Scannell's New Jersey first citizens : biographies and portraits of the notable living men and women of New Jersey with informing glimpses into the state's history and affairs, 1917-1918, Vol I, Part 49

Author: Sackett, William Edgar, 1848- ed; Scannell, John James, 1884- ed
Publication date: 1917
Publisher: Patterson, N.J. : J.J. Scannell
Number of Pages: 592


USA > New Jersey > Scannell's New Jersey first citizens : biographies and portraits of the notable living men and women of New Jersey with informing glimpses into the state's history and affairs, 1917-1918, Vol I > Part 49


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made all the arrangements for it and chartered the steamship "Carpathia" of the Cunard Line for the journey.


Monsignor Sheppard was also one of the influential members of the Bishops Committee that framed what is known as "The Bishops Law" for the regulation of the liquor traffic in the state with a special view to a better observance of the Sunday law and for the suppression of the vicious back rooms some of the drinking places maintained ; and he also originated the movement that resulted in the passage of the act prohibiting Justices of the Peace from performing marriage ceremonies.


MORRIS ROBESON SHERRERD-Newark .- Civil Engineer .- Born in Scranton, Penn., on December 16, 1865 ; son of Samuel and Frances M. (Hamilton) Sherrerd ; married July 9, 1912, to Eleanor V. Norris, of Williamsport, Pa., daughter of William and Harriet B. Norris.


Morris R. Sherrerd has been for sixteen years Chief Engineer of the Board of Street and Water Commissioners of Newark, and has conse- quently been a factor in the development of one of the largest and most important industrial cities in the United States. It was under his super- vision that the $6,000,000 contract with the East Jersey Water Company was carried out and the city's great new water plant installed. He is also Consulting Engineer to the New Jersey State Water Supply Commission which has supervision of all of the water supplies of the state, and one of the consulting engineers for the Passaic Valley Sewerage Commission.


Mr. Sherrerd's family is of English origin. The founder of the Amer- ican branch on his father's side, John Sherrerd, came to this country from London about the middle of the Eighteenth century and settled in Sussex county. He was a farmer, a store keeper and a saw mill owner. John M. Sherrerd, a graduate of Princeton in 1812, was the first Surrogate of War- ren county. His son, Samuel, father of Morris R. Sherrerd, and a practic- ing lawyer first in Scranton, Pa., and afterwards in New Jersey, was the Presiding Judge of the Warren County Courts for some years. His mother's stock is of Quaker lineage. The Robesons with whom she is connected on both sides of her family were wealthy Friends who were among the earlier settlers in both Pennsylvania and New Jersey. Jonathan Robeson, the founder of the New Jersey branch, was a son of Judge Andrew Robeson, Chief Justice of the Province of Pennsylvania, who came to America from Scotland in 1676. His son Jonathan moved to Warren county, then a part of Sussex county, and founded the town of Oxford. He was one of the first Judges of Sussex county, and his son, grandson and great-grandson, each in turn, occupied seats on the Court Bench. A daughter in the family mar- ried Gen. Samuel Fitz Randolph Hamilton, who was for many years Quar- termaster of New Jersey. Gen. Hainilton's son, Benjamin, was a large land owner in Princeton; the University grounds cover part of the estate. The land was donated to the then college, and old "Nassau Hall" stood on it. General Hamilton and his wife were Morris R. Sherrerd's maternal grand- parents.


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Morris R. Sherrerd was prepared for college in the Blair Presbyterian Academy at Blairstown and afterwards attended the Rensselaer Poly- technic Institute at Troy, N. Y. Having graduated from there with the class of 1886 with the degree of Civil Engineer, he was for two years con- nected with the Lackawanna Iron and Coal Company of Scranton. Then he entered the employ of the Public Improvement Commission of Troy ; his work since that time has had chiefly to do with municipal improvements. He was afterwards Assistant City Engineer of Peoria, Illinois, but declined the office of City Engineer to return to Troy to take up a consulting prac- tice. He was made City Engineer of Troy and held that position until in 1895 he accepted the tender of the position he now holds in Newark.


Newark created the office of Chief Engineer of Street and Water Board for him, under an act which gave him more latitude in the handling of the engineering work which the introduction of the new water system necessi- tated than had been allowed under older acts. After having laid down the plant and set it in operation, he supervised the construction of the great reservoir at Cedar Grove, with its attending tunnel and pipe lines which, at a cost of about $2,000.000, makes the water supply plant of the city the most complete of that kind of any city of its size in the country. Mr. Sherrerd has, besides his municipal work, been associated with many other large undertakings. One of these, in which he acted as a consulting engineer, necessitated his going to Brazil.


Mr. Sherrerd is past President of the American Water Works Associa- tion, the American Society of Municipal Improvement, and the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute General Alumni. He is past Director of the American Society of Civil Engineers, and is a member of the New England Water Works Association, the American Society for the Testing of Materials, and the New Jersey Sanitary Association, of the Engineers Club, New York Club and Theta Delta Chi Club of New York City, and the Essex and Union Clubs of Newark.


LOUIS SHERWOOD-Jersey City, (15 Exchange Place.)-In-


surance. Born in Newark, October 3rd, 1864; son of Thorne P. Sherwood and Sarah Carman Sherwood.


Louis Sherwood is President of the Jersey City Chamber of Commerce : and his activities have been with the movements that make for the upbuild of the city and the county. His parents moved to Jersey City when he was two years old; so he is familiar with the history of the city and for over twenty-five years has taken an active part in public affairs. He attended Public School No. 13 and the High School and graduated from Hasbrouck Institute in 1882. In the fall of that year he entered his father's insurance office, but eight years later formed a partnership in the insurance business with Edwin Van Houten. He subsequently purchased Van Houten's interest and incorporated under the name of Van Houten & Sherwood Company.


Becoming interested in the Property Interests Association, composed of the banks and manufacturers for the improvement of trolley and ferry con- ditions, Mr. Sherwood was made its Vice President. He served as a mem-


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ber of the Citizens Committee that arranged the week's observance of the 250th Anniversary in 1910, of the founding of the Town of Bergen, (now Jersey City), and of the other Committee of Thirty that arranged the local ceremony at the opening of the McAdoo tunnels in 1909. He was a mem- ber, too, by Gov. Fielder's appointment, of the Ways and Means Committee, which, on behalf of New Jersey, prosecuted, before the Interstate Commerce Commission, the case against the railroads for alleged discrimination in freight rates to Jersey City. He was one of the delegates from the Hud- son County Historical Society to the historical ceremonies in Newark that were part of that city's 250th Anniversary Celebration in 1916.


Mr. Sherwood was President of the Y. M. C. A. of Jersey City in 1899; was charter member of the Signal Corps, N. G. N. J., serving for nine years and one of the incorporators of the Down Town Club and its first President ; has been Vice President of the Lincoln Trust Company since 1910, and Secretary of the Hud- son County Historical Society since 1909 and for thirty years a member of the Lincoln Associ- ation of Jersey City. He is a member of Unique Council, 434, Royal Arcanum, was President of the Schubert Glee Club of Jersey City, is a Director of the Newman Industrial Home of Jersey City and a charter mem- ber of Montclair Chapter S. A. R. and a member of the New Jersey Society Sons of the Revo- lution. He is Treasurer, Elder and senior organist of Lafayette Reformed Church and a member of the Montclair Club of Mont- clair and the Carteret and Cos- mos Clubs of Jersey City.


The only public office Mr. Sherwood ever held was that of Harbor Board Commissioner, which went out of existence when Jersey City adopted the Commission form of govern- ment. While he was serving on the Commission the city, with its aid, took formal possession of the South Cove tract which had been the subject of controversy in the courts for twenty-five years or more. The Commission erected a municipal dock, the only modern public dock owned by the city on its valuable water front. The same Commission was the first body to recommend an Industrial Connecting Railway, the first section of which will soon be constructed. He has served actively in the Jersey City Chamber of Commerce for over twenty years, has been its Treasurer and Vice Presi- dent, having served on many of its more important committees before be- ing elected as its President. As Chairman of the Insurance Committee of the Board of Trade (former name of the Chamber of Commerce) he aided to secure improvements in the Fire Department and Water Supply Service


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1


that reduced insurance rates and saved the public in the aggregate about $100,000 a year in insurance premiums.


He was Chairman of the campaign committee in 1916 which established the Jersey City Chapter of the Red Cross in Jersey City with a membership of about 4,000 and is now Vice-Chairman of the Chapter.


JAMES K. SHIELDS-Maplewood .- Clergyman. Born at Blairs- ville, Pa., June 22, 1867; son of John and Myrtilla (Stewart) Shields ; married at Blairsville, September 17th, 1891, to Gertrude M. Graff, who died February 25th, 1898; re-married November 15, 1900, to Bessie M. Mack, of Chicago.


Children : Wendell G., born June 20th, 1895; James Marshall, born Sept. 18, 1904; Stewart Dudley, born Dec. 17th, 1907; William Wallace, born Oct. 23, 1909.


Dr. Shields is the Superintendent and the chief Executive Officer of the Anti-Saloon League of New Jersey, which aims to establish prohibition in the state through the agency of local option elections. While he is recog- nized as a forceful platform speaker, his greatest strength and most notable successes have been as a leader and organizer. He comes of early Puritan stock on his mother's side; on his father's side he is of Scotch-Irish descent. He spent the first twenty years of his life on a farm in Indiana County, Pa., attending the school in that locality meanwhile. After his studies at the Indiana State Normal school, and at Alleghany College, Meadville, Pa., he entered the North Western University to prepare for the ministry.


In 1887 Mr. Shields went to Chicago and resided there for twenty-five years. On leaving the North Western University in 1906, he organized the Joyce Methodist Episcopal Church, north side of Chicago, and left it after five years in a prosperous condition. Following this, he served the Engle- side Avenue Church and the First Methodist Episcopal Church of Free- port, Illinois. At the beginning of the year 1906, he was called to reform work as the Superintendent of the Anti-Saloon League of Illinois. It was in the early days of this great work and under his management that the Illinois League became the second most powerful organization of its kind in the Union and it has since remained so. During his administration he procured the passage of the present Local Option Law, which has resulted in driving the saloons from considerably more than one-half of the state. has aroused a sentiment for the closing of the saloons even in Chicago and laid the foundation for the state-wide Prohibition which is now being actively urged upon the Legislature of Illinois.


In 1911, the greatest Inter-National Anti-Alchoholic Congress that was ever held met at the Hague, Holland. Queen Wilhelmina requested that the United States Government select twelve representatives to be sent to this Congress. Mr. Shields was one of the twelve named by President Taft for that important mission.


It was in the fall of 1912, that Dr. Shields was called to the State of New Jersey to direct the labors of the Anti-Saloon League here. Under his


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directions the movement lias made great headway in this most difficult field.


GEORGE MARSHALL SHIPMAN-Belvidere .- Lawyer. Born at Belvidere, on April 20th, 1850 ; son of Jehiel Gardner and Mary Louisa (Morris) Shipman ; married at Belvidere, on June 26th, 1878, to Annie Louisa daughter of Richard D. Wilson,


Children : Margaret Wilson ; Jehiel Gardner ; George Marshall, Jr.


George M. Shipman was for many years the Presiding Judge of the Warren County Courts. A republican in politics, his first appointment came from Gov. Griggs in 1898, and he served by re-appointment by Gov's Mur- phy and Fort until Gov. Wilson displaced him with Joseph M. Roseberry. His father, also a lawyer, had a large railroad practice ; and before Judge Shipman ascended the Bench he was Counsel for the Delaware Lackawanna & Western, the New York Susquehanna & Western, the Central of New Jersey, the Lehigh Valley and the Lehigh & Hudson railroad companies.


Judge Shipman is of Norman descent, though his family has long figured in the professional and public life of Warren county. His mother was a descendant of Major Peter Morris who was an officer in the Conti- nental army. Judge Shipman was educated under the preceptorship of Rev. Frederick Knighton, D. D., Principal of the Classical Academy at Belvi- dere, and later took a course in Princeton University, graduating from there in 1870 with the A. B. degree. The University subsequently conferred the A. M. degree. His law studies were pursued in his father's office and he was admitted to the Bar as an attorney in 1873 and became a counselor in 1876. The partnership which, upon his admission, he formed with his . father, continued until the elder Mr. Shipman's death and the practice of the firm was then taken over by Judge Shipman alone. He continued in it until his appointment to the Bench. Judge Shipman is much interested in church work, a presiding elder in the First Presbyerian Church of Belvi- dere and in 1911 the Presbytery of Newton elected him to the office of Moderator. He is President of the Belvidere National Bank.


Judge Shipman is a member of the Sons of the American Revolution, the Easton Pomfret Club and the Princeton Club of New York.


Judge Shipman's son, Jehiel G., a graduate of Princeton and for a time a student in the law office of Robert H. McCarter, is now of the law firm of Fort & Fort, Newark.


GEORGE S. SILZER-Metuchen, (Graham Place.)-Jurist. Born at New Brunswick, April 14, 1870; son of Theodore and Christina (Zimmerman) Silzer; married at Metuchen, on April 18, 1898, to Henrietta T. Waite, daughter of Cephas K. Waite.


Children : Parker Waite, born April 20, 1900.


George S. Silzer was elected to the New Jersey State Senate in 1906. on an anti-bribery platform suggested by the agitation of the day against


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the purchase of seats in the United States Senate. The amendment to the Federal Constitution which provides for the popular election of United States Senators was largely due to the belief that money had more to do than merit with Senatorial elections. Mr. Silzer had been a leading member of the New Brunswick Board of Aldermen and Chairman of the Democratic County Committee, and he entered the anti-bribery movement with consid- erable force. Made the democratic candidate for the State Senate in 1906, he was elected by a handsome majority and re-elected by a larger one in 1909. The translation of Dr. Woodrow Wilson from Princeton University to the Governorship of New Jersey was the outgrowth of a reform move- ment, of which the anti-bribery agitation was a feature.


Mr. Silzer was in the Senate during the first two years of Gov. Wilson's administration, and aided in the passage of the remedial and corrective legislation which Governor Wilson promoted. The Governor nominated him for Prosecutor of the Pleas of Middlesex county at the expiration of his senate term in 1912. In 1914 he resigned to accept appointment as a Cir- cuit Judge. The appointment was for an unexpired term, and when it ran out in 1915 he was reappointed. His term will expire in 1922.


Judge Silzer was educated in the local schools and at the High School of New Brunswick. He was admitted to the Bar as an attorney in 1892 and made a counselor in 1899. He is a 32nd. degree Mason, of the Mystic Shrine, a B. P. O. E., a member of the New Jersey State Bar Association and of the New Brunswick Country and Somerville Country, Metuchen Golf and the Metuchen Clubs.


V


WINFIELD SCOTT SIMS-Newark, (163 Mt. Prospect Avenue.) -Inventor. Born in New York City, on April 6, 1844; son of Lindsay D. and Catherine B. Sims; married on June 11, 1867, to Lida Leek, of Newark .- 2nd, on June 24, 1891, to Mrs. Josephine Courter French.


Winfield S. Sims has specialized in the application of electric power to marine vehicles and in the invention of high power war weapons. He was the first to apply electricity to the propulsion of torpedoes. Among his in- ventions is a submarine boat with a cylinderical hull of copper having coni- cal ends and with a screw propeller and rudder operated by electric power generated on shore or on ship board, by means of which the torpedo is propelled, guided and exploded. This invention was followed by others that commanded for Mr. Sims recognition among the inventors of effective war weapons.


Mr. Sims attended the public schools of Newark and had just graduated from the High School when the Civil War broke out. He enlisted in the 37th Regiment New Jersey Volunteers and served until 1864.


Among Mr. Sims' earlier inventions were various devices in electro- magnets and the construction of an electric motor, weighing 45 pounds for light work, with a battery of twenty half gallon Bensen cells that propelled an open boat sixteen feet long with six persons on it, at the rate of four miles an hour. His invention of the submarine torpedo boat was followed


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by the devising of a boat with a speed of 22 miles an hour to carry a 500 pound charge of dynamite. He invented also a wireless dirigible torpedo for the Japanese Government in 1907. The Sims & Dudley dynamite gun, also of his invention, was used by the Cuban insurgents, and, at the battle of Santiago by the "Rough Riders." Others of his designs are a dynamite gun for use with dirigible war ships and an aeroplane dynamite gun.


ALFRED FORD SKINNER-Madison .- Lawyer. Born at New- ark, on September 24, 1862 ; son of Daniel M. and Mary C. (Squier) Skinner ; married at Newark, on January 1, 1894, to Josephine Phillips, daughter of John M. and Elizabeth Phillips, of Newark.


Children : Alfred Phillips, born February, 1895; John Morris, born January 2, 1897, (died in infancy) ; Mary Eleanor, born September 23, 1900; Morris Phillips, born August 22, 1904.


Alfred F. Skinner, who is now of the law firm of Pitney, Hardin & Skinner in Newark, had been previously active in the official life of the state and community. The republicans of Essex county named him as one of their candidates for the New Jersey House of Assembly in 1893, and serving in the legislature of 1894 he was re-elected to that of 1895. The enactment of the New Jersey Borough Law, which bearing his name, was of his devising, was one of the features of his work in Trenton. Two years later he was made the republican candidate for Register of Deeds for Essex county and elected. While serving in that capacity, Gov. Voorhees, in 1900, tendered him the appointment of Presiding Judge of the Essex County Courts, and he resigned his county office to accept the judicial one. He sat on the Bench until 1906, when he resigned that also to become a partner in the firm of which he is still a member.


Judge Skinner's early education was acquired in private schools in Newark. He entered Rutger's College in 1880, graduating in 1883. After leaving College he took up a course in the Columbia Law School in New York. He studied law in the office of John W. Taylor, who from 1873 to '75, was President of the State Senate, was admitted as an attorney in 1886 and became a counselor in 1891. He afterwards acted as clerk for eight months under Edward M. Colie and later served as Managing Clerk for Whitehead & Condit ; then formed a partnership with Jay Ten Eyck which was dissolved when he went upon the Bench.


Judge Skinner is a member of both National and State Bar Associa- tions, one of the Trustees of Rutgers College and a member of the Essex Club of Newark, the Madison Field Club and the Lawyers Club of New- ark.


THOMAS O'CONOR SLOANE-South Orange, (55 Montrose Avenue.)-Scientific Expert. Born in New York, November 24, 1851; son of Christian and Eliza M. (O'Conor) Sloane; married


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September 18, 1877, to Isabel X. Mitchell, of Brooklyn-2nd. on April 16, 1884, to Alice M. Eyre, of Dublin, Ireland.


Children : Thomas O'Conor ; Chas. O'Conor ; John Eyre; Alice M.


Mr. Sloane is a graduate of St. Francis Xavier's College, at that time located in New York City. He graduated in the class of 1869, receiving from the College the degree of B. A. Later he graduated from the School of Mines of Columbia College, as it was then called, receiving the degree of E. M. and next the degree of M. A. from St. Francis Xavier's College. In 1876 he received the degree of Ph. D. from Columbia College for original work in the analysis of coal gas and the technology of coal gas manufac- ture. In 1912 he received the degree of LL. D. from St. Francis Xavier's College.


After serving on the U. S. Geological Survey of the territories in 1872, visiting the then little known Yellowstone Park and the geyser basins with Professor Hayden's party, he acted as private assistant to Professor Chas. F. Chandler of Columbia College, and in the spring of 1873, accepted a posi- tion of chemist of the New York Gas Light Company. While occupying this position he published a number of papers on original work on coal gas, re- ports of lectures which he gave on scientific subjects appearing in the dif- ferent journals of the time. In 1877, he published a description of a new process for determining sulphur in illuminating gas. This is really the first accurate method for making this somewhat difficult determination. It pro- vided for the combustion of gas in air, which air was purified before use so as to free it from any sulphur it might contain. Careful tests show that no sulphur escaped the apparatus; so the determination was scientifically ac- curate. In 1877 he was appointed chief engineer of the Citizens' Gas Light Company of Brooklyn, and while there invented a Self Recording Photo- meter called the Thermophote. This registered upon a disc of paper the candle power of coal gas throughout the day so that any variations were shown as well as the time at which they occurred. This is supposed to be the first instrument that recorded mechanically the candle power of gas. Really applied to coal gas, it has not been introduced into the water gas field.


Dr. Sloane is author of several books on electrical topics, a "Standard Electrical Dictionary" among them. Others of his books are on the Liquefaction of Gases, Home Experiments in Science, etc. He was an early contributor to the now "Engineering Record" and has written much for other technical publications. Articles of his have appeared, too, in the "Encyclopedia Britannica," "Appleton's Annual Encyclopedia," "New York Gas Light Journal," the "New York Independent," and many other publica- tions.


Mr. Sloane appeared on the lecture stage at an early date, has given a great many lectures in different institutions of education and served as Public Lecturer for the New York City Board of Education. He has ap- peared as scientific expert in a large number of patent cases. He served for a number of years on the editorial staff of the "Scientific American," of New York City. He was a member of the New Jersey State Board of Edu- cation for several years during the incumbency of Gov's Stokes and Fort. He was President of the South Orange Public Library for a number of years, is a member of the New York Yacht Club, of the Automobile Club


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of America, a charter member and governor of the Washington Society of Essex County, a charter member and governor of the International Motor Club. He was Professor of Natural Science and Higher Mathematics in Seton Hall College, South Orange, and a Trustee of the South Orange Public Library.


JOHN WESLEY SLOCUM-Long Branch .- Lawyer. Born at Long Branch, April 25, 1867.


John Wesley Slocum, a life long resident of Long Branch, is a member of the State Board of Public Utility Commissioners. His ancestor John Slocum, according to the old records of May, 1668, was one of the Associate Patentees of Monmouth county.


Mr. Slocum after leaving school studied law and was admitted to the Bar as an attorney at the June term of 1888 and as a counselor in 1892. He was City Solicitor of Long Branch for eight years.


In the fall of 1911 Mr. Slocum was named by the democrats for the State Senate and, elected, he served for the ensuing three years. At the ses- sion of 1914 he was made President of the body, and during the Governor's absence on a western trip in June of that year he was sworn in as Acting Governor. At the expiration of his term he was appointed Law Judge of the County Courts at Freehold but resigned his seat on the Bench to accept appointment to the Board of Public Utility Commissioners. His term will expire in 1921.




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