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 59
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Mr. Willis has an enviable record as an organizer of educational bodies in his county. Among the organizations to bis credit are the Middlesex County Pedagogical Library Association, in 1895, Middlesex County School Board Association, in 1896, District Monthly Conference in 1900, Supervising Principals' Association in 1902, County Medical Inspectors' Association in 1909, and the Middlesex County Vocational School Board Work in 1914. At the commencement exercises at Rutger's College, 1917, the degree of Master of Arts was conferred upon him by President Demarest.
He is a member of the following organizations: National Educational Association, of which he was a director and vice-president ; State Teachers' Association, of which he was president; State Sanitary Association, of which he was president ; New Jersey Council of Education ; New York Schoolmasters' Association : New Brunswick Country Club and the Sum- mer School Faculty of Rutger's College.
The public school forces of Middlesex county, cities, boroughs and townships recently honored him by giving a dinner at the Hotel Klein
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at New Brunswick upon the completion of thirty years of school super- intendency in Middlesex county. Mr. Willis was presented with a loving cup, a silk American flag, and a booklet showing the progress made in the schools of Middlesex county during the past fifty years by . father and son.
His business address is County Office Building, New Brunswick, N. J.
EDMUND WILSON-Red Bank .- Lawyer. Born at Shrews- bury, on December 15. 1863; son of Thaddeus and Charlotte Ann Wilson.
Edmund Wilson was for six years Attorney General of the state. In September, 1903, he had been retained by United States Attorney Gen- eral Moody as special assistant in the trial of cases which the national De- partment of Justice was pressing against certain bank officers in New Jer- sey for violation of the National Banking Act. He served for years on the State Board of Education and in June, 1907, was made a member of the State Board of Railroad Commissioners. He resigned that position in 1908 to accept appointment as Attorney General and served in the latter office until 1914.
Attorney General Wilson's father was the pastor of the Presbyterian church at Shrewsbury for forty-five years-at the time of his death Pastor Emeritus. The Attorney General prepared for college at Phillips Aca- demy in Exeter, N. H., and entering Princeton University in 1881 graduated from there in 1885. He studied law at Columbia University, New York, and in the offices of General Henry M. Nevius, at Red Bank. Admitted to the Bar in 1898 he immediately entered into partnership with General Nevius and the relation continued until the General was made a Circuit Court Judge.
JAMES WILSON, Jr .- Paterson, (423 Van Houten Street.)- Merchant. Born at Paterson, N. J., August 19, 1874; son of James and Margaret (Miller) Wilson ; married at New York, N. Y., December 9. 1896, to Annie Ryle, daughter of John C. and Annie (Rowson) Ryle.
Children : James, born March 9, 1899; Leda Margaret, born August 19, 1904.
James Wilson, Jr., was educated in the public schools of Paterson and the Centenary Collegiate Institute at Hackettstown.
He is president of the Paterson Chamber of Commerce, president of the Paterson Coal Dealers Association, secretary and treasurer of James Wilson & Son. Inc., president of the Charity Organization Society. a mem- ber of the Board of Managers of the Paterson General Hospital and vestry- man of St. Paul's Episcopal Church.
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He is a member of the following clubs : Hamilton ; Rotary ; Kiwanis, Club and Drawing Room Club, all of Paterson. He is an ex-president of the Rotary Club, and vice-president of the Drawing Room Club.
His business address is 108 Railroad Avenue, Paterson.
PHILIP SHERIDAN WILSON -- Newton, (19 Academy St.)- Principal of Newton Academy. Born at Gorham, Maine, August 24, 1869; son of Joel and Addie (Waterhouse) Wilson ; married at New Rochelle, N. Y., December 30, 1899, to Annie Ferens Lockwood, daughter of John Ferens.
Philip Sheridan Wilson is of English-Scotch descent. He was edu- cated at the country school at Gorham, Maine, the place of his birth, and on his coming to New Jersey in 1884 he entered the Newton Academy, a pre- paratory school, then conducted by his father, Captain Joel Wilson. In 1886 he entered Lafayette College, where he remained until 1890. He then went abroad, and on his return became associated with his father in the management of Newton Academy. Since 1900 he has been principal and owner of the school, and has made a military school out of it, which prepares boys for college or business.
He has always taken a prominent part in the affairs of Newton, and is active in fraternal, educational and church activities. Since 1914 he has been a member of the governing body of the city, and is also a mem- ber of the Board of Health.
In 1916 he was elected to the State Legislature on the Republican ticket, receiving a plurality of but nine votes over his opponent, Edward Ackerson. The year following he was re-elected to the Assembly, but with a plurality of 425 votes over Warren D. Haggerty.
He is a member of the Delta Kappa Epsilon Fraternity of Lafayette College, School Masters Association, National Geographic Society, the Masonic Order, and the Odd Fellows.
His business address is Newton, N. J.
SAMUEL WILSON-Jersey City .- Agitator, Author and Edi- itor. Born March 1, 1850; son of Joseph and Martha (Wood- worth) Wilson ; married March 4, 1871 to Mary, daughter of John Williams and Margaret Jones of Goderich, Ontario, Canada.
Children : Clarence Ernest, born November 17, 1875.
When Samuel Wilson appears in public the first thought of those who recognize him is-"There is an enemy of the liquor traffic." This publicity has been earned by twelve years of incessant agitation in the courts, the legislature and the press, in pulpits and on the platform, as he expresses it, "Trying to compel saloon keepers to behave themselves, and to convince the public that the saloon is a nuisance that should be abated."
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Mr. Wilson's boyhood was spent in bis native village of Geneva, Ill., in the beautiful Fox river valley, and his education was in the public school from which he graduated at the age of fourteen. What took the place of university training was obtained in publishing houses where he was employed, and in literary societies of which he was an active mem- ber.
A year was spent on a farm, then he went to Chicago, and was em- ployed in the office of the Evening Journal. Later he went with the "Lit- tle Corporal" a flourishing juvenile magazine of which Emily Huntington Miller was the editor.
In 1870 he formed a partnership with another young man in the whole- sale bedding and material business, the chief product being corn husks. The business was burned in the great fire of 1871, and as his capital was exhausted he studied stenography and was employed, first in a law office, and later with the Pullman Palace Car Company, being assigned to duty as secretary to the Superintendent in Philadelphia ; was promoted in 1884 to be Assistant Eastern General Superintendent, removed to New York City where he continued with the company until 1905 when he retired at his own request as a pensioner after thirty-one years service.
During fourteen years of this period the family Iived at Rahway New Jersey, but moved to Jersey City in 1888 where Mr. Wilson still re- sides, his wife having died in 1913.
For a number of years Mr. Wilson, without compensation, edited a monthly religious magazine known as "Words of Truth." He had for years been an active religious and temperance worker, and after his re- tirement was drafted by the Protestant church forces of Hudson county as General Superintendent of the Civic Righteousness Federation, the pur- pose being to secure saloon closing on Sundays. Three years of intensive agitation followed.
During this period, in 190S Governor Fort, appointed him to represent the State at the Centennial Celebration of the first Temperance Society at Saratoga Springs. At this time many citizens and the Jersey Journal were urging Mr. Wilson as a representative temperance man to be a mem- ber of the State Excise Commission.
Meantime the Anti-Saloon League was growing in influence in the State, and Mr. Wilson gave to the League the benefit of his business, literary and law-enforcement experience, and has ever since been a promi- nent influence all over the State. He has delivered over 1500 public ad- dresses, written hundreds of communications for the press, worried law- breaking saloon keepers, gamblers, and disorderly house proprietors more than any other individual. In 1913 he was instrumental in exposing and sending to the penitentiary the proprietors of the Hotel Nevarre, Hotel Broad and a number of other disorderly house proprietors in Newark. Mor- al house cleaning crusades under his supervision were conducted in Pater- son, Jersey City, Hoboken, Asbury Park and throughout the State.
He has by his trenchant pen, made the American Issue, of which he is the editor, a powerful political and moral reform factor in the State.
Mr. Wilson is the author of many pamphlets among which are: Lay- men's Guide to the Liquor Laws of New Jersey ; Local Option for New Jersey ; Abraham Lincoln an Apostle of Temperance and Prohibition ;
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Is Moderate Drinking Justified-the Answer of Life Insurance (reprinted from the Outlook) ; Light Wines and Beer ; The American Commonwealth vs the Liquor Traffic; Uncle Daniel's Bible Class, and a long list of tracts and leaflets. He is consulted as an authority by temperance and prohibi- tion leaders of the nation.
Mr. Wilson is a member of the First Presbyterian Church, Jersey City ; Assistant State Superintendent of the Anti-Saloon League of New Jersey ; Director of the Anti-Saloon League of America ; and editor of the American Issue, New Jersey edition. Although in his seventieth year, he is in the prime of physical and mental vigor; and expects to keep prodding John Barlycorn until he is driven out of our nation; then he hopes to grow old gracefully in that old man's Paradise, California, where he is the owner of a well developed orange and olive ranch, and where his son now resides.
WODDROW WILSON -Princeton. - 28th President of the United States. Born in Staunton, Va., December 28, 1856; son of Joseph R. and Jessie (Woodrow) Wilson ; married June 24, 1885. to Ellen Louise Axson, of Savanah, Ga., who died August 6, 1914. Re-married at Washington, D. C., on December 18, 1915, to Edith Bowling Galt, of Washington. D. C.
Children : Margaret Woodrow Wilson; Mrs. Francis Bowes Sayre; Mrs. William Gibbs McAdoo.
Woodrow Wilson-scholar, author, statesman and orator-is of Scotch- Irish lineage on both his father's and his mother's side. His father, a native of Ohio, was a distinguished scholar and clergyman of the Presby- terian church, some time Professor at the Columbia (S. C.) Theological Seminary and at the time of his death Professor in the Southwestern Theological Seminary at Clarksville, Tenn. His mother was a native of Scotland.
President Wilson acquired his early education with private tutors and at the schools of Augusta, Ga., Columbus, S. C., and Wilmington, N. C. He entered Davidson College, N. C., in 1874, Princeton a year later, gradu- ating there in 1879, and studied law at the University of Virginia, Char- lottesville, graduating in 1881.
When he was ready for business, he opened an office in Atlanta, Ga., but gave up the practice in 1883 to answer a call to the educational field. From '83 to 'S5 he did post graduate work at Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Md .; he was Professor of History and Political Economy at Bryn Mawr College, Pa., from 1885-1888. and from 1888 to 1890, Professor in the same branches at Welseyan University. In June, 1890, he was elec- ted Professor of Juriprudence and Political Economy at Princeton Univer- sity ; in 1895 he was assigned to the chair of Jurisprudence; in 1897 pro- moted to be McCormick Professor of Jurisprudence and Politices : and. made President of Princeton University in 1902, served until 1910.
He was elected Governor of New Jersey, November, 1910. over Vivian M. Lewis, republican, with 49.056 plurality, inaugurated on January 17,
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1911, and took part, immediately after the organization of the legislature, in the election of a United States Senator to succeed John Kean. The pre- vailing idea was that the democratic Legislature would select ex-United States Senator James Smith. But, in a referendum, held in the fall of 1910 under the Senatorial Preferential Act, and in which Mr. Smith bad not participated, James E. Martine had been indicated as the preference of the party voters; and Gov. Wilson insisted that the Legislature was bound to make the popular choice effective by selecting Martine. That was done after weeks of excitement, and enormous impetus was given to the movement that materialized, after Gov. Wilson became President of the United States, in the Federal constitutional amendment for the election of United States Senators in all the states by popular vote instead of by the legislatures. Other products of his administration as Governor, were the "Seven Sisters" act to enforce personal responsibility for unlawful acts of corporations, forbidding interlocking directorates, etc .; laws to punish for corrupt practices at elections, to provide for government of cities by three to five elective rulers on the "Short Ballot" System; providing for the nomination of all elective officials, from Governor to constable, in popu- lar primaries and making nominations by convention unlawful ; providing for choice of election booth officers by civil service test and otherwise re- forming the election machinery of the state; and providing for the estab- lishment of Jury Commissions in the counties as a means of ending the control of political and public affairs by the sheriffs through grand juries of their own drawing.
In June, 1912, Governor Wilson was nominated by the Democratic Na- tional Convention at Baltimore, for President of the United States; and in November he polled 6,286,214 votes against 3,488,922 cast for W. H. Taft, Regular Republican, and 4,126,020 cast for Theodore Roosevelt, Progressive Republican. In the Electoral College 41 states cast 435 votes for Gov. Wilson. On March 1, 1913, he resigned his office as Governor of New Jer- sey, and on March 4, 1913, was inaugurated President of the United States.
Features of President Wilson's administration in the international field, during his first term were his refusal of recognition to General Huerta as President of Mexico followed by Huerta's deposition and flight ; and a complicated diplomatic policy that for a time-and when the situation was often tense-kept the United States out of the War of the Nations that, starting between Austria and Servia in the summer of 1914, eventually plunged a dozen European powers-and finally even involved the United States-into the most bloody and destructive conflict in all the history of Time.
The domestic policy of President Wilson's administration has been particularly featured by President Wilson's appearing before the two Houses of Congress in person to read his messages and other communica- tions-the innovation being in pursuance of his policy of "talking direct to the people." In legislation during his first term, President Wilson promot- ed and secured the passage by Congress of the Underwood tariff law. de- signed to reduce by one-half the duty on foodstuffs, on woolen clothing by nearly two-thirds, on cotton clothing by one-third and the average rate on all goods to about 26% ; the passage of the Glass-Owen Banking Reserve law which plans to fore-stall panics by concentrating the reserves of 25,000
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banks into a single banking association and to mobilize the reserves of all member-banks so as to make them liquid and quickly available; a law creating the Federal Farm Loan Board and system of Rural Credits to facilitate loans to farmers; the passage of laws imposing an income tax on inheritances, for the creation of the Federal Trade Commission, of the Federal Employment Bureau, of the Board of Mediation and Conciliation charged with the settlement of labor controversies and one of arbitration, to inquire into the reasons for pending strikes ; laws for a commission to devise a system of Vocational Education, for Government aid in laying out and maintaining good roads, for the construction of 1,000 miles of railroad in Alaska to develop resources there, for the admission of foreign ships to American Registry, for Army re-organization and enlarging and federal- izing the militia of the several states, for a naval bill calling for 16 battle- ships and cruisers and adequate auxiliary fleet and appropriating $20,000,- 000 for a Government plant to produce nitrate for the manufacture of mu- nitions, and $11,000,000 for a Government armor plant.
On the eve of the President's re-election in 1916 the Railroad Brother- hoods threatened a general strike on all the railways in the country for an eight hour day and for overtime compensation. The strike order was to have gone into effect on August 1, but the President's intervention induced the Brotherhood Chiefs to postpone the "call out" until September 4th. The situation remaining meanwhile acute, because of the deadlock between the railroad managers and the employees that threatened to paralyze the com- merce of the nation, President Wilson (August 29th) laid the situation be- fore the two Houses of Congress. "The four hundred thousand men from whom the demands proceeded had voted to strike if their demands were re- fused," he said in his personal address; "the strike was imminent; it has since been set for the fourth of September next. It affects the men who man the freight trains on practically every railway in the country. The freight service throughout the United States must stand still until their places are filled, if, indeed, it should prove possible to fill them at all. Cities will be cut off from their food supplies, men of every sort and occupation will be thrown out of employment, countless thousands will in all likelihood be brought, it may be. to the very point of starvation, and a tragical national calamity brought on," unless an adjustment were made.
He urged the establishment of an eight hour day as the legal basis of work and wages for all railway employees actually engaged in interstate transportation, and the appointment by the President of a small commission to observe the actual results in experience of the adoption of the eight hour day in all of its practical aspects-such commission to report to Congress "in order that the public may learn from an unprejudiced source just what actual developments have ensued." A law (Public-No. 252-64th Con- gress) covering these two suggestions was passed, but action was postponed upon cognate suggestions. At the re-opening of Congress in December the President again went before the Houses to urge enactment of the further laws-one. for the enlargement and administrative reorganization of the Interstate Commerce Commission and a second lodging in the hands of The Executive "the power," as he phrased it, "in case of military necessity. to take control of such portions and such rolling stock of the railways of the country as may be required for military use and to operate them for mili-
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tary purposes, with authority to draft into the military service of the United States such train crews and administrative officials as the circum- stances require for their safe and efficient use." These acts of Executive mediation warded off the most disastrous strike that has ever threatened the peace and safety of the nation.
Meanwhile in June of 1916 President Wilson was renominated, by ac- clamation, by the Democratic National Convention at Chicago. The contest between himself and ex-Supreme Court Justice Charles E. Hughes, whom the republicans had nominated, was a close one that the vote of California, after days of doubt, decided in President Wilson's favor; and in the Elec- toral College of 1917 he was declared to have been re-elected for the term 1917-1921. The official declaration of the count, made by the two Houses of Congress, gave President Wilson 277 electoral votes to 254 cast for ex- Justice Hughes.
Soon after President Wilson's second inauguration on March 4, 1917, the relations between the United States and Germany had become so acute that the President felt called upon to present the situation to Congress, which he did in a personal address before the two Houses jointly assem- bled ; and that body adopted a resolution declaring a State of War to exist between the two countries. The declaration was followed by loans of bil- lions of money to the Entente Allies, by the passage of an act for the com- pulsory service of all males between the ages of twenty-one and thirty-one and by the appropriation of sums unprecedented for magnitude in all the history of the nation for the support of an army and for enlarged naval facilities.
All available ships were pressed into service, and the American troops were sent over to France to help the cause of Humanity. Training camps for soldiers and sailors sprang up in all parts of the country, and after a few months' training in the camps, they were placed aboard a transport and sent overseas. General John J. Pershing was named by President Wilson to command the American Expeditionary Forces.
At the same time, the President took steps to build up the American ship building industry, and at the same time to deal the foe a heavy blow in this country. By his orders, all German-owned ships in the country were seized, and fitted out as transports to carry the American soldiers across the ocean. Mr. E. N. Hurley was named director of shipbuilding, and a huge industry sprang up as though out of the ground. Shipyards were built along the entire Atlantic, Pacific and Gulf coasts, and one ship after another was launched, in accordance with the President's ship- building program.
And realizing that the enemy manufacturing interests in this coun- try, which ran in the millions, were dangerous to the successful conduct of the war, N. Mitchell Palmer, since made U. S. Attorney-General, was made Custodian of Alien Property and began a systematic sale of all enemy-owned stock. New Jersey was one of the states where a con- siderable quantity of German-owned stock was sold to American citizens at public auction, particularly the woolen mills of Passaic county, as well as a number of smaller dyestuff concerns.
In the meantime the Allied troops, once more spurred on to victory by the Yanks, who were coming over in larger numbers every month,
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were hard pressing the Germans out of their occupied territory and after the disastrous defeats at St. Mihiel, Chateau-Thierry and Belleau Boise, the enemy showed signs of giving in. It was then that President Wilson laid down his memorable "Fourteen Points" as a basis of Peace. The ac- ceptance of peace under those conditions, meant the complete over- throw of "Imperialism."
Unrest in Germany grew, until the memorable day of November 11, 1918, when Emporer William abdicated the throne, and fled to Holland, and the German peace emmissaries arrived within the French lines, with the flag of truce, and asked for an armistice to be based on President Wilson's "Fourteen Points." This was granted, Germany complied with the conditions of the armistice, which included the turning over of her ships and implements of war, and the Allies began to occupy her territory.
In the meantime peace negotiations began, and President Wilson startled the country by his announcement that he intended to attend the Peace Conference in person. In the early part of December, 1918, he left America, on the "George Washington," once a German-owned vessel, in the company of Mrs. Wilson, Secretary of State Lansing, General Tasker Bliss, Colonel House and Col. Henry White.
Unbounded enthusiasm reigned in Paris when the President arrived. and on his visits to England, and Italy, he was received with the same enthusiasm.
In February he returned to the States, to be present when Congress adjourned, although he was greeted with great ovation by the people, particularly at Boston, where he landed, he found at Washington a hos- tile Congress. He was bitterly criticised by some of the Congressmen on his "League of Nations" policy, who declared that it was a violation of the Monroe Doctrine.
President Wilson did not remain long in the country, but after Con- gress had adjourned, and the President had attended to details of his office, he again returned to Paris, on the "George Washington." Prior to leaving, he made an address at the Metropolitan Opera House in New York City, on the League of Nations. He was followed by ex-President William Howard Taft, who endorsed the League, as the only means of preventing future wars.
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