construct a railroad to connect Minneapolis and the wheatfields of the Northwest with the country to the south, Mr. McNair was one of the original incorporators and direc- tors. He was also heavily interested in railroad contracting and in lumbering. And as he was identified with some of the largest business enterprises, so it was natural that he should be listed among the leading bankers. He was connected with one of the oldest banking institutions in the city, the Security of Minnesota, which had been organized out of the old State Bank of Minnesota in 1868, and his name is on the rolls of directors of the Security National Bank, one of the largest institutions of its kind in the Northwest.

In addition to these interests, Mr. McNair was also one of the men who early appreciated the future of the city in the way of real estate, and became one of the heaviest holders of city properties.

As Mr. McNair's career in Minneapolis was characterized by

leadership in professional and business life, in a manner typical of earlier times, rather than of the present, so too he was among the foremost of the citizens in a social way. He was married August 21, 1862, to Miss Louise Wilson, a sister of his law partner at that time, Eugene M. Wilson, and a daughter of Edgar C. Wilson, a prominent resident of Vir- ginia. To the MeNairs two daughters were born, one of whom, Agnes O., is now the wife of Louis K. Hull, and the other Louise P., now the wife of Francis M. Henry, a well known engineer. The home of the MeNairs for many years was in a beautiful residence which Mr. McNair built on Linden avenue, facing Hawthorn park, and which was long one of the show places of the city. It was the scene of social affairs, and was one of the chief centers of the brilliant society events of the day.

Mr. McNair dicd on September 15, 1885. Yet so prominent was he in the public life of the city that his name remains one of the most frequently mentioned in reference to the strength and stability of Minneapolis institutions.

FRANK HENRY CARLETON.

There is in Minneapolis a fast narrowing circle of promi- nent citizens to whom the expression "the good old days" has a magic significance. Among them is the jurist, journalist, scholar and citizen, Frank Henry Carleton. Mention "the good old days" to any one of this luminous circle and you will call up the time of real friendships, real comradeship, of struggle, and of youthful ambition. This youthful ambition has carried many of these men a long way, but no one of them to the outward observer, has more definitely "arrived" than the young man who came west forty years ago to cast his lot with the pioneers.

When Mr. Carleton turned his eyes westward the great city on the Mississippi was a vision which only the most optimistic eyes could behold. He came with the idea of growth and advancement; he stayed to achieve all that his ambition craved, and by doing so helped to build for the betterment of city and state.

Minneapolis has been good to Mr. Carleton, but he has. always given as much as he has received, for few young men bring to a new country such abundant equipment for success as did this young man from Newport, N. H.

Perhaps it is not exact justice to give a man credit for his ancestry, but it is interesting to know that Mr. Carleton traces his line back to some of the best blood in England. On his father's side he is descended from Sir Guy Carleton, while from his mother there comes to him the loyal blood of that splendid old Englishman, Joseph French, who as a settler and leading citizen of Salisbury, Mass., was a stanch American a generation before the Revolutionary War.

Mr. Carleton's father, Henry Guy Carleton, was president of a bank in Newport for many years. and for forty years was one of the leading democratic editors of New Hampshire. He was a man of wide acquaintance and influence, a member of the State Legislature and was the personal friend of such men as John P. Hale, Franklin Pierce and William Butter- field. It is easy to see why the son of so able an editor should have felt the lure of newspaperdom when he came to Minneapolis after graduation at Dartmouth College. He pre- pared for college at Kimball Union Academy, at Meriden,

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IIISTORY OF MINNEAPOLIS AND HENNEPIN COUNTY, MINNESOTA

N. H., graduating in 1868, and completed his college course at Dartmouth in 1872.

Just at this period of his career he first showed his literary ability, for he took the first prize for English composition and wrote the elass ode in his senior year in college. Like many other of the young men of New England he partly earned his way through eollege by teaeliing, and had a varied experi- ence in different parts of the country. This work took him in 1870 into Mississippi during the "reconstruction" and "carpet-bag" days, where he was principal of an academy for white pupils, and where he had great success in his work.

That the fascination of the newspaper held him even from boyhood is shown from the fact that as soon as he graduated from Dartmouth he became city editor of the Manchester (N. H.) Daily Union and continued in that work for some time prior to his coming to Minneapolis. In this first experi- ence he showed the ability which has characterized his literary career throughout, and ealled from his associates prophecies of achievement which have been abundantly fulfilled.

Mr. Carleton's first newspaper experience in the west was with George K. Shaw who was then editor of the Minneapolis News. Later he was associated with Mr. Joseph A. Wheelock as city editor of the St. Paul Daily Press, with "Mart" Wil- liams as a colleague, and "Aleck" Johnson of the Pioneer as a rival. This editorial work continued successfully for over a year, during which time he developed remarkably in his knowl- edge of human nature and in literary taste. The stamp of this newspaper experience has shown in Mr. Carleton's later life for he is noted for the excellence of his literary judgment among his friends. Newspaper men, with whom he has a wide acquaintance, like to eonsult him on matters pertaining to the early history of Minnesota. The "newspaper instinct" has never deserted him, and when "short of copy" many a news- paper correspondent has made him "give down" data for an interesting "write up." He is as alert today as when he and Frank A. Carle of the Tribune were associated.

The real ambition of his life was to become a lawyer, and he entered the law office of Cushman K. Davis and C. D. O'Brien at St. Paul, and commeneed his studies in that direc- tion. After five years of close application to his legal work, during which time he was 'clerk of the Municipal Court at St. Paul, his health failed and, with his cousin, Charles A. Pills- bury, the flour miller, he took an extended trip to Europe, returning fully recovered. Upon his return from Europe he became the confidential and private secretary to Gov. Jolin S. Pillsbury. In this eonneetion he rendered most valuable serv- ices in the preparation of papers and documents relating to the adjustment of the repudiated Minnesota Territorial railroad bonds. Even now he did not give up entirely his newspaper work, for he acted as Minnesota correspondent for the New York Times and the Chicago Inter-Ocean for several years.

In 1882 Mr. Carleton formed a law partnership with Judge Henry G. Hicks and Capt. Judson N. Cross. Cross, Hicks & Carleton was the firm name until Norton M. Cross, Capt. Cross' son, was taken into the firm. In 1883 Mr. Carleton was made assistant eity attorney, and served until 1887. This was a period of importance in the history of the city, as it brought into active operation the new principle of the "patrol limits" in the regulation of the liquor traffic. Mr. Carleton had charge of all this litigation, succeeded in estab- lishing in all the courts of this state the validity and legality of the "patrol limit" principle. Mr. Carleton's practice and that of his firm has always been one to eall out a high order

of judgment and ability, and is far reaching and varied. Real estate, probate law, corporations and financial adjustments are the branches of the profession which brought the firm into the most prominence. Since the death of Capt. Cross and Judge Hicks, Mr. Carleton's partners have been his son's, Henry Guy Carleton and George A. Carleton.

Republicanism and all that it stands for is Mr. Carleton's politics, but he has never taken an active part in party scrambles. Scientific research, reading and literary pursuits have always taken precedent over political studies or aspira- tions. He has always been a collector of books and has a large private library in his city and country homes. He is now and for many years has been a member of the Library Board of the city of Minneapolis, and is the Chairman of the General Com- mittee of the Library Board.

The name of Frank H. Carleton is prominent in the history of the Park Avenue Congregational Church, of which he is a member, and in which he has always been a deacon or a trustee. He was for many years one of the directors of the Minnesota Home Missionary Society. For many years Mr. Carleton has taken an active part in Masonry. He is a Knight Templar, the 32d degree Scottishi Rite Mason, a Shriner, and has been the treasurer of the Minnesota Masonic Home since its incorporation.

Frank Henry Carleton was born in Newport, N. H., October 8, 1849, and Ellen Jones, daughter of the late Judge Edwin S. Jones, and a sister of ex-Mayor David P. Jones, of Minne- apolis, became his wife in 1881. They have six children : Edwin Jones, Henry Guy, George Alfred Pillsbury (Charles Pillsbury, who died in infancy), Frank H., Jr., Fred Pillsbury and Margaret S. Carleton.

It is in the cultivation of flowers and in fly fishing that he finds the greatest recreation. His love of nature is baek of both of these inclinations. Flowers bring the beauties of nature into his own garden, and angling takes him into the picturesque northern fishing ground. At River Falls, Wiseon- sin, in the beautiful valley of the Kinniekinnie, where trout abound, he has a large farm, where fruits and flowers are eultivated in abundance, and blooded stock is raised. His favorite cattle are Holstein-Friesians, which he breeds. He is a member of the Holstein-Friesian Association of America. He is also a breeder of Berkshire swine. He knows a good horse and owns some, but he ean't drive.

With the true American blood flowing in his veins, with the best of New England's ideals and traditions as the basis of his character development, and with the hustle and struggle of the then new west to develop that character, Frank Henry Carleton has been an example and an inspiration to hundreds of the younger men of Minneapolis, a generous, whole-souled and loyal citizen and stands today as a living monument of the best that New England and Minnesota ean produce.

GEORGE WASHINGTON CROCKER.

Sagacity, perseverance and ability, together with the deter- mination to do what was really best, and not just what he wanted to think was best, brought about the conspicuous success in the life of George Washington Crocker. Left on his own resources in early youth, he forged his way onward and upward. The biography of this Nestor of the millers would be the veritable history of the flour industry in Min-

Yes, Mbrocker

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HISTORY OF MINNEAPOLIS AND HENNEPIN COUNTY, MINNESOTA

neapolis. He was one of the first men to engage in the milling business here and he passed through all the stages, from practical working miller to proprietor. For nearly fifty years Mr. Crocker was continuously in the milling business in this · City, commencing with the first grist mill that ever turned a wheel in the State, and managing the first mill of any kind on the west bank of the river.

Mr. Crocker was born in the State of Maine, in the Town of Hermon, Penobscot County, in 1832. He was the son of Asa and Matilda Crocker. His father kept a small inn on the road to Bangor and had a farm as well. His mother was in poor health, so when the boy was only seven years old he went to live with a neighbor's family. He stayed here for ten years, his mother dying soon after he left home and shortly afterwards he lost his father. He had to work his way, even from his seventh year, and only went to school when there was nothing particular for him to do on the farm. In this way he acquired a fairly good education, for he was ambitious and made every moment of his school time count. When he was but seventeen years old he went out into the world to earn his way by his own exertions, in theory as well as in fact. He went to Providence, Rhode Island, and found employment in the Butler Hospital there. In the summer of 1852, when he was but twenty years of age, he started out with his brother to go to the gold fields of California. The route taken was the only practical one at the time, across the Isthmus of Panama, they crossing the Isthmus on foot. He did some placer mining there with very satis- factory returns and soon went into the mercantile business for himself. This was in Merced, California. He was suc- cessful and soon returned to New York, via the Isthmus route, with a comfortable accumulation of money for so young a man. From there he and his brother came directly to Min- neapolis in 1855, and it was with the money brought from California that he bought an interest in the City Mill.

This was the old government mill at the west end of the falls which had been built by the garrison at Fort Snelling in 1822 and used for sawing lumber and later for grinding grain. This had fallen into disuse and was in a forlorn and dilapidated condition. Thomas H. Perkins, from western New York, arrived in Minneapolis in 1854 and secured the property and fitted it up as a grist mill. He took in Smith Ferrand, as partner, and soon after Mr. Crocker purchased the latter's interest. This was the beginning of Mr. Crocker's milling career at St. Anthony Falls. Toll was taken for the service of the mill and everything was arranged on the most primitive plan. When it is said that Mr. Crocker was a practical miller it means that he put on the dusty garments of the trade and did everything that there was to do about the mill. He was not a miller when he went in with Mr. Perkins. But time soon made him so, for he worked to master all that there was to learn. What he did in the early days, with the poor equipment, he did throughout his experience. He worked through all the years, of new methods and improved equipment, to know all the details of everything pertaining to the business, whether mechanical or otherwise. What he did not know about milling, no one knew. In 1865 he sold the City Mill and built a stone mill on the Mill Company Canal with a capacity of 300 barrels a day. In this he was associated with a Mr. Rowlandson. It was known as the "Arctic Mill." Mr. Crocker sold his interest in this in 1870 and bought an interest in the "Minneapolis Mill." This mill was destroyed by fire twice while Mr. Crocker owned it and each time it

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Compendium of history and biography of Minneapolis and Hennepin County, Minnesota, Part 64

Author: Holcombe, R. I. (Return Ira), 1845-1916; Bingham, William H Publication date: 1914 Publisher: Chicago : H. Taylor & Co. Number of Pages: 1190

Author: Holcombe, R. I. (Return Ira), 1845-1916; Bingham, William H
Publication date: 1914
Publisher: Chicago : H. Taylor & Co.
Number of Pages: 1190