USA > New Jersey > Hudson County > Hudson County to-day; its history, people, trades, commerce, institutions and industries > Part 4
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16
West New York.
Happy is the town whose history is short. is a saying that very aptly applies to this town. Only within the past few years has West New York bestirred itself and began to make its own history. In these modern days the builder and real estate men are hustling, and as a result of their activities the town is now rapidly taking its place as one of the most up-to-date mu- nicipalities in North Hudson.
There was a time when instead of the hum of the loom and the steady rattle of machinery in all kinds of factories, there was only to be heard the tap of the blockmaker's hammer. Within the past ten years the fields were laid out in blocks, streets were made and paved, and then came the builder. The town fathers went slow and noted the mistakes of their neighboring towns. In this way they avoided the undesirable things and took advantage of the good things made and done.
West New York has grown more rapidly in the past five years than any other town in the northern end of the county. Buildings are going up as if by magic. and the growth of population is keeping pace with the provision made for them. As a manufacturing centre it is fast coming to the front.
The foregoing is necessarily a brief outline of the beginnings of the several towns in North Hudson. As may be noted, the entire northern end of the county began as one town and now a new page of history is about to be written. For some time there has been a movement on foot to bring North Hudson back to the point where it began, and make the northern end of the county one city. This movement began about half a century after the process of breaking up into small towns took form. With consolidation will come the opening chapter of the real history of this section of the county.
H. MACPHERSON.
35
Lam
HE importance of the proper administration of justice has been recognized from the earliest times. When our forefathers adopted our constitu- tion, they made the judicial department one of the three great branches of our government. The same is true of the organization of our own state. There is no doubt but that some of the early decisions of the Supreme Court of the United States did much to inspire public confidence and to insure the perpetuity of our nation. The names of the great jurists who contributed to these decisions are found high upon our country's roll of honor. Notwith- standing some criticisms that have been made from time to time, the courts are looked upon as the great bulwark of protection to the mass of our citizens. Ilere the oppressed can come for relief : here those who have wrongs to right can come for redress ; here all alike can look for protection against robbery and arson and for protection against those who would violate the sanctity of their homes or do injury to their property or person.
A sacred duty rests upon those who have in their keeping the adminis- tration of justice, whether they sit as judges upon the bench or appear as counsel to explain the law and assist these judges in the due administration of justice. It should be considered an honor to appear in either of these capacities; and those who do so should have due appreciation of their re- sponsibility and act with the determination that through no act of theirs shall the just opinion of our courts be lowered or justice be betrayed.
The members of the bar of this county have been leaders, too, in other walks of life. They have adorned literature with the products of their pen. They have been in the vanguard of those whose voices have been raised on the public platform in condemnation of wrong and in pioneering these great reforms that have contributed from time to time to our advancement and betterment. In times of peace they have served our state and nation from the more humble capacities to the greatest office that our people can give.
JOHN D. PIERSON.
36
John D. Hiersm.
J OLIN D. PIERSON, lawyer, at 95
River Street, Hoboken, was born near Johnsonburg. Warren County, N. J .. January 30, 1871. His parents were John W. and Eunice E. Pierson. He was educated in the public schools of Warren County and prepared for college at Blair AAcademy. graduating at the head of his class as valedictorian. lle entered Lafayette College, graduating with honor, again being valedictorian. While at college he secured several prizes in scholarship and oratory and was elected a member of the honorary Phi Beta Kappa.
Leaving college he taught for three years, one in the historic Cumberland Valley, Pennsylvania, and two in the Washington, N. J .. High School. He then took up the study of law with Judge George M. Shipman at Belvidere. He was admitted to the bar in 1900 and sub- sequently graduated from the New York Law School. He has practiced in Hoboken ever since.
He has always been active as a Republican and has stumped in various campaigns. He was prominent in the first fight for commission government in Hoboken and helped in preparing the proposed new charter for that city. He was one of the first to agitate a publie playground for Hoboken and through his talks before societies and clubs helped arouse the sentiment re- sponsible for the purchase of St. George ericket grounds as a county park.
Mr. Pierson is a past master of Masons, a past noble grand of Odd Fellows. a member of the Encampment and Rebekah Lodge of Odd Fellows, elder of the First Presbyterian Church and superintendent of the Bethesda Sunday School.
37
John Albert Blair
3 OHN ALBERT BLAIR, for fifteen years judge of the Court of Com- mon Pleas, General Quarter Sessions, and Orphans' Court of the County of Hudson, was born near Blairstown, N. J .. July 8, 1842, his parents Le- ing John Il. Bair and Mary (.Angle) Blair, of Knowlton Township, Marien County. N. J. His ancestors sprang from the noted Blair family of Blair-Athol. Perthshire, Scotland, whence they came to this country in 1720. settling in Pennsylvania and New Jersey.
Among then were broth- ers. Samsel and John Blair, loth of whom were e:lu- cated at the Log College of the Neshaminy under the celebrated William Tennant. They became distinguished ministers of the Presbyterian church.
Rev. Samuel Blair, the second, declined the presi- deney of the College of New Jersey ( Princeton ) which was offered him. The Rev. John Blair was ordained pastor of Big Spring. Middle Spring and Rocky Spring in the Cumberland Valley in 1742. In 1767 he became professor of divinity and moral philosophy at Princeton and was acting president of the college until the accession of Dr. Witherspoon in 1769. He died in 1771.
While this branch of the family was devoting its work to the ministry and the dissemination of knowledge, another was molding the commerce which has since become one of the mainstays of the State of New Jersey. In the latter part of the eighteenth century another Samuel Blair was sent by a Philadelphia firm to take charge of the iron industry at Oxford Furnace in Warren County. N. J. This Samuel Blair was the great-great-grandfather of Judge John A. Blair. Judge Blair's rudimentary education was obtained in the public schools of his native place and he prepared for college at the Blairstown Presbyterian Academy. Ile entered the College of New Jersey at Princeton and graduated in 1866. At the close of his college term he began the study of law with Hon. J. G. Shipman at Belvidere, N. J. He was admitted to the bar as an attorney in June. 1869, and as counsellor in June, 1872. In 1870 he came to Jersey City, where he has ever since resided, and took up the practice of his profession.
On the passage of the law creating district courts in Jersey City Bennington F. Randolph and John A. Blair were appointed the first judges thereof. In May. 1885. Mr. Blair became corporation counsel of Jersey City. He resigned in 1889. He was reappointed in 1894 and served until 1898. when he resigned to accept the appointment to the Common Pleas Court.
Judge Blair, until his accession to the bench, was an active Republican He attends the Presbyterian Church, is a member of the Union League Club. the University Club and the Princeton Club, all of Hudson County. He is a director of the Hudson County National Bank.
38
Robert Carry
OBERT CAREY, judge of the Court of Common Pleas, 1908-1913, was born in Jersey City. September 16, 1872. His parents were Thomas and Eliza beth Carey. Since entering public life he has advanced in the esteem and councils of the men looking for municipal and state betterment and purity in politics. Edu- cated in the public schools of Jersey City, he was graduated from the New York Law School in 1893, admitted to the bar in New Jersey in 1893. to the bar in New York in roos, and to practice in all the United States courts.
His political activities have been Re- publican. Ile was corporation attorney of Jersey City, 1903-1908: member of the State Board of Taxation, 1908; judge of the Iludson Court of Common Pleas as be- fore stated : defeated as a candidate at the Republican gubernatorial primary in 1913. and was defeated for Congress in 1912 in a strong democratic district by only three hundred votes.
In sociological and charitable work he is prominent, being a trustee of Christ Hospital. the German Hospital Association, Home of the Hofneless, the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children, and the Jersey City Fresh Air fund. Socially he is affiliated with the Jersey City Club, the Carteret Club, etc .. and fraternally he is a Mason and an Arcanian.
As an orator his services are much in demand. He has stumped the State in the Republican campaigns of the past twenty years and has lectured in New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania and the Eastern states on "Municipal Govern- ment" and "The Criminal Courts."
39
William G. Super
EW men on the bench have been more in public life than Judge William H. Speer of the Circuit Court in Hudson County. His legal training has been such that he is particularly fitted to occupy a position of this kind, he having much experience in practice, both as a private lawyer and as Prosecutor of the Pleas.
Judge Speer was born in Jersey City, October 21, 1868. He was educated in Hasbrouck Institute in Jersey City and at Columbia University in New York City. He studied law at Columbia University Law School and the office of John Linn in Jersey City. At the November term, 1891, he was admitted to the bar of New Jersey and was made a counselor-at-law in June, 1895.
After being admitted to the bar, Judge Speer became a member of the law firm of Linn & Speer, his partner being Clarence Linn, a son of John Linn, with whom the judge had previously studied. This partnership was continued for a number of years. The firm was well known and reputable and it enjoyed a lucrative practice.
Among his fellow members of the Hudson County bar Judge Speer has always been popular. He was twice elected vice-president of the Hudson County Bar Association. He was president of the association in 1903 and his administration of the office was such that it is still favorably commented upon among the members.
On February 8, 1903, Mr. Speer was first appointed Prosecutor of the Pleas by Governor Franklin Murphy. He was confirmed as such by the State Senate, duly qualified for the office and held the position with honor to himself and profit for the people until 1907. when he was appointed by Governor Edward C. Stokes to the Circuit Court bench to succeed Judge Charles W. Parker, who had been promoted to the Supreme Court. This appointment was made to fill an unexpired term, but in 1908. Governor Fort appointed him for a full term and he still occupies the honorable position in the judiciary of Hudson County.
Judge Speer, to the time of his appointment to the bench, was very active in polities. He was and is an ardent Republican. Before his appoint . ment he was much sought as a speaker during the stirring campaigns of former days. Since his appointment he has naturally not been so prominent in politics, he believing that politics and the bench should be separated as much as possible. This does not mean that he does not take a keen interest in the welfare of his party, but that he does not allow that interest to preju- dice his judicial position.
At the time of his appointment as judge he was the senior member of the firm of Speer & Kellogg, his partner being Frederick S. Kellogg, also well known to the bench and bar as an upright lawyer. Judge Speer's circuit includes Hudson County. His term will expire in 1915.
Although occupying a judicial position, the judge is fond of golfing, automobiling and other open air pastimes. He is said to be an expert golfer and is often seen on the links when the pressure of business in his court will permit him that pleasure. He and former Judge Cary are often opponents at golfing and it is said to be nip and tuck between them.
40
Hierre 3. Garvan
A MONG the lawyers of Hudson County foremost in their profession is Pierre P. Garvan, of Bayonne, with offices at 586 Newark avenue, Jersey City. Mr. Garvan is a comparatively young man, having scarcely reached middle age, but he has been very successful in the practice of his profession and is counted among the solid men of the legal fraternity. Pierre P. Garvan is a native of Hudson County. He has lived here all his life. He was born in Bayonne, June 9, 1872, his parents being James and Emma Garvan, among the highly respected residents of the South Hudson city. He acquired his early education in the schools of his native city, being a graduate of the Bayonne High school.
From the first his education in law has been auspicious, He studied in the offices of the Central Railroad of New Jersey and took his degree at the New York Law School. On April. 1898, he was admitted to the New Jersey bar as an attorney, and in February, 1901, as a counselor-at-law.
Mr. Garvan is well studied on corporation law and that is his favorite practice. He is attorney for the Standard Oil Company of New Jersey, for the Vacuum Oil Company, the Grasselli Chemical Company and several other of the largest corporations of the United States.
In his home city he is regarded as a substantial, solid citizen. Ile is president of the City Bank of Bayonne and is a director in a large number of corporations of which he is a stockholder. These corporations are so num- erous that he thinks it worth while not to detail them. None, however, are of the nationally important type.
Politically Mr. Garvan is a Republican. He has been signally honored by his party in being twice elected mayor of his home city, in 1905 and 1907. after having been defeated when he first ran for the office in 1903. It speaks well for his popularity when it is known that he received an increased vote and majority at each of the elections. In 1908 he was appointed Prosecutor of the Pleas by Governor Fort, an office he held with honor until his term expired in February, 1914. While prosecutor he was called upon to inves- tigate the beef trust, cold storage trust and county affairs.
He is a member of the Newark Bay Club and numerous other clubs and organizations, political and social. Fraternally he is a Mason, in which fra- ternity he has gone the route and is a member of Salaam Temple, Ancient Arabic Order Nobles of the Mystic Shrine, of Newark. His home is modestly appointed residence at 65 West Fourth street, Bayonne. He owns considerable property in Bayonne and elsewhere and is considered as well-to-do.
Mr. Garvan goes in a good deal for athletic sports. He is fond of base- ball. football and anything of an athletic nature, barring golf. He can't see the fun of a big man walking across field and hill and dale on a hot day, pegging away with a big-headed stick against a ball which at times seems smaller than a pea.
With all his legal, financial and sporting activities, Mr. Garvan finds time to be a congenial companion, a home loving and lovable man, a citizen active in affairs for the betterment of his home city and county, and an altogether useful citizen. Much of the progress of Bayonne is due to his activities along the lines of development and progress. He moves in good social circles and is admired and liked by no end of acquaintances. He always has a hearty hand shake for a friend and was never known to repudiate an agreement of any kind.
41
John J. Harnell
A MONG the more prominent, able and busy lawyers of Hudson County is John J. Marnell, who for nearly twenty years passed has success- fully practiced law, with a constantly growing clientele, in the Second National Bank building in Hoboken. He is acknowledged by bench and bar as an able practitioner and his advice is often sought by influential clients. To a large extent his is what is known as an "office business."
Mr. Marnell was admitted to the New Jersey bar in June. 1895. He immediately established his office in its present location and has continued there throughout his entire legal career to the present time. The character- isties of the man and his work may best be shown in his reply regarding queries concerning his career. "Just say I am a busy lawyer," he says, "and let that suffice."
Friends and clients, however, are inclined to say more of him. He is well read and studious. He keeps in touch with the technicalities of and decisions in cases which affect a general legal practice. He takes pride in his profession and regards it as something higher than a mere means of making a living. While standing well in his profession, he is not austere. He is a good friend and congenial companion to those he likes. To possess his friendship is regarded by many as being akin to honor. He has served in the Assembly at Trenton.
Mr. Marnell does not court pandering publicity. Neither does he want the praise which expresses itself in platitudes. He would rather be called "a good lawyer than a good fellow." In an unostentatious and dignified way he impresses one as being a man who believes his profession should not be dishonored by questionable methods, even when these methods might lead to more material success.
John Milton
3 OHN MILTON, now corporation counsel of Jersey City, is one of the best known of the legal lights in Hudson County. He personally is modest regarding himself and his attainments and it was with difficulty that the data necessary for this article was obtained. Mr. Milton was born in Jersey City, January 21, 1881, his parents being Charles J. and Catherine Milton. lle has lived in Jersey City all his life. He received his earlier education in Jersey City, attained his knowledge of the law there and was admitted to the New Jersey bar and immediately settled down to the practice of his profession there.
From early manhood Mr. Milton always took an active interest in municipal questions, especially those concerning his own particular neigh- borhood. He fought hard to have the smoke nuisance of the railroads running through the "Horseshoe" section of Jersey City eliminated and suc- ceeded in having this done to an appreciable extent. Mr. Milton has the bulldog tenacity to keep eternally at a thing when he knows he is right. and it is this characteristic, coupled with the name he has made for himself, and the general esteem in which he is held that found him his position as corpora- tion counsel, his being truly a case of the office seeking the man, rather than the man seeking the office.
Mr. Milton's practice has always been of the highest order and he is regarded as an authority on civil and municipal law, as well as on state and federal legal matters. He is still a young man and has a splendid career before him, for he is able as a practitioner, is conscientious in his work and is a slave to no habit.
42
3. Emil Malsrhein
COUNSELLOR J. Emil Walscheid was born December 23, 1872, in the house at 309 Fulton street, Union Hill, now occupied by his brother. Dr. Arthur Walscheid. His parents were German citizens, but his father had become a naturalized American citizen in 1844. The counsellor has made the town of his birth the scene of his life work and he has achieved a success and popularity because of his sterling citizenship and services to his friends and neighbors. He enjoys a large practice and is concededly one of the leading lights of the Hudson County bar. His offices are located in the Harvard building at 25 Bergenline avenue. He lives in Highwood Park.
Counsellor Walscheid received his preliminary education at the Hoboken Academy. Upon his graduation from that institution he expressed a desire to study for the law. His father, who was bent upon his son learning a trade. would not hear to this expression and so young Walscheid determined to learn the silk business, entering the employ of the Phoenix Manufacturing Company as an apprentice. At that time the company was one of the largest and most successful manufacturers of silk in the country, with plants at Paterson. Allentown, Bethlehem and other eastern towns. He took up the study of this trade in the Allentown plant in 1889. He spent two years in the mills, beginning in the spinning department and going through the various stages of silk production until he reached the designing room. Whatever he (lid he did well and he became a silk designer of no mean ability.
But all this time his ambition to become a lawyer remained. Ile im- portuned his father to allow him to begin the study of his chosen profession. Finding his son in earnest in the matter, the elder Walscheid relented and consented to his becoming a law student. The younger Walscheid entered the New York University Law School, from which he graduated in 1896 in the academic class. To complete his law course at the same time he doubled his studies and took both the academic and law courses at once. He took the lectures in the academic course in the morning, in the law course in the afternoon, and devoted the evening of each day to study.
In the same year he was admitted to the New Jersey bar, having pre- viously secured his legal apprenticeship in the offices of Page & Taft, counsel to the New York, New Haven and Hartford railroad. and with the firm of Randolph, Condit & Black of Jersey City. He then opened an office for the practice of his profession in Union Hill. where he enjoys a large and lucrative clientele, which is constantly increasing.
In politics Walscheid is a democrat. He served in the State Assembly with honor in 1899 and 1900. At the time he was president of the Third Ward Democratic club of Union Hill and a member of the executive committee of the Democratic central organization. He did not again seek office until 1912. when he was a candidate for Congressman. but was beaten after a hard-fought three-cornered battle for the nomination.
43
Julius Dirhtrustrin
J ULIUS LICHTENSTEIN, of the firm of Weller & Lichtenstein, lawyers, of Hoboken, has during the years of his association with Mr. Weller and of his own career in the legal profession, gained a large acquaintance and a splendid clientele among the leading men of his city, the county and the state. There is no member of the bar in Hudson county more generally respected by the bench and his fellow members of the legal fraternity than Mr. Lichtenstein. Ile is recognized as having a mind especially trained for legal matters, has a retentive memory, and is one of those legal lights, whose acumen and handy reference knowledge of the law has brought him to the front.
Mr. Lichtenstein is a familiar figure in the courts of the city and county, for he has a large clientele which brings him almost constantly in one court or another when they are in session.
His practice covers all branches of the law, civil and criminal. He is (fficient in all, ready to quote decisions in complicated cases, and wins a splendidly large percentage of his cases. His clients have learned to rely upon him. They know that if a case has any merits, no point of it will be missed by Mr. Lichtenstein. He is quick at retort, convincing in his argu- ments before a jury, although quiet in his oratory, if such it may be called, a skilled cross examiner and quickly gets at the truth of matters if he sus- pects a witness is not telling the truth. It is these qualities which have made Mr. Lichtenstein's reputation as a reliable attorney and counsellor, and built up a great deal of the remunerative practice enjoyed by the firm with which he is associated.
John T. Sheridan
J OHN II. SHERIDAN is a Hoboken lawyer who has been since his ad- mission to the bar a credit to the city and to the profession he repre- sents. Mr. Sheridan has a select list of clients, which is constantly growing, because in him those who are careful in legal matters recognize a man who will look after their interests as closely as he would after his own. Mr. Sheridan cannot be said to be a progressive lawyer. On the other hand, he is a lawyer of the old school, a lawyer who lives and breathes and feels deeply the trusts which are imposed in him by his clients. There is nothing of the spectacular about him. none of the flambuoyancy which marks so many of the profession today.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.