Encyclopedia of the history of Missouri, a compendium of history and biography for ready reference, Vol. I, Part 35

Author: Conard, Howard Louis, ed. 1n
Publication date: 1901
Publisher: New York, Louisville [etc.] The Southern history company, Haldeman, Conard & co., proprietors
Number of Pages: 856

USA > Missouri > Encyclopedia of the history of Missouri, a compendium of history and biography for ready reference, Vol. I > Part 35

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183

BATES.

cier of very superior ability and accumulated a handsome fortune in lead-mining and rail- road enterprises, and in operations in city realty. He was president of the old North Missouri (now the Wabash Western ) Railroad Company, and was conspicuously identified with the early railroad development in Mis- souri. When Hamilton R. Gamble, his old law preceptor, was Governor of Missouri, he appointed him a judge of the Supreme Court of the State to fill a vacancy, and he was sub- sequently elected to the same position for a full term. He served with distinction on the bench and was recognized as a capable and conscientious jurist. After his retirement from the Supreme Court judgeship he did not resume the practice of law, but devoted his time and attention to the care of his estate, and to varions financial enterprises, among these being the building of the Eads Bridge, of which he was one of the projectors. After- ward. retiring to his farm in St. Charles County, he lived there quietly until his death.

JOHN C. BATES, another of the sons of Edward Bates, was born in St. Louis, August 26, 1842. After receiving a thorough education in the city schools of St. Louis he was com- missioned a first lieutenant in the Elev- enth United States Infantry Regiment when he was nineteen years of age, his commission bearing date of May 14. 1861. He served with his regiment in the Army of the Potomac thereafter until April, 1863. commanding a company at the battles of Gaines' Mill, Mal- vern, Bull Run, Antietam and Fredericksburg. From December, 1862, to April, 1863. he served as adjutant of his regiment, and was then appointed aid-de-camp to the command- ing general of the Army of the Potomac, sery- ing in that capacity until the army was dis- banded in 1865. During the closing months of the war he was on duty as chief commissary of musters of the Army of the Potomac, and as such mustered fully fifty thousand men out of the service. While serving as an aid- de-camp he participated in the battles of Chan- cellorsville, Gettysburg. Rappahannock Sta- tion. Bristow Station, Mine Run, Wilderness, Spottsylvania. North Anna and Petersburg. and in the operations which resulted in the surrender of General Lee's army. For his services during the war he was breveted suc- cessively major and lieutenant colonel. Since the war he has served in Minnesota, North and South Dakota, Montana, Nebraska, Mis-

souri. Kansas, Indian Territory, Texas and New Mexico, except during one year, when he was in Washington as president of the tactical board of the army. He was second in command of the escort sent with the first surveying party west from the Missouri River to locate the line of the Northern Pacific railroad in 1871, and in 1882 was selected by General Phil Sheridan to organize the division rifle competition of the army. In 1884, while in command of four troops of cavalry and two companies of infantry, he captured about eight hundred Creek Indians, who had made war on the recognized Creek government and defied the United States authorities. For this service he was commended by General John Pope, the department commander. In 1892 he was on duty with the National Guard of the State of New York in their camp at Peekskill, and in 1803 served as a member of the board on magazine small arms, which adopted the present rifle and carbine. In 1894 he was sent in command of fourteen com- panies of infantry and four troops of cavalry to quell riots at Butte City, Montana, during the railroad strike of that year. In 1807 he was appointed president of the board to pre- pare firing regulations for the army. He was made a brigadier general in the regular army after the breaking out of the Cuban war, in May of 1898.

Bates, Frederick, second Governor of the State of Missouri and Acting Governor of the Territory of Louisiana in 1807, was born in Belmont, Goochland County, Virginia, June 23,. 1777. His parents were Quakers and very worthy people, but their means were limited, and the son had not the advantages of a liberal education. He was, however, en- dowed with very superior natural abilities and developed into a practical and able man of affairs very early in life. When he was twenty years old he went to Detroit, where he en- gaged in mercantile pursuits and served, for a time, also as postmaster at that place. While in Detroit he acquired a knowledge of the French language and a familiarity with the customs and habits of the French settlers in that region, which were subsequently of great value to him in his intercourse with the Mis- souri pioneers. In 1805 President Jefferson appointed him first United States judge for the Territory of Michigan, but a year later he removed to St. Louis. Here he became at

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once prominent in public life and also as a business man. He was appointed Secretary of the Louisiana Territory during the admin- istration of General James Wilkinson as Gov- ernor, and was Acting Governor much of the time during Wilkinson's absences from St. Louis. He also occupied judicial and legis- lative positions and exercised great influence in the conduct of public affairs during the formative period of Missouri's history as Territory and State. He was also author of the first book published in St. Louis, a com- pilation of the laws of the Territory of Louis- iana, published in 1808. At the second elec- tion after the admission of Missouri into the U'nion as a State, he was chosen Governor. succeeding Alexander McNair, the first in- cumbent of that office. He died in office, August 4, 1825, after serving about a year as chief executive of the new State. He had great force of character and left a marked im- press upon the carly history of Missouri and the city of St. Louis. His wife was Nancy Ball before her marriage, and she was a daughter of Colonel John S. Ball, of St. Louis County. They were married in 1819, and the Bates homestead was established in Bon- homme Township.

Bates, Lucius Lee, farmer and legis- lator, was born March 18, 1821, at Thornhill, . St. Louis County, Missouri, son of Honorable Frederick and Nancy (Ball) Bates. He passed his entire life in Bonhomme Township, St. Louis County ; at Thornhill, his birthplace and the parental home, until 1859, and thereafter at Belmont, not far distant. In boyhood he attended the school taught by Mr. Shepard, in St. Louis, where he was most thoroughly grounded in the rudimentary branches of an English education. This was followed by careful instruction, particularly in languages and the higher mathematics, under a tutor, in the home of his paternal uncle, Edward Bates, who soon rose to eminence, and subsequently became Attorney General in the Cabinet of President Lincoln. He finished his classical and literary studies at St. Charles College. afterward devoting himself assiduously to read- ing law under the careful tutelage of the talented uncle who had previously aided him so greatly in acquiring an education. Not- withstanding all this careful and thorough preparation, he made no effort to enter upon the practice of the profession for which he was

so well fitted, preferring to cultivate the farm upon which he lived. In this he continued during his life, until the later years, when he rented the property, not ceasing, however, to make it his home. During the session of 1851 and 1852 he was a member of the Legislature from St. Louis County, and, while a member of that body, his own was the only vote cast against the proposition to make the judges of the Supreme Court elective officers. He had no liking for politics, and declined fur- ther public service in that or any other official capacity. In politics he was a Whig, so long as the Whig party had an existence ; after its dissolution he became a Democrat, and was identified with that party until his death. Always strictly moral and upright in his con- duct, and reverent in regard to religion, he did not connect himself with any religious body until a year before his death, when he united with the Bonhomme Presbyterian Church, his predilections and sympathies hav- ing been with that denomination for many years. Soon after his admission to the church he was elected elder, but declined to serve, on account of his advanced age and failing health. In early manhood he became a Freemason, but soon ceased to affiliate with the order. Mr. Bates was married, November 28, 1854. to Miss Conway, daughter of Samuel Conway, of Bonhomme Township, St. Louis County. Her paternal grandfather, Joseph Conway, was a Virginian by birth, and in early days came from Kentucky to Missouri. He was engaged in various battles with the Indians, in one of which he was scalped and left for dead, but was rescued, and lived for years afterward. To Mr. and Mrs. Bates were born two children, both of whom are now living. Dr. Conway Bates, a practicing physician. of Clayton, Mis- souri, and Miss Lucia Lee Bates. Mr. Bates died October 24, 1898, at his home place. Although well fitted, by native ability and generous education, to take an active and use- ful part in public affairs, his naturally retiring disposition constrained him to hold aloof from all which might seem to give him prominence before his fellows. Notwithstanding this, he took an unfailing interest in politics, and all other matters affecting the general welfare, commenting upon them with rare intelligence and discrimination, when in the company of friends. A constant reader, deep thinker, and charming conversationalist, his visitors, and those with whom he met, found in him a wealth

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BAUMHOFF.

of knowledge, a sweet reasonableness of dis- course, and a well tempered judgment, that not only commanded respect, but won for him affection and reverence. His deeds were as kindly as only such a life could inspire, and remain after him "as the benediction that fol- lows after prayer."

Baumhoff, George W., street rail- way manager, was born in St. Louis, June 3, 1856, son of Frederick W. and Henrietta Baumhoff, the first named a native of the city of Cologne, Germany, and the last named of Galena, Illinois. He obtained merely the rudiments of an education in the public schools of St. Louis, and the attainl- ments which have made him remarkably suc- cessful as a man of affairs were acquired by the process of self-training and self-education while engaged in the active duties of life. His school days ended when he was nine years of age, and from that time forward he was dependent upon his own resources. His good fortune began when he became an employe of the Lindell Street Railway Com- pany, although he began work for that cor- poration in one of the humblest positions in its service. It was in 1875 that he was assigned to duty by the railway company as a hostler, with wages fixed at $1.50 per day, and lie was then nineteen years of age. He was promoted to driver of a street car and his pay advanced to two dollars a day. Out of this he saved six dol- lars a week and entrusted these surplus earn- ings to the treasurer of the company for safe- keeping. This evidence of thrift. his good deportment and superior bearing fixed upon him the attention of John H. Maxon, at that time president of the Lindell Company and a man of large experience in the conduct of af- fairs, peculiarly apt in his judgments of men. Mr. Maxon recognized in the young driver Baumhoff the qualities of sterling manliood and a latent ability which the young man did not at that time suspect himself of possessing. There were no conductors then on the com- pany's cars, and each passenger was expected to drop his nickle into a box provided for the purpose. Taking the cash from these boxes, counting the receipts and turning them into the company's treasury was the responsible position to which Mr. Baumhoff was next ad- vanced. He was then appointed general superintendent of the Lindell Railway Com- pany, and, until again promoted, sustained the

relationship of general manager and chief executive officer to a city railway system, the rapid expansion and improvement of which is probably without a parallel in the history of street railway development. The electric sys- tem was inaugurated under his supervision, and his genius can truthfully be said to have been the prime factor in developing it to its present magnificent proportions. In 1890 all the street railways of St. Louis, with a single. exception, were consolidated into one systeni under the control and management of the St. Louis Transit Company. While the details of this consolidation were being arranged, Mr. Baumhoff continued to act as superintendent of the former Lindell Railway lines, and in the meantime his capacity was being gauged and his ability measured by the new corporation and the new owners (many of them Eastern capitalists) of the St. Louis Railway. As a result, early in the year 1900 he was again promoted and became general manager of what is probably the most extensive strect rail- way system in the world. In this position he has had to deal with more perplexing prob- lems than ever before confronted a street railway manager in St. Louis, and throughout a most trying and desperate labor strike has shown himself the well balanced, fair-minded. but courageous and determined man of affairs.

For some years, Mr. Baumhoff has been prominent in the councils of the Republican party, and, although he has declined to hold any official position which would conflict with his business interests, he has served as a mem- ber of the Republican city central committee of St. Louis and was a candidate for presidential elector on the McKinley and Hobart ticket in 1896.

Baumhoff, Frederick W., post- master of St. Louis, was born in that city, January 8. 1859. son of Frederick W. and IIenrietta Baumhoff, the father a native of Cologne, Germany, and the mother of Galena, Illinois. Between the fifth and ninth years of his childhood he lived in Quincy, Illinois, and in the schools of that city and later of St. Louis he acquired a common and grammar school education. When twelve years old he went to work, and, after serving an appren- ticeship of five years to the machinist's trade, he entered the employ of the Lindell Railway Company. He served this corporation faith- fully for three years, and thien obtained a po-

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sition in the postoffice, being employed as general utility man in the newspaper depart- ment of the office, then located in the old Customhouse Building, at the corner of Third and Olive Streets. April 19, 1881, he was regularly appointed to the city postal service and thereafter was promoted succes- sively to the positions of "distributor" in the newspaper and letter departments, which handle outgoing mails; "mail dispatcher," "mail receiver," "assistant foreman," "fore- man," "assistant superintendent." "superin- tendent of the city distributing department." and finally, on April 19, 1897, the sixteenth anniversary of his appointment to the postal service, he was appointed assistant postmaster under Postmaster James L. Carlisle, who held office by appointment of President Cleveland. At the close of Mr. Carlisle's term a spirited contest was waged over the successorship, a number of the leading citizens and most prom- inent Republicans of St. Louis being pressed by their friends for the appointment. On the 28th of July. 1898. President Mckinley terminated the contest by appointing Mr. Baumhoff to the position, and he soon after- ward entered upon the discharge of his duties as one of the principal government officials of St. Louis.

Baurdick, Anthony J., banker, was born October 16, 1840, in Westphalia, Mis- souri. son of Anthony and Susanna (Koester) Baurdick, the first named a native of Prussia. and the last named of Hanover. His parents emigrated to America about the year 1836, and were married in this country, becoming early settlers at Westphalia. When he was eight years of age Anthony J. Baurdick was taken from Westphalia to Jefferson City, Missouri, and in the last named city he obtained the greater part of his education in the public schools. In May of 1861 he went to St. Louis and enlisted as a private soldier in the Eighth Missouri Volunteer Infantry Regiment, which was mustered into the United States service and with which he served three years. lle later served eighteen months in the quarter- master's department of the Union Army, being mustered out as quartermaster sergeant, No- vember 1, 1865. At the elose of the Civil War he returned to Jefferson City, where he was employed for a year and a half thereafter as a clerk in a mercantile house. Removing then to Sedalia, Missouri, he engaged in that city in

the general merchandising, commission and forwarding business with Lohman Hall & Co. for two years. In February of 1869 he established himself in the mercantile business in Neosho, Missouri, and was thus engaged until 1885. In that year he sold out his com- mercial house and became cashier of the Neosho Savings Bank. In 1889 he was made president of that prosperous banking house and has continued to occupy that position up to the present time. As a man of affairs he has gained an enviable reputation during the thirty years of his residence in Neosho, and as a citizen he has been not less highly esteemed.

Prior to the war Mr. Baurdiek affiliated with the Douglas wing of the Democratic party.

Since then he has been a consistent member of the Republican party. In 1871 he was ap- pointed treasurer of Newton County, and filled that office until the year following. For many years he was a member of the town board of Neosho, and beginning with 1882 he served a second term as treasurer of the county. He has been closely identified also with the upbuilding of the educational system of Neosho. For twelve years he served as a member of the Board of Education, and dur- ing ten years of that period he was president of the board. During his administration the present handsome high-school building was erected and the school system of the city was brought to a high state of efficiency. Mr. Baurdiek is a consistent member of the Roman Catholic Church. He is unmarried.

Bay, Samuel M., lawyer and Attorney General of Missouri, was born in Hudson, New York, in 1810, and died at St. Louis, in 1849. He received a good education at the Hudson Academy, and spent two years in Washington City as a pupil in the private school of Salmon P. Chase, afterward chief justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. On his return to New York he found employment in an importing house and was sent on business to Europe. On the com- pletion of his mission, he came back and studied law with Judge Swayne, at Columbus, Ohio. In 1833 he came to Missouri, and located at Union, the county seat of Franklin County, where he soon had a good practice. In 1836 he was elected to the Legislature. and at the elose of his term made Jefferson City his home and became one of the most successful lawyers of that bar. In 1839 Gov-

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ernor Boggs appointed him Attorney General of the State, and he held the position until 1845. Afterward he formed a partnership with Abiel Leonard, and continued the practice of his profession at Jefferson City with success until 1847, when he removed to St. Louis and became attorney for the old Bank of the State. He was in the midst of a large practice when he was stricken down with cholera, and died in the prime of his powers, in the midst of his usefulness, and in the enjoyment of the esteem of the profession and the public.

Bay, W. V. N., lawyer, Congressman and judge of the Supreme Court, was born at Hudson, New York, in 1819, and died at Eureka, St. Louis County, Missouri, February 10, 1894. He received a good education and. after studying law, came to Missouri in 1840 and located at Union, in Franklin County. In 1844 he was elected to the Legislature and at the close of his term was re-elected. In 1848 he was elected to Congress. In 1862 he was appointed by Governor Gamble judge of the Supreme Court of the State, to succeed Judge E. B. Ewing, who refused to take the convention oath of loyalty, and in 1863 he was elected to the position along with Barton Bates and John D. S. Dryden. In 1865 he was thrown out by the "Ousting Ordinance" of the convention of 1865, and retired to private life, spending his late years in the writing of the "Reminiscences of the Bench and Bar of Missouri," a book of great interest, which was published in 1878. He was a man of small stature, of quiet and retiring manner and studious habits. Judge Bay was noted for his fair-mindedness in the treatment of public and legal questions, and in all the stations of trust in which he served acquitted himself with credit. Ile was a younger brother to S. M. Bay, of Franklin. County, a distinguished practitioner who served for six years as At- torney General of the State.

Bayha, John, who has been a resident of Kansas City, Missouri, since 1880, and has been identified with the real estate interests of that city since 1886, is a native of West Vir- ginia. During the sixties he resided in St. Louis, Missouri, but in 1868 he returned to West Virginia. While in St. Louis, and after his return to Wheeling, he was in the pork- packing business with D. C. List, who is now associated with him in the real estate business,

under the firm name of D. C. List & Co. In 1880 Mr. Bayha removed to Kansas City from Wheeling and engaged in the wholesale sad- dlery goods and hardware trade. The name of the firm with which he was connected was Kelsey, Roberson & Co. After a few years he sold his interest in this concern, and a stock company for the transaction of the same kind of business was formed, under the name of Merriam & Roberson Saddlery Company. That continued until 1886, when Mr. Bayha retired from the jobbing line and entered the real estate business, his associates being Gib- son Lamb and M. W. Barber, of Kansas City, the firm style being Bayha. Lamb & Barber. They were succeeded by the firm of Bayha, Barber & List, the last named being D. C. List, with whom Mr. Bayha had been associ- ated in business several years before. Mr. Barber afterward withdrew and a corporation was formed, known as the Bayha & List Realty Company, which is still in existence and one of the strongest combinations of its kind in Kansas City. Mr. List is not a resi- (lent of Kansas City, and the subject of this sketch is in charge of the company's affairs. He is a member of the Kansas City Real Es- tate and Stock Exchange, and is serving as treasurer of that organization. Hle is one of the appraisers of the Prudential Building & Loan Association, and is connected with the Jackson County Building & Loan Associa- tion. He is well acquainted with realty values, has seen the inflation of prices, the resulting decline and the present steady growth of prop- erty holdings in a city that is enjoying a notably prosperous condition of material af- fairs.

Beardsley, Henry Mahan, lawyer, was born October 20, 1858, in Knox County, Ohio. His father, George F. Beardsley, was a native of Ohio, and his grandfather settled in that state about 1816. Martha Mahan, the mother of Henry M. Beardsley, was born in the State of New York. Mr. Beardsley re- ceived his education at the University of Illi- nois. Champaign, and graduated from that institution in 1879. After his graduation he read law at Champaign in the office of George W. Gere, and was admitted to the bar at Mt. Vernon, Illinois, before the Court of Appeals, in 1882. Immediately after his admission a partnership was formed with his former tutor, Mr. Gere, under the firm name of Gere &

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Beardsley, and this association existed until Mr. Beardsley removed to Kansas City, Mis- souri, in 1886. Of that place he has since been an honored resident and a prominent practitioner. He was alone in the practice un- til January, 1887, when he formed a partner- ship with Alfred Gregory. This continued until August, 1900, when Charles H. Kirshner was admitted to the firm, and the name be- came Beardsey, Gregory & Kirshner. Their practice is entirely along civil lines. Politically Mr. Beardsley is a Republican, and he is a member of the upper house of the Kansas City common council. He is a member of the First Congregational Church. His work along religious lines is best known through his un- tiring efforts in behalf of the Young Men's Christian Association of Kansas City, an or- ganization of which he has been president for nine years, which has been built up to a degree of unprecedented strength during his admin- istration of its affairs, and which ranks favor- ably with the associations of the largest cities. A history of the association, by Mr. Beards- ley, appears in this work. He is also a mem- ber of the directorate of the Board of Asso- ciated Charities of Kansas City, a member of the Manufacturers' Association, and of the Kansas City Bar Association. As an ener- getie, pushing citizen of a municipality in which he has strong faith, and as a dignified exponent of the legal profession, Mr. Beards- ley occupies a position of growing promi- nence. He participates in every wholesome movement calculated to work toward the gen- eral welfare, and maintains at the same time a steadfast position in the front rank of the bar as a studious, careful lawyer. He was mar- ried, in 1883, to Marietta Davis, of Monticello, Illinois. Mr. and Mrs. Beardsley have three children, Ella, George and Henry S. Beards- lev.

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Encyclopedia of the history of Missouri, a compendium of history and biography for ready reference, Vol. I, Part 35

Author: Conard, Howard Louis, ed. 1n Publication date: 1901 Publisher: New York, Louisville [etc.] The Southern history company, Haldeman, Conard & co., proprietors Number of Pages: 856

Author: Conard, Howard Louis, ed. 1n
Publication date: 1901
Publisher: New York, Louisville [etc.] The Southern history company, Haldeman, Conard & co., proprietors
Number of Pages: 856