USA > New York > Westchester County > Biographical history of Westchester County, New York, Volume II > Part 42
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John Eugene Pawson, the subject proper of this sketch, was born in October, 1871, at Mott Haven, now included within the Greater New York. He acquired a good business education in the grammar and high schools of New York city, and learned the trade of silk-cutting, which he followed for some time in New York city. He then became an employe of his brother, James Oliver, who was carrying on the roofing and concrete business. As foreman of this work our subject continued until the death of his brother, and when the widow sold her interest in the concern to the present company, J. E. Pawson was retained, being made superintendent. Under his judicious management the business has rapidly grown, and now the company is trans- acting the most extensive trade in this line in the county. In the past two years they have laid over one hundred thousand square feet of seyssel rock asphalt for the board of education of Yonkers, and they are the sole agents for this kind of asphalt in the county.
A true patriot and good citizen, Mr. Pawson belongs to the Patriotic Order Sons of America, and is the vice-president of the local lodge. He is an active member of the volunteer fire department, connected with the Hope Hook and Ladder Company; is associated with the A B C Bowling Club, and is councilor of the lodge of the Ancient Essenic Order. He is a member of the City Club, of Yonkers, and a non-resident member of Mount Vernon City Club. Politically he is a loyal Republican. His marriage to Miss Hannah Amelia Maiden was solemnized December 31, 1896, and on October 6, 1897, Mrs. Pawson was summoned to the silent land. 54
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HENRY H. CANNON.
The present mayor of the pretty village of Irvington, Westchester county, and for a period of thirty-five years one of the leading merchants of the place, is Henry H. Cannon. He is one of the native sons of Irvington, his birth having occurred here February 28, 1842, and from his earliest recol- lection he has been closely associated with the welfare and interests of this immediate locality. That he is esteemed as a man of sterling worth has been frequently manifested in material ways by his fellow citizens and neighbors. When Irvington was incorporated he was appointed treasurer of the village and served in that capacity for fourteen years. He has been president for the past four years, and is discharging his duties in a manner generally satis- factory to all concerned.
Having spent his entire life in Irvington, Mr. Cannon is widely known in the locality. His parents were James and Clarissa (Ackley) Cannon. His father was a native of Ireland who came to the United States when very young, and for many years was successfully engaged in contracting and build- ing, his home being in Irvington. His mother was born and reared in Con- necticut.
The early educational privileges which Henry H. Cannon received were such as the public schools of his native town afforded, but later he pursued special courses of study under the tutorship of Rev. Dr. McVickar, rector of the Episcopal church, and also under the direction of Benson Ferris, who for years was president of the Tarrytown Savings Bank and whose death occurred in the autumn of 1898. In 1865 Mr. Cannon embarked in the busi- ness to which he still gives his attention, the buying and selling of flour, grain and feed, engaging in both the wholesale and retail trade. He soon acquired the confidence of the business world and from the beginning he met with the success which he so richly deserves. The best of shipping facilities are his, as his place of business is situated near the New York Central Rail- road tracks,-no small matter to a merchant who handles such quantities of freight as does Mr. Cannon.
In 1870 he married Miss Lucy H. Davis, a resident of New York city, in which metropolis she was born and reared to womanhood. Her father, Dorrance Davis, was a descendant of an old colonial family of Connecticut. Ten children-eight sons and two daughters-have blessed the marriage of Mr. and Mrs. Cannon.
In his political views Mr. Cannon is independent of party ties, his sup- port being given the men and measures that he believes will best promote the public welfare. That he is a capable official is indicated by his long reten- tion in office, and through his instrumentality the welfare of the village has
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been greatly advanced. Religiously he is connected with St. Barnabas' Episcopal church, of which he has been a member since his youth, while for many years he has served the congregation as vestryman.
JEROME A. PECK.
Among the founders of the New Haven colony was William Pecke, who located in Connceticut in 1638. He and his son often spelled their names Pecke, but in the latter part of their lives they dropped the final letter. Will- iam Pecke was born in or near the city of London in 1601, and was married there about the year 1622. With his wife Elizabeth, and their son Jeremiah, the only child born to them in the mother country, he came to America, probably sailing from London, in the ship Hector, in company with Governor Eaton and Rev. John Davenport, the voyage being completed by their arrival at Boston, June 26, 1837. Trumbull, in his History of Connecticut, erro- neously states that their arrival was July 26, and some have copied their mistake. The members of the company were principally from London, where Mr. Davenport had been a celebrated minister. There were many wealthy merchants and others of great respectability from the world's me- tropolis, together with farmers from Yorkshire, Hartfordshire, Kent and some from Surrey and Sussex. They had suffered much from the intolerance and persecution of Archbishop Laud during the reign of Charles I, and the object of their emigration was to secure the unmolested enjoyment of civil and religious liberty.
As stated above, William Pecke went to New Haven in 1838 and became one of the original proprietors of the town, his autograph signature being affixed to the " fundamental agreement," or constitution, dated June 4, 1639, for the government of the infant colony. This is said to have been one of " the first examples in history of a written constitution organizing a govern- ment and defining its powers." He was admitted a freeman of the colony, October 20, 1640; was a merchant by occupation, and a trustee, treasurer and the general business agent of the Colony Collegiate School, established on the basis of the Hopkins fund. He is usually named in the records with the title " Mister," then a prefix of respect and distinction. From 1659 until his decease he was a deacon in the church at New Haven. His wife Eliza- beth died December 5, 1683, and he subsequently married Sarah, the widow of William Holt. His death occurred October 4, 1694, at the advanced age of ninety-three years. His children, all born of his first marriage, were Jeremiah, John, Joseph and Elizabeth, all of whom together with his second wife, survived him, and are named in his last will and testament, dated March 9, 1688-9 (" 1689 as we now write it "). This will is found
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recorded in the probate records of New Haven, book 11, page 176. His home lot of about an acre, and his dwelling-house and shop, or store, in New Haven were, at the time of his decease, on the southeasterly side of, and fronting on, Church street, the lot extending from Center street northerly in front on Church street toward Chapel street about one hundred feet, and extending easterly from Church street a few feet beyond Orange street. The front on Church street is now covered by the Connecticut Savings Bank building, on the corner of Church and Cedar streets, the Clark and the Odeon buildings. His grave is in that part of the old burial ground now under the Center church in New Haven, but his tombstone is in the new cemetery, having been removed thither in 1821, together with the monu- ments and tombstone, of others, whose graves also are covered with the old church.
Jeremiah Peck was born in the city of London, England, or vicinity, in 1623, and was brought by his father to this country in 1637. Little is known of his early history except that he had a good education, acquired in part before he left England. He is said by Cotton Mather to have been bred at Harvard College; but though probably a student, his name does not appear in the catalogue of graduates of that institution. He was married November 12, 1656, to Johannah Kitchell, a daughter of Robert Kitchell, who went to New Haven in the company of Eaton, Davenport and others in 1638, and the next year settled in Guilford, Connecticut, being a prominent citizen and one of the first planters of that town. He was one of those who emigrated from the New Haven colony to Newark, New Jersey, in 1666, and there died about 1672. His only son, Samuel Kitchell, also went to Newark about the same time, was a man of high standing and respectability, and died April 26, 1690. The wife of Robert Kitchell died in Greenwich, Connect- icut, in 1682, while residing there with her daughter, the wife of Rev. Jere- miah Peck.
Before his marriage, Jeremiah Peck had commenced preaching and teaching school at Guilford, Connecticut, and followed those professions until 1680, when he was invited to take charge of the collegiate school at New Haven. This was a colony school, and had been instituted by the general court in 1659. It was open to students from other colonies, and in it young men were to be fitted for college, Latin, Greek and Hebrew being part of the curriculum. He accepted the invitation, and removing from Guilford to New Haven, entered upon his duties as an instructor, and con- tinued to discharge the same until the summer of 1661, when the school was. temporarily suspended for want of adequate support. It was revived, how -. ever, after a few years, and has continued and flourished until the present day, under the name of the Hopkins Grammar School.
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In the autumn of 1661, Rev. Jeremiah Peck was invited to preach at Saybrook, Connecticut, where there is much reason to suppose that he was ordained and where he settled as a minister, succeeding Rev. James Fitch, the agreement of settlement being dated September 25, 1661. After a few years there was some dissatisfaction with his ministry and a misunderstand- ing in regard to the provisions of his agreement of settlement, and when this was amicably arranged he left Saybrook and early in 1666 removed to Guil- ford. He was then, and for some time had been, together with numerous other ministers and churches in the New Haven and Connecticut colonies, decidedly opposed to what was called the Half-way Covenant, adopted by the general synod of 1662, and, with many of the leading ministers and the people of the New Haven colony, was especially and irreconcilably hostile to the union of the New Haven and Connecticut colonies under the charter of Charles II, which, however, after a protracted struggle, was finally effected in 1665, and he resolved to emigrate from the colony.
Removing from Guilford in 1666, he became one of the first settlers of Newark, New Jersey, his grounds and residence being on the northeast corner of Market and Mulberry streets. It does not appear that he officiated as a minister at Newark, but he preached to the neighboring people of Elizabeth- town soon after his removal to Newark, and finally settled there as minister in 1669 or 1670. During the latter year and again in 1675 he was invited by the people of Woodbridge, New Jersey, and in 1676 by the people of Green- wich, Connecticut, to settle with them in the ministry, but he declined these several invitations. In September, 1678, he was again invited to settle as a minister, and in October, 1678, he had a similar call from Greenwich, remov- ing there late in the autumn of that year from Elizabethtown, New Jersey. He became the first settled minister at that place, where his pastorate was a very quiet and useful one, being disturbed only by his refusal in 1688 to bap- tize the children of non-communicants, allowed by the introduction of the Half-way Covenant, which still agitated the churches of Connecticut. Though sustained by a majority of the members of his church, the dissatis- faction of the minority probably led to his resignation in 1689. He then commenced preaching in Waterbury, Connecticut, and, having accepted the unanimous invitation of the residents of that town to settle with them in the ministry, he removed there early in 1690 and became the first settled minister of the church in that place in 1691, at which time he was nearly seventy years of age. In a few years his health gradually failed, but he continued to be the pastor of the church and discharged the most of his official duties until his decease, at Waterbury, June 7, 1699. He seems to have possessed consider- able energy and ability and to have been a man of much usefulness, both as a teacher and minister in the frontier settlements. His wife survived him, dying
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in Waterbury in 1711. His will, dated January 14, 1696-7, in the form of a deed of gift, is recorded on page 6 of the Waterbury Land Records, volume 1; and hers, in the same form, dated October 7, 1686, appears on page 103 of the same volume.
Samuel Peck, who was born in Guilford, Connecticut, January 18, 1659, went to Greenwich, Connecticut, with his father in 1678, acquired a good edu- cation and was married, November 27, 1688, to Ruth Ferris, whose father, Peter Ferris, was a son of Jeffrey Ferris, of Stamford, Connecticut. Samuel Peck became the progenitor of the numerous Greenwich families of his sur- name. He was a man of large wealth and influence, for about fifty years was justice of the peace and held other important positions in Greenwich, where he died, April 28, 1746. His wife's death occurred there, September 17, 1745. when she had reached the age of eighty-three years. Their grave- stones are still standing in the old Greenwich cemetery.
Theophilus Peck, born in March, 1702, was married February 5, 1728, to Elizabeth Mead, daughter of Benjamin Mead, of Greenwich, who was born in November, 1703, and died November 17, 1783, aged eighty years. He was the owner of an extensive tract of land in the northern part of the town of Greenwich, called Pecksland and Round Hill, where he resided until his death, November 7, 1783.
Theophilus Peck, born March 15, 1730, married Rebecca Knapp, July 5, 1753, and died in Greenwich July 8, 1812.
David Peck, born in February, 1754, was married August 10, 1773, to Amy Rundell, who died January 31, 1793, and in 1794 he wedded Alathea Honeywell. He resided in Greenwich, where he followed farming and also engaged in preaching as minister of the Baptist church. He died there April 23, 1835, and his second wife passed away May 14, 1850.
David Peck, born March 16, 1805, was married March II, 1829, to Mary B. Miller, and in 1870 was living in Greenwich, Connecticut.
Cephas Peck, the father of Jerome A. Peck, was born January 3, 1830, was married December 31, 1857, to Josephine Ferris, in 1861, was a resident of Port Chester, New York, and died April 14, 1895.
Jerome Alvord Peck, clerk of the village of Port Chester, was born in 1863, in Pecksland, town of Greenwich, Connecticut, and a few years after- ward, about the close of the civil war, his parents removed to Port Chester, taking up their residence on Locust street, where he has since made his home. He obtained his early education in the public schools of this district and at O. W. Starr's Military Academy, which flourished here in the early '8os, and subsequently was graduated at the New York University in 1883, with the degree of LL. B. In the following year he was admitted to the bar at Poughkeepsie and for a short time thereafter was clerk in the office of
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ex-Governor John T. Hoffman, in New York city. Since that time he has engaged in practice on his own account, and his superior ability has enabled him to gain a position of distinction at the Westchester bar.
SAMUEL T. CLARK.
Samuel T. Clark, a well known resident of New Castle township, West- chester county, has made his home here, on his present farm, for the past twenty years, during which time he has gained an enviable reputation for uprightness and good citizenship. He has been very successful in his various business enterprises, and is justly entitled to the prosperity which crowns his efforts.
The Clark family of which the subject of this article is a most worthy representative, originated in England. His father, Samuel Thompson Clark, was a native of the city of London, and there learned the business of manu- facturing hats. Desiring to become a citizen of the United States, "the land of the free," he crossed the ocean and took up his abode in the town of Mystic, Connecticut. There he married Lucinda Thompson, a native of the place, and some time afterward removed to Chenango county, New York, where they reared their large family. The father died when in his fiftieth year, in Norwich. The mother, surviving him many years, died when she had reached the advanced age of eighty-five years. She was a lady who was universally loved and esteemed and for years she was an active and zealous member of the Baptist church.
S. T. Clark, who was born in Norwich, Chenango county, New York, January 13, 1827, is one of thirteen children, ten of whom were sons. Their names in the order of birth are as follows: William, Mary Ann, Abigail, Charles, Calvin, Hannah, Lewis, Daniel. Samuel T., Edward, Jasper, Les- ter and Horace.
The youth of our subject was spent in his native county, his education in the higher branches of learning being gained in Oxford Seminary. When he was about seventeen years of age he entered a store at Norwich, as a clerk, and there acquired the rudiments of business training, after which he con- tinued merchandising for several years in that town. In 1866 he went to New York city and for the following twelve years was occupied in business affairs in the metropolis. In 1878 he removed to the homestead which he is now engaged in cultivating, and has since resided here. The place is a well-kept, fertile, desirable farm in every respect, and comprises two hundred acres. Fifty acres of this is covered by a fine old orchard, and a ready market is found for the numerous varieties of fruit which are grown on this
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place. Mr. Clark has been engaged in the milk and dairy business to some extent and has derived a good income from this source alone.
During his residence in this community, Mr. Clark has won the esteem of his neighbors and those who have been associated with him in one way or another. Prior to the civil war he was a strong abolitionist and since the organization of the Republican party he has been one of its sturdiest defenders. He is at present serving in the responsible office of justice of the peace.
The marriage of Mr. Clark and Miss Anna M. Thomson, of New York city, was celebrated in 1872. Mrs. Clark is a daughter of William A. and Mary (Corwin) Thomson, and is of Scotch descent. Two children blessed the union of our subject and wife; Mary C., Mrs. Robert L. Tompkins, and William A. T., who is at home and assists his father in the general manage- ment of the farm.
WILLIAM J. GRANEY.
William J. Graney, in whom public confidence has reposed positions of public trust, is one of the most prominent residents of Westchester county and is now serving as state senator. His has been an honorable record, well worthy of emulation from the time when, forced by circumstances to give up his cherished hopes of a collegiate course, he started out to make his own way in the world. Most of our best men are "self-made," and among the histories of the leading, substantial and successful men of this locality that of Senator Graney deserves a high place by reason of his well-directed efforts, broad charities and public spirit.
Born on the 5th of May, 1858, at Dobbs Ferry, New York, he attended the public schools and was graduated at the high school there. After his father's death it became necessary that he seek employment as a means whereby he might support his widowed mother and his sisters, and, putting aside his own ambitions for a collegiate education, he sought and obtained a position as bookkeeper in a leading mercantile establishment at Dobbs Ferry, where he remained for several years, his services proving very satis- factory to his employer and creditable to himself. His business-like meth- ods and thorough reliability attracted the attention of Warner D. Hatch, president of the Hatch Lithographing Company, by whom he was offered a position. In that house he rapidly worked his way upward and served as manager for the firm until their retirement from business.
Mr. Graney has been a very prominent factor in political circles, and gives an unwavering support to the Democratic party. No man in West- chester county has labored more untiringly or effectively for its interests, and for many years he has been the able chairman of the town committee and a
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member of the Democratic county committee, also serving as its chairman for several years. His powers of organization, his executive ability, and his keenness in foretelling results contributed in no small measure to the suc- cess which has attended the Democracy in Westchester county. His first official service was in the office of clerk of the village of Dobbs Ferry. In 1892 he was the Democratic nominee for register of the county and was elected by a large majority; but in 1895 was defeated for the same office, owing to the great Republican tidal wave which swept the county. Never- theless he ran fifteen hundred ahead of his ticket, which was certainly a compliment to his ability and an indication of the confidence reposed in him. He was elected to the general assembly by a majority of one thousand in a district which the year previously had given a Republican majority of twenty- five hundred, and in 1898 he was elected to represent the second district in the state senate, so that he is the present incumbent in that position. While in the lower house he served as a member of the committees on insurance, railroads, and fish and game, and in the senate on the committees on insur- ance, roads and agriculture. He has been instrumental in securing the passage of some fifty-eight bills, all of local interest to Westchester county, including the one making New Rochelle a city. He has always favored the labor element and is active in all legislation which has benefited the work- ing-man.
In 1893 Senator Graney was united in marriage to Miss Mary Louise Maher, of Dobbs Ferry, a daughter of Thomas Maher. She was called to the home beyond December 22, 1897. Mr. Graney is a very popular citi- zen, broad and liberal in his views and judgments, strong in his convictions and earnest in his opinions. Self-willed but not obstinate, a strong, stalwart character whose life record will bear the closest scrutiny without suffering criticism, such men leave a lasting impress for good, and the story of their lives cannot fail to exert a beneficial influence on the youth of succeeding generations.
SETH SHOVE, M. D.
We live in a world of fractional truths, of judgments resting on frac- tional premises. Perhaps this is not more manifest than in our estimates of men's lives. We are prone to judge their conduct by a fixed standard, with- out much reference to the conditions under which they act, -to exact of all like results in like positions, with little consideration for the peculiar charac- ter of each, which essentially enters into and qualifies his work. We make more allowance for the intellectuality of men, forgetting that character is a greater power in life than mere intellect. Philosophically considered, ability
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includes character as well as intellect or knowledge. With how great ven- eration, and even humility, may we then view such a life as was that of the honored subject of this memoir,-a life that typified the apotheosis of nobility in characterity; a life in which intellectuality was vital, permeat- ing, certain; a life dignified by simplicity and by a gentleness that spread wide its wings to shelter all who were in "in any way afflicted in mind, body or estate;" a life, in short, in which great powers co-ordinated them- selves to produce a character which was a benediction to all whom it touched. In a consideration of the life and services of Dr. Shove, whose name is revered throughout the county where so many years of his long and useful life were passed, there would be a manifest incongruity in having recourse to ful- some eulogy, since his was a nature signally modest, self-abnegating and unassuming. His life was purposeful, canopied and directed by duty; and though there was naught of supine inefficiency in connection with either his mental or moral attributes and actions, yet that one tender word, pregnant with meaning, "simpleness," denotes his character so truly that the biog- raphist would but do violence to the record of honest worth and honest endeavor were he to speak of the honored dead in terms other than those of quiet appreciation and reverence.
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