USA > New York > Encyclopedia of biography of New York, a life record of men and women whose sterling character and energy and industry have made them pre?minent in their own and many other states. V.6 > Part 38
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ton, Vermont, and participating in that battle where the Green Mountain boys under Colonel Ethan Allen won undying fame. The maternal grandfather of Mrs. Hyde was a Mr. Peck, also a resident of Vermont and a participant in the Revo- lutionary War with the Colonial army.
Salem Hyde pursued his education in the district schools of Victory, New York, and in the Red Creek Academy. He entered business life as a clerk in a country store at Wolcott, Wayne county, where he remained for a year. He after- ward spent two years in Red Creek, and in the spring of 1864 came to Syracuse where he began clerking for Price & Wheeler on the site of the present Edwards house. There he continued for two years, or until 1866, when he entered the employ of McCarthy & Sedgwick, wholesale dry goods merchants, while later he was with Neal, Baum & Com- pany, wholesale dealers, as salesman. He afterward engaged with Charles Chad- wick & Company as manager of one of their departments, and after the death of their senior partner this firm consolidated with that of Neal & Baum under the name of Sperry, Neal & Hyde in 1879. Mr. Hyde was enabled to become a member of the firm as a result of his many years experience. At Mr. Sperry's death in 1891 the firm became Neal & Hyde. The concern has grown very rapidly during this time, enjoying a steady, healthful development and their trade covers Penn- sylvania, Massachusetts, Connecticut and Vermont, together with the immediate surrounding territory. They employ a large force in the house and a large corps of salesmen on the road, doing a strictly jobbing business. This has become one of the leading wholesale houses of Central New York and its success is attributable in no small measure to the labors, enterprise and careful manage-
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ment of Mr. Hyde. He is also a trustee of the Onondaga County Savings Bank, and widely recognized as a prominent factor in the commercial life of Syra- cuse.
Mr. Hyde is a member of the Citizens' Club, the Chamber of Commerce and the Lotos Club of New York City, and has been a co-worker with many leading citizens in movements toward the up- building of a Greater Syracuse. In politics he is a Republican with a citizen's interest in the adoption of the prin- ciples which he believes best conserve good government. He was the first com- missioner of jurors in Syracuse and filled that office for six years. He is serving his third five-year term as a trustee of the Syracuse Public Library and has been for many years vice-president of the Historical Society, also of the Syracuse Museum of Fine Arts, of which he is a charter member. He belongs to the May Memorial (Unitarian) Church, and is greatly interested in charities, to which he has been a liberal contributor. Mr. Hyde during his lifetime has been a man of literary tastes and has accumulated one of the finest private libraries in the city, containing many rare volumes and being especially strong in early nineteenth century English literature and in books pertaining to the history and literature of Greece. A unique feature of this library is the collection of Emersoniana, number- ing nearly five hundred bound volumes in several languages, which together with many pamphlets, autograph letters and other items of interest probably forms as complete a collection of works relating to Emerson and his writings as may be found anywhere. His life has been char- acterized by a resolute purpose and early in his career he became imbued with a laudable ambition to master each task that was assigned him and progressed
until he is to-day with Mr. Neal equal owner of a business which pays tribute to his industry and his ability, and stands as a monument to his enterprise and cap- able management.
Mr. Hyde married Anne P. Cheney, a daughter of Timothy C. Cheney, an early settler of Onondaga county, and a prominent contractor, who built the old Wieting block, the courthouse and other notable structures of the city. The chil- dren of Mr. and Mrs. Hyde are as follows : Henry N., born in 1873, rector of St. Philip's Church, Joplin, Missouri; Mary Frances, born in 1875, now the wife of Charles W. Andrews; Charles Salem, born in 1877, employed in the store with his father; Dana Cheney, born in 1879, also associated in business with his father ; Florence M., born in 1882; Nelson C., born in 1888, secretary to Congress- man Magee, and Washington correspond- ent of several newspapers; and Dorothy A., born in 1891.
CURTICE, Edgar N., Head of Important Industry.
The financial and commercial history of New York State would be incomplete and unsatisfactory without a personal and somewhat extended mention of those whose lives are interwoven closely with its industrial and financial development. When a man or select number of men have set in motion the machinery of busi- ness which materializes into a thousand forms of practical utility, or where they have carved out a fortune or a name from the common possibilities open for com- petition to all, there is a public desire, which should be gratified, to see the men so nearly as a portrait and a word artist can paint them and examine the elements of mind and the circumstances by which such results have been achieved.
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The subject of this review finds an appropriate place in the history of those men of business and enterprise in the State of New York whose force of char- acter, whose sterling integrity, whose fortitude amid discouragements, whose good sense in the management of com- plicated affairs and marked success in establishing large industries and bringing to completion great commercial under- takings, have contributed in an eminent degree to the development of the re- sources of this noble Commonwealth. The great army of employes and the magnitude of the business which he controls both attest the marked ability of Edgar N. Curtice, whose name is known in trade circles wherever civiliza- tion has left its stamp.
He was born in Webster, Monroe county, New York, on December 9, 1844, a son of Mark Curtice and a descendant of one of the oldest Colonial families. His ancestry is traced back to Henry Curtice, who was one of the original grantees of the town of Sudbury, Massachusetts, in 1638. His son, Lieutenant Ephraim Cur- tice, born March 31, 1642, was a noted frontiersman and famous Indian scout. Ephraim Curtice, son of Lieutenant Cur- tice, was born in Topsfield, Massachu- setts, in 1662, and became the father of Ebenezer Curtice, born in Boxford, Mas- sachusetts, August 21, 1707. The latter's son, Jacob Curtice, was born March 21, 1730, in Topsfield, Massachusetts. He wedded Mary Stiles, a native of Boxford, Massachusetts, and from Boxford re- moved to Amherst, New Hampshire. He and five of his sons valiantly fought for American independence in the Revolu- tionary War, Jacob Curtice enlisting at Amherst in 1775 and serving until the close of hostilities. Jacob and Mary Cur- tice had nine children, of whom Ebenezer, the fifth, was born in Amherst, New
Hampshire, June 9, 1760. He married Sarah Parker, and removed to Western New York. He was among the earliest settlers of this part of the State, locating at Bloomfield, New York, in 1789. In 1792 he removed to Webster, then a part of Ontario county, where his remaining days were passed. He died August 22, 1832, and was buried in Lakeside Ceme- tery in Webster. His wife died August 16, 1847, in her eighty-third year.
Mark Curtice, the father of Edgar N. Curtice, was the youngest of the eleven children of Ebenezer and Sarah (Parker) Curtice. He was born in Windsor, New York, October 17, 1808, and died in Webster, Monroe county, New York, November 9, 1880. Mark Curtice's wife, Elmina (Goodnow) Curtice, daughter of Simeon and Sarah (Griffen) . Goodnow, was the first white child born in what is now the town of Webster. She was born July 3, 1812, and died March 26, 1888. Simeon Goodnow came to Monroe county from New Hampshire in 1810. He was born in the old Granite State in 1787, died November 20, 1826, and was buried in Lakeside Cemetery at Webster. He was a son of Calvin Goodnow, who was born February 15, 1752, in Westboro, Massa- chusetts. Calvin Goodnow served in the Revolutionary War from Rindge, New Hampshire, and also from Amherst, New Hampshire. The Goodnow family in America is descended from Edmund Goodnow, who came to America on the ship "Confidence" in 1638. In the family of Mark and Elmina (Goodnow) Curtice were five children: 1. Delia, who was born in 1833, became prominent in educa- tional circles, acting for more than twenty-five years as principal of different public schools in Rochester, most of this time being at the head of No. 20. She was a woman of superior mind, highly respected and loved by all. Her death
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occurred in 1903. 2. Albin B., born in 1838, died in December, 1886. 3. Simeon G., born August 13, 1839, died February 7, 1905, after long connection with the extensive business now conducted under the name of Curtice Brothers Company. 4. Edgar N., of whom further. 5. Belle Sophia, the wife of the late A. B. Wol- cott ; is now a resident of Rochester.
Edgar N. Curtice was educated in the common and advanced schools of Web- ster and in what was known as Satter- lee's Institute in Rochester, completing his course when about twenty-one years of age. He then joined his brother, Simeon G. Curtice, who about three years before had embarked in the grocery busi- ness on a small scale in what is known as the Flatiron building at Main, North and Franklin streets, Rochester. This was in 1865 and there they continued until 1868. They removed in that year to the building at the corner of Water and Mortimer streets, and commenced the canning and preserving business which has grown steadily to the present exten- sive enterprise. The business continued in this location until 1872, when the de- mand for increased space compelled the Curtice Brothers to build at No. 200 North Water street, the new structure being used for canning and preserving on a larger scale. In 1880 they bought the land and erected the buildings now occu- pied by the company, which from time to time have been enlarged in order to meet the growth of the trade. In 1887 the business was incorporated under the name of Curtice Brothers Company, with a capitalization of $200,000. Simeon G. Curtice was the president ; Edgar N. Cur- tice, the vice-president and treasurer ; and Robert A. Badger, the secretary of the new corporation. In 1901 the business was reincorporated under the same name and the same officers and with a capital-
ization of $1,500,000, showing thus a more than seven-fold increase in the fourteen years. On the death of Simeon G. Cur- tice in 1905, Edgar N. Curtice was made president and treasurer; Henry B. Mc- Kay, vice-president; and Robert A. Badger, secretary.
The Curtice Brothers Company is one of the largest producers of high grade food products in the world and con- tributes much to the fame of the Flower City as a commercial center. Its products are found in the markets all around the globe, being recognized as goods of the highest quality and the company has difficulty in meeting the increasing de- mand made upon it. Each year has shown the necessity of increased acreage to supply the fruits and vegetables needed for the business until now the company contracts for the yield of over eight thousand acres in farm and market garden products from some of the most famous and fertile lands in the world- notably the valley of the Genesee. The company owns and operates four plants, the parent plant in Rochester, one in Vernon, Oneida county, New York, for vegetables, one in Woodstown, New Jer- sey, for tomatoes, and one in Bergen, Genesee county, New York. The Roches- ter factory not only carries on all sorts of canning and preserving, but also manu- factures the cans for use in all its fac- tories. At Rochester also are the admin- istrative offices. It is essentially a Roches- ter concern. This immense enterprise pays out annually very large sums of money to its employes and to the farmers who grow the fruits and vege- tables used in the business. It markets its products all over the world, as has been said, and the profits of this enor- mous business come back into Rochester to increase the wealth of its citizens and the resources of the banks. Each of the
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company's plants is equipped with the latest and most perfect mechanical appli- ances, securing the highest degree of cleanliness and most sanitary conditions. Over twenty-five hundred employes are at work in the factories in the busy season, and a still larger number are en- gaged on the farms in producing the fruits and vegetables needed for the business. The world-wide fame of the "Blue Label" ketchup, chili sauce, soups, per- serves, jams, jellies, meat delicacies, etc., is simply a recognition of the efficient methods, the constant watchfulness, and the wise management of the vast enter- prise of which Mr. Curtice is the head, and of which he and his brother have been the creators.
Edgar N. Curtice was married in 1876 to Lucy E. Gardner. Their only son, Edgar N. Curtice, Jr., born in 1878, died in 1905, in which year the death of Mrs. Curtice also occurred. Louie Belle, a daughter, is the wife of Frederick Edwin Bickford. Agnes Eloise, another daugh- ter, is the wife of Dr. Volney A. Hoard.
Mr. Curtice is a member of various clubs and social organizations, among them the Genesee Valley Club, the Rochester Yacht Club, Rochester His- torical Society, the Country Club of Rochester, the Oak Hill Country Club and the Sons of the American Revo- lution. Deeply interested in the welfare and commercial development of Roches- ter, he has been a member of the Cham- ber of Commerce since its organization, and he is also a director of the National Bank of Rochester and of the Fidelity Trust Company. His political allegiance is given to the Republican party. Such, in brief, is the life history of Edgar N. Curtice, a man remarkable in the breadth of his wisdom, his indefatigable energy and his fertility of resource. One of the prominent characteristics of his success-
ful business career is that his vision has never been bounded by the exigencies of the moment, but has covered as well the possibilities and opportunities of the future. This has led him into extensive undertakings, bringing him, into marked prominence in industrial and commercial circles. A man of unswerving integrity and honor, one who has a perfect appre- ciation of the higher ethics of life, he has gained and retained the confidence and respect of his fellow men and is distinc- tively one of the leading citizens, not only of Rochester but of the Empire State, with whose interests he has been identified throughout his entire career.
WIDENER, Howard H., Lawyer, Public Official.
A man of wide general information, broad reading and deep thinking, well educated and well bred, Mr. Widener even without the prestige which he deserves from his high position at the Rochester bar would be a man singled out from among his fellows as one far above the ordinary. As a lawyer he is a clear thinker, a logical reasoner, well versed in the branches of the law, to which he has devoted himself. As assistant and as district attorney of Monroe county he was necessarily obliged to specialize in criminal law and some most notable vic- tories are to his credit. His practice ex- tends to all State and Federal courts of the district, and he acts as legal repre- sentative for some of the most prominent men and concerns of the city, his sage counsel based upon comprehensive under- standing of the law proving a valuable asset to his large clientele. He is noted for his industry, his thorough knowledge of the law, his concise and searching mind, his systematic habits, his resource- fulness, his personal honesty, and his
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lofty professional ideals. It is the special function of the lawyer to actively partici- pate in the affairs of his community. He is the spokesman for its patriotic observ- ances, for the reform of its abuses, and for the enlargement of its functions. He is the motive power of its educational, moral and charitable work. All these re- quirements of Mr. Widener fulfills, and no man is more genuinely useful and helpful than he. Admitted to the Monroe county bar in 1885, he has in the years inter- vening made continuous progress in his profession and has long occupied a posi- tion of distinction among the leading lawyers of that bar. His reputation as a lawyer has been won through earnest, honest labor, and his standing at the bar is a merited tribute to his ability.
Mr. Widener springs from one of the historic families of New Jersey, his great- grandfather, Henry Widener, serving with the "Minute-Men" of Sussex county in the Revolutionary War. The family is of German origin, the American ancestors settling in Eastern Pennsylvania about 1735. A lineal descendant was Peter A. B. Widener, the great financier and capi- talist, whose son and grandson were lost at the sinking of the great steamship "Titanic." The wonderful contributions of that branch of the family to the art galleries and philanthropies of Philadel- phia are the glory of that city, and at Harvard University a memorial building stands as a monument to the brave young man whose soul went out over the frozen sea when the "Titanic" plunged beneath the wave. Other noted descendants are General Josiah Gorgas and his son, Colo- nel William Gorgas, both of the United States army, the latter of Panama Canal fame. Professor R. F. Widener, of Chi- cago, is also a descendant of the German ancestor.
Henry (2) Widener, son of the Revolu-
tionary patriot, Henry (1) Widener, of Sussex county, New Jersey, settled in Chili, Monroe county, New York, in early pioneer days, and at one time was the owner of six hundred acres of cultivated land. He was a soldier of the War of 1812, serving with the defenders of the Niagara frontier. He married Prudence Kimball, of Riga, New York, who bore him ten children. He died at Chili, Janu- ary 21, 1837, his wife, Prudence, died Jan- uary 7, 1845.
Kinney A. Widener, son of Henry (2) and Prudence (Kimball) Widener, was born at Chili, New York, April 22, 1822. He was a man of education, taught school for fourteen years, but was a farmer the greater part of his life. He was closely identified with public affairs, held many town offices, including town superintend- ent and school commissioner. He mar- ried, March 11, 1848, Mary R., daughter of Samuel and Eliza (Reed) Phillips, of Chili. She was the mother of three chil- dren: Howard H .; Chandler Reed, born March 25, 1862, died January 11, 1865; and Blanche Eliza.
Howard H. Widener, eldest son of Kin- ney A. and Mary R. (Phillips) Widener, was born at Chili, Monroe county, New York, May 6, 1860. He obtained an academic education and was graduated from Chili Seminary, class of 1879, and for four years taught school. But his ambition was for the profession of law, and after a thorough course of prepara- tory study he was admitted to the Monroe county bar at the June term, 1885. He at once began practice in Rochester, and has been continuously in practice until the present time (1916). He soon gained a foothold in his profession, and has gone forward as the years have progressed to a position of professional importance most gratifying to himself and his many friends. He possesses that rarest of gifts,
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the faculty for honest work, a faculty which has won him professional fame and, combined with business ability and sa- gacity and personal qualities of the highest order, has won him public confidence and esteem and the affection of a host of friends.
A Republican in politics, Mr. Widener was appointed assistant district attorney of Monroe, and in that office tried some very important criminal cases, and won notable victories. In 1907 he was the candidate of his party for district attor- ney, and won the verdict of the polls. He not only upheld the high reputa- tion he had gained as assistant, but won additional fame and the highest encomiums of the bench and bar. He prepared his cases with the greatest care, and in his presentation is clear, logical and forceful. He is a fair oppo- nent, a close observer of the ethics of the profession, courteous to court, and most solicitous for a client's interests. He is fond of historical and genealogical study, and in his hours "off duty" has compiled a history of the Widener family, a work of great labor, and very valuable. He is a thirty-second degree Mason of Rochester Consistory, and a Noble of Damascus Temple, his lodge, Younondio, No. 163, Free and Accepted Masons. He is a member of the local and State bar asso- ciations, and much interested in their proceedings.
Mr. Widener married, February 22, 1886, Anna L., daughter of Lyman and Mary J. (Hamlin) Brooks. The family home is in Chili, where the family has been resident for considerably more than a century. His professional offices are in the Powers Building, Rochester.
RICKER, Marcena (Sherman), M. D., Successful Female Physician.
In 1888 Dr. Marcena (Sherman) Ricker located in Rochester, New York, for the
practice of her profession, her advent causing much more comment then than can be now understood when the woman doctor is no longer a novelty but a fixed star in the medical firmament. She came thoroughly prepared by college training and hospital experience, but in the years which have since intervened she has pur- sued post-graduate courses in New York City institutions and in her specialties, diseases of women and children, has won the highest professional reputation. She is a member of the County, State and National Medical societies. She has de- voted a great deal of time to church, char- ity and philanthropy. As an able repre- sentative of the professional women of her city, she has been of great aid to every other woman who was ambitious to enter a profession, and through the influence of her own successful career and noble life she has aided in breaking down the wall of prejudice and opposition until now woman can apply for admission to nearly every institution of learning with the cer- tainty that her sex alone will not be a bar. Argument was good a quarter of a century ago, but it needed the object teaching of lives like Dr. Ricker's to make the argu- ment effective, as the men controlling col- leges of law and medicine are perhaps bound by tradition more firmly than any other class and yield only when their de- fense is utterly demolished by facts and Dr. Ricker aided by furnishing a fact in her own life.
Marcena (Sherman) Ricker was born in Castile, Wyoming county, New York, daughter of Benjamin H. and Eliza (Llewellyn) Sherman. Benjamin H. Sherman was born in Rhode Island, a distant relative to General William T. and Senator John Sherman, of Ohio, and died in 1887, aged sixty-nine. His wife, born in Bristol, Orleans county, New York, was of Welsh descent. They were the parents of two sons and four daugh-
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ters. Marcena Sherman was educated in Castile schools, Gainesville Seminary, and Albany Normal College, qualifying as a teacher. After graduation from Normal she taught for three years, then began the carrying out of a long formed ambition, the study of medicine. She obtained her degree of M. D. from the Cleveland Homeopathic College, class of 1888, and shortly afterward located in Rochester where she has since been in continuous practice, specializing in diseases of women and children. She was remarkably suc- cessful in her earlier efforts to establish a practice, and it was not long before her office was being sought for by a most desirable class of patrons. Her experi- ence and post-graduate courses taken in New York later gave her greater confi- dence in her own powers and she is now the strong, self-reliant physician, skillful in both diagnosis and treatment, her skill being accompanied to the sick room by that sympathy and womanly tenderness which brings healing in itself. A student and thinker, she is recognized as a learned and able member of the medical profes- sion and the contributions from her pen to the medical journals have been fre- quent and well received.
Dr. Ricker is a member of the Monroe County Medical Association, Western New York Medical Society, the American Institute of Homeopathy, member of the staff of the Homeopathic Hospital of Rochester, president of the board of man- agers of the Baptist Home of Monroe County, visiting physician at the Door of Hope, member of Lake Avenue Baptist Church. The Baptist Home of Monroe County was established largely through her persistent effort extending over a period of ten years, ere "hope ended in fruition."
Miss Sherman married, June, 1898, Wentworth G. Ricker, born in the State
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