USA > Missouri > Encyclopedia of the history of Missouri, a compendium of history and biography for ready reference, Vol. II > Part 52
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In 1703 war was proclaimed by Great Britain against France and Spain, a proceed-
ing, as well may be believed, having an im- portant bearing upon affairs in the Missis- sippi Valley. The French had established themselves at various points in the South and especially on the eastern shore in the Illinois country. Louisiana, under the French title, ยท embraced the wide region between the Al- leghanies and the Rocky Mountains, north to the Great Lakes.
Passing over a period of nearly sixty years, we find that November 3, 1762, France ceded to Spain all of Louisiana by a secret treaty, which in the following year (February 10th) was succeeded by the final peace treaty be- tween France and Spain and Great Britain, whereby France ceded to Great Britain all territory east of the Mississippi, and to Spain her claims to Florida. This event caused consternation to the French and Canadian settlers, by whom the British were cordially detested, and by none more than the people of Kaskaskia, Cahokia, Prairie Du Rocher, St. Philippe and Fort Chartres. The trans- fer of allegiance to a kingdom which the French had learned to despise was something that rankled like a barb in their breasts.
Antedating the secret treaty, Kelerec, who had been Governor of Louisiana for ten years, had granted a license to the mercantile firm of Maxent, Laclede & Co., of New Or- . leans, to establish trade with the Indians on the Upper Mississippi and Missouri Rivers, and this firm had purchased goods in Cuba for that purpose. Laclede was sent forward to determine upon the location of a trading post, and leaving New Orleans on the 3d of August, 1763, arrived in exactly three months at Fort Chartres, proceeding in December with a small party by land as far as the mouth of the Missouri, choosing a suitable site and returning to the fort for the winter. Mean- time the news was received of the cession to Great Britain, and taking advantage of the indignant feeling thereby aroused, Laclede induced many to join him in a colony on the western shore on the spot he had selected. This was the origin of "Laclede's village," now the city of St. Louis. (See "Crozat,""De Soto," "Iberville,""Hennepin," "Joliet." "La- clede,""Marquette," "Moscoso,""Vasquez.")
Discovery Celebration .- October 21, 1892, the four-hundredth anniversary of the discovery of America by Christopher Columbus, was celebrated in St. Louis in a
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highly spectacular and attractive way. A parade was given, with 10,000 persons in line, and all nations represented.
Dittmann, George F., merchant and manufacturer, was born March 27, 1818, in Hesse-Darmstadt, Germany, and died in St. Louis, April 27, 1896. ' He came to this country when a boy twelve years of age, and first lived at Chambersburg, Pennsyl- vania. While still young he set out for the West, leaving home with five dollars in his pocket. He made his way on foot and by stage over the mountains, and then worked his way down the Ohio and up the Missis- sippi River to St. Louis, where he obtained his first employment as a clerk in the shoe store of J. F. Comstock & Co. A judicious husbanding of his earnings thereafter en- abled him to accumulate money enough to start a small retail shoe store, and the busi- ness thus established was the foundation upon which he built a splendid fortune and a great commercial and industrial enterprise. Some years after he began business he en- gaged in manufacturing and in the whole- sale trade, and built up the great establish- ment which is still conducted under the name of the George F. Dittman Boot & Shoe Com- pany, and which is known and has a trade extending throughout the entire West and Southwest. Some ten years before his death he retired from active business, and passed a green old age at the home of his daugh- ter, Mrs. Philip Burg, on Hawthorne Boule- vard, at which place he died when seventy- nine years of age. He was one of the pio- neers in establishing and building up an in- dustry for which St. Louis has since become famous, and his painstaking efforts and cor- rect business methods contributed in no small degree to the development of a line of man- ufacturing and merchandising which has been immensely beneficial to the city.
Dixon .- An incorporated town in Pulaski County, on the St. Louis & San Francisco Railroad, about twelve miles northeast of Waynesville, the county seat. It has a good school, two churches, a bank, a newspaper, the "Echo," Democratic, published by Tingle & Tingle, one hotel and about a dozen stores in different lines of trade. Population, 1899 (estimated), 650.
Dobson, Charles Lee, lawyer and jurist, was born in Harrison County, Vir- ginia, February 8, 1848. The Dobsons are of Scotch-English descent, the ancestors of our subject having emigrated to Virginia in early times. Austin Dobson is a noted Eng- lish poet. William Dobson was a celebrated portrait and historical painter, a pupil of Van Dyke, whom he succeeded as painter to Charles I. He painted the portraits of both Charles I and Charles II, and of Prince Rupert, and several courtiers. On his moth- er's side, Judge Dobson is related to General Andrew Lewis and to Colonel Charles Lewis, who were so prominently associated with Washington in the Revolutionary War. The Lewises are an eminent Virginia family. The parents of Judge Dobson emigrated from Fairfax to Harrison County, West Virginia, and from the latter to Linn County, Mis- souri, in 1854. Here he attended the com- mon schools and the University of Missouri, at Columbia, having previously begun the study of law. After his return from the uni- versity, and while still a law student, he was appointed, in 1869, clerk of the Linn County court of common pleas, which afforded him the opportunity of completing his legal edu- cation in a practical way. He was admitted to the bar February 10, 1870, and at once began a successful practice. In 1874 he was appointed judge of the court of which he had previously been clerk. The law required the judge to be thirty-five years of age, but the disability was removed by a special act of the Legislature. He served during the term for which he had been appointed, but declined the Democratic nomination for the office, resuming the practice of his profes- sion at Linneus, the county seat, January I, 1875. He practiced successfully in Linn and adjoining counties until 1879, when he sought a wider field in Kansas City. Here, in 1883, he formed a law. copartnership with Shannon C. Douglass, of Columbia, under the firm name of Dobson & Douglass. From 1885 to 1887 he was secretary and treasurer of the commission that located and built State Lunatic Asylum No. 3, at Nevada. In the year 1886 J. McDowell Trimble removed from Mexico, Missouri, to Kansas City, and became a member of the new firm of Dob- son, Douglass & Trimble. This firm was dis- solved in 1890, when Judge Dobson, asso-
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ciating with himself Henry L. McCune and Herbert L. Doggett, formed the law firm of Dobson, McCune & Doggett. On January I, 1894, Governor Stone appointed Judge Dobson to fill the vacancy on the bench of the Sixteenth Judicial Circuit, caused by the resignation of Judge James Gibson. He was elected his own successor by a very large vote, in 1895, but in 1897 he declined being again a candidate, and returned to the practice of law with his former partner, under the firm name of Dobson & McCune. His experience on the bench broadened and en- larged his knowledge of law and familiarized him with all the phases of practice, which enabled him to resume with ease a law prac- tice which has steadily grown. His fine legal attainments, his high character and un- sullied honor caused the judicial ermine, un- sought for, to fall upon his shoulders. In 1894 he was made lecturer on the law of private corporations in the University of Kansas, which position he still holds. Judge Dobson is prominently identified with the material and social interests of Kansas City. He is an officer and director in various boards, and counsel for many corporations. As a citizen he is ever ready to give material aid to all enterprises promotive of the wel- fare of the city. He is a Democrat, prompt to aid his party without aspiring to public office. He has traveled extensively through his own country and through the chief parts of Europe. He has a fine private library, and by reading, observation and close investiga- tion, he has become thoroughly versed in public affairs, and has acquired great influ- ence through his sterling qualities of heart and mind. He was married to Miss Carrie E. Meade, of Fayetteville, New York, in 1880. His wife died in 1881, leaving one child, Meade Clay Dobson.
Dockery, Alexander Monroe, ex- Congressman and present Governor of Mis- souri, was born in a log cabin, on Honey Creek, five miles south of Gallatin, Daviess County, Missouri, February II, 1845. He is descended from a typical Western pioneer ancestry, from which he inherited a superb physique, strong mental traits, and those sterling virtues which adorned a primitive age. The founder of the Dockery family in America came from Ireland about the close of the eighteenth century, settling in North
Carolina, whence his descendants dispersed into Kentucky, Missouri, Arkansas and Mis- sissippi, and bore a full share in the devel- opment of those great Commonwealths. Of the Kentucky branch of the family was Wil- lis E. Dockery, who in early life removed to Missouri. He became a minister of the Methodist Episcopal Church, and when that body was disrupted he adhered to the South- ern branch. For more than fifty years he was an active itinerant preacher, laboring in the counties of northern Missouri. He was a worthy and useful minister, and was instru- mental in the organization of many churches which are now well established and prosper- ous. At the advanced age of seventy-eight years he is borne upon the superannuated list, and makes his home in Marion, Iowa. His wife was a woman of great strength of character, who before her marriage was Miss Sarah Ellen McHaney, daughter of Andrew McHaney, a pioneer settler in Boone County. Governor Dockery was their only child. En- gaged, as the father was, in itinerant minis- terial work, the family was for many years without a permanent home, and the educa- tion of the son was, of necessity, limited to such instruction in the ordinary English branches as he could derive from the com- mon schools in the different neighborhoods where a short stay was made. He afterward entered Macon Academy, at Macon City, but had scarcely begun his studies when the Civil War began, and his student life was ended through the coming of Federal troops and the consequent close of the school. Too young for military service, he took up a course of self-appointed reading, and in 1863 entered upon the study of medicine, under the tutorship of Dr. F. W.White, of Keytes- ville, Missouri. He afterward entered the St. Louis Medical College, from which he was graduated March 2, 1865. During the season of 1865-6 he took a post-graduate course at Bellevue Hospital Medical College, New York City, and at Jefferson Medical College, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. From 1865 to 1868 he practiced his profession in Linn County, Missouri, making his home at Linneus. In 1868 he removed to Chilli- cothe, Missouri, where he built up a suc- cessful practice, and was for three years en- gaged as county physician, then a lucrative position. March 20, 1874, he removed to Gallatin, Missouri. Here he assisted in or-
alex m. ckery
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ganizing the Farmers' Exchange Bank, in which he served as cashier for a period of eight years. As was afterward discerned, this was a most important event in his life, resulting in his developing financial abilities of a high order, fitting him in a peculiar degree for the important work which afterward de- volved upon him in formulating and procur- ing national legislation affecting the conduct of the accounting and disbursing departments of the Federal government. In 1878 cir- cumstances, in no wise of his own seeking, . introduced him to public life. In that year, in. the Democratic Convention of the Tenth Congressional District, at Chillicothe, a three days' deadlock prevented the nomination of either of the contesting candidates. Mr. Dockery was a member of that convention, and chairman of the congressional commit- tee. He had already attracted favorable at- tention through his activity and ability in political organization, and for the vigor and felicity of his addresses upon political sub- jects. He was assured that a sufficient num- ber of delegates could be drawn to his support to effect his nomination, and he was urged to permit his name to be placed be- fore the convention, but he positively refused, holding that he was in honor bound to con- tinue to support Honorable C. H. Mansur, to whom he had been committed from the outset. As a result, one hitherto unnamed received the nomination. In the Congres- sional District Convention at Brunswick, two years later, Mr. Mansur was supported for nomination by a large majority of instructed delegates. Randolph and Chariton Counties, however, were bitterly hostile to him, and on roll call delegates from those counties cast their votes for Mr. Dockery, without his knowledge of such intention, and greatly to his surprise. In 1882 he became a can- didate before the congressional convention of the then new Third District, which con- tained but three of the counties which had constituted the old Tenth District. Nearly every county presented a candidate, and the contest was protracted to the twenty-eighth ballot, when Mr. Dockery was nominated by a considerable majority. After once tak- ing his seat in Congress, so well was he re- garded, and so closely did he stand in sympathy with his constituents, that it was his remarkable experience to be renominated by acclamation and re-elected for seven suc-
cessive terms. In 1898, when approaching the end of sixteen years of service, to close March 4, 1899, he announced his intention to retire from congressional life, to become a candidate for the gubernatorial nomination in 1900. During all his long period of con- gressional service, Mr. Dockery's conduct was dominated by inflexible principle. True to the cardinal tenets of Democracy, he was earnest and active as a party man, but re- garded his partnership as only a means to maintain and advance political principles which he held to be absolutely indispensable to the preservation of free institutions. At all times in close touch with the people from . whose midst he came, and from whom he would permit no adventitious circumstance to separate him, he was always fully aware of their conditions, their necessities, and their sentiments, and to their service he gave effort conspicuous for intelligence, sa- gacity and loyalty. Before he had been long in Congress he had come to be regarded by his party associates as a wise and safe leader, and an able and tireless worker; while the opposition held him in honor for his candor, ability and honesty. The support, on the one hand, and recognition on the other, afforded him an opportunity to procure, or aid in pro- curing, much legislation which was ad- vantageous to the country, and which brought honor to himself. His congressional service, occupying hundreds of pages of the Congres- sional Record, can be but briefly epitomized here. For ten years he served on the great committee on appropriations, and in this con- nection he constantly exercised the closest scrutiny of proposed expenditures, and urged the greatest economy consistent with public interests. He served for six years on the committee on post offices and post roads, and was author of various important bills, among which were the bill providing for fast mail service between New York and Kansas City, via St. Louis, the second fast mail route established in the United States; the bill extending free delivery to small cities, and the bill extending special letter delivery to all post offices. He was also author, in part, of the bill divesting land-grant railways of monopoly rights in telegraph franchises and' service. He was chairman of the World's Fair congressional investigating commit- tee of five in 1893, and upon his report was paid the conditional government appropria-
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tion; seven years later his voluminous re- port was placed in the hands of the St. Louis World's Fair Committee, and proved of great value in forwarding its purposes. Mr. Dock- ery's most distinguished public service, how- ever, was as chairman of what was known as the Dockery Commission, comprising three Senators and three Representatives, and the measures enacted on the reconi- mendations of that body were largely of his authorship. A principal advantage secured was the adoption of the present Dockery accounting system in the Treasury Depart- ment, supplanting the crude and complicated methods based upon the system founded by Alexander Hamilton, and modified in an un- systematic way in after years. Under the operations of the Dockery system, which went into effect October 1, 1894, the settle- ment of the public accounts amounting to upwards of five hundred millions annually, is expedited, entire accuracy is obtained, and great saving is effected, the immediate and directly recognizable saving amounting to $810,000 annually. The work of the com- mission was highly commended, and Mr. Dockery was solicited to endeavor to extend its operations into other channels, but his party having lost control of the House of Representatives, he was disinclined, fearing factious opposition would embarrass or neu- tralize his effort. Mr. Dockery was also the author of a measure for the printing of en- rolled and engrossed bills, and since its en- actment not an important error has occurred, while prior to that time the Treasury lost large amounts through pen errors in tariff and appropriation bills. Among other bills of which he was the author, in large part, was that substituting salaries for the fee compensation of certain United States court officers, making an annual saving of $2,500,- 000. Legislation of local importance effected by him included appropriations for the im- provement of the Mississippi and Missouri Rivers, and for the completion of the gov- ernment building in Kansas City; and a bill for the relief of William Jewell College, for damages incurred during the Civil War. On occasion, he was a forceful speaker on the floor of the House, never rising but for a definite purpose, and always commanding close attention. His most important utter- ances were in opposition to import duties except for revenue, and to war taxes in time
of peace; in urging legislation in the inter- est of economy in public expenditures; in fostering agricultural and labor interests, and in extending and perfecting the postal sys- tem. He frequently acted as chairman of the committee of the whole House, on occa- sion as speaker of the House pro tempore, and over and over again when important leg- islation was pending he acted as a conferee from the House in joint conference com- mittees. In the exercise of his congressional prerogative he was strictly conscientious, and never knowingly approved an unworthy ap- plicant for appointment to office. Many of his appointees yet remain in the Federal service, solely on their merits. Holding that the better class of party workers should be provided for, he was always active in mak- ing place for them through the removal of Republicans. While a most capable organ- izer, Mr. Dockery has given little attention to the practical work of political conventions. In 1886, at St. Louis, he presided over the Democratic State Convention, although not a delegate in that body, and without previous notification of the honor which was to be conferred upon him. During his entire con- gressional term he refrained, through mo- tives of delicacy, from accepting a seat in a convention. In 1898 he made a vigorous campaign for his ticket, affirming funda- mental Democratic principles, and denounc- ing trusts and centralization of governmental powers. At the Democratic State Conven- tion, held in Kansas City, June 5, 1900, he was nominated by acclamation for Governor, and, upon his insistence, a plank demanding the taxation of franchises was incorporated in the platform. At the ensuing election lie was elected by a plurality of 32,147, over Joseph Flory, the Republican candidate. The inauguration of Governor Dockery took place January 14, 1901. Governor Dockery has always been an earnest and enthusiastic friend of education, and takes pride in recall- ing the fact that his first vote was cast for the erection of a public school building. He was for several years president of the Chilli- cothe board of education, and he was a mem- ber of the board of curators of the Missouri State University from 1872 to 1882, resign- ing in the last named year, when elected to Congress. In 1876 he was elected to the City Council of Gallatin, in which he served for five years, and in 1881 he was elected
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mayor of the same city, and was re-elected in 1882, in both instances without opposition. In religion he is in sympathy with the Meth- odist Episcopal Church, South, of which his wife is an active member. He is prominent in Masonic circles, and was eminent com- mander of Kadosh Commandery, No. 21, at Cameron, in 1880; grand master of the Grand Lodge of Missouri, in 1881-2, and grand high priest of the Grand Chapter, in 1883-4. He is also a member of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows. April 14, 1869, he married Miss Mary E. Bird, daughter of Greenup Bird, a prominent banker of Chillicothe, Mis- souri. Mrs. Dockery was educated at Clay Seminary, Liberty, Missouri. She is a mem- ber of the order of the Daughters of the Revolution, deriving her membership through her mother, in descent from Commodore Oliver Perry. Eight children born of this marriage are all deceased.
Dodd, Samuel Morris, merchant, was born in Orange, New Jersey, June 3, 1832, son of Stephen and Mary (Condit) Dodd. He was educated in the public schools of Orange and at Bloomfield-New Jersey-Academy and was then trained to mercantile pursuits. When sixteen years of age, he became a clerk in a New York City hat and fur store. After remaining there three years he came to St. Louis, and became connected there with the old house of Nourse, Crane & Co., which was located on Main Street. After a time he pur- chased an interest in this house, which was succeeded by the firm of Baldwin, Randall & Co., in which he was also a partner. In 1862 he purchased the entire establishment and for a time conducted its business under his own name. He then entered the wholesale dry goods field, founding the house of Dodd, Brown & Co., in 1866. Mr. Dodd continued at the head of the firm, doing a prosperous business until 1886, when the firm was dis- solved and he severed his connection with the dry goods trade. Since that time he has been largely interested in corporate enter- prises of various kinds and has continued to hold a position among the leading men of af- fairs in St. Louis. A man of great adminis- trative ability, he has been called upon to assume the duties and responsibilities of official position in connection with these en- terprises, and is now president of the Broad- way Real Estate Company, vice president of
the American Central Insurance Company, president of the Missouri Electric Light and Power Company of St. Louis, and a director in the National Bank of Commerce. He is also president of the American Brake Com- pany, which was later leased to the Westing- house Air Brake Company. Loyal always to the interests of St. Louis, he has taken pride in the progress and advancement of the city, has noted with pleasure the extent of its commercial development, and has con- tributed his share to the upbuilding of the city during his active business career of more than forty years.
Dodd's Island .- See "Big Island."
Doddridge, William B., railway manager, was born at Circleville, Ohio, Oc- tober 19, 1850, and is therefore at this time- 1898-still under fifty years of age, in the prime of his powers ; but he has had as much experience in railroading and its kindred vo- cations as most railroad men encounter in a lifetime. He was not born to favors, ad- vantages and privileges; and what he is and what he has become he owes to no one but himself and those whose friendship he has won by diligence fidelity and efficient service. He found himself an orphan at the age of fourteen years, with the stern necessity im- posed upon him of being dependent upon relatives, or looking out for himself-and it did not take long for the independent, reso- lute spirit that was in him to choose the lat- ter. He had acquired a pretty good English education in the public schools of Columbus, Ohio, and this served him to good purpose in the Western Union Telegraph office in Columbus, where he applied for and obtained a place as messenger, at fifteen dollars a month. It was a small beginning, but it answered the purpose well enough. Teleg- raphy and railroading are close of kin to one another, and this messenger boy service in the Columbus office of the Western Union was the first stepping-stone in the way that was to lead young Doddridge to the general management of one of the largest railway systems of the country. He was not con- tent in this first position, nor in any of the other higher places he afterward filled, with merely performing his official duty; he made himself indispensable by performing it as well as he could, and by learning all about the
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