USA > New York > Noted living Albanians and state officials. A series of biographical sketches > Part 14
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singleness of purpose that cannot be turned aside from the one great object to be obtained. Onward - onward and upward is the motto of such men, as they march on till they attain the greatest possible excellence and eminence in what- ever they undertake as a calling in life. Following the natural bent of their genius, carefully studying the require- ments of their chosen work, diligently improving the flying moments, and closely attending to the wants of the public, they are sure in the end to meet with that suc- cess which their youthful imagination painted in glowing colors.
William H. Keeler, the subject of our present memoir, was born in 1843, in the city of Albany. He is a son of Daniel Keeler, a highly-respected and life-long resident of this city, who died about the year 1840. At a tender age William was sent to the district school, where he was in- structed in the elementary branches of education, such as might fit him for carrying on some useful, practical business in every-day life He was early inclined to the active pur- suits of trade and commerce, not to the securing of academ- ical honors or the mastery of some learned profession. As he grew up there was no hesitancy about the choice of an occupation. From boyhood this had been fixed in his mind and he has never since had cause to regret the course he pursued. When a young man of twenty he opened a small place on Green street as an oyster-house. As he was poor he commenced business on a very small capital; but at the same time he was industrious, honest, prudent, eco- nomical and enterprising, and visions of final success cheered him in his new, adventurous undertaking. At first his pa- trons were few, but they reported so many good things about Keeler's little oyster-house, especially how well they liked
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his "stews," that it was soon more largely patronized, till the place was thronged by new comers from morning till late at night. More room was soon required, and accord- ingly additions were made to the original establishment. And then his customers came in still larger numbers, and the chief reason was because they found that Keeler's oysters and clams, in every style of preparation, were the best to be found in the city. He seemed to have thoroughly mastered the minutest details of his occupation -to have learned the art of preparing his dishes in the most inviting and delicious style, so that his oyster-house really became famous among Albanians and the traveling public from all directions. He always made it a point to serve those who sat down at his table with a liberal hand. His stews came hot from the stewing-pan, like "a steam of rich distilled perfumes," with plenty of choice butter, crackers, cold-slaw, pickles, etc. His raw oysters and clams were the best to be found in the market, and the milk he furnished was in its original purity. Everybody who visited " Keeler's" was sure to get the worth of his money, and to go away highly pleased. And here, under this judicious and successful man- agement was conducted an oyster-house on Green street, which for seven years became a universal and favorite resort. Mr. Keeler then sold the property.
Some of his political friends having persuaded him to en- ter into political life, he was elected as a democratic alder, man from the fourth ward in 1872, and re-elected in 1874, serving in all four years. He was also street commissioner five years. His popularity still increasing, he was in 1882 elected sheriff of Albany county over John Sand, republican, and Colonel Severance, independent democrat. He held the position during a term of three years, administering its
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affairs with much efficiency and ability,and to the satisfac- tion of all parties having dealings with the office.
In 1877 Mr. Keeler married Miss Taylor, and has a family of five children. His private residence is 979 Madison ave- nue, surrounded by large and handsome grounds, where the calmer walks of domestic life may be more fully enjoyed.
It is somewhat remarkable that after an experience of twelve years in the exciting and perplexing arena of politi- cal life Mr. Keeler should return with renewed vigor and activity to the chosen occupation of his earlier days, to achieve still greater success and more widespread celebrity in it.
In looking around for another establishment, with an eye especially for the complete accommodation of ladies as well as gentlemen, Mr. Keeler purchased, in 1886, the stately building, No. 26 Maiden lane, now the busy thoroughfare for the traveling public to and from the cars and boats. It is a most desirable location for the purposes for which it has been selected. And it is hardly necessary to say that from the very first this venture was a grand success, the place being the popular resort for many of our leading merchants and business-men, besides the numerous visitors, who on reaching Albany soon find their way to " Keeler's" on Maiden lane. In it are contained all the latest improve- ments and appliances in the modus operandi of a first-class establishment of this kind. On the first floor and near the large front windows are the ovens and ranges where, during the colder months of the year, oysters, clams, eggs and meats of all kinds are prepared for the table in the most ex- peditious manner, and under the care of professional cooks. In the summer the food is generally prepared in the kitchen in the rear of the restaurant. There is a new feature re-
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cently introduced into this establishment, and that is steam stewing-pans, of which a patent is held in St. Louis, and which are, we believe, only to be found in the Hoffman house and the Morton house, New York. This is certainly a great improvement on the old way of preparing oyster stews. There is no danger of scorching the food, and the fine flavor is perfectly retained. About twenty-five tables for gentlemen, are placed through the dining-room, while large ventilating fans, on which Mr. Keeler has secured a patent, constantly revolve over the heads of the guests in the warm summer days and nights, cooling as the breath of autumn. On the second floor is the ladies' dining-room, where ample accommodation is afforded for two hundred and fifty, in a quiet and inviting way, and where all the delicacies of the season are served by ready, skillful hands. But Mr. Keeler's idea of what should constitute a perfect restaurant in connection with a grand model hotel on the European plan has been fully realized in the finishing up of other apart- ments in an elegant manner and by additional stories to the main building. A brief glance at some of these new attractions will be interesting to many. Besides the ladies' large dining-room on the second floor, already mentioned, facing Maiden lane and James street, finely finished with oak and chestnut and richly carpeted, with mirrors extend- ing all along the walls of the room, with ventilating fans overhead, there are twenty-eight other smaller dining rooms, for select parties, furnished with elegant new chairs, tables, mirrors and Brussels carpets, rivalling in beauty and attractiveness the little private dining-rooms in the United States hotel or Grand Union at Saratoga and some other famous hostelries. With gentlemen of quiet, retiring manners this attractive feature cannot be too highly appreciated. These rooms are already in de-
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mand by committees, and members of different societies and organizations wishing to transact business in a more private and quiet manner. On the third, fourth . and fifth stories are the gentlemen's new sleeping rooms, forty in all, fitted up in the latest style, with a choice artistic dis- play of furniture -with the best bedding, fine chamber sets, rich, new carpets, mirrors, and all that is necessary to con- tribute to the comfort of the most refined persons. These rooms are large, perfectly ventilated, and heated by steanı. There is no dark room in the number. Taken altogether they are among the finest rooms for gentlemen that can be found in any hotel in the state. They are let by the day, week or month, while the restaurant tables below furnish food for the most fastidious appetite. This supplies on a larger and more magnificent scale something that has long been wanted in our city - a first-class restaurant in connec tion with a first-class hotel on the European plan.
The business of this establishment increasing so rapidly and encroaching on the dining-room in the restaurant, it was thought best by the proprietor to have a separate cafe on the first floor. This is a room 20x28 feet, whose interior finish is a marvel of beauty. The walls are ten and a half feet in height and the ceiling is of corrugated iron, furnished by James Wasson of this city, being the only one of the kind in Albany. A visit to this room would well repay the lover of fine workmanship. A small sitting-room is in the rear of the cafe, and a neat, commodious reading-room between this and the gentlemen's dining-room, both of which are well-lighted. Several bath-rooms for gentlemen are tastefully fitted up in different parts of the building. The whole work of con- struction in all departments is in harmony with the original grand design of the projector and owner of the establish-
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ment. It may be proper to add here that, in full compliance with a recent law, fire escapes, manufactured by Sullivan & Ehlers of this city, have been placed on the front of the building, No 28 Maiden lane.
Thus, to the enterprise of William H. Keeler, his long and close study of the wants and comforts of different classes of people, their various tastes and feelings, is due the completion of this new restaurant and hotel which will doubtless be the leading and most noted establishment of its kind this side the metropolis, and one in which Albanians will take especial pride, and which will call forth the highest commendations from weary travelers from abroad, who will here find the best of food, the best of accommodations, and the tranquillity which they so often long for, in its home-like and pleasant rooms. The whole interior work was finished about the Ist of September, 1888, when all the new apart- · ments were thrown open to the public.
In keeping with his naturally progressive spirit, and to carry out his plans on a still broader compass, Mr. Keeler, in January, 1890, purchased the building, Nos. 484 and 486 Broadway near the corner of Maiden lane, which is to be connected with his Maiden lane establishment and fitted up in fine, modern style for the use of guests ; the first floor to be thrown into a large dining-room, hotel office, etc., and the upper stories to be used as sleeping-rooms. In the com- ing spring will be added to this establishment the build- ings Nos. 30 Maiden lane and 19 James street, and the total number of gentlemen's sleeping-rooms in all will be one hundred and fifteen. The full requirements will then be secured for conducting a mammoth restaurant and hotel on the grandest scale.
GEORGE W. KIRCHWEY.
A MONG the younger members of the Albany bar, whose attainments, not only in his special profession, but also in the wide range of general literature, have already gained for him distinction and honor, is George W. Kirch- wey, of the law firm of Eaton & Kirchwey, and dean of the Albany Law school.
Born on the 3d day of July, 1855, in the city of Detroit, Mich., he is the oldest child of honored parents who are still living in our midst. He was reared in an atmosphere of ideas, and does not remember the time when he did not have a book in his hands. He would have been a dull boy if he had not been something of a philosopher even in child- hood. But he was not a dull boy and he made good use of the advantages which were thus afforded him. Home edu- cation in Detroit was followed by regular instruction in the schools of Chicago, to which city Mr. Kirchwey removed with his family soon after the outbreak of the civil war, in 1862. Nine years later, in the fall of 1871, the family removed to Albany, which has proved to be its permanent home.
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After arriving in Albany George spent a year in one of the public schools and then entered the high school, where he received his preparation for college. He was then a bright, active, thoughtful boy of sixteen, and from the tes-
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timony of his teachers and fellow-pupils was a faithful and successful student, taking the highest stand in his classes and distinguishing himself particularly in his literary work and in debate. He was throughout his course a leader among his fellows, with whom he was deservedly popular, and in the debating society of the school gained a reputa- tion for forcible and convincing oratory and parliamentary ability which has not been surpassed in the school since his graduation, fifteen years ago. At the commencement of his class he delivered the valedictory oration and was awarded the medal for the best graduation essay in a class of fifty. He has ever since been looked upon as one of the brightest of the many able graduates of that flourishing in- stitution. He retains a lively interest in and a warm affec- tion for the school, frequently serving on its examination committees, and he was one of the leading spirits in the or- ganization of its alumni association, of which he was for several years the president.
On leaving the high school with such an enviable record he entered Yale college in the fall of 1875, in a class num- bering two hundred men. From the first he applied him- self with ardor as well as with all diligence to the severe labors of his college course. His earnest and well-directed efforts were crowned with an unusual measure of success. He gained literary and classical prizes even in his fresh- man and sophomore years. In his junior year he became the most prominent man of the year in college by the bril- liant effort with which he captured the junior exhibition prize, one of the most coveted honors of the course at Yale. His oration on that occasion, on Richelieu, won for him the praise of the faculty as well as of his fellow-students, and is reputed never to have been surpassed on that stage.
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After these successes and the distinction which they brought him, he was the inevitable choice of his class for the position of class orator, and of the faculty for the place of honor (after that of the valedictorian and salutatorian) on the commencement stage. His class oration, on " De- mocracy and the Individual," was a profound and noble effort, and more than justified his selection to represent the class on the most memorable occasion of its course in college.
Kirchwey was perhaps the busiest man in his class, if not in New Haven, during his commencement week, in the sum- mer of 1879, as he had, in addition to his class and com- mencement orations, to take part in the great contest for the DeForest medal, which rounds up the career of each class at Yale college. He was one of the six men selected by the faculty, on the ground of scholarship as well as liter- ary ability, to take the Townsend prizes and speak in the college chapel in competition for this medal, and he was confessedly second in the contest only to his distinguished fellow-townsman, Louis Judson Swinburne, to whom the medal was awarded. Besides the brilliant Swinburne, whose untimely death occurred only a few years ago, this class was distinguished by the fact that it included three other Al- banians of unusual ability and rare promise. These were Harry James Ten Eyck, whose brilliant career at college was followed by a few years of increasing usefulness and grow- ing distinction here in his native city, and whose recent . death we have not yet ceased to mourn ; James W. Eaton, Jr., distinguished equally as a lawyer, a shrewd politician and a graceful after-dinner orator, who is the law part- ner of Mr. Kirchwey and his associate in the law school, and the rising and successful young specialist, Dr. David Fleischman.
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After graduating with such exceptional honors, Mr. Kirchwey immediately returned to Albany and commenced the study of law in the office of Stedman & Shepard, then one of the leading law firms in this city and of which the honored Stephen O. Shepard was counsel. Of this office he was managing clerk for three years, during which he worked and read law incessantly and at the same time made the most of the exceptional opportunities in the way of practice which his responsible position with this important firm af- forded him. He prepared himself for his life-work with characteristic deliberation and thoroughness. He was a sound lawyer before he applied for admission to the bar, which he did in the fall of 1882.
In the spring of the following year, after having spent six months in practice in New York city, he formed a part- nership with his friend and former classmate, Mr. James W. Eaton, Jr., which still continues. After the usual painful experience of young lawyers in establishing a practice, the tide, as it always does, when energy and perseverance are combined with talent, turned in favor of the young firm, until at present it enjoys a large and lucrative, as well as growing practice. While undertaking general law cases Mr. Kirchwey has paid particular attention to corporation law and numbers many corporations at Albany and elsewhere among his clients.
During his legal practice he has devoted much of his spare time to literary labors. He has written frequently on historical, political aud legal topics for papers and legal peri- odicals. He has read an occasional paper before the Al- bany institute, and, in 1886, he delivered a notable and stirr- ing fourth of July oration in the city hall in Albany. He contributed some chapters to Mr. James W. Eaton's admir-
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able edition of Reeve's Domestic Relations, published in 1888, and is now engaged on an important piece of legal writing, which, however, will probably not see the light for at least a year to come. Three years ago he was selected by the regents of the University of the state of New York to undertake the important work of editing the Clinton papers - a great and invaluable collection of historical material con- tained in the state library - and for a year he devoted him- self assiduously to the congenial task which had been in- trusted to him, when the exigencies of his growing practice compelled him to surrender it. During his incumbency of this office, brief as it was, he succeeded in collecting a great deal of valuable historical material and in laying the founda- tion of more than one historical work, which it is hoped he may some day have leisure to elaborate and complete.
In politics Mr. Kirchwey has always been a republican, but he was one of " the immortal army of martyrs " who, in 1882 1884 and again in 1888, voted for the democratic can- didate, and it is not recorded of him that he has yet re- pented of his ways. He has, ever since his school days, been deeply interested in all the reform movements which have successively swept over the social and political fields. He has done good service in the cause of civil service re- form, in whose doctrines he is an ardent believer. He is the permanent secretary of the Albany branch of the Civil Ser- vice Reform league, of which the Hon. Matthew Hale is president, and is also a member of the Reform club of New York. He has never sought a political career nor held a political office. Nevertheless his time and talents have ever been at the service of every worthy cause which claimed them, and offices of trust and honor have more than once been conferred upon him. He is a member of the
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American Historical association, and of the Albany insti- tute, in whose work he takes a great interest, and of whose publication committee he is the efficient chairman ; he is a member of the Fort Orange and Press clubs, a trustee of the Female academy, secretary of the Yale Alumni associa- tion of eastern New York, etc., etc.
Mr. Kirchwey is pre-eminently a scholar. He has been a life-long student, a great lover of books, devoting many a leisure hour to the companionship of those silent but elo- quent friends of the spirit. Even from his boyhood he has been an omnivorous and inveterate reader. The range of his reading was remarkable. Before he went to college, at the age of nineteen, he had read the works of Carlyle, Emerson, Froude, Matthew Arnold, Darwin, Spencer and many more of the masters of modern literature, science and philos- ophy - besides all the fiction that he could lay his hands These tastes and characteristics have remained with on.
him and become a part of him. He has been heard to say that much, if not the best part of his education, at school and college, was gained by him in this way, without the as- sistance of texts and teachers. Since that time his favorite studies outside of law, have been in the departments of his- tory, political and social science, etc. He has read widely in general jurisprudence and has not allowed the severer duties of his profession to keep him a stranger to the history and literature of the law. In addition to the acquirements already dwelt upon, it may be added that Mr. Kirchwey is a classical scholar and linguist of no mean attainments, hav- ing a good command of the German and French as well as of the Greek and Latin languages, and being a competent as well as an enthusiastic admirer of the literatures embodied in those tongues.
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It is not surprising that greater honors and heavier re- sponsibilities were in store for one with such qualities of mind and such capacities for work. Accordingly, upon the resignation of the Hon. Horace E. Smith, the honored head of the Albany Law school, a year ago, the position of dean of the school with the professor's chair, vacated by Prof. Smith, were at once offered to Mr. Kirchwey and accepted by him. He has entered upon the exacting duties of his high office with characteristic ardor, energy and industry, with most exalted ideas as to the part which the law school should play in the education of coming generations of law- yers, and with a determination to raise the Albany Law school to the first place among American schools of law. No one who knows the man and the opportunity will doubt the results of his efforts. His distinguished associate in the faculty of the law school, Prof. Irving Browne, thus speaks of the beginnings of the new administration in a recent num- ber of The Green Bag:
"George W. Kirchwey, one of most brilliant and best ed- ucated of the young lawyers of Albany, was, by the unani- mous voice of the faculty and trustees of the school, chosen to succeed Mr. Smith. He is thirty-four years of age, and was graduated at Yale in 1879. He brings to his arduous post the gifts of youth, energy, tact, physical and mental vigor and power of expression, and the acquirements of pro- fessional and general scholarship in a remarkable degree. The opening of his administration has been characterized by an unusual measure of success, and the faculty predict for him great eminence as an instructor, and an increase of usefulness and prosperity for the school. Mr. Kirchwey has adopted a new and most effective method of instruction, based upon the Harvard system of teaching by leading cases.
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His lectures, which are entirely extemporaneous and are combined with the discussion of carefully selected cases pre- viously assigned to the class, have resulted in stimulating the interest of the students to a most gratifying degree."
It was most fitting that this young and gifted son of old Yale should be placed at the head of an institution over which, in past years, had so ably presided Ira Harris, Amos Dean and Isaac Edwards - those great jurists and instruct- ors in legal science. To this honorable place Mr. Kirchwey is entitled by his culture and attainments as a schiolar, his profound knowlege and practical experience of law, his clear, logical mind, his high executive ability and remarkable in- dustry, with all the amenities that grace his social life and the rare, sterling qualities of his private character. Under his administration there will doubtiess be infused a new, glowing spirit into a time-honored institution, from which so many now distinguished members of the bar have gone forth to engage in the contests of legal warfare as well as into the higher walks of public life.
It may be of interest in this, the forty-first year of the Albany Law school's useful existence, to give a list of the faculty with the subjects taught by them respectively. They are as follows : Hon. William L. Learned, LL. D., president of the board of trustees; professor of Equity and lecturer on The Trial of Causes; George W. Kirchwey, dean of the law school, professor of Jurisprudence and the law of Con- tracts and Evidence; Hon. Matthew Hale, LL. D., professor of Personal Rights and Torts, and lecturer on Professional Ethics; Charles T. F. Spoor, professor of Practice and Plead- ing; Irving Browne, professor of the law of the Domestic Relations and Criminal Law; Nathaniel C. Moak, lecturer on Books and Judicial Systems; Maurice J. Lewi, M. D.,
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