USA > Missouri > Centennial history of Missouri, vol. 1 > Part 21
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John C. Settle
buildings, not only of St. Louis, but also of other sections of the state, including the Varied Industries building of the Louisiana Purchase Exposition, which was built at a cost of seven hundred and twenty thousand dollars. He likewise had the contraet for a number of the state buildings and other smaller structures of the exposition. At Jefferson Barracks he erected the administration building, the arsenal, the barracks, the quartermaster's storehouse and two large ware- houses seventy-five by three hundred feet. He did much construction work at Fort Riley, Kansas, and has been the builder of several postoffices and custom houses for the government. He likewise did much work for the state and was also the builder of various churches, including the Union Methodist church of St. Louis, which, though erected a number of years ago, is still in perfect con- dition. For several years he did all carpenter work for W. A. Cann at Jefferson City and he built the gymnasium and Sunday school building of the Evangelical church, which is the largest structure of the kind in the state. During the last five years of his life Mr. Settle had the contract for all building for the Laclede Gas Light Company and the Madison Coal Corporation. For the latter he built sixty houses for its employes at its mines in Kentucky. At one time he had under construction fifty bungalows for the Cairo Real Estate Improvement Company at Cairo, Illinois, and at Carterville, Illinois, he built fifty-two houses. Not long prior to his demise he began specializing in the wholesale construction of homes and he negotiated with housing corporations from the Lakes to the Gulf. In fact, Mr. Settle was one of the best known contractors and builders of the entire Mississippi valley. His operations were most extensive and of an important character and he was well qualified to handle large contracts requir- ing the employment of hundreds of workmen. He thoroughly understood every scientifie principle of his business besides all the practical phases of construe- tion, and his powers of organization and executive force were dominant ele- ments in the attainment of his place of prominence and his gratifying success.
On the 24th of December, 1902, Mr. Settle was married to Miss Agnes Price, a daughter of Elwyn Price of Versailles, Missouri. For seventy years her father has lived at Versailles, where he has followed farming and merchan- dising. Ile was brought from Roanoke, Virginia, when five years of age by his parents. Ilis father went to California in the gold rush of 1849 and there his death occurred. Mrs. Price was descended from the Livingston family, which came from Scotland in early days and settled in Virginia. To Mr. and Mrs. Settle were born two children, Nadine and John C., Jr.
In politics Mr. Settle was an independent democrat. Religiously he was connected with St. John's Methodist Episcopal church of St. Louis and was always active in church and Sunday school work, serving for fifteen years as the teacher of the Bible elass. He was a Mason, belonging to Rose Hill Lodge No. 550, A. F. & A. M., of St. Louis; and to St. Louis Chapter, No. 8, R. A. M. He was also connected with Odd Fellows Lodge, No. 5, of St. Louis, and passed through all of the chairs to captain in the lodge at Pueblo, Colorado. He like- wise belonged to the City Club and to the Chamber of Commerce and his interests were broad and varied, for while preeminently a busy and successful business man, he never neglected his duties and obligations in any particular. The attainment of success was never the sole end and aim of his life, but only a means to an end, and that end was largely service to others.
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Thomas J. Mlplet
HOMAS J. MYLET, who through an active and prosperous bus- T iness career has been identified with various lines which have contributed to general prosperity and advancement as well as to individual success, is now the president of the American Auto Supply Company of St. Louis and of a number of other business concerns of importance. He was born in Greenfield, Indiana, February 21, 1879. His father, P. F. Mylet, was a native of Ireland and was brought to the United States by his parents when but six years of age, the family home being established at Cincinnati, Ohio. There he resided until he had attained his majority and then removed to Rush- ville, Indiana, where he engaged in the grain business. Later he became a prosperous farmer of that state, in which he continued to make his home until called to his final rest in June, 1917. Ile had served his country as a soldier in the Civil war and was a most loyal and patriotic citizen throughout his entire career. He married Ella Sullivan, a native of Ireland, and she, too, passed away in 1917. Their family numbered ten children, eight of whom are yet living.
Thomas J. Mylet pursued his education in the schools of his native state and was graduated from the high school of Bunker Hill, Indiana. Subsequently he attended the normal school and for two years engaged in the profession of teaching, but, thinking to find other pursuits more congenial, he directed his efforts elsewhere. He was engaged in the retail clothing business at Peru, Indiana, for a time and later spent several years in traveling through Indiana and Ohio as representative of a large New York wholesale clothing house, Ile next went to Texas as representative of the John B. Farwell Land Company and sold a million aeres of land in that state for the corporation which he repre- sented. He next removed to Charleston, Missouri, in 1909, and took up the work of developing and selling land in the southeastern section of the state. In February, 1917, he established his home in St. Louis and he now owns and operates very successfully five thousand acres of farm land, located in Missouri, Illinois and Indiana. His business affairs have been most judiciously managed. He is the president of the American Auto Supply Company and has various other business interests, being president of the Mylet Brothers Shoe Company of Peru, Indiana, while still other commercial concerns have profited by the stimulus of his activity and his enterprise. In July, 1919, he promoted an oil company which was financially independent without any stock selling. A three thousand acre traet of land was purchased in Wilbarger county, Texas, and the company was called the Prescott Peoria Oil Company of Wichita Falls, Texas. Shortly after boring was commenced and according to the prophecy of
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Thomas J. Oplet
experts, oil was struck. At the present time the few investors in land on this tract are in a fair way of becoming financially independent.
Mr. Mylet belongs to the Missouri Athletic Association, also to the Benev- olent Protective Order of Elks and is a fourth degree member of the Knights of Columbus. He is a man of affable manner and genial disposition, who in business is both forceful and resourceful, and has been particularly suc- cessful in the development of farm property. He carries forward to success- ful completion whatever he undertakes and in his vocabulary there is no such word as fail.
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Grayer Bringt
Gray C. Briggs, A.D.
R. GRAY C. BRIGGS, a well known Roentgenologist, was D born in Burlington, Iowa, June 30, 1882, a son of Dr. Waldo Briggs, who became a noted surgeon of St. Louis. Hle was born at Bowling Green, Kentucky, July 3, 1856, his parents being William Thompson and Anna (Stubbins) Briggs. He won his professional degree on the completion of a course in the medical department of the University of Nashville, at Nashville, Tennessee, and in 1877 began practice in St. Louis. From 1895 until 1898 he was professor of surgery in Beaumont Medical College and in the latter year accepted the professorship of surgery in the St. Louis College of Physicians and Surgeons, since continuing in this position. He is also superintendent of Jefferson Hospital and is president and dean of the St. Louis College of Physi- eians and Surgeons. Fraternally he is connected with the Knights of Pythias. He wedded Nellie Gray, a native of Jamestown, New York, who passed away at the age of forty-five years.
Dr. Gray C. Briggs, their only child, was educated in the public schools of St. Louis and the Central high school. after which he became a student in the University of Chicago and later attended the College of Physicians and Surgeons of St. Louis, from which he was graduated in 1909 with the M. D. degree. Fol- lowing his graduation he spent the first year at clinical work in the college and then entered upon private practice, in which he continued until 1912. In that year he took up special X-ray work, in which he has since engaged and is now widely known as an able Roentgenologist. Ile keeps in touch with professional thought and progress through his connection with the St. Louis and Missouri State Medieal Societies, the American Radiological Society and the American Roentgen Ray Society. From October, 1918, until March 1, 1919, he served in the United States navy with the rank of senior lieutenant.
On the 18th of June, 1919, Dr. Briggs was married in St. Charles, Missouri, to Miss Edith Ingram, a native of St. Louis and a daughter of William and Mary (Holloran) Ingram. Fraternally Dr. Briggs is connected with the Missouri Athletic Association and is a member of the Phi Chi fraternity. In politics he maintains an independent course, nor has he ever sought or desired office. preferring to concentrate his efforts and his energies upon his professional inter- ests. He has become an authority in the line of his specialty and has contributed many articles to scientifie magazines on X-ray work.
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6 ( devar J. Hach
Coward Studley Dart
DWARD STUDLEY HART, who died May 10, 1921, occupied E one of the finest homes in Webster Groves. For many years he ranked with the leading printers of St. Louis and his service as mayor of Webster Groves and as the promoter of many public interests well entitled him to the high esteem in which he was held. His was indeed a well spent life and as the architect of his own fortunes he builded wisely and well. A native of Mississippi he was born in Carrollton, March 9, 1855, his parents being Charles C. and Olivia (Studley) Hart. In the acquirement of his educa- tion he attended the common schools of Shawneetown, Ilinois, his parents having removed to Logan, Ohio, and then to Illinois. He passed through con- secutive grades, becoming a high school pupil and after his textbooks were put aside he entered upon an apprenticeship to the trade of compositor under R. P. Studley & Company in 1871. This firm was established in 1853 and Mr. Hart continued in active connection from 1871 until 1919, or for a period of forty- eight years, at the end of which time he retired from active business to enjoy in leisure the fruits of his former toil. He made steady advancement in his business career, became a member of the firm in 1876 and was elected the president and treasurer of the company upon its incorporation in 1905. The company engaged in business as manufacturing printers, bookbinders and lithog- raphers and through the assistance and later under the guidance of Mr. Hart a business of extensive proportions was built up. He also became the first vice-president of the Bank of Webster Groves, and was everywhere recognized as a man of sound business judgment, keen sagacity and unfaltering enterprise and the most envious could not grudge him his success, so creditably was it won and so honorably was it used.
On the Sth of May, 1898, Mr. Hart was united in marriage in Webster Groves to Miss Florence Bate and to them were born three sons and a daughter: Edward S., Jr .; Elizabeth; Robert Page, and Donald Bate. A daughter of a previous marriage, Margaret, married H. M. Patton and lives in Webster Groves.
Mr. Hart became a member of the St. Louis Typothetae and was long identified with the Masonie fraternity, in which he had become a Knight Templar in the York Rite and a Consistory Mason in the Scottish Rite. He was also a member of the Mystic Shrine. His religions faith was that of the Congrega- tional church and his political belief was that of the republican party. For seven years he filled the office of alderman of Webster Groves and for an equal period was mayor of the city. Under his administration the electric lights and water and sewer systems were installed, sidewalks were laid and the little village of twenty-five hundred grew to a thriving city of eighty-five hundred, peopled by a class of progressive men who were attracted to the beautiful suburban city
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Coward Studley Dart
as a desirable location in which to reside. It has been the home of many of the most progressive and successful business men of St. Louis, including Mr. Hart, the man whom his fellow townsmen delighted to honor as their "first citizen" for seven years.
henry A. Smith, A.D.
R. HENRY A. SMITH, physician and surgeon of St. Louis and D also the president and medical director of the People's Life & Accident Insurance Company, a Missouri corporation, was born in Madison, Jefferson county, Indiana, September 16, 1857. He was educated in the public schools of Madison and pursued his medical course in the American Medical College, an Eclectic School of St. Louis, from which he was graduated with the M. D. degree in 1905. Various experiences, however, had come to him ere he prepared for his present profession. At the age of fourteen years he started out to earn his own living and was apprenticed by his father to the drug business, which he continued to follow successfully for a decade. During the succeeding ten years of his life he was connected with the Wabash Railroad Company at Moberly, Missouri, acting as chief clerk for five years in the yardmaster's office and later as assistant chief clerk in the office of the master ear builder. When twenty-eight years of age he entered the ministry of the Methodist Episcopal church, South, and served as an ordained clergyman in the Missouri conference. He is still active as a local elder in that church. On the 1st of August, 1898, he removed to St. Louis and became connected with the Prudential Insurance Company. While thus engaged he studied medicine and in this way was able to make his way through college. Since 1905 he has been continuously engaged in practice and his success is indicated in the large number of his patients. He is constantly reading and studying to broaden his knowledge and promote his efficiency and his ability as an able general prac- titioner is widely acknowledged. He is also the president and the medical director of the People's Life & Accident Insurance Company, a Missouri cor- poration. He belongs to the State Eclectic Medical Association and also to the National Eeleetie Association.
At Indianapolis, Indiana, on the 10th of June, 1878, Dr. Smith was united in marriage to Miss Addie Ballinger, a native of Indiana. They have become parents of three children, Grace, Mabel and Ella, but the last two have passed away. Dr. Smith and family are members of the Mount Auburn Methodist Episcopal church, South, and Dr. Smith is connected with Aurora Lodge, No. 267, A. F. & A. M., of which he formerly served as chaplain. In politics he is a staneh demoerat but not an office secker, preferring to concentrate his efforts upon his professional duties. His life has been a busy one and of great useful- ness and value to his fellowmen, for he has ever contributed to the physical, intellectual and moral progress of the communities in which he has lived. Hle deserves much eredit for what he has accomplished and has been both the builder and architect of his own fortunes.
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John & Viannay
John Leo Tierney, M.D.
D R. JOHN LEO TIERNEY, a St. Louis physician who special- izes in internal medicine and diagnosis, was born in Lead, South Dakota, November 22. 1590, a son of William George and Mary (Yuren) Tierney. The family comes of Irish ancestry, although many generations ago representatives of the name removed to England, where one of the ancestors of Dr. Tierney was knighted as Sir Edward Tierney and a statue erected to his memory in Westminster Abbey. Another of the carly ancestors was Sir Matthew Tierney, who was at one time court physician to King George III. William G. Tierney, father of the Doctor, in 1899 became interested in mining and went over the White Pass to Dawson and thence by dog team to Cape Nome, Alaska. He was twice elected mayor of Cape Nome, but refused the office. He is now a retired mining engineer, making his home in California. His wife died in 1891, when her son, John L., was but a year and a half old.
Dr. Tierney received his early educational training fron the Sisters of Mercy at Manchester, Iowa, and for one year was a student in St. Viateur's College near Kankakee, Illinois. Later he attended St. Mary's College at St. Marys, Kansas, and next became a student in the St. Louis University of St. Louis, Missouri. He also pursued special courses in Harvard University and in Wash- ington University in St. Louis. He was graduated at St. Mary's in 1910, re- ceiving the Bachelor of Arts degree, and from the St. Louis University in 1914, at which time the M. D. degree was conferred upon him. In 1912 he also received the Master of Arts degree from St. Mary's College. Since completing his medical course he has confined his efforts and attention to practice and has largely specialized in internal medicine and diagnosis. He served as interne in St. John's Hospital of St. Louis and afterward entered into partnership with Dr. William Engelbach of this city in 1916. Ite has also been well known as a lecturer upon medical subjects and following America's entrance into the World war he enlisted for service in the Medical Corps in August. 1917. He was sent to Camp Cody, near Deming. New Mexico, in September and was chief of the medical service there. In July, 1918, he was transferred to Des Moines, Iowa, was afterward sent to New Jersey and sailed for France in September, 1918. While overseas he was stationed at Bazoilles sur Meuse in connection with Base Hospital, No. 79, and when his aid was no longer needed across the water he returned to St. Louis with the rank of captain in May, 1919.
Dr. Tierney had been married in Normandy, St. Louis county, Missouri, on the 23d of May, 1914, to Miss Marguerite Mary Curran, a daughter of Con P. and Margaret Ann (Seully) Curran. Mrs. Tierney is a pupil of the Madames of the Sacred Heart. Her father built up a large publishing business in St.
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John Leo Tierney, S.D.
Louis. Mrs. Curran died in 1920, leaving a family of four daughters and three sons, while one daughter died in 1918. The children of Dr. and Mrs. Tierney are: Margaret Ann, John Leo, Florence Katherine and Mary Kathleen.
The religious faith of the family is that of the Roman Catholic church and Dr. Tierney belongs to the Knights of Columbus. Politically he maintains a non-partisan attitude and he is prominent socially through his membership in the University Club, the Glen Echo Golf Club and the Players Club, his geniality and unfeigned cordiality winning him friends wherever he goes. In the strict path of his profession he is identified with the American Medical Association, the Missouri State Medical Society, St. Louis Medical Society, the Southern Medical Society, the Southwestern Medical Society, the Mississippi Valley Medical Society and the Association for the Study of Internal Secretions.
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Jackson Johnson
BACKSON JOHNSON of St. Louis, who as chairman of the board of the International Shoe Company has gained not only American but world leadership in connection with the shoe manufacturing interests, was born in La Grange, Alabama, on the 2nd of November, 1859, a son of James Lee and Helen (Rand) Johnson, the former a native of Mississippi, while the latter was born in Alabama. The father owned and conducted a plantation up to the time of the Civil war. J
Jackson Johnson pursued his education in the public schools of his native state and when nineteen years of age initiated his business career by becoming identified with a general merchandise establishment at Holly Springs, Miss- issippi, where he conducted business until 1892. He then disposed of his store and in the following year removed to Memphis, Tennessee, where he was active in organizing the Johnson, Carruthers & Rand Company, a business concern of which he remained the president for five years. On selling out he removed to St. Louis in March, 1898, and was active in organizing the Roberts, Johnson & Rand Shoe Company, manufacturers of shoes. He became president of this organization and so continued until the 29th of December, 1911, when the Roberts, Johnson & Rand Shoc Company was merged with the Peters Shoe Company, the new organization being incorporated under the name of the International Shoe Company, of which Mr. Johnson served as the president until 1915, when he became chairman of the board. This corporation controls the largest shoe manufacturing trade of the world and covers all branches of the industry. In May, 1921, they absorbed the W. II. McElwain Company of Boston, Massachusetts, and Kistler, Lesh & Company, tanners, of the same city, this deal alone involving twelve million dollars and bringing the capital- ization of the International Shoe Company up to forty-seven million dollars. Some idea of the magnitude of the enterprise which Mr. Johnson heads may be gained by the fact that the International Shoe Company is of greater magnitude than the other two largest shoe manufacturing companies of the United States combined and larger than the ten largest in Europe. From his entrance into the business world he passed on to positions of executive control and subse- quently bent his energies largely to organization, to constructive effort and administrative direction. Possessing broad, enlightened and liberal-minded views and recognizing the vast potentialities for development as well as the specifie needs of the country along the distinctive line chosen for his life work, his has been an active career in which he has accomplished important and far- reaching results. He has no active business interests outside of his connection with the shoe trade, save that he is a director of the First National Bank of St. Louis and the St. Louis Union Trust Company.
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Jackson Johnson
On the 30th of December, 1880, Mr. Johnson was married at Holly Springs, Mississippi, to Miss Minnie Alva Wooten, a daughter of Andrew Jackson and Martha (MeKinnon) Wooten, the former a native of Greenville, Pitt county, North Carolina, whenee he removed with his parents to Mississippi when very young, becoming a planter in the latter state. Both the Wooten and MeKinnon families were of Seoteh ancestry. Mrs. Wooten was a daughter of John Bushrod MeKinnon, of Glasgow, Scotland, who came to the United States in early youth and settled in Mississippi. To Mr. and Mrs. Johnson were born two sons and three daughters. Andrew Wooten, the elder son, is associated with his father in business and is now a director of the International Shoe Company. He married Helen Johnson, of Memphis, Tennessee, who though of the same name was not a relative, and they have two children, Jane and Jackson Johnson (III). The second son, Jackson Johnson, Jr., was born June 3, 1897, and was but eight months old when brought by his parents to St. Louis. When twenty years of age he enlisted for service in the World war at New York city on the 12th day of August, 1917, becoming a member of the artillery seetion in the ammunition train of the Twenty-seventh New York Regiment. He was trained in Spartanburg, South Carolina, but on account of illness was transferred in December, 1917, to the ordnance department at Washington, D. C. When twenty-one years of age, or on the 3rd of June, 1918, he joined the Tank Corps, becoming a member of Company A, Three Hundred and Thirty-second Battalion Light Tank Corps. He then received training at Gettysburg and at Tobyhanna and sailed overseas on the 24th of September, 1918. He died of pneumonia on the 9th of October following in a military hospital in Liverpool, England, and was buried in the Everton cemetery at that place, but in January, 1920, his remains were returned to the United States and on the 20th of January were placed in the family mausoleum in Bellefontaine cemetery in St. Louis. Great as is the sorrow which has come to the family in the loss of this son, he leaves behind him a splendid heritage-that of a noble name and the record of faithful service and undaunted patriotism. Despite the handicaps which seemed to deter him in military service, he nevertheless at length succeeded in getting overseas, actuated by his love of the stars and stripes, which will ever be to his family and his friends the symbol of his heroism and his devotion to the ideals and principles of democracy. Of the three daughters Helen married Lee I. Niedringhaus, of this eity, and they are the parents of two children, Marjorie and Lee I., Jr. Florence married Bradford Shinkle, of Covington, Kentucky, and they have two children, Bradford, Jr., and Jackson Johnson Shinkle. The youngest daughter of the family, Ada Rand Johnson, is one of the leaders in the younger social eireles of St. Louis and by reason of her beauty and charm was chosen for queen of the Veiled Prophets ball in the fall of 1920-the highest honor that St. Louis society ean bestow upon one of its members.
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