USA > North Carolina > History of North Carolina: North Carolina biography, Volume VI > Part 42
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David Paton was born in Scotland in 1801 and he was of a prominent family which was one of the oldest in Scotland. Capt. John Paton, a Scotch hero who died as a martyr for the Presbyterian religion, was his great-grandfather. He was born at Meadow-head in the parish of Fenwick and Shire of Ayr. He was in the Scots army or militia who went to England in January of 1643 and was at the Marstan-Muir. His wife was named Janet Linsdey. Their son, David Paton, was the grand- father of David Paton, the present subject. He married Eleanor Campbell, the sister of Lord Campbell of Monzie Castle. The Campbells were descendants of the Earl of Breadalbine. The father of David Paton, the present subject, was named John Paton. He married Eleanor Roper, the sister of Sir Timothy Roper. John Paton was an extensive builder, and constructed the greater part of the new town and also the famous Dean bridge across the water of Leith at Edinburgh, Scotland.
David Paton was liberally educated at the Uni- versity of Edinburgh. He took up the profession of his father, through whom he gained a thorough, practical experience, and also studied under Sir John Sloan, R. A., professor of architecture to the Royal Academy of London.
Circumstances brought Mr. Paton to New York in 1833, and while in that city he entered into a contract with Mr. Town acting for the State Capitol Commissioners of North Carolina to super- intend the work on the capitol at Raleigh, which had been in progress for over a year but had en- countered great difficulties, largely for lack of a. supervising intelligence over the entire enterprise. David Paton came to Raleigh in the fall of 1834.
Thos barrick
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He was then thirty-three years of age. He was not only an accomplished architect but an experi- enced builder. He knew how to work and how to employ workmen to the best advantage. When he came, the cost of overseeing was $25 a day. He reduced it to nine dollars a day. Twenty- eight stone cutters were being paid $81 a day, and he reduced the wage to $56. He found himself not only the supervisor of the work. but the su- perintendent, and also bookkeeper and paymaster. In fact he had all the details as his responsibility. He made the working drawings, and was builder, architect and designer. While his practical effi- ciency was of the greatest value to the enterprise he did not fail to incorporate in his work the spirit of his earlier instruction and acquaintance with the best models of architecture of classic and modern times, and of that spirit the State House in its present form is a beautiful exempli- fication. He won the esteem and confidence of the commissioners and of the private citizens and remained thoroughly devoted to his task until it was completed. In 1837 he was invited to become architect of the Federal Government in construc- tion of the arsenal at Fayetteville, North Caro- lina, but he declined to abandon his contract with the State of North Carolina.
He saw the completion of his great task in the summer of 1840. The first appropriation for the building had been made in December, 1832. Prac- tical builders acquainted with modern cost of con- struction and material are amazed at the fact that the State Capitol at Raleigh, which was in course of construction for more than seven years, cost in the aggregate only $530,000.
When the contract was finished in the summer of 1840 Mr. Paton returned to New York, and soon afterward, at the earnest solicitation of his father, sailed for Edinburgh. He remained in that city nearly ten years, returning to America in 1849. For more than thirty years he was professor in the American Institute of Architecture of Brooklyn and the Mechanical Institute of New York. There he rendered splendid service to his profession by training others, as he was trained himself, to study the beautiful, to build solidly and to erect noble edifices. Hundreds of architects in America have given their tribute and gratitude to the influences of David Paton exerted during their period of training.
David Paton died at Brooklyn March 25, 1882. He was not only a great man in his profession but had the nobility and simplicity of nature and the finest virtues of the Christian citizen.
Mr. Paton married Eleanor Nicol in Scotland, but she died before he came to America, in 1833. She was survived by a daughter, Eleanor Murry, who married John Wyld, a banker in Glasgow, also a cousin to William Gladstone. Since 1606 there had been in the Wyld family a succession of parliamentary membership, but owing to the death of their son. John Paton Wyld, the long line was closed. During his service as architect at Raleigh, David Paton courted and married Miss Annie B. Farrow. of Washington, North Carolina. By this marriage there were eight children: Anna, who died unmarried; Theresa, who became the wife of Elbert Snedeker, once the general man- ager of the Brooklyn Elevated Railway; Sarah, who married Nathaniel Bush, an architect of Brooklyn; Maltida. who became the wife of Wil- liam Van Gordon. of New York; Mary. who mar- ried Oscar Silvev. of Denver, Colorado; John Paton, of New York; Esther, whose first husband was H.
F. Hopkins and who afterwards married E. M. Shute; and Agnes Charlotte. Agnes Charlotte just before the outbreak of the Civil war came to Washington, North Carolina, to visit her Grand- mother Farrow. The war coming on she remained with her grandmother and grew up so southern in her sentiments that she did not care to return permanently to the North. She has ever since lived in North Carolina and is now the wife of Mr. C. E. Foy, a prominent business man of Newbern, North Carolina.
REV. THOMAS CARRICK is one of the interesting citizens of North Carolina by reason of his forty years of service in the Baptist ministry, and also by varied other connections and relations to his respective communities. Rev. Mr. Carrick now re- sides at High Point and gives much of his time to the supervision of a farm near that city.
Mr. Carrick was born on a farm in Healing Springs Township of Davidson County, North Car- olina. His grandfather, John H. Carrick, was born on a farm midway between Alexandria, Virginia, and Georgetown, D. C., in 1784. He grew up there to the age of eighteen, and in 1802 came with his father's family with wagons and teams to what is now Healing Springs Township in Davidson County, North Carolina. The great-grandfather spent the rest of his days in that locality. John H. Carrick was reared as a farmer and on reaching manhood bought land and established a plantation in Davidson County. He owned a number of slaves, and was a man of great ability and vigor. His death occurred in February, 1883, when in his ninety-ninth year. His life thus covered a remark- able period in the nation's history. He was born only a year or so after the close of actual hostilities between the colonies and Great Britain, had grown to manhood before the second war with England, was past middle life when the war with Mexico came on, and he lived through the period of the struggle between the North and the South, and also witnessed the beginning of the revival of ' prosperity in the South after the devastation wrought by the war. He married Sally Bean, who was born in Healing Springs Township, daughter of William Bean, who was of Scotch-Irish an- cestry. William Bean was a slave owner and planter and also owned and operated a flour mill. Mrs. Sally Carrick died in 1847, the mother of three sons and four daughters.
John Carrick, father of Rev. Mr. Carrick, was born in Healing Springs Township in 1813 and after reaching manhood bought land near the old homestead and was a prosperous general farmer of that locality until his death, at the age of eighty-six. He married Lucy Nooe, who was born in Jackson Hill Township of Davidson County, daughter of Thomas and Lurania (Davis) Nooe. The Nooe family settled in Wake County in colonial times. Thomas Nooe. grandfather of Mrs. John Carrick. was owner of 640 acres of land near the Falls of the Neuse River. Mrs. John Carrick died in 1877. at the age of sixty years.
Rev. Thomas Carrick, who was one of a family of nine children, gained his primary advantages in rural schools, attended Abbotts Creek Academy, and in 1875 graduated A. B. from Wake Forest College. The following two years he spent in the Southern Theological Baptist Seminary at Green- ville. South Carolina, and was ordained to the ministry in his home church in Healing Springs Township. His first pastorate was at Greenville, North Carolina, where he remained ten years, and
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following that had another long pastorate of ten years at Lexington, North Carolina. Since then he has held pastorates in different places, and since 1897 has been a resident of High Point. Mr. Carrick has always been fond of country life and farming, and finds time among other responsi- bilities to conduct the operations of a tract of land near High Point. He is deeply interested in the work of home and foreign missions. Fra- ternally he is affiliated with the Masonic and Odd Fellow fraternities.
In 1880 he married Miss Mary H. Bain, who was born at High Point, daughter of John A. and Nancy W. (Doak) Bain. Her father was a farmer and owned land now included in the City of High Point. Mr. and Mrs. Carrick have four children: Thomas Bright, Mary Stephens, Doak Bain and Carey Walton. These sons have given excellent accounts of themselves. Thomas B. is a civil engineer living at Hoboken, New Jersey; Mary is a graduate of Meredith College and Cornell Uni- versity, and is now in charge of the domestic science department of Greensboro College for Women. Doak B. is a graduate of Cornell Uni- versity with the degree of Ph. D. and is now in the department of pomology in the United States De- partment of Agriculture. Carey Walton, who graduated Master of Science from Cornell Uni- versity, is a professor in Purdue University at Lafayette, Indiana.
WILLIAM DAVID BURNS, A. B., LL. B. The dis- tinguishing work and that which has the greatest value at present and for the future of William David Burns as an educator has been in connection with the development, upbuilding and administra- tion of the Piedmont High School at Lawndale in Cleveland County. Here is a school with a mission, and as it has been in existence for over twenty years, it is possible to say that the mission has been worthily fulfilled, though with its present equipment and outlook the promise for the future is vastly better than ever before. Some of those who have looked into the workings of Piedmont and are thoroughly acquainted with its methods and with its graduates have called the school equal to some of those high class exclusive preparatory in- stitutions of the North and East. Undoubtedly it deserves all the recommendations it has received, and while the scholarship records and the character and achievements of its graduates are giving it an ever wider fame, the school continues as in the past to serve the needs of young men and women whose lives for the most part would be barren of opportunities without the presence of this insti- tution in their midst.
Piedmont High School was established twenty- one years ago and has always enjoyed the generous patronage of the people and with its growing repu- tation for thoroughness and efficiency it has at- tracted students from all over the state and even from outside North Carolina's boundaries. A nuni- ber of years ago a joint stock company was organized, was chartered by the Legislature, and as a result of donations from friends abroad and in the immediate vicinity, from former students and even from the current student body, revenues have been supplied to keep the equipment and buildings somewhat tardily apace with the in- creasing needs of the school. A number of build- ings have been erected on the handsome campus, and though two or three disastrous fires have occurred the institution has recovered and has been better and greater after each successive visi-
tation. One of the most persistent and generous benefactors of the school was the late Major H. F. Schenck, who died September 25, 1916. A man of wealth, he had given his time, talents and his means to the cause of popular education, and he is reported to have said that while he never received anything from Piedmont in the way of financial dividends he had never invested money in anything that pleased him better than the money he put into the high school.
From a bulletin issued by the high school the purposes are defined as follows. "To prepare boys and girls thoroughly for college and to fit them for the practical duties of life. It is as much our purpose to develop nobility of character and a high sense of honor as to impart knowl- edge of text-books, and no effort is spared to teach a proper appreciation of each one's rights and duties as members of society, and to educate the heart as well as the brain in those Christian graces that constitute true nobility of character."
Officials of such well known institutions as Trinity College and Wake Forest College, other educators, ministers, editors and citizens, have again and again expressed their appreciation of the splendid work done by Piedmont. While space does not permit a general notice of these remarks, room should be found for some of the statements made by the treasurer of the Cleveland Mill and Power Company, John C. Schenck, who has long been in a position to understand the influence of the high school upon that community. He says: "The citizens of this county and state are greatly indebted to you (Mr. Burns) for having placed within reach of so many worthy young men and women an excellent preparatory education at so small cost to them. The beautiful and elevated location of your school, its charming mountain scenery, its delightful physical environment of richly wooded hills and flowing streams, its health- ful atmosphere and water, all add much to its attractiveness; but those are not the features that appeal most to me. I would base my admiration and high opinions of your school mainly upon my observation of the worthy ambitions and high ideals with which your ever loyal student body al- ways seems to be inspired. * * * Although your excellent baseball and basketball grounds have been sufficiently utilized, they have not seriously de- tracted from the excellent literary society work for which your school has deservedly won a wide reputation. I congratulate you on the marked suc- cess of so many of your old students, who, as thinkers, orators and debaters, are excelling in this state."'
A local paper recently had a good deal to say about the Piedmont High School, including the following: "It is to this institution that many of the mill boys and girls go when they have com- pleted their courses down in the village schools. In conversation with Professor Burns he stated that in all of his experience in teaching he had found that the boys and girls from the mill com- munities were just as quick of mind and just as easily managed, just as noble in character as any students coming to him from any other walks of life. It was a mill boy who two years ago carried off the scholarship at his school. It was a cotton mill boy who a few years back went up from the Lawndale mill settlement to the A. and M. College at Raleigh where he led his classes and where he is today one of the professors of the institution. "'
As a matter of fact, among the many students
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who have been in Piedmont High School and have prepared for college are a number that have made brilliant records as students in higher insti- tutions. One of the most notable of these was H. Rowland English of Cleveland County, who was under the instruction of Professor Burns from early boyhood. He went from Piedmont High and on his student qualifications was admitted to Leland Stanford University, and won the gold medal for debating in that institution, and was also chosen as representative of the univer- sity in a Tri-State contest and there carried off the honors. There are a number of other similar cases.
William David Burns has given practically all his active life to educational work. He was born in Onslow County, North Carolina, in 1868, a son of Wilham Edmondson and Susan' (Jenkins) Burns. Both parents are now deceased, the father dying when the son was only three months of age. Professor Burns has always felt an especial debt of gratitude to his mother felt the inspira- tion she gave him and the self sacrifices she en- dured in helping him to a liberal education. She was a woman of great nobility of both heart and mind. Her last years were made tragic by paralysis.
This branch of the Burns family was estab- lished on the eastern shore of North Carolina in 1745 by Walter and Francis Burns, brothers, who came from Ayrshire, Scotland. The most distinguished member of the family was Professor Burns' great-great-uncle, Captain Otway Burns. He was a practical ship builder by trade, and during the War of 1812 was a privateersman and as captain of the Snapdragon played havoc with British shipping, capturing a million dollars worth of boats and cargo. After the war he settled down to business in Onslow County, and became a very prominent character in public and political affairs during the '20s and '30s. For eighteen years he was a member of the Legislature, and became one of the leaders in the building of the Western North Carolina Railroad and also advocated various other public improvements for the western part of the state. Himself a resident of Eastern North Carolina, he naturally incurred unpopularity with the politicians of that section, since in this particular period of the state's history there was ever an active contention between the political fac- tions of the two sections of the state. It was be- cause of his distinguished career that the Town of Burnsville was named in his honor. Captain Burns was a big man and one of the leaders of his day. It illustrates his far sightedness when it is re- called that about 1815-16, more than 100 years ago, he advocated the drainage of Matamosqueet Lake in Eastern North Carolina, a project that has re- eently been completed in 1917.
William D. Burns received his early education in publie schools and in the Jones County Male and Female Academy. He early began teaching, and in intervals of this self-sustaining employment he spent four years altogether in Wake Forest College, where he was graduated A. B. in 1897. At Wake Forest he distinguished himself and won the highest honors in both the junior and senior debates, and his forensic qualifications have enabled him to train and direet the talents of many students at Pied- mont. He also studied law at Wake Forest. was given his LL. B. degree, but has never practiced the profession.
After one year of teaching at Moorehead City Mr. Burns became connected with the Piedmont
High School in 1897, and has been its principal and business manager ever since. He teaches Latin and History, and the business management of the school devolves upon him and he has been re- sponsible for its great success during the past twenty years. He is an active member of the Baptist Church.
Mr. Burns married Miss Annie Clapp, daughter of the late Dr. J. C. Clapp, of Newton, Catawba County. Her father was a noted educator and was connected as president and in other capacities with Catawba College for forty years. Mr. and Mrs. Burns have three children, Mary, Billy and Bobby. Mrs. Burns, who was educated in Catawba Col- lege, Peabody Conservatory of Music and the Mary- land Institute of Art and Design, has in addition to looking after her family been able to give her cultivated tastes and accomplishments to Pied- mont High School and is serving as matron of the institution.
REV. W. E. ABERNETHY, D. D. It is due his in- dividual attainments and services and those of his honored father that an appropriate sketch of Doctor Abernethy should appear in this publica- tion. In response to the request for such an article the following was prepared by Hon. J. D. McCall, whose service in that connection is hereby acknowledged.
Rev. W. E. Abernethy was born in Burke County, North Carolina. His father was the late Dr. Robert Laban Abernethy, founder of Ruther- ford College, who traced his lineage to the Royal family of England. He was a man of wonderful gifts. He literally educated himself and became in turn one of the greatest educators the South has ever produced. Dr. R. L. Abernethy was not only a profound philosopher but his linguistic ac- complishments were marvelous, especially as they were the result of his own unaided efforts. With- out assistance he mastered seven languages. He was an eloquent speaker and an exponent of the sublimest faith I ever witnessed. He was in truth an intellectual giant.
W. E. Abernethy had the advantages of an early and thorough education. He was graduated from Rutherford College when but seventeen years old. After he graduated he read law under Col. George N. Folk at Lenoir, North Carolina, and made a brilliant record as a law student. As soon as he finished his law course he began to teach law at Rutherford College and continued to teach it for ten years. He was also professor of Latin and Greek in that institution twelve or fifteen vears. Upon the death of his father he was elected president of Rutherford College, and as head of that institution he presided with marked distinction for four years.
After he quit the college he was elected county superintendent of the public schools of Burke County. which position he held for several years. He then embarked in the newspaper business and edited the Morganton Herald for a year. While editor of that paper he wrote some of the most brilliant editorials ever published in the South. Every article he produced was a literary gem, but it is as a public speaker and pulpit orator that he shines the brightest. In the opinion of the writer he is the profoundest scholar in the South- ern Methodist Church. He is the equal of Webster in ponderous sublimity of thought, of Calhoun in cogent, clear metaphysical reasoning, of Clay in moving impetuousness. Sergt. Smith Prentiss scarcely surpassed him in his ability to strike at
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will the chords of human passion. He is a born actor. His style is elegant and judicially enriched from the classics. He has more of the world's history at his tongue's end than any man I have known. He is as familiar with Greek Mythology as the average man is with Webster's blue-back speller. I do not think I exaggerate when I say "his logic is as powerful as the club of Hercules and his eloquence as irresistible as the lyre of Orpheus." The writer once sat on the platform with a distinguished North Carolinian while "Will"' (as we call him) was addressing an audi- ence of 5,000 people on the subject of "General Education." In the midst of his impetuous and matchless delivery of that speech the distinguished North Carolinian unconsciously exclaimed: "My God, I have never heard such eloquence."' Dur- ing the great constitutional amendment campaign in North Carolina in 1900 he was invited to deliver an address on the amendment in the City of Charlotte. He spoke in the county courthouse on the night of April 7, 1900, and those of us who heard it will never forget his sublime, eloquent and dramatic discussion of the immortal amend- ment which is now a part of our State Constitu- tion. His knowledge of constitutional legislation by the Federal Congress and by the different states of the Union was astonishing, and from his well stored mind he poured forth a torrent of gems as varied in color and as symmetrical in form as was ever seen in a revolving kaleidoscope. Witty, sarcastic, argumentative, impetuous and sublime-it was a masterpiece. His friends knew when he entered the ministry that he would make a great preacher, and he has made good. He is in every sense of the word a great preacher and teacher. Analytical, logical, pungent, he is a powerful and eloquent defender of the faith, and his friends hope, some day, to see him wear the "Episcopal Toga.''
NOAH JAMES ROUSE. There is a class of indi- viduals who in their own communities are natu- rally accorded leadership in public and private en- terprise. This industrial sovereignty is conferred by reason of a popular recognition of superlative ability. Varied and diversified talents adapt these few men to captain enterprises of an important and differentiating nature, and they are, there- fore, placed in a position to render highly valued and valuable service to the commonwealth, while at the same time securing for themselves a compe- tence which assures their independence. By origi- nating, organizing and helping to direct large en- terprises of a commercial, agricultural and finan- cial nature, by promoting movements for county and state improvement, and by rendering an hon- orable account of himself in professional, business and public life, Noah James Rouse, of Kinston, has accomplished just such a double result through his well directed labors. He has succeeded as a lawyer, business man and banker, and has also rendered his community valuable service in the handling of its civic affairs.
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