USA > North Carolina > History of North Carolina: North Carolina biography, Volume VI > Part 5
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Samuel Parsons McConnell attended private schools at Springfield and Lombard College at Galesburg, Illinois, from which latter institution he was graduated in 1871 with the degree of Bachelor of Arts. He then studied law in the office of the famous old law firm of Stuart, Edwards & Brown at Springfield. Maj. John Todd Stuart of this firm was one of the notable lawyers and public characters of his day, a former law partner of Abraham Lincoln, a member of the State Senate, three times a member of Congress and the candi- date for governor of Illinois in 1860. Benjamin Stevenson Edwards, another member of this firmi, was a son of Ninian Edwards, first governor of Illinois ; was a delegate to the Constitutional Con- vention of 1862, was a candidate for Congress, and was' Circuit Judge of the Springfield Circuit. Under such able preceptors the young student made rapid progress, and in December, 1872, was
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admitted to the bar. Judge McConnell has most interesting and lasting memories of Abraham Lin- coln. He recalls the stirring incideuts of his two great political campaigns, and although then a small boy was greatly impressed by the evident greatness of the man. As a young man iu the law office above referred to he was given the honor, together with Major Stuart aud three other com- missioners officially designated by the State of Illinois for that purpose, of attaching his sig- nature to the identification of the remains of the President at the time of their removal from their original burial place at Springfield to the site where they have ever since rested, the site of the great Lincoln mouument.
Judge McConnell was about twenty-two years of age when he moved from Springfield to Chicago, a young man of ambition, energy and enterprise, whose training had been thorough and compre- hensive. After a short period of practicing alone he became a member of the firm of Crawford & McConnell, and later organized the firm of Mc- Connell, Raymond & Rogers. His business pros- pered and he quickly obtained the reputation of being a most capable and trustworthy attorney, winning equal eminence both as a consulting and as a trial lawyer. In 1889 he was elected judge of the Cook County (Illinois) Circuit Court, to fill the vacancy caused by the death of Judge W. K. McAllister, and served in that positiou until 1894, when he resigned to give his attention to private practice. During his tenure of office he tried numerous noted cases, the most notorious of which, perhaps, was the famous Cronin murder trial, at which he was called upon to preside shortly after his election, although at that time he was one of the youngest members of the bench. At the time this was the most remarkable criminal trial that had ever taken place at Chicago, and has been excelled by but few since there or else- where. It was peculiar as the alleged result of a conspiracy among the members of a secret or- ganization to remove one who had become ob- noxious, as well as for the deliberation with which it was perpetrated and the skill with which evi- dence of a crime had been concealed, until the discovery of the remains of the victim disclosed the fact that a brutal murder had been com- mitted. The evidence was practically circumstan- tial in its entirety, no part being conclusive, but taken as a whole it constituted an irrefragable chain of certainty and was a triumph of legal skill and acumen. In presiding over this case, Judge McConnell displayed the highest order of judicial ability, and the press, public, legal pro- fession and bench were unanimous in giving him praise for the dignity and expediency of his judicial labors and the justice, soundness and im- partiality of his decisions. He also had charge, as presiding judge, of a number of civil suits of great importance affecting corporations.
When he retired from the bench Judge McConnell formed the firm of Tenney, McConnell & Coffeen, which soon became known as one of the foremost legal combinations of Chicago. A large general practice was done, the firm representing many of the biggest Chicago enterprises, private and cor- porate, and it was in the latter capacity that the splendid abilities of Judge McConnell were recog- nized by the George A. Fuller Construction Com- pany, by which he was retained as counsel. Soon thereafter he was made general counsel and vice president of the company, and in those capacities
removed in 1900 to New York, the headquarters of the concern. He thus eutered the class of the great corporation lawyers of the country. His duties, however, were not only legal, but adminis- trative of the affairs. of this great company, which has built more great sky-scrapers aud bus' 'ss structures thau any other concern in the wu 1 .He conducted the business of this coucern for several years at New York, aud upon his retire- ment from that company was presented with a beautiful loving cup by his fellow-officials. While residing in New York he built and lived in a beautiful home near Peekskill ou the Hudsou, about thirty-five miles north of New York.
In 1911 Judge McConnell came to Carthage, Moore County, North Carolina, to take charge of the affairs of the Randolph & Cumberland Rail- road, which had been built from Cameron to Car- thage, a distance of ten miles, and which has since been extended in a northwesterly direction to Mc- Connell on the Deep River in the northern part of Moore County. He established his home at Car- thage and has become a permanent resident of this wonderful section of the Sandhill country of North Carolina, and where he has a beautiful home on a hill which commands an inspiring view of this pine-clad region. His coming to North Carolina was brought about by his company having come into possession of most of the bonds and legal obligations of the Randolph & Cumberland Rail- road, and it was decided by his associates that Judge McConnell was the one best fitted to come here and take charge of the property and carry on its affairs. He has direct charge of the manage- ment and operation of the road and its auxiliary industries and land interests. A splendid water power site on Deep River near McConnell is a fine field for future industrial development, as well as are the great tale deposits in the same vicinity. There are also undeveloped coal resources along this line, as well as timber prospects.
Judge McConnell is a most interesting person and his reminiscences are a source of never- ending entertainment to his friends and ac- quaintances, of whom there are a great concourse. Particularly is this true in regard to his connec- tion with politics and public affairs and his asso- ciation and friendship with the notable characters in Chicago and Illinois public life and politics. He has always been a democrat. He first became active in politics about 1895, and in that year pre- sided over the Democratic State Convention of Illinois, which declared for the remonitization of silver. He was not, however, a "Free Silver"' man, but was against the extreme gold standard element of the party. He was a delegate to the Demo- cratic National Convention which nominated Wil- liam Jennings Bryan for the presidency in 1896. Prior to this he had been a great friend and ad- mirer of the late Gov. John P. Altgeld of Illinois and assisted in the management of his campaigns. He was a member of the committee which framed and had signed the petition for pardoning the con- demned anarchists, and this effort was successful to the extent of the releasing of Fielden and Schwab. Judge McConnell enjoyed the personal acquaintance of every governor of Illinois from the time he left Springfield to go to Chicago until he .removed his place of residence to New York, and it would be difficult to call the name of any prominent public character in Illinois beginning at that period whom he did not know and of whom he cannot talk about in a most interesting
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manner. He was on the "inside" of the always- interesting politics of Chicago and Illinois.
Judge McConnell married Sarah Rogers Febru- ary 16, 1876. She was the daughter of Judge John G. Rogers, a distinguished jurist of Chicago, at one time on the circuit bench, and a great- granddaughter of Judge Crenshaw, who was chief justice of the Supreme Court of Kentucky. They had four children, of whom two survive: Julia, who is the wife of M. D. Follansbee, of Chicago, a very prominent attorney, former president of the Chicago Bar Association and now a director of the Erie Railroad and of the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company, and Eleanor, who is suc- cessfully engaged in the practice of bacteriology at Chicago.
James McConnell, son of Judge McConnell, achieved international fame, was one of the first heroes of the United States to give his life to the cause of the Allies, and his part has been claimed and recognized as belonging to the glorious annals of the Republic of France in the present war. He was born at Chicago, Illinois, March 14, 1887, attended private schools there, the Morristown Academy in New Jersey, Haver- ford College in Pennsylvania, and in 1909 grad- uated from the University of Virginia. For a year or so he was in business at New York in the auto- mobile business and connected with a large ad- vertising agency. In 1911 he went with his father to Carthage, North Carolina, and at once made himself at home among the people of the locality, by whom he was held in the highest esteem and regard and by whom he was affectionately called "Jim." He was land and industrial agent for the Randolph & Cumberland Railroad and took a very active part in the varied business and social affairs of Carthage. When the European war broke out in 1914 he showed a very decided sympathy for Belgium and the cause of the Allies, and January, 1915, found him in France a member of the Ameri- can Ambulance Corps. His bravery and general efficiency attracted the attention of the French officers and at their suggestion and following his own inclination he became a student in the flying corps and in a remarkably short space of time had qualified as an airman for the firing line. He was put into service and thereafter rapidly acquired distinction as an air fighter. He gained the rank of sergeant pilot in the French Flying Corps and had many glorious achievements to his credit and was sergeant of the Lafayette Escadrille when his rendezvous with death came in the summer of 1917. He was awarded such cherished honors as the much coveted "Croix de Guerre," a medal which bears the inscription "Aux Braves." Many Americans served as volunteers under the flag of France, and only a man of the highest courage and ability could have been singled out for such dis- tinctions as were bestowed upon James McConnell. A striking instance of this was afforded by the Associated Press Dispatch early in 1918, in which it was stated that the French Government desired to place a bronze tablet on the monument erected at Carthage, North Carolina, to James R. Mc- Connell, the American air-man who died for France. Ambassador Jusserand had notified, so the dis- patch said, Senator Overman, and the request was forwarded to Judge McConnell at Carthage. A monument is to be erected by the University of Virginia on the college campus.
Many thousands of Americans recall his bril-
liant article "Flying for France," which was a feature of the November, 1916, number of the World's Work and now in book form. This ar- ticle was noticed and greatly appreciated by Jus- serand, the French Ambassador at Washington, who wrote a letter in regard to it to the great literary critic, John Jay Chapman, who in turn communicated to Judge McConnell under date of November 18, 1916, as follows: "What a won- derful article that is of your boy's in the Novem- ber number of World's Work. It has all the talent of Kipling without the faking that literary chaps throw in. I was just going to write to him and congratulate him when it occurred to me that I will write you instead. It is not often that a man has wielded both sword and peu as your boy does. I am delighted that he is still safe. This article of his is going to do a lot for this country. Yours sincerely, John Jay Chapman."
Another distinguished tribute paid to this bril- liant American air-man was given in his home community when the Moore County Hospital at Eureka was named in his honor the James Mc- Connell Memorial Hospital.
The present wife of Judge McConnell is Mrs. Mayo (Methot) McConnell, a native of Chicago, Illinois. They have three very interesting and talented children: Elizabeth, Mayo and John. Mrs. McConnell is president of the Women's Club of Carthage and is prominent in such matters, being also chairman of the Women's Committee of the Council of National Defense of Moore County.
J. GILES FOUSHEE. As one of the commissioners of Greensboro and present mayor pro tem the name of J. Giles Foushee is one of the most familiar in the citizenship of that community. Mr. Foushee has had a long and active career, has been identified with railroad construction and is also credited with much of the work which brought about the improved condition of the county highways of Guilford County.
He represents a colonial family of North Caro- lina. His great-grandfather was a French Hugue- not and on coming to America in colonial times settled at Richmond, Virginia, where he spent the rest of his life. His son John Foushee, grandfather of the Greensboro citizen, was born at Richmond and when a young man came to North Carolina and bought land in the locality then known as Egypt, now Cumnock in Chatham County .. It was his intention to mine coal, but after dis- covering that coal could not be produced in suffi ciently paying quantities to pay for the operations he directed the labor of his slaves and his facili- ties to farming and lived in that locality until his death. He married in Chatham County Jane May, who was a lifelong resident of the county. They had three sons, George, Marion and Giles. Marion moved to the State of Mississippi and bought a farm now included in the City of Okolona in Chickasaw County. The son Giles lived on the old homestead until after the war.
George Foushee, father of J. Giles, was born in Chatham County on his father's plautation in 1826. He became a man of large affairs, buying a plantation on Deep River in Chatham County. His land was uuderlaid with coal and he de- veloped some extensive mines, operating them in connection with his general farming. At one time he owned 100 slaves. So harmonious were the
Vol. VI-2
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relations between slave and master that he never employed the services of a white overseer, and left the direction of their work to one of their own number. These slaves were so attached to him that when freed they refused to leave the plantation and continued as tenant farmers and some of them are still there after more than fifty years. Dur- ing the war George Foushee was detailed to look after the widows and orphans and their families of soldiers and was also a buyer of supplies for the Confederate Government. At the close of the war he removed to Pittsboro, and lived retired in that town, the management of his farm being in the hands of his negro tenants. He died in 1875. George Foushee married Sue Steadman. She was born near Pittsboro, daughter of Orren Steadman. while her maternal grandfather was John Johnson. She survived her husband many years and died in 1897.
J. Giles Foushee, only child of his parents, was born on their plantation at Cumnock, Chatham County, and grew up in a home which favored the best development of his business and mental talents. He attended the Pittsboro schools and also the Horner Military Institute at Oxford. At the age of twenty-one Mr. Foushee removed to Raleigh and for four years was clerk in a cotton commission merchant's office. He then spent nine years as an independent merchant at Gulf in Chatham County. He left that business to join the construction department of the Durham & Charlotte Railroad, now the Norfolk & Southern, and on the completion of that line he was made auditor of the company and so remained until 1900. He resigned as a railway official to move to Greensboro and take the superintendency of the construction of county highways. He was superintendent of road building in Guilford County until 123 miles of fine macadam road had been constructed. Mr. Foushee was elected in 1911 city commissioner of Greensboro and has been kept in office continuously by reelection.
In 1880 he married Miss Annie Smith, who was born at Greensboro, daughter of Madison and Lou (Dick) Smith. Mr. and Mrs. Foushee's children are Louise, George, J. Henry Smith, Eugene, Sue Steadman and John M. Louise is the wife of William J. Horney and her seven children, grand- children of Mr. and Mrs. Foushee, are named William, Giles, Robert, Julian, Jennie, Mary and Eugene. The son George married Nora Calhoun. J. Henry Smith married Nellie Holmes Pearson. Eugene married Flavia Holt, while Sue Steadman
is the wife of J. J. Anderson. Mr. and Mrs. Foushee are charter members of the Presbyterian Church of the Covenant at Greensboro. He is an elder of the church and was the first superin- tendent of its Sunday school. Fraternally he is affiliated with Corinthian Lodge No. 342, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, Greensboro Chapter No. 14, Royal Arch Masons, Ivanhoe Commandery No. 8, Knights Templars, Oasis Temple of the Mystic Shrine and Greensboro Lodge No. 80, Knights of Pythias.
CHARLES DAVID KELLENBERGER has been a resi- dent of North Carolina for the past ten years and is one of the men who have been attracted to this state by its unrivaled business opportunities and splendid resources. Mr. Kellenberger is an ex- perienced furniture manufacturer, and has been identified with one of the leading industries of that kind in Greensboro.
He is of an old Pennsylvania family. He is a son of Lewis and Eliza (Zarfoss) Kellenberger, a grandson of John Kellenberger, 3rd, and great- grandson of John Kellenberger, 2nd, and great, great-grandson of John Kellenberger. The latter was born in Germany, and on coming to America settled in Adams County, Pennsylvania, where he owned a large tract of land between Hanover and Littlestown His wife was a native of Ireland, by name Welsh.
Charles D. Kellenberger had a good education as a preliminary to life's experiences and achieve- ments. He attended Hanover Academy, the York County Academy, the Schissler Business Col- lege at Norristown, Pennsylvania, and graduated from Patrick's Business College at York, Pennsyl- vania. For three years he was a successful teacher, and then became connected with the Long Fur- niture Company of Hanover, Pennsylvania. At the end of three years he resigned and went to the West York Furniture Manufacturing Company, York, Pennsylvania, with which he remained until 1908.
On coming to Greensboro Mr. Kellenberger took the position of secretary, treasurer and manager of the Standard Table Company, and has done much to develop the possibilities of this business and made it one of the successful and growing con- cerns of the city. In 1901 Mr. Kellenberger mar- ried Ella J. Stover. They have two children, Ruth and Charles David, Jr. Mr. and Mrs. Kellenberger were reared in the Lutheran faith, and he was one of the organizers of the First Lutheran Church of Greensboro, a member of its building committee, and has been an elder and treasurer since organi- . zation. He is also a member of the Chamber of Commerce and the Travelers Protective Associa- tion, also the Young Men's Christian Association and the Country Club.
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JONATHAN THOMAS HOOKS. During a long and active career as a planter, banker, merchant and public official, Wayne County has had no stronger and more influential citizen and construc- tive factor in its affairs than Jonathan Thomas Hooks of Fremont.
Fremont is his native town, where he was born September 30, 1855, a son of William and Peni- nah (Dew) Hooks. His father was a substantial planter and well known citizen, served as a colonel of militia before the war, and afterwards was judge of county court and a county commissioner.
Jonathan Thomas Hooks was liberally educated in private schools. Up to the age of twenty-five he lived at home and worked as a farmer. He then entered the general merchandise business in partnership with his brother, W. R. Hooks, at Fremont, but after ten years he sold that and returned to the business of planting, which he still follows. Mr. Hooks has developed a large amount of land in Wayne County and owns 900 acres variously employed in the planting opera- tions with which his name is most familiarly asso- ciated. In 1900 he was one of the organizers of the Bank of Fremont, and has been its president since organization. He is also president of the Fremont Oil Mill Company. Governor Aycock ap- pointed him a director of the State Penitentiary and he was on the board during 1903-04. For twenty years he served as a commissioner of Fre- mont, was chairman of the board of graded schools between ten and twelve years, and is now a member of the school board of Fremont. Mr.
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HISTORY OF NORTH CAROLINA
Hooks was elected and served in the State Sen- ate of North Carolina during 1913-14. He is a member of the Primitive Baptist Church.
JASPER MILLER. The prosperity of nations as well as communities rests upon commerce, and buying and selling, meeting the demands of pro- ducer and consumer, and so regulating trade that injustice be on neither side and that progress and contentment result make up so large a portion of the world's activities and engage the best efforts of so many people that the merchant stands in the forefront among the world's civilizing agencies. Merchandising, which includes the handling of commodities for the accommodation and needs of a community or a country, is a commercial relation absolutely necessary in the development of any section. In the cotton industry, which forms so great a part of the business activity of North Carolina, one of the leading merchants is Jasper N. Miller, of the firm of Jasper Miller & Son Company of Charlotte.
Jasper Miller was born in Cleveland County, North Carolina, in 1855, being a son of Eli Alexander and Mahulda (Warlick) Miller, both of whom are now deceased. Both the Miller and Warlick families are old ones in Lincoln County and Cleveland County, the latter of which was formerly a part of Lincoln. Eli Alexander Miller was born on the old Miller homestead in what is now the eastern part of Cleveland County (for- merly Lincoln), about nine miles from the Town of Shelby. The grandfather of Jasper Miller, John Miller, was also born in that vicinity and was the son of David Miller, a Scotchman from Belfast, Ireland, who shortly before the Revolutionary war had come to North Carolina by way of Charleston, South Carolina. On his mother's side, the War- lick's, Jasper Miller is of German ancestry. This family originated in Germany, from which country it immigrated to America and located in Penn- sylvania, and that branch of which Mr. Miller is a descendant later came through Virginia into North Carolina and settled in Lincoln County. That was about the year 1760. Mahulda (War- lick) Miller was born in that part of Lincoln County which is now Cleveland. Her father was David Warlick, and the latter was the son of Absalom Warlick, who is noted in history as hav- ing built the first cotton mill south of the Potomac River. It was located in the south part of the present boundary of Lincoln County, at Labora- tory, on the South Fork of the Catawba River. There has been a cotton mill at Laboratory ever since those days. Absalom Warlick had associated with him in the building of this mill Michael Schenck, the grandfather of Judge David Schenck. ' The firm name was Schenck & Warlick. Michael Schenck married Absalom Warlick's eldest daugh- ter. Mrs. Miller, at the time of her marriage to Eli Alexander Miller, was a widow, her first husband having been Edward White Oates, member of a prominent pioneer family of Mecklenburg County, and a brother of the late Robert M. Oates, who was the first president of the First National Bank of Charlotte.
Jasper Miller was reared on the home place in Cleveland County and was educated in private schools and at Wake Forest University. At the age of eighteen years, in 1873, he came to Char- lotte and engaged in the cotton business. In 1878 he went to Columbia, South Carolina, and in part-
nership with his brother engaged in the cotton business in that city, under the firm name of Miller Brothers. This was the first firm in Colum- bia to engage in the cotton business on a large scale and was the means of starting Columbia on a career that eventually brought it to a position as the largest cotton center in South Carolina and one of the largest in the South, and, as a further result, in making it one of the great centers of cotton manufacturing in the Southland. When Miller Brothers first began business at Columbia the community was a poor, straggling and unim- portant small city, not yet awakened from the depression of the war between the states and the burning of the city during that struggle. This firm took the leading part in its rehabilitation, and eventually conducted a business amounting to millions of dollars annually and putting large sums of money in circulation in regular business channels. Also they were the leading boosters of the city, finding time from their large business interests to give encouragement and support to movements for the public welfare and doing much to secure needed civic improvements and good of- ficial government.
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