USA > Minnesota > St Louis County > Duluth > Duluth and St. Louis County, Minnesota; their story and people; an authentic narrative of the past, with particular attention to the modern era in the commercial, industrial, educational, civic and social development, Volume III > Part 34
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Mr. Cavan was born at Atlantic Mine, Michigan, December 30, 1885. His father, David Cavan, came from his native Scotland as a youth, and was a pioneer in the copper region of the Northern Peninsula of Michi- gan. He was a merchant there, later manager of the stores of the Atlan- tic Mining Company, and exemplified all the Scotch instinct for business shrewdness. He became an American citizen and died in 1899. His wife was Susan Cook, and they reared three children.
David Cavan spent his early manhood in and around Houghton, Michigan. He graduated from the high school of that city and in 1907
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finished the course of the Michigan College of Mines at Houghton. With this technical education he came at once to the Mesaba Range, and has been continuously in the service of Pickands, Mather and Company. Until 1910 he was mining engineer at the Elba Mine, then until 1912, assistant mining captain at the Elba and Corsica Mines, from 1912 to 1914 was mining captain of the Mohawk Mine at Aurora, was mining captain of the Belgrade Mine at Biwabik from 1914 to 1917, and super- intendent of the Bangor. Mohawk and Hudson Mines from 1917 to 1919. For the past two years he has been assistant general superin- tendent of the entire district.
Mr. Cavan is a member of the Engineers' Club of Northern Minne- sota and the Eshquaguma Club. During the World war he was captain of Company C of the Minnesota Home Guards. He served two years as a member of the School Board at Aurora, and has endeavored to make his influence count as a good citizen, though for the most part his time and energies have been completely absorbed in his regular business. He is a member of the Episcopal Church, a Republican, and a Mason, and in 1918 served as master of Biwabik Lodge No. 293.
On September 5. 1912, Mr. Cavan married Miss Alice Stanchfield. Their two children are David and Ann Elizabeth.
JOSEPH BINNEY. The first scenes he looked out upon as a child with conscious memory were those of a famous mining section in south- western England, and Joseph Binney has had all the experiences of a miner from boyhood, has been identified with every phase of mine opera- tions, has mined coal as well as the metals, and for a number of years past has been mining captain of the Elba and Corsica Mines at Gilbert for Pickands. Mather and Company.
He was born in the parish of St. Clear. Cornwall, England. December 7. 1857, son of Henry and Mary Ann (Jay) Binney, who lived and died in England. He was one of nine children, only three of whom are now living. Growing up in his native country, with a modest period of school- ing. he began work at the age of eleven in the copper ore mines of Cornwall. He was twenty-three years of age when in 1880 he made his first visit to the United States. At that time he came to the mining district of the Great Lakes, being employed in the Osceola Mine at Calumet, Michigan. Later he worked in the mines of Iron Mountain. Michigan, and subsequently was employed to direct the operations of sinking a shaft for an anthracite coal mine at Scranton, Pennsylvania. In 1884 he went to New York city and for a time was foreman in tun- nel construction while one of the great aqueducts was being built for the city water supply.
Then following a brief visit to his home in England Mr. Binney entered the service of the Pittsburg & Lake Angeline Company at Ish- peming, Michigan, as a miner and later as shift boss. He came to the Mesaba Range of northern Minnesota in 1902, and for eighteen consecu- tive years has been mining captain of the Elba and Corsica Mines oper- ated by Pickands, Mather & Company. Captain Binney is one of the oldest mining captains in point of continuous service on the Mesaba Range, and is a man highly honored in his profession, enjoying the com- plete confidence of his superiors as to his efficiency and technical judg- ment, and also the friendship of those under him.
Captain Binney is affiliated with the Independent Order of Odd Fel- lows, with the Lodge of Foresters at Ishpeming, and is a thirty-second degree Scottish Rite Mason and a member of Aad Temple of the Mystic Shrine. He is a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church.
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June 19, 1886. Mr. Binney married Louisa Stephens, of Tremar Comb, Cornwall, England. Mrs. Binney died July 6, 1913, the mother of five children, named Elsie, Maud, Louisa Jane, Harriet Ann (now deceased), Thomas Henry and Celia May. Captain Binney's only son. Thomas H., was a corporal in the One Hundred and Twenty-sixth United States Artillery. He saw service with his command in France and was mustered out with an honorable discharge.
LEONARD C. DAVID. As a mining engineer few men in northern Minnesota have had such a varied and eventful experience as Leonard C. David, now general superintendent of the Eastern Mesaba District for Pickands, Mather & Company.
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The headquarters of this great corporation which he represents at the Elba location are in Cleveland, and Mr. David was born in that city Octo- ber 13, 1881. son of Herman and Bessie (Mayer) David. His father was a native of Germany and his mother of Cleveland. Both parents are now deceased. One of four children, Leonard C. David grew up in his native city, graduated from the Central High School in 1899, and acquired his technical education in the Case School of Applied Science. He was graduated 'as a mining engineer in 1903.
His professional career covers seventeen years. The first two years were spent as engineer at the Loretto Mine on the Menominee Range in Michigan ; another year in the lead district of southwest Missouri; and in March, 1906, he came to the Mesaba Range in northern Minnesota. For one year he was at Mountain Iron, engineer for the Oliver Iron Min- ing Company, and during that time laid out the Stephens Mine at Colby, had charge of the original drilling of the Norman Mine and the engi- neering work at the Higgins and Mountain Iron Mines. A promotion then put him at the operating end of the work as pit foreman of the Mountain Iron Mine. Later he was made mining captain of the Hig- gins Mine, and succeeding that was mining captain of the Norman Mine of the Oliver Iron Mining Company.
In April, 1913, on the recommendation of the . Oliver Iron Mining Company, Mr. David was sent to Russia to be superintendent of the Caucasas Copper Company's mines in Asiatic Russia. The great bank- ing house of J. P. Morgan & Company was financially interested in these properties, and he remained there two years, until the Turkish invasion of the Caucasus Region in November, 1914, stopped the mining, opera- tions. From the beginning of the World war until it became absolutely necessary for the staff of the company to make a sudden exodus more or less excitement prevailed every day, though the staff members, com- posed of English, Scotch and American, made every effort against great odds to keep the mines and smelters in operation with a maximum pro- duction of refined copper, so greatly and urgently needed by the Allies.
Mr. David returned to the United States on December 24, 1914, and in February. 1915, was made mining captain of the Leonard and Alex- andria Mines of the Arthur Mining Company at Chisholm, Minnesota. Clement K. Quinn subsequently engaged him as general superintendent, and in that capacity he developed properties which he had acquired on the Cuyuna and Mesaba Ranges. August 1, 1918, Mr. David became assistant general superintendent for Pickands, Mather & Company, and November 15th of the same year was made general superintendent, the office he has since filled. He is a member of the Engineers' Club of Northern Minnesota.
January 11. 1911. Mr. David married Miss Margaret Champion, of Loretto, Michigan. They have two children. The older, May A., was
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born October 7. 1911. at Virginia, Minnesota. The son, Lawrence J., was born August 26, 1914, at Alexandrovsky. Russia. Mr. David is a Republican, is a member of Eveleth Lodge No. 239, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, is a charter member of Virginia Chapter No. 77, Royal Arch Masons, a member of Duluth Consistory No. 3 of the Scot- tish Rite and Aad Temple of the Mystic Shrine. He is a charter member . of Sigma Alpha Epsilon college fraternity at Case School of Applied Science at Cleveland, is a member of the Eshquaguma Club, and is inter- ested in civic affairs, being a director of the Curling Club and director of the Gilbert Commercial Club.
FREDERICK BARRETT. M. D. An accomplished physician and surgeon and public health leader, Doctor Barrett has lived in the mining districts of northern Minnesota .since boyhood, and for over a quarter of a cen- tury has practiced medicine and surgery. He was a medical officer in the army during the World war.
Doctor Barrett, whose home is at Gilbert, was born in Liberty, Mis- sissippi. September 17, 1875. His father, Frederick Barrett, Sr., a native of Pennsylvania, served as a Union soldier in the Eighty-second Pennsyl- vania Infantry during the Civil war, and after the war became a revenue officer in the south during the reconstruction period. He was also a county superintendent of schools and private secretary to the governor of Mississippi. After returning to the north he lived in Wisconsin until 1888. when he moved his family to Tower, Minnesota. He at once became one of the influential men in the Iron Range. He published the Vermillion Iron Journal, the Ely Iron Home, and was publisher of the first paper at Merritt, the first town on the Mesaba Range. Though he died at Duluth May 17, 1895, his name is still spoken with honor through- out St. Louis County.
Dr. Frederick Barrett was twelve years of age when brought to Tower, acquired a public school education, graduated in 1893 from Breck College at Wilder, Minnesota, and began the study of medicine under Doctor Harwood at Tower. In 1897 he graduated from Rush Medical College in Chicago, following which he practiced at Tower two months, six months in the Virginia Hospital, was associated with Doctor More of Eveleth a year and a half, and for ten years was with his old pre- ceptor. Doctor Harwood. in the Fayal Hospital. Since then Doctor Bar- rett has practiced in Gilbert. While at Fayal he served two years as a member of the Board of Supervisors of the township, was health officer at Eveleth, and since coming to Gilbert has been deputy county coroner. He was elected and for several years past has been president of the village of Gilbert.
Doctor Barrett is a member of the County and State Medical Societies and the American Medical Association. His experience and special talents have brought him distinct fame as an obstetrician, and he has prepared many papers on obstetrics for medical journals. He has been the professional attendant at more than twenty-two hundred births. Doctor Barrett was in the service of the Government in the Medical Corps for thirteen months, first as lieutenant, then as captain, and after the close of the war was commissioned major in the Medical Reserve Corps. He received his medical officer's training at Fort Riley, Kansas, and his chief duty was at Camp Lewis, Washington, where he had com- mand of the Motor Ambulance Company in the sanitary train.
Doctor Barrett is a thirty-second degree Scottish Rite Mason, is a member of the Episcopal Church, and a Republican in politics. On August 25, 1904, he married Edith Smith, of Beaver Dam, Wisconsin. He has one son, John Frederick.
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FERMANAH P. RUTHERFORD has been in the great mining district of northern Michigan and northern Minnesota for over thirty years, and has had an interesting variety of experience. For a number of years past he has been chief clerk at the Elba Mine of Pickands, Mather & Company for the Eastern Mesaba District.
The Rutherford family has a conspicuous record in war as well as in peace. Three of Mr. Rutherford's sons were gallant soldiers in the World war. The Rutherfords originally were Scotch, but for several gen- erations the family have lived in the North of Ireland. His grandfather, Adam Rutherford, served as an officer in the British army and partici- pated in the battle of Waterloo. One of his great-grandsons just a cen- tury later was wounded not far from the Waterloo battlefield. Adam Rutherford late in life brought his family from Ireland to Canada. He was a pensioner of the British Government and came to Canada to take possession of a grant of land conferred on him by the British Crown.
His son, David Rutherford, was born in Ireland, and married Mar- garet McKnight, a native of the same country. David Rutherford was twelve years of age when his people came to Canada, and as a youth he became a logger and for many years was engaged in lumber operations in Canada. He and his wife are both deceased, but of their ten chil- dren nine are still living.
One of these is Fermanah P. Rutherford, who was born at Owen Sound, Ontario, April 14, 1868. He grew up in Canada, was educated in public schools, also had a commercial course, and was eighteen when he first came to the United States. His first employment was hauling wood for a steam engine on the Gogebic Range of northern Michigan. Then followed other occupations, including merchandising, service as assistant postmaster at Ironwood, and as railroad messenger for the United States Express Company on the Northwestern Railway.
At Ironwood, Michigan, October 13, 1892, Mr. Rutherford married Francis Elkerton. For about six years following he operated a store at Hurley. From that he entered the service of the Oliver Iron Mining Company as clerk in the Tilden Mine at Bessemer, and then as cashier of the Forest Mine near Iron Mountain. Mr. Rutherford came to Eveleth, Minnesota, in 1902 as assistant chief clerk for. the Oliver Iron Mining Company, and in 1907 began the duties he has since performed as chief clerk at the Elba Mine for Pickands, Mather & Company.
His friends and associates know him as a man of vigorous action and good citizenship. During the World war he was a member of the Minnesota Home Guards and is still a member of that organization, which performed some valuable service in wartime in suppressing sedi- tion. From 1908 to 1919 he was clerk of the Mesaba Mountain town- ship, and since 1910 has been a member of the Board of Directors of Independent School District No. 18. Mr. Rutherford is a Republican, an elder in the Presbyterian Church, is the fifteenth to hold the office of worshipful master of Eveleth Lodge No. 239, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, and is also affiliated with the Independent Order of Odd Fel- lows and the Knights of Pythias.
The three sons and one daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Rutherford are Harold McKnight, Cyril F., D. Dewey and Jean. This was one of the few families in northern Minnesota to contribute all its sons to the war. Harold was in the Twenty-seventh Engineers, Dewey, in the One Hun- dred and Twenty-sixth Regiment of Infantry, while Cyril was in the British army. The first two saw active service in France. Harold, who held the non-commissioned office of sergeant, was twice wounded in the engagement at Vilesnes-sur-Meuse when within the German lines.
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NORRIS J. COLVIN has been a member of the Range country of north- ern Minnesota for twenty-eight years, has seen practically all the pioneer development of several sections, and has been a busy factor, achieving definite success for himself and contributing something to the welfare of his community. He has been a resident of Gilbert for twelve years, practically since the beginning of the village, and is an executive officer in one of the largest lumber, fuel and building material concerns in this part of the state.
He is a native of Minnesota, born near Monticello March 13, 1870, one of seven children, four of whom are still living. His parents were Jacob James and Anna Eliza (Griswold) Colvin. His father in early life was a school teacher and farmer, and later a carpenter. While working at his trade in the erection of some of the large terminal build- ings in Kansas City he was accidentally killed in 1885. His widow is still living and now makes her home at Los Angeles, California.
Norris J. Colvin has been a life-long resident of Minnesota. When he was four years of age his parents moved to Anoka, where he attended the graded schools. He was fifteen when his father died, and soon after- ward the family moved to Duluth and later lived in other places. For several years Norris Colvin was at Minneapolis in the employ of a large carpet concern.
His association with the Range country began in October, 1893, at Biwabik. where his brother was in the lumber business in partnership with James A. Robb. Later the business was incorporated as the Colvin- Robb Lumber Company. Norris Colvin becoming an official of the corpo- ration. A reincorporation was effected in 1916 under the title of the Northern Lumber & Coal Company. This business is now a widespread commercial enterprise conducting seven yards, at Aurora, Biwabik, Eveleth, Hibbing. Gary and Gilbert in Minnesota, and at South Superior in Wisconsin. Norris J. Colvin has been the firm's representative at Gilbert since the spring of 1908, and he established a yard and sold some of the first lumber and building material used in the pioneer construc- tion of the town. Altogether his life on the Mesaba Range has been coextensive with the principal period of development in this section. As a good business man he has been looked to for leadership in Gilbert. He is a Republican, a member of the Presbyterian Church, and is affili- ated with the Knights of Pythias.
On August 20, 1902, Mr. Colvin married Miss Clara West, of Gales- burg, Illinois. Their children are Francis West. Marion Ruth, Betty Elizabeth and Clara Louise.
CARLTON A. WEBB, the efficient and popular station agent for the Duluth, Missabe & Northern Railroad in the village of Mountain Iron. claims the fine old Gopher state as the place of his nativity, he having been born at St. Paul, the capital city of Minnesota, on the 24th of Feb- ruary. 1885. His father, Isaac W. Webb, was born at Salem, Ohio, and became a pioneer settler in the city of St. Paul, Minnesota, where he took up his residence in the year 1852 and became bookkeeper in the Ameri- can House, one of the early hotels of the capital city. Later he became one of the principals in the firm of Cook & Webb, which established and operated an omnibus line in that city, and finally he purchased a large tract of land near Crookston, this state, and instituted the develop- ment of a farm. Eventually he returned to St. Paul and engaged in the real estate business. Both he and his wife died in St. Paul. Mrs. Webb, whose maiden name was Edna Parker, was born at Wheeling, Illinois, of English parentage.
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Carlton A. Webb, the youngest in a family of nine children, gained his early education in the public schools of St. Paul, where he was graduated in the Mechanic Arts High School as a member of the class of 1905. Thereafter he was employed about one year as clerk in the office of the Gotzin Shoe Company at St. Paul, and for the ensuing two years held a clerical position in the general offices of the Great Northern Railroad in his native city. After learning telegraphy he was assigned by this company to the position of telegraph operator at Buhl, and about four months later was transferred to Virginia, St. Louis County, where he served as cashier at the Great Northern Station for one year. During the ensuing three years he was station agent at Bovey, and he then accepted the position of relief agent in the service of the Minnesota & Northern Railroad. In September, 1913, he came to Mountain Iron, where he has since continued in effective service as station agent for the Duluth, Missabe & Northern Railroad, with all departments under excellent systematization and with service that marks him as a most efficient executive and one whose personal popularity is of unequivocal order. Mr. Webb has taken loyal interest in the welfare and advance- ment of Mountain Iron, where he served two terms, 1915-17, as village clerk, was elected village president in March, 1921, and has served as a member of the municipal finance committee and as a valued member of the Board of Education, of which he was a director in 1918, chair- man in 1919, and of which he is clerk at the time of this writing, in 1920. He is a Republican of independent proclivities, is a thirty-second degree Mason and a member of Aad Temple, Ancient Arabic Order Nobles of the Mystic Shrine, of Duluth. He and his wife hold mem- bership in the Presbyterian Church. In the World war period Mr. Webb gave every possible aid in furtherance of the Governmental loan drives in St. Louis County by personally taking subscriptions for the loans and the savings stamps and by active membership in the Defense League.
July 20, 1910, recorded the marriage of Mr. Webb to Miss Ethel G. Wescott, who was born at Altoona, Wisconsin, of Scotch and English lineage, and their one child, Edna Grace, was born February 15, 1913.
JOHN C. McGILVERY. For a number of years John C. McGilvery has figured prominently as a lawyer, public official and man of affairs in the Iron Range district of northern Minnesota. He has had a large law practice, and has also played an important constructive part in the business and civic affairs of this section of the state. He was appointed justice of the peace in 1898, and the Governor of the state appointed him the first municipal judge at Eveleth. For two years he was United States commissioner, has served as village attorney for Aurora, Biwabik,Gilbert and Costin, is now village attorney of Leonidas, and is in his third term as attorney for the city of Eveleth. He was attorney for the Charter Commission of Eveleth when the commission form of government was inaugurated.
Mr. McGilvery is a stockholder and vice president of the Miners National Bank of Eveleth, and has some very extensive realty, interests in St. Louis and other counties. He is a Republican, a Presbyterian, is an active member and for three years was president of the Eveleth Commercial Club, and is affiliated with the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks.
WILLIAM W. WEBER, M. D., is a young man whose character and ability have given him distinct prestige as one of the representative physicians and surgeons of St. Louis County, and he is engaged in the
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successful practice of his profession at Mountain Iron. In addition to his private practice, which is of substantial order, he is associated in a pro- fessional way with the Shaw Hospital at Buhl. He was in service as a member of the medical corps of the United States Army at the time of the nation's participation in the World war, and prior to coming to Minnesota he had unusual experience both in his present profession and in connection with educational affairs.
Dr. Weber was born at Iowa City, Iowa, on the 26th of March, 1887, and is the eldest of the four children of William W. and Clara ( Harring- ton) Weber, the former of whom was born at Baltimore, Maryland, July 5, 1862, and the latter of whom was born near Williamsburg, Iowa. November 15, 1867, she being a representative of one of the sterling pioneer families of that section of the Hawkeye state. The parents of Dr. Weber still reside in Iowa City, where the father is living virtually retired after many years of application to the sturdy trade of blacksmith.
In the public schools of his native city Dr. Weber continued his studies until his graduation from high school in 1906, and thereafter he was for two years a teacher in the Institute Americano at La Paz, Bolivia, where he was retained by the Bolivian government to assist in instituting American educational methods in the schools of that South American nation. Upon his return to his home city, the seat of the University of Iowa. Dr. Weber entered the medical department of that institution, where he continued his technical studies three years. He was then tendered and accepted the position of house physician at the hospital of the Medical College of Kansas City. Missouri, in which institution he became a member of the senior class and continued his medical studies while acting also as house physician at the hospital and as demonstrator of anatomy in the college. He was graduated from this college as a member of the class of 1912. and after thus receiving his degree of doctor of medicine he engaged in the private practice of his profession at Leon, Kansas. In the summer of the fol- lowing year he transferred his field of professional work to Hartford, that state, where he continued in practice until August 19. 1917, when he was commissioned a first lieutenant in the medical corps of the United States Army and assigned to Fort Riley, Kansas, to receive pre- liminary training. There he remained until the 21st of January, 1918, when he was honorably discharged, owing to physical disability. It was a matter of extreme regret to him that he was not permitted to continue his service in connection with the military activities of his country in the climacteric period of the World war.
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