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, 1919-1920, Vol II > Part 14
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J. Warren Davis, Judge of the United States District Court for the District of New Jersey has been conspicuous equally in politics and pro- fessionally. He lived with his parents near Norfolk, Va., until 1889, when he went to Chester, Pa., to prepare at the Chester Academy for college. He subsequently attended Bucknell University at Lewisburg, Pa., and in 1896 graduated from there. Thence he went to Crozer Theological Semi- nary in Chester receiving his diploma there in 1899. On the day of his graduation he was made Instructor in Hebrew and Greek in the Seminary and taught there for three years. During the summer months of 1900 and 1901 he attended the University of Chicago; and a year later became a student at the University of Leipzig, of History and Philosophy. During his two years at Leipzig he also attended lectures at the Universities of Berlin, Halle and Gottingen. Upon his return to America he entered the law school of the University of Pennsylvania, taking his degree there in 1906.
With his brother, James M. Davis, he entered the law office of A. S. Ashbridge, Jr., in Philadelphia ; and subsequently both became partners with Mr. Ashbridge. Mr. Davis had become a resident of Salem County this state in 1903; and in time the Philadelphia partnership was dissolved and the brothers entered upon the practice of law in Camden.
Mr. Davis was elected to the New Jersey State Senate in the fall of the year in which Woodrow Wilson became Governor of New Jersey ; and there 'he was the Governor's lieutenant in the promotion of the reform measures which the Governor submitted to the legislature, being ma- jority leader of the Senate in 1913.
Upon his election to the Presidency of the United States, Mr. Wilson named Senator Davis for United States District Attorney for the District of New Jersey. Because of the number of corporations that hold charters under the state laws, the district is one of the most important in the country. While District Attorney. Mr. Davis compelled the Jersey Central Railroad Company to pay a fine of $200,000 for violation of the law against rebating. and the Lehigh Coal and Navigation Company upon conviction was fined $100,000 for soliciting and accepting rebates. The fine im- posed on the Jersey Central was the largest ever paid by a railroad for rebating.
In the criminal branches of his work, he convicted sixteen noted yeggmen in one year and put a damper on the robberies of post offices that had previously been quite prevalent throughout the state.
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Upon the creation by Congress of a new Federal Judgeship in the District of New Jersey, President Wilson appointed Senator Davis Judge for this District, in May, 1916, which position he now holds, the tenure of office being "during good behavior."
THOMAS A. DAVIS-Orange, (252 Main Street) -Lawyer. Born at Orange, on Jan. 14th, 1871; son of Michael and Mary Davis ; married in Orange on November 25th, 1896, to Mary Adele, daughter of Henry and Margaret (Cox) Jacobs.
Children : Three sons and three daughters.
Thomas A. Davis, whose father held the positions of alderman, free- holder and police justice, in Orange, acquired his education by attendance at the preparatory school of St. John's Church at Orange, and the College of St. Francis Xavier, New York City. He then matriculated at the Metro- polis (late the University) Law School, and also received instruction for his profession of law under the guidance of Vice Chancellor Stevens, Edward M. Colie and Supreme Court Justice Swayze. He was admitted to the New Jersey Bar as an attorney in June, 1895, and as counselor in June, 1898. In the same year that he was admitted to the Bar he formed a partnership with John L. Blake and William Read Howe, of Orange, and the connection with Mr. Howe has continued up to the present. Mr. Blake died about fifteen years ago, and the firm is now Howe & Davis.
In May, 1908, Mr. Davis was appointed County Judge of Essex county by Governor Fort, and he served until December, 1911, when he resigned because of the demand of his practice. He also served as City Counsel for Orange for a period of seven years, was a member of the Common Council of Orange for three years, was Village Counsel for South Orange for five years, and his firm is counsel for the Orange National Bank, the Half Dime Savings Bank, the Trust Company of Orange, and the Orange Valley Bank. He is also Supreme Court Commissioner and Special Master in Chancery. He keeps membership in the New Jersey State Bar Association and the Lawyers' Club of Essex County, and is also a mem- ber of the Essex County Country Club, the New England Society, and the Order of the Knights of Columbus. He is a member of St. John's Roman Catholic Church. In June, 1909, Seton Hall College conferred on him the degree of LL. D.
IDA WHARTON DAWSON (Mrs. Henry Hollister Dawson) - Newark, (692 High Street ) and Avon by the Sea .- Social Worker. (Photograph published in Vol. 1-1917). Born at Newark, daugh- ter of John and Mary A. (Greenwald) Wharton; married at Newark, on May 7, 1890. to Henry Hollister Dawson, son of Edwin Hicks and Julia ( Hollister) Dawson, of Newark.
Children : Mary, born March 3, 1899.
Ida Wharton Dawson's activities are in the recent club and uplift movements of the state. She has been President of the New Jersey State
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Federation of Women's Clubs, and of the Contemporary Club of Newark, whose membership of 1,500 makes it one of the largest in the Federation ยท of Women's Clubs in the United States.' She has Been a Director in the Bureau of Associated Charities, is now Vice President of the Women's Auxiliary of the Y. M. C. A. of Newark, and Secretary of the Women's Housing Association, and was one of the members of the Committee of 100 in the celebration in 1916 of the 250th birthday of Newark.
Mrs. Dawson is of English descent on her father's side and French on her mother's. The house in which the generations have been reared since 1796 still stands on Kingsland street on the banks of the Yanticaw river, Nutley. The land on which it stands was part of a grant made in 1668 to Major Nathaniel Kingsland of The Barbadoes. His West India products were sent to the New York markets; and his sea-faring associates brought back such glowing stories of New Jersey's richness in soil and scenic beauty, that he asked for a grant of land in what is now the Nutley region, and it was given to him. The old homestead was built by a nephew of his in 1796; and, modernized with later day conveniences, was occupied by his descendants until after the opening of this century. A grandmother of Mrs. Dawson, helped to start the first Sunday School opened in New York City.
Mrs. Dawson was educated in the public schools and at Houghton Seminary, in Clinton, N. Y. Upon leaving school she began civic work by joining the Newark Female Charity's Society's Board of Managers. She organized its Registration Department and was a member of its building Committee when it began its industrial relief work. In the Bureau of Associated Charities, she was Chairman of its District Conference and organized and was President of its Friendly Visitors Conference, where the problems of poverty, their cause and cure, were worked out for the first time in Newark.
Mrs. Dawson has been Recording Secretary of the General Federation of Women's Clubs, numbering two millions in membership; and compiled and edited the report of the official proceedings of its tenth Biennial Con- vention. As President of the New Jersey State Federation of Women's Clubs she re-organized the Federation as to methods and departments of work; and as President of The Contemporary organized its civic work. One result was the Girls Vocational School in Newark which has since been taken under the wing of the City Board of Education. The object of the courses is to fit girls for profitable occupations that can be taken up im- mediately on completing the courses. The subjects taught include power machine operating, personal hygiene, arithmetic related to the trade, pen- manship, English, industrial history and geography, design and textiles. The course lasts two years. Several hundred women were trained in civic work, through this civic department of The Contemporary while Mrs. Daw- son was President. The Women's Housing Association opened the first hotel in Newark for working girls, known as the Caroline, and has entire charge of it still. It is conducted on a purely business basis and not as a philanthropy. In her work as Vice President of the Women's Auxiliary of the Y. M. C. A. of Newark she is especially interested in the mothers meet - ings where home training for the young is considered ; and as a member of
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the Newark Celebration Committee of 100 she rendered assistance on its Historical and Literary sub-Committee.
Mrs. Dawson is also a former President of the Sesame (Women's) Club which was one of the two clubs founding The Contemporary. She is deeply interested in church work. Avon by the Sea is her summer home.
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WILLIAM JAMES DAWSON-Newark, (1028 Broad Street) -- Clergyman and Author. (Photograph published in Vol. 1-1917). Born in Towcester, Northamptonshire, England, November 21st, 1854; son of Rev. William James and Susan (Waller) Dawson ; married to Jane Powell, of Lowestoft, Eng., in September, 1879.
William J. Dawson was educated at Kingswood School, Bath, and Didsbury College, Manchester, on leaving which in 1875 he became a Wesleyan minister, being for some time the pastor of John Wesley's Chapel in City Road, London, and holding various other pastorates in Eng- land and Scotland. He first visited America in 1891, as a delegate to the Aecumenical Council of the Methodist Church. In 1892 he became the minister of the Highbury Quadrant Congregational Church, one of the largest churches in London, in which pastorate he remained until 1904. Lecturing during this period, the largest public buildings in the country often proved inadequate for the crowds that sought to hear him.
In 1904 he visited this country for the second time, holding a series of services in Plymouth Church, Brooklyn. The interest aroused by these services resulted in a call for similar services from other parts of the United States. The sermons preached in Brooklyn were printed verbatim day by day in the "Brooklyn Eagle," and were afterwards republished in his "The Evangelistic Note." He returned to the States in 1905 for a prolonged preaching tour, 70,000 persons hearing him in the first six weeks. The enthusiasm of his reception determined him to settle in the United States, and in 1906 his family joined him, taking up their residence at Taunton. Mass. He continued his travels until 1911, when he began to preach in the Old First Church, Newark, as stated supply, becoming in 1912 the settled pastor. He has taken a great pride in the old Church, whose origin is coincident with the settlement of the city; and on the oc- casion of the City's 250th Anniversary Celebration, delivered the Founders' Day Oration and represented the Protestant Churches of the city in the great united memorial service held in Weequahic Park.
Dr. Dawson's work as an author is large and various. His first volume was poetry, published in 1884, "A Vision of Souls." This was followed by a volume of literary and critical essays, "Quest and Vision," published in 1988. His first novel, "The Redemption of Edward Strahan," published in the following year, won the praise of Mr. Gladstone. Since then he has published many novels, the best known of which are "A Prophet in Baby- lon," "Judith Boldero" and "Masterman and Son." His trilogy of books on literature, "The Makers of Modern English, Poetry, Fiction and Prose," is his best known work. It was commenced twenty-five years ago, has had a wide sale. and has been often used as a text-book on modern literature. His "Readers' Library," prepared in conjunction with his son, Coningshy
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Dawson, containing volumes on the Great English Letter-Writers, Novelists, Essayist, etc., may be considered as a companion work.
Dr. Dawson's contribution to religious literature includes several volumes of sermons, devotional volumes such as "The Forgotten Secret" and "The Empire of Love," and a "Life of Christ," which tells the story of Jesus from the human point of view, its original title in the English edition being, "The Man Christ Jesus." In his latest volume,-"America and Other Poems"-published since his settlement in Newark, he has re- turned to poetry. He is also the editor of "The American Hymnal," which is used in the First Church at Newark, and in many of the leading Churches of the country. It contains several original hymns by Dr. Dawson. His latest books are "The Father of a Soldier," and two novels "Robert Sheustone" and "The War Eagle."
Dr. Dawson's eldest son, Coningsby Dawson, with whom he has colla- borated in some of his productions, is author of the novels, "The Garden Without Walls," "The Raft," "Slaves of Freedom." "Carry On," "The Glory of the Trenches" and "Out to Win."
RALPH DECKER-Sussex .- County Superintendent of Schools. Born at Flatbrooksville, N. J., Feb. 23, 1873; son of Martin and Sarah E. (Rosenkrans) Decker; married at Sussex, N. J., June 28th, 1899, to Amelia Stickney, daughter of Chas. E. and Louise (Dennis) Stickney.
Children : Martin, Oct. 10, 1900; Alice R., March 27, 1903 ; Helen A., August 21, 1905.
As a life long resident of the state, it is not strange that Ralph Decker should have received all his education in the schools of New Jersey. He first attended the public schools at Flatbrooksville and afterwards the Newton Collegiate Institute (now known as Newton Academy), Blair Hall and later was graduated from the Trenton State Normal School in 1896.
At this date he was the principal of a grammar school at Stockton, Hunterdon County, N. J., for one year, at the expiration of which time he became the head of the Sussex High School of Sussex Borough. This position he held until Oct. 7, 1903, when he was appointed to the office he now holds-Sussex County Superintendent of Schools.
In 1889 he taught in a country school at Harmony, Frankford Town- ship, Sussex County, for two years, and also for two years in a country school at Walpack Center, Walpack Township. Thus there is no doubt where Mr. Decker first became interested in the problems of the rural school, in which subject he is still intensely interested, particularly in physical and industrial education in these institutions. Mr. Decker's efforts for the betterment of the country schools resulted in their con- solidation several years ago. He was also the originator of "Go-to-school week," now observed yearly in New Jersey, and has been a contributor of articles to school magazines and newspapers.
His organization memberships are, National Educational Association, New Jersey State Council of Education, New Jersey Teachers Association, Samaritan Lodge No. 98 F. & A. M., Vice President Sussex County His-
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torical Society, Vice President Sussex County Bible Society, Secretary of Sussex County Board of Agriculture, Elder and Clerk of Session of First Presbyterian Church of Sussex.
Mr. Decker's business address is Newton, N. J.
MILTON DEMAREST -- Hackensack, (78 Main Street) - Jurist. Born in Middletown, Rockland Co., N. Y., June 8, 1855; son of John C. and Isabella (Taulman) Demarest; married at Hackensack on December 15, 1850 to Carrie W. Christie, daughter of Jonathan S. and Charlotte (Beemer) Christie of Hackensack; 2nd to Adaline B. Christie, widow of Walter Christie and daughter of Albert Bogert and Ellen Flearabaum Bogert, of Westwood.
Children : Charlotte, born May 3, 1888; Carrie I., born June 10, 1890; Edith, born November 14, 1891.
Milton Demarest was for some years the Presiding Judge of the Ber- . gen County Courts, and is the President of the Hackensack Improvement Commission, the governing body of the city. His family of Huguenot origin, is one of the oldest in America. From Middletown his parents went to New York, and, settling later in Nyack, he acquired his early education there. When the family subsequently settled in Hackensack he attended the Hackensack Academy, of which Prof. William Williams was the head. Early in his school life he picked the law for his profes- sion and meanwhile maintained himself by work in an upholstery estab- lishment. He was admitted in 1877 as an attorney, and became a coun- selor in 1880. His brother-in-law, Walter Christie, was his business partner during the year 1879; and, practicing alone then until '94, he entered into partnership with Abram De Baun, and the partnership has since continued.
While practicing alone he began to participate in public affairs, and from 1894 to 1908 was a member of the local Board of Education, its President during the last seven of the fourteen years. He was Counsel for the town from 1897 to 1904 and in 1906 his law firm succeeded to the duties of the position. He was made the Judge of the Court of Common Pleas and Orphans Court by Governor Fort in 1908, and sat on that bench until Woodrow Wilson became Governor. Gov. Wilson being a Democrat and Judge Demarest a Republican, he gave way in April, 1913, to William M. Seufert. He had scarcely stepped from the bench when, on January 1, 1915, he assumed the duties of President of the Hacken- sack Improvement Commission, the governing body of Hackensack, and was re-elected by the combined vote of the Republican and Democratic parties in 1916.
Judge Demarest is a member of the Holland Society of New York City by right of descent, and in 1904-05 was a Vice President of the Society for Bergen County. The Bergen County Branch of the Holland Society in New York owes its organization to his initiation, and he was its first President. He is a member of the First Reformed Church of Hackensack and served at one time as the Superintendent of the Sunday School. He is a member also of the Pioneer Lodge, No. 70. F. A. M ..
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and of Bergen County Lodge, No. 73. I. O. O. F., and one of the trustees of the Union League Club of Bergen County.
WILLIAM HENRY STEELE DEMAREST-New Brunswick .- College President. (Photograph published in Vol. 1-1917). Born at Hudson, N. Y., on May 12, 1863 ; son of David D. and Catharine L. (Nevius) Demarest ; unmarried.
Wm. H. S. Demarest is President of Rutgers College. Since 1864 the Scientific School of the College has been the State College for the benefit of Agriculture and the Mechanic Arts. The 1917 Legislature named it the State University of New Jersey. Mr. Demarest is the first college alm- nus to become its President. Ancestrally his connection with the college - is almost co-extensive with its history. His mother is the daughter of James Schureman Nevius, who was a Justice of the Supreme Court of the State of New Jersey just before the middle of the last century ; and her great grandfather, John Schureman, a Judge and member of the legisla- ture, was a member of the College Board of Trustees from 1782 to 1795. Dr. Demarest's great grandfather, the Rev. Henry Polhemus, was trustee from 1800 to 1816; and his maternal grandfather was a trustee from 1825 until 1858, for five years beginning in 1825 Secretary of the Board. The Rev. David D. Demarest, D. D., LL. D., Dr. Demarest's father, was, for thirty-three years, Professor of Pastoral Theology and Sacred Rhetoric in the New Brunswick Theological Seminary : and Dr. Demarest himself has served as a Trustee since 1899 and was the Board's Secretary from 1904 to 1906. Thus his family has been identified with the history of the college for over a century and a quarter.
President Demarest's boyhood and young manhood were spent in New Brunswick; and, having graduated in 1879 from the college grammar school, he entered Rutgers College as a student. At the commencement exercises in 1883 he was first honor man. He taught in the college gram- mar school for two years, and entered the Theological Seminary, graduat- ing in 18SS. Licensed by the Classis of New Brunswick to preach, he was ordained by the Classis of Orange, and became Pastor of the Re- formed Churches in Walden, N. Y. (1888 to 1897) and Catskill, N. Y. (1897 to 1901). In 1901 the General Synod elected him Professor of Ecclesiasti- cal History and Church Government in the New Brunswick Theological Seminary. He continued in this professorship for five years; he was also, during the last of the five, Acting President of the College. The Trustees formally elected him President on February 8. 1906: and, in the June following, his inauguration took place in the presence of a notable as- sembly of Alumni and friends.
Rutgers conferred the degree of Doctor of Divinity on Dr. Demarest in 1901 and New York University in 1916. In 1910 he received the LL. D. degree from Columbia University, in 1911 from Union College and in 1912 from the University of Pittsburgh.
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Dr. Demarest is a member of the University Club of New York, of the Huguenot Society, the Holland Society, the Japan Society and of the Delta Phi Fraternity.
ALFRED LEWIS DENNIS-Newark, ( 25 James Street )- Broker. Born Newark, October 26, 1857; son of Martin Ryerson and Josephine ( Rose) Dennis.
Alfred Lewis Dennis is a member of the firm of Post & Flagg, mem- bers of the New York Stock Exchange, and has been the resident partner in charge of the Newark Branch since 1894. His ancestry in direct and collateral lines reaches back to the settlement of this country in the seventeenth century. John Howland, John Tilley and Elizabeth Tilley, who landed with the Pilgrims, on the "Mayflower" at Plymouth, Mass., in 1620, were his forbears on this side of the seas. His father was the son of Ezekiel and Mary Baldwin Dennis of Newton; son of Jesse and Ann Schooley Dennis, of Wantage, (Sussex Co.) ; son of Joseph and Hannah Lewis Dennis, of Quakertown, Bucks County, Pa .; son of Joseph, of Cohansey. (N. J.) ; son of Jonathan and Rachel Moore Dennis, of Wood- bridge; son of Robert Dennis, of Yarmouth, Mass.
Alfred L. Dennis was educated at the Newark Academy and was graduated from Princeton University with the class of 1879. After finish- ing his course at the University, he entered the firm of Martin R. Dennis & Co., bankers and general brokers. Outside of business he has taken an active interest in musical affairs and has done much to cultivate the taste of the community and encourage native talent. He is a member of the board of directors of the Newark Symphony Orchestra and Treas- urer of the Newark Music Festival Association. He is also President of the Playfellows, an amateur comedy club, a director of the Dennis Library at Newton, and of the Martin Dennis Company of Newark, one of the trustees of the First Presbyterian Church, and a member of the Sussex County Country Club at Newton.
LABAN W. DENNIS-Newark .- Manufacturer. Born Fulton, Mo., April 7, 1858: son of Isaiah and Caroline (Van Winkle) Dennis; married at Newark, December 5, 1883, to Eliza Willis Morton, daughter of James Morton of Matawan.
Children : Dorothy Dennis, born July 19, 1895.
Laban W. Dennis is Treasurer of the George Brown & Company on Passaic Street, Newark. In his early- boyhood he lived with his parents in Jersey City and attended the schools there from 1866 to 1870. He was afterwards tutored at S. A. Farrand's Private School in New York and took a course in business at the New Jersey Business College. He is Director of the City Trust Company, Newark, and Secretary of the Coronado Oil Company. He is a member of the Down Town Club, Rose'
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ville Athletic Association and of the Union Club, of Newark; also a member of the Board of Trade.
SAMUEL SHEPARD DENNIS-Morristown, (Miller Road. )- Trustee and Director. Born in Newark, September 11, 1852; son of Alfred Lewis and Eliza (Shepard) Dennis; married Eliza Thomas, daughter of Richard S. and Helen (Naylor) Thomas of Chicago, on April 15, 1SS4.
Children : Helen Ewing, Dorothy and James Shepard.
Mr. Dennis received bis preparatory education at Phillips Academy, Andover, Mass. He entered Yale, class of 1874, but was obliged to with- draw on account of ill health. He traveled extensively in Europe and the Orient, and on his return became connected with the hardware firm of Gifford & Beach of New York. He retired in 1880 to give attention to his father's estate.
Mr. Dennis is President of the Howard Savings Institution of Newark; Vice President of the United New Jersey Railroad and Canal Company ; Director of the Chicago Junction Railways and Union Stockyards Com- pany, the Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, Chicago & St. Louis Railroad Company, the Morris and Essex Railroad Company, the Pennsylvania Tunnel and Terminal Railroad Company, the Harrison and East Newark Connecting Railroad Company, the American Insurance Company, the Prudential In- surance Company of America and of the National Newark Banking Com- pany : Trustee of the Syrian Protestant College of Beirut. Syria, and of the Dennis Library of Newton, (N. J.), and a member of the Society of the Cincinnati, New Jersey Historical Society, the Washington Association (Morristown). Century, Union, Down Town (New York) Clubs. He is a Republican and an Episcopalian.
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