The civil, political, professional and ecclesiastical history, and commercial and industrial record of the county of Kings and the city of Brooklyn, N. Y., from 1683 to 1884, Volume II, Part 132

Author: Stiles, Henry Reed, 1832-1909, ed
Publication date: 1884
Publisher: New York, W. W. Munsell & Co
Number of Pages: 1345

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possessed of machines that would print 50,000 copies an hour. Nor did his desire to improve and enlarge stop there. One of the last things he did for the Eagle was to devise the improved process by which it is now enabled to use both type and stereotype plates, and by so doing preserve all the advan- tages of the stereotyping process, while losing none of the advantages enjoyed by those who print with type. No mother ever watched a child with more solicitude than he watched the Eagle. There was no sacrifice he was not prepared to make in its behalf, and there was nothing that pleased him so much as the facts that appeared from time to time, evinc- ing its augmenting prosperity. He declared that the happiest day of his life, and the happiest he ever expected to enjoy, was that in which he learned that he could truthfully put at the head of his paper the lines so familiar now to all readers of the Eagle, " The Brooklyn Daily Eagle has the largest cir- culation of any evening newspaper published in the United States." Mr. Van Anden published a Democratic newspaper, because he was a Democrat by conviction; had been reared in that faith, and held to it with the steadiness characteristic of his people and race. He believed that the welfare of the country depended upon the operation of Democratic prin- ciples, as he understood them-honesty in public life, economy in government, and no interference by government in affairs in which the people are competent to manage for themselves. For Brooklyn, as a city, he had a profound love. He had made his fortune in it; his friends were here and all that he anticipated of material prosperity centered here. He not only never sought office, but again and again rejected offers that would have moved any one less single of purpose than himself. There is no doubt that he could have besn Mayor of Brooklyn; for the nomination for that position was tendered him by men who could, by their influence, have secured his election. But he had no political ambitions, and would form no connection of any kind likely in the slightest degree to embarrass the cause of the paper. No man, perhaps, who has ever been identified with a newspaper had fewer per- sonal ends to serve than Mr. Van Anden, and to this must be attributed in no insignificant degree the influence which the Eagle gained while under his management. Of his attach- ment to Brooklyn he desired in some way to give attestation. He was among the foremost and firmest friends of the Bridge enterprise, and the $25,000 which he gave for stock of the company at its incipiency was paid in the belief that he never would receive a cent in return. "That much," he said, "I am willing to give toward the betterment of Brook- lyn." He was an early friend of the Prospect Park enterprise; he was one of the Commissioners intrusted with its conduct; and, so firm was his belief in the character of the men as- sociated with him in it, as regarded the commendable nature of the project, that he would listen to no man who assailed either. To the Park, as to the Bridge, he gave hie time and thought cheerfully, animated by a desire to serve the city and the citizens, to whom he felt an abounding gratitude for the success which had covered his business career. He was, also, a director in the Mechanics' Bank, the Brooklyn and the Standard Life Insurance Companies, the Safe Deposit Company, and was a helper in many charities. He was upon the Democratic Electoral ticket in 1865 and 1869-once de- feated, once elected.

Mr. Van Anden, in social life, was what his business and public life implied. Unostentatious, somewhat retiring, never demonstrative, but kindly and unmistakably honest in his utterance. He was the friend of every man for whom he pretended friendship, and for no man did he pretend even respect, when he believed him unworthy of it. He cared but little for company; and, so it came that his friende were

Tomar Pinsella

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THE PRESS.

rather few than numerous. His attachments, when formed, were of an enduring kind. Toward men who served him he had a gratitude that was constant. Murphy, Lott, and Van- derbilt, the men who helped him in his younger days, were men that he always held himself under obligations to serve ; and, from Mr. Van Anden, the younger servants of the Eagle learned, as they took positions of trust, that, come what might, these, his early friends, were to be treated as friends. He was not less attached to old servants. He disliked changes among the persons about him. One department was under the charge of a man who counted 35 years in Mr. Van Anden's service. Another had come as a boy to the Eagle office, and had grown gray without leaving it. A third had commenced his career as a journalist, and had continued it, without a break, from youth to advanced age; and so on. These things pleased Mr. Van Anden hardly less than the growth of the paper itself, and in that they gave him joy we have an evidence of the gentle character of his mind. Mr. Van Anden was a bachelor. He was accustomed to say that the Eagle, in early days, was his mistress, and that he in- dulged the passion until it became too late to transfer his affections to any other object.

Mr. Van Anden's birthplace is a mile and a half north from the main street of Poughkeepsie, and is not now in possession of the Van Anden family. The house stands on a high bluff overlooking the Hudson, and commanding a fine view of the Catskills in the distance. His Brooklyn residence was on Columbia street, where, for many years, he lived with his venerable mother and widowed sister; and here, in his well-stocked and pleasant library, he passed nearly all his leisure hours, amusing himself in viewing the ever-changing scene presented by the busy harbor before him; in storing his mind with useful informa- tion, or in laying out the plans for the development and conduct of his darling newspaper, which his subordinates were to work out to the letter by his schedule. His pleas- ures, aside from the one great pleasure of his life, were few and simple; his dress elegant, without being finical; his man- ner plain aud unaffected. His life-which ended at the resi- dence of his brother, at Poughkeepsie, August 4, 1875-was marked by gentle consideration for the poor and humble; generosity and self-sacrifice in the interests of those less prosperous than himself; and by courtesy and good will to- wards all mankind.

THOMAS KINSELLA.

THOMAS KINSELLA, editor of the Eagle .- Among the names of the really great men whom Brooklyn has delighted to honor, none stand forth more prominently than that of Thomas Kinsella, the editor of the Eagle, whose career was as intimately associated with her public interests as with that of the newspaper whose prosperity was linked with his fame. His death, at the comparatively early age of fifty-two years, was the supreme test by which his value to the city of his adoption was established. Tried by this ordeal, the great soul of Thomas Kinsella stood forth before his fellow men, larger and nobler and wiser than in life it had been permit- ted to reveal itself. Every principle for which he had con- tended with pen and voice was proved to have been defended from motives that had for their foundation the best interests of the greater number, and the rights of all races and creeds. The man was greater than his works, and the depth and breadth and the height of the sum total of his character the world realized when death had unveiled his life, and the higher nature was exhaled from the material form that had hidden it from the general view. It was then realized that Brooklyn had lost a true son, whose unselfish love for her was a part of his patriotic love for free institutions and governments founded on the truest ideals of freedom.

Thomas Kinsella was an adopted citizen of the United States, having been born in the county Wexford, Ireland, in December, 1832. He came to this country so early in life, that while the basis of his character was Irish, its develop- ment and embellishment were wholly American. His entry in the United States was through the Bay of New York, and he has often said that it remained always for him a vision of heaven, typical of the cultivation and advancement that his character was to receive in the new country which opened her arms to him, as she had done to so many of his race be- fore. America was at that time the El Dorado of all Irish youth, and while they scarcely believed the wild traditions that the precious metals could be picked up in the streets, all of Thomas Kinsella's friends, as well as he himself, fully be-

lieved that, in that far-off land there were fortunate Isles on whose shining shores were peace, happiness and a larger future for both mind and body. The biography of this man is of an ideal self-made man. An ancient philosopher has said, that a man is his own friend and also his own enemy, and should try to raise himself by his own means, for if raised by the means of another, the power of the enemy in himself is not weakened. Thomas Kinsella instinctively knew this, and presents in his life and character an example of one who has raised himself solely by his own means. He came to America unknown, an orphan, a foreigner ; and he left it when death came upon him, one of the best known men in the nation; identified with its laws, its cities, its gov- ernment and history. More than all this, he was beloved by all who rightly knew his greatness of heart, his nobility of nature.

A characteristic incident is related of him during his early work in Cambridge, New York, which shows what was in the man, and how not even pleasure could divert him from the improvement of his mind. It was in the year 1857. A few friends made up a trout-fishing party, and Thomas, as he was called, was invited. They proceeded to the piscato- rial shambles and threw in their "flies," but very soon " Thomas " was observed lying upon his back, with the rod in one hand and a volume of Burns' poems in the other, which he was industriously reading, oblivious of his sur- roundings.

We cannot picture him going through any academy, or show him at the head of any class, or as the writer of vale- dictories and theses; but he must be looked for at all times in his life battling with circumstances, while he imbibed learn- ing and acquired culture. Such a man never fails to make his mark in the times in which he lives, and he very fre- quently occupies a much larger share of the attention of the world, than one who has been favored by fortune or born in the lap of a happy inheritance. Mr. Gardiner, who published the Washington N. Y. Post in 1851, and for whom Mr. Kin-

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sella worked as a compositor, wrote that, observing the lat- ter's fondness for study, he gave him the free use of his library of 300 volumes, every one of which Kinsella read. His adoption of journalism may very clearly be traced to a train of accidental circumstances. He said, in a letter to a friend, that while a compositor on the Post, at the time of Henry Clay's last sickness, the editor was compelled to go away, but wrote a leader, and left instructions for Kinsella, in co-operation with a lawyer of the village, to write an arti- cle upon the great Whig. Clay died, but Kinsella took pains to write the article alone and then submitted it to the lawyer, who gave it unstinted praise. This elated the young com- positor, and he then and there resolved to take up journalism. Whether he had or had not any prophetic vision of his future at that time, and of the way it was realized, is not known, but we find him covering a great deal of territory in wandering before his final settlement in Brooklyn. Leaving the Cam- bridge Post, he went to Troy, N. Y., working there as com- positor and occasional contributor, for a time not exceeding a year. From Troy he came again to New York, from whence he went in 1854 to the Southern States. Alternating between New Orleans and Vicksburg, he worked at his trade, and at the same time diligently studied the burning question of slavery upon its own ground and in its very presence. This he declared was his chief object in going South. The Jeffer- sonian principles had been early adopted by him, and his ex- perience in the South confirmed his hostility to the " peculiar institution," and made his soul revolt at the enormity of put- ting up for sale a human body, the tenement of a living spirit.

Therefore, when in 1858, he returned North to Brooklyn, he was fully aroused against the giant that had so long raised its horned head unmolested in the fairest portion of our country, and was ready to join those fearless fighters for human brotherhood, who were resolved not to tolerate the secession of the South, nor to permit slavery to gain a foot- hold in the Western States.

Up to this time he had been, so to say, in a nebulous con- dition, unfixed, unpermanent; not definitely attached to any point from which he might grow in any direction and shed whatever light was vouchsafed to him. But here we are to look for the beginnings of his "future;" for, as his history afterward showed, this was the moment when his wanderings were to cease, and his active, concentrated work as journalist, citizen, statesman, editor, was to begin. He had always aspired to be an editor, for justly he looked upon the editor as the greatest educator, the most efficient moulder of men and events alike; and had he written in the order of his esti- mation, the various avocations, he would have put that of editor highest and first. He idealized the press and the type- stick. The mere mechanical view of them he could not abide, for they were to him not only the chief instrument of modern thought, but the almost conscious ministers of intelligence. He said himself, " only a born dunce can be a printer and not learn to love literature;" and thus we see that he ad- vanced from the composing-stick to the editor's chair of the most powerful and well-conducted afternoon journal in the United States, through his high ideal of the vocation of a printer, and a prophetic view of his own future.

Having pitched his tent in Brooklyn, he applied to Isaac Van Anden, and obtained employment upon the Brooklyn Daily Eagle, which was then a fair paper, but did not possess the importance to which it attained under his management. At first his duties were mechanical, but he speedily wrote himself into another position, one step toward his final goal. He began with short notices of current events, then reviews of books, and at last the attention of the editor-proprietor was attracted to him, resulting in his appointment as head

of the then rather limited reportorial staff of the paper. The editor was Henry McCloskey, a trenchant writer, and an ac- complished scholar, with a warm heart, but convictions as strong as they were sometimes erroneous. He remained in his position from 1853 until September, 1861, when the Civil War evolved the juncture which was destined to give Thomas Kinsella his great opportunity. McCloskey believed in the right of secession, while Kinsella did not, but insisted upon the right of the government to put it down. Van Anden counselled moderation, while he upheld the freedom of his editor. The government, however, interdicted the Eagle as a treasonable sheet, unless a loyal man was ap- pointed its editor. McCloskey, unable to give up his con- victions, which he claimed as his own possession, resigned, and Mr. Van Anden immediately appointed Thomas Kinsella to his vacant chair, who at this moment could see stretching before him, the wide road to fame, wealth, and a command- ing influence and power as a journalist. The light breaks clearly, and Thomas Kinsella can see before him the fruition of his earliest hopes; they were realized, and before long he became the controller, the guide, the censor, the preserver of a journalistic property worth one million of dollars, and that has lately paid annual dividends of $125,000. A man of his large powers and trained ability, joined to a splendid physique, and who drew strength from perennial fountains of true Irish wit, sentiment and cheerfulness, could not be at the head of a journal like this and fail to reach a high posi- tion in the community. At the same time, like all earnest men, he was sure to make enemies. These he always had, but they never succeeded in accomplishing aught to his in- jury. Upon his paper all were his friends, from the most insignificant boy to his associate editors, and he commanded from each a loyalty and devotion which is ever sure to be accorded to a loyal heart.

In 1869, he was appointed Commissioner of the old Brook- lyn Water Board, where he served one year and a half, then returned to his editorial duties. He was a warm advocate of President Johnson, who appointed him Postmaster of the city for a short time. In 1870 he was elected to represent the Second District in Congress. Mr. Kinsella was one of the earliest advocates of a union between the Democrats and the Liberal Republicans; and, in the nomination of Horace Greeley for President, he was, of the Democratic leaders, the one most active and influential. In this, his own city, no man, save perhaps Mr. Hugh McLoughlin, has exercised as much influence upon its politics as Mr. Kinsella.

For years he opposed the one-man power, and stood fear- lessly in the path of all " bosses." This, of course, made for him many political enemies. But he loved the city of his adoption. No citizen of ancient Venice had more affection for the Bride of the Sea than Mr. Kinsella had for Brooklyn, and thus no party politics or mean expedients of hack politi- cians could make him waver from the course he deemed the best for Brooklyn. He filled the office of Bridge Trustee, and was also a member of the Board of Education. His positive nature and really patriotic feeling for Brooklyn, joined to great administrative and organizing ability, drove him al- ways into politics, but not for profit. Far from that, for he spent much money and time in going to Albany whenever any measures concerning the city were before the Legislature. He could not bear to see his own city hurt by adverse or narrow legislative action, and was willing to spend of his substance for her benefit.

It was the same with him when in Congress. His large heart was ever ready to move him into action for widows and orphans, whose just claims for pensions were delayed by in- efficient clerks and departmental red tape.

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In many instances he has worked night and day to procure for some of the needy citizens of his city who could not em- ploy counsel, the distribution at an early date of what money was their due. After leaving Congress, Mr. Kinsella devoted himself to the Eagle and local politics, taking an active part in the latter. He was a hearty supporter of Mr. Tilden in 1876; and, in 1880, was largely instrumental in the selection of Gen. Hancock for nomination, as the Eagle was the first paper that mentioned his name for the Presidency. There were hardly any political conventions of his party held in the city that did not see Mr. Kinsella a delegate.

A elight difference occurred, in 1882, between him and the owners of the paper, growing out of an interference with bis policy as editor and freedom of action, so that he made a threat to purchase a rival paper and leave the Eagle alto- gether, unless he was left untrammeled. This threat was currently taken in Brooklyn for definite action, and many expected to see the Eagle's prestige decreased. But the un- pleasantness was healed over, and Mr. Kinsella recovered undisputed away.

But constant work, both of hody and mind, told on his iron constitution, so that he was compelled to go to Europe in the summer of 1883, to recuperate, returning much im- proved in some respects. But, as usual, the restless Irish spirit drove him again, and threw him into the centre of the political battle during the municipal election of 1883, and that, coupled with subsequent hard work in Washington, where his efforts were instrumental in the election of Mr. Carlisle for Speaker, broke him down again in the month of November of that year. He went home from his office one rainy afternoon, to return no more. His illness, not alarm- ing, continued through three months ; his disease, an aggra. vated form of jaundice.

The estimation in which he was held was vividly brought out during his battle with death, as all classes of people in- quired daily for him, watching the papers and bulletins for newe of his condition ; and when, at last, on the afternoon of the 11th of February, 1884, the relentless hand of the de- stroyer could be no longer averted, and he passed away from

the scene of his busy and useful life, all Brooklyn mourned him, and the flags at half mast throughout the city bore mute testimony that an honored and regretted soul had fled away.

The chief characteristic which endeared Mr. Kinsella to his friends was his kindly, humane interest in his fellow beings. The trials and sorrows of his friends bore with heavy weight upon his sensitive heart. Where he could not alleviate misery, he suffered with an intensity often screened by an as- sumed roughness of exterior. As he advanced in life, his sympathies became more keenly sensitive, while his larger charity and benevolence were constantly remarked by those about him. His finest trait, perhaps, was his gratitude to those who had ever befriended him or his. Towards those who had won his regard through real or fancied service, his friendship was unalterable; and, though the bond was often strained by selfishness on the part of others, it was kept in the fullest fidelity by him.

Before the writer lies the draft of a letter, one of the last he ever wrote at his desk before leaving it forever, which eloquently attests his appreciation of kindness shown him. In this letter he asks of a prominent business man in New York employment in some lowly position for a fellow-coun- tryman, apologizing for making the request in these words : " When I was a friendless boy, Dennis did me a favor." Fortunate "Dennis," who had won the gratitude of this "friendless boy," who never forgot or passed by an old friend. The letter goes on to explain that the writer is in a position to repay the debt, but not in the way that will best serve the recipient, and then follows a eulogy upon the man whose cause he makes his own. No better tribute to his nobility of character could he paid than is portrayed in this letter, written to a friend and designed for no other eye.

Over the narrow plot of earth that holds all that remains of this self-made man, far-seeing statesman and patriotic citizen, Brooklyn has paid her last tribute of respect, and no more fitting inscription can be placed ahove it than those words of Abou Ben Adhem : "One who loved his fellow men." LAURA C. HOLLOWAY.

COL. WILLIAM HESTER.

COL. WILLIAM HESTER, President of the Brooklyn Eagle Association, was born in Poughkeepsie, N. Y., in December, 1835. His father, Mr. Samuel Hester, now of Kingston, comes of good old English stock; his mother was a sister of the late Isaac Van Anden whose name will always be identified with the Eagle. Col. Hester, therefore, represents two of the stur- diest and most enterprising European nationalities, the English and the Dutch. His early education was received at a Poughkeepsie public school, from which, as he grew older, he was transferred to the Rhinebeck Academy, where he was prepared for the business career in which he has been so suc- cessful. Early in 1852, while he was in his seventeenth year, he left home to begin life on his own account, and not unnat- urally, with strict injunctions to place himself under Mr. Isaac Van Anden's care. His uncle was a thorough business man, and entertained old-fashioned and conservative ideas upon the subject of giving young men a start in life. Favoritism was especially abhorrent to him. Mr. Van Anden had begun at the foot of the ladder, and he was determined that if his nephew rose to distinction, it should be through his own efforts and capabilities. The young gentleman from Pough-

keepsie was therefore put to work with the boys in the office, doing such work as fell to an apprentice. In a short time he had mastered the intricacies of the composing-room, and awaited his turn of recognition as a compositor. At the age of twenty-one years, he was setting type at his case with other gentlemen who have attained eminence in this city. The Eagle was rapidly growing in importance, and the staff was increasing with its needs in all the departments. It was young Hester's ambition, when a vacancy occurred in the fore- manship of the composing room, to win that distinction, but Mr. Van Anden could not bear even the suggestion of favorit- ism, and another candidate won the coveted position. Shortly afterward a vacancy occurred in the clerical force of the counting-room. It was a step higher and the young compositor determined, if possible, to secure the appointment. There was no question here of superior merit, and Mr. Van Anden with a clear conscience was enabled to place his nephew behind the counter, in which he speedily justified the wisdom of his appointment. From being book-keeper he worked his way up to the head of the department, and while Mr. Van Anden controlled the business of the Eagle, his nephew became the

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The civil, political, professional and ecclesiastical history, and commercial and industrial record of the county of Kings and the city of Brooklyn, N. Y., from 1683 to 1884, Volume II, Part 132

Author: Stiles, Henry Reed, 1832-1909, ed Publication date: 1884 Publisher: New York, W. W. Munsell & Co Number of Pages: 1345

Author: Stiles, Henry Reed, 1832-1909, ed
Publication date: 1884
Publisher: New York, W. W. Munsell & Co
Number of Pages: 1345