A history of Cleveland and its environs; the heart of new Connecticut, Part 44

Author: Avery, Elroy McKendree, 1844-1935; Lewis Publishing Company
Publication date: 1918
Publisher: Chicago, New York The Lewis Publishing Company
Number of Pages: 904

USA > Ohio > Cuyahoga County > Cleveland > A history of Cleveland and its environs; the heart of new Connecticut > Part 44

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and morning for his board, with the privilege of attending school in the winter. When school was over he continued work for his employer three years at five dollars a month. When about eighteen he worked from March to October as a conductor on the Met- ropolitan Street Railway at Washington, and leaving that job, and without any preliminary experience or other qualifications, he took a contract to build a wood house for the colored reform school, known as the House of Refor- mation for Colored Boys, at Cheltenham in Prince George County, Maryland. He filled the contract to the letter and with complete satisfaction, and was then put in charge of the knitting factory, which was a part of the in- stitution. A man named Henry Clagett had the contract for the knitting factory and paid the institution twenty cents a day for each boy employed. Mr. Soper received twelve dollars a month and board while in that position, and he had never witnessed the operation of a knit- ting machine until he went into the factory. He was there a year and a half, and after- wards he returned to Washington and with his brother and a man named Hill took a contract to put up fire escapes on public buildings, hotels, schools and other structures.

The next employment he obtained opened up a larger field for experience. He went to work as a laborer with the firm of Warner & Swazey at Washington and was employed in the construction of some of the domes and transit buildings for the United States Ob- servatory at Washington. About a year later he came to the Cleveland factory of Warner & Swazey, and at the personal request of Mr. Warner he served an apprenticeship at the machinist's trade. He started in at wages of forty cents a day. Later he was sent back to Washington to assist in installing and erect- ing telescopes and other instruments. In June following he returned to Cleveland and as- sisted in assembling the Yerkes telescope in the yard and plant of the Warner & Swazey Company. This great telescope was shipped to Chicago and exhibited at the World's Fair in 1893, and Mr. Soper accompanied it and was on the World's Fair grounds from July to November. The telescope was then taken down and stored at Chicago until the building could be completed at Lake Geneva, Wis- consin, where it is today.

Returning to Cleveland Mr. Soper remained with Warner & Swazey at wages of forty cents a day for the first year, eighty cents the second year, and ninety cents the third year. He did

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general work and finally was promoted to fore- man at eighty cents a day. He remained with the company until 1903 and was then getting $125 a month, which he considered big wages at that time.

In 1903 Mr. Soper left the company and engaged in business for himself, establishing a little machine shop at 23 Michigan Street, now Prospect Avenue. He continued the business until November, 1915, but more and more his work in automobile lines crowded out his interests in the machinery end of his in- dustry. He and a man named Crawford were the first to set up an automobile repair busi- ness at Cleveland. The first automobile was a French machine known as the "Panhard." The first machine Mr. Soper ever repaired was for the notorious Cassie Chadwick, whose clever financial operations afforded daily stories to the newspapers some ten or twelve years ago. Mr. Soper found his services more and more in demand in adjusting and ap- praising automobile damages, and finally he found it necessary to give his whole time and attention to this line of business and opened his present office in the Leader-News Build- ing in April, 1916. He is called an automo- bile expert and looks after more automobile accident cases probably than any other ten men in the state. He also does a large per- centage of the automobile insurance business in Cleveland and vicinity, and is called many times to appraise in factories covered by fire insurance. He is well known by all the judges and attorneys of Cleveland, and has been fre- quently called to appear on different sides of damage cases. Prominent men from the in- surance companies have told him that he is the only individual in the United States in his special line of work.

In politics Mr. Soper is a rather independ- ent democrat, voting for the best man. His home is at 10402 Edgewater Drive. On De- cember 29, 1898, at the age of thirty, he mar- ried Miss Louise Ellsasser, who was born and educated in Cleveland, daughter of Charles and Anna (Forhman) Ellsasser. Her father is a retired contractor and both parents are still living here. Mr. and Mrs. Soper have one daughter Louise Elizabeth, born at Cleve- land.

SHELDON PARKS recently rounded out, though hardly noticing it himself or making it the occasion of any celebration, his thirty- fifth continuous year as a practicing attorney at Cleveland. In any of those years, as today, he might be equally described as a busy lawyer,

hard working, faithful to the interests of his clients, and practicing law without any im- portant deviation from his profession, conse- quently his name has never appeared in con- nection with any office or as a candidate for official honors.

Mr. Parks was born at East Cleveland, Janu- ary 24, 1857, a son of Leonard and Harriet A. Parks. In the matter of ancestry Mr. Parks is a mixture of several important American stocks. On his father's side he is descended from a French Huguenot physician, Alexis M. Beaumont, also from an English Puritan named Elijah Parks, who settled at Bethlehem, Connecticut, in 1650, and also from a German grandmother, Catherine Earls. In the ma- ternal side he is descended from some early families of Holland Dutch. His father, Leon- ard Parks, came to Cleveland as early as 1834, was a farmer, and died August 23, 1883, hav- ing been retired for the last ten years of his life. The widowed mother is still living in East Cleveland at the age of eighty-one. Of the children one daughter died in 1876, the others, four sons and one daughter, are still living in this city.

Sheldon Parks was liberally educated, grad- uating A. B. from Western Reserve College in 1879, and taking his law degree from the University of Michigan in 1882. In that year he was qualified by admission to the Ohio bar and his work as a lawyer has been continuous from that date. In local professional circles he has become known for his unusual ability and long experience in corporation and com- mercial law, and in the administration of trusts. He is a director in several banks and has always kept in close touch with public movements, though not as a politician. He is content to cast his vote as a democrat. He is a Presbyterian and is affiliated with the Cleve- land Chamber of Commerce, Woodward Lodge No. 508, Free and Accepted Masons, Holyrood Commandery, Knights Templar.

June 24, 1886, at Salem, Ohio, he married Miss Clara V. Street, daughter of Rev. Samuel Street. Salem, Ohio, is one of the most notable centers of Quaker population in the state, and the Street family were all of that faith and were identified with the settlement at Salem as early as 1802. Mr. and Mrs. Parks have three children : Thomas Thacher Parks; Esther Margaret Parks, who married Paul G. Hartley ; and Sheldon Parks, Jr.

LEONARD BACON PARKS was one of the first Ohio soldiers in the new National Army to give up his life in the cause for which he en-

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listed. In Cleveland, where this young man had won appreciation for his spirited citizen- ship and exceptional qualifications as a lawyer, there resulted from his death a heightened un- derstanding of the real grim meaning of war, mitigated, however, by the sentiment expressed by the old classic phrase that dying for one's country is both beautiful and fitting.

A son of Sheldon and Clara S. Parks, his father a Cleveland lawyer of many years' standing, Leonard Bacon Parks was born at Salem, Ohio, April 23, 1887. He was gradu- ated in 1905 from Phillips Academy at Andover, took his A. B. degree from Yale Uni- versity in 1909, and graduated from law in Harvard University in 1912. He was a splen- did specimen of physical manhood, strong, athletic, well built, and while at Yale played on the football team and won the intercollegiate heavyweight wrestling championship. After finishing his law course he returned to Cleve- land and having been admitted to the bar in December, 1911, began a professional career which promised high honors and distinguished attainments. He was a member of the Cleve- land Bar Association and was very popular among his bar associates. He belonged to various clubs and societies in East Cleveland, and was very active as captain and leader of the East Cleveland dry forces and a mem- ber of the Ohio Anti-Saloon League. He was a democrat and a Presbyterian.

Soon after the trouble broke out along the Mexican border he enlisted as a private in what was formerly Company E of the Ohio Engineers, and under the National Army or- ganization became first lieutenant of Company E of the One Hundred and Twelfth Ohio Mili- tary Engineers. He was with his regiment in training and waiting the call to France when he fell a victim of typhoid fever at Montgom- ery, Alabama, October 29, 1917. He was given a military funeral at the camp, the entire Engi- neer Regiment accompanying the body to the station and from there it was brought to Cleve- land and laid to rest in this city.

HORACE FORD PARKS, attorney at law with offices in the Williamson Building, is a brother of Sheldon Parks.

Horace F. Parks was born at East Cleveland, September 17, 1863, son of Leonard and Har- riet A. Parks. He finished his college educa- tion in Adelbert College of Western Reserve University, being awarded the degree A. B. in 1886. He soon afterwards qualified for the legal profession and has given his time to that

vocation with ability and succss. Mr. Parks is a member of the Masonic Order, the Presby- terian Church, and on December 24, 1901, married Alice Irene Bartholomew, daughter of Nelson M. and Irene Bartholomew. They have three children, Leonard Beaumont, Lois Adria Parks, and Francis Parks.

ALFRED L. FRITZSCHE. The deadly peril of fire, one of the accepted four elements of earth formation, and that most essential agent of eivilized living, attends every footstep of man despite its genial and beneficent offices in his behalf. That it has become a harnessed giant, submissive and obedient to a large extent, by no means eliminates its underlying peril, its possibility of breaking bonds and its conse- quent terrific power of devastation. To make common use of this mighty agent and to com- pletely control the operation of its energy, have been objects of scientific thought and ex- perimental mechanical genius for ages. In- ventions have multiplied whereby life and property may have protection; nevertheless, in America alone, it is estimated that even in these progressive, modern days, no less than 3,000 persons annually lose their lives through preventable fires, while property losses amount to millions. The word preventable is pur- posely used, because the happy time has come when this fearful desolation may practically be banished. Inventive genius has, in the Grinnell Automatic Sprinkler, perfected a sim- ple, practical, economical method of doing away with the great fire loss that yearly has taken its heavy tool of heroic and innocent lives and swept fortunes in property into noth- ingness. This notable invention, however, like many devices that preceded it, has re- quired the guiding hand of business efficiency to bring it before the world, and no member of the manufacturing official force has done more in this direction than has Alfred L. Fritzsche, who is general sales manager for the General Fire Extinguisher Company for the United States and Canada, with headquar- ters in Cleveland.

Alfred L. Fritzsche is a native of Ohio, born in Cleveland, May 21, 1869, and is a son of Alfred and Caroline Fritzsche. The father was born in Dresden, Germany, in April, 1836, of affluent parents who were able to afford him a private tutor in boyhood and later a course in the University of Berlin, with a half brother, now Judge E. H. Bohm, of Cleveland. On completing his university training he en- tered the Berlin Theological Seminary, from

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which institution he was also graduated. In 1855 he came to the United States and located at Cleveland, embarking in a real estate busi- ness, which he conducted until 1863, when he became a soldier in the Union army and served until the close of the Civil war as a member of the One Hundred Forty-third Ohio In- fantry. Upon his return to Cleveland he re- sumed his former business and continued to deal in real estate until 1873, when he went into the insurance line, this he continuing until his death, which occurred April 8, 1889. He was a man of sterling character, a public spirited citizen at all times and was quite active in the political affairs of Cleveland. In 1867 he was married in this city to Miss Caroline Schneider, and three children were born to them : Alfred L., Henry E., and Caro- lyne Meta.

Alfred L. Fritzsche attended the public schools until he was ten years old and then prevailed upon his parents to permit his enter- ing a printing office to learn the typesetter's trade. For two years he worked in the office of the Sunday Journal and for two years more in the office of the Sun and Voice, and it is quite probable that Mr. Fritzsche at the pres- ent time could acquit himself very creditably at a case.

In 1890 Mr. Fritzsche entered the employ of the Neracher Sprinkler Company as a pipe fitter and worked as a mechanic for two years and then became a salesman for the com- pany, his practical experience in the shops be- ing very helpful in the latter position. In 1893 the Neracher Sprinkler Company con- solidated with the Grinnell Sprinkler Com- pany, adopting the name of the General Fire Extinguisher Company, Mr. Fritzsche re- maining under the new organization and in 1903 became western sales manager and a director in that company. Since 1913 he has filled the office of general sales manager for the United States and Canada, and largely through his wisdom and enterprise the sale and installation of the automatic sprinklers con- trolled by this company has been so well de- veloped.

The General Fire Extinguisher Company was started by William Neracher of Cleve- land, who was the inventor of the Neracher sprinkler. When consolidation with the Grin- nell Sprinkler Company was effected in 1893, the plant was at Warren, Ohio, and since then ten other plants have been located in the United States and Canada. The development of this business under excellent salesmanship

has been truly remarkable, growing from $1,000,000 in 1893 to $12,500,000 in 1917. This company today is protecting property valued at over $100,000,000,000, maintaining fire protection in such large cities as New York, Chicago, Boston, Cleveland and Minneapolis, where such systems are required by present laws in buildings of certain construction and occupancy. The basic idea on which the Grin- nell Automatic Sprinkler was developed was to attack a fire in its incipiency by automa- tically drenching the slight blaze from which fires start. In manufacturing his automatic sprinkler the company commands highly per- fected engineering work, careful planning and scientific thought. This combination of engi- neering skill and manufacturing exactitude has secured for Grinnell equipments the title "Standard of the World," and with expert and enlightened salesmanship it has made many people and cities feel secure. This com- pany also does heating and power pipeing for large industrial plants.

Mr. Fritzsche was married June 6, 1894, at Cleveland, to Miss Clara Neracher, and they have four children: Allen W., born in 1895, is a graduate of Notre Dame and West- ern Reserve universities, was employed in the engineering department of the General Fire Extinguisher Company and is now a first lieutenant in the U. S. Army; Alfred L., a student at Cornell, has enlisted in the navy ; Paul H., at Carlton Academy, Summit, New Jersey; and William N., a pupil in the city schools. Mr. Fritzsche and family are mem- bers of the Roman Catholic Church. In political alliance he is a republican, and his club connections are representative of high standing in both business and social life, these including: The Cleveland Chamber of Com- merce, Cleveland Athletic and Shaker Heights Country clubs, the Cleveland Museum of Art and the Toledo Club of Toledo, Ohio. He also belongs to the Knights of Columbus.

JAMES ADELBERT MATHEWS. Of the promi- nent men of Cleveland probably none have manifested more of the spirit of initiative and proved more completely their power to grow with opportunities than James Adelbert Mathews. The people of Cleveland have so long known Mr. Mathews as a substantial fig- ure in industrial circles and as a leading banker, that it is difficult to realize the handi- caps and disadvantageous circumstances of his earlier life, through which he rose to success.

He was born in Bedford, Cuyahoga County,

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Ohio, February 17, 1850, son of Thomas W. and Sarah Ira (Wolfcale) Mathews. His father, a native of Poland, Trumbull County, Ohio, was for about fifty years the village blacksmith at Bedford, Ohio, where he died. His wife was born in Austintown, Mahoning County, Ohio, and died in October, 1899, at the age of seventy-nine.

A half century has passed since James A. Mathews completed his high school course at Bedford in 1867. In the preceding summer vacation of 1866 he was "train boy" and sold newspapers and other commodities on the Alliance accommodation, a train running be- tween Cleveland and Alliance on the Cleve- land & Pittsburgh Railroad. A similar job was offered him in 1867, but on the advice of old railroad men he declined. In September of that year he was working in a general store at Hudson, and three years later went to the Rolling Mill store at Newburgh, owned and controlled by the firm of Cady & Woodbridge.

These were years of experience and accumu- lating wisdom but otherwise are not note- worthy in the larger fabric of his career. Life's real opportunity came on July 23, 1871, when a little past twenty-one he accepted a position in the office of The American Sheet & Boiler Plate Company. His salary was only nominal. It was a place where the routine man might have stayed indefinitely. Young Mathews used it as a training ground for something better. At the end of sixty days besides his regular work he had accomplished the feat of learning telegraphy. The telephone had not yet been introduced as one of the principal mediums of the transaction of detail in a busi- . ness office. Mr. Mathews was made office man- ager-installed the Morse sounder on his desk and handled the telegraph line from what was then 99 Water Street or West Ninth Street to Newburg and all business coming from New- burg passed directly through Mr. Mathews' office. The American Sheet & Boiler Plate Company subsequently became a department of The Cleveland Rolling Mill Company. For twenty-three years he was paymaster and office manager of this latter corporation, and during those years he never had a vacation of more than a week's duration. It was a period of close and unremitting work, and to him it was a school from which he graduated to a life of larger experience and broader independent achievement.

He left the position to become an indepen- dent factor in iron and steel industry. In 1894 he organized The Crescent Sheet & Tin Plate

Company and was its secretary, treasurer and general manager. This was an independent company for the manufacture of tin plate and existed until December, 1898, when it was sold to The American Tin Plate Company, organ- ized at that date. Mr. Mathews became a director in the latter organization, and for a time filled the position of district manager of the Cleveland district. Later he was made assistant to the second vice president in charge of the operating end of the corporation with headquarters at Chicago and on February 22, 1900, the general offices of the company were removed to New York and located in the Bat- tery Park Building.

The organization of The American Tin Plate Company was the first consolidation of indus- trial enterprises of this character but soon after the removal of the offices to New York there came the formation of The National Steel Company, The American Steel Hoop and The American Sheet Steel Company and others, all of which were later made subsidiary companies of The United States Steel Corporation and be- came instrumental factors in the formation of that "billion dollar company." Mr. Mathews continued as director of The American Tin Plate and manager of the claim department until April, 1902, when he withdrew, having tendered.his resignation in the previous Decem- ber. Since then he has lived with his family in Cleveland.

After a few months of rest from business cares Mr. Mathews, in August, 1902, became manager of the real estate department of The Guardian Savings & Trust Company. He has been one of the active officials of that great Cleveland financial institution for fifteen years. After a year and a half he was made manager of the company's branch at 341 Euclid Avenue, and remained there until the bank was moved to its new quarters at 322 Euclid Avenue. Mr. Mathews was formerly assistant treasurer and a vice president of The Guardian Savings & Trust Company, and had the pleasure of being one of the executive officers when that company entered its splen- did new building on December 10, 1916, and which is said to be one of the finest banking structures in the United States. He retired from active duties in the bank January 1, 1917, but is now honorary vice president.

Among other large business interests which Mr. Mathews has held are the positions of treasurer of The Columbia Steam Ship Com- pany, director of The Hydraulic Pressed Steel Company, stockholder in The National Refin-

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ing Company, The B. F. Goodrich Rubber Company, The Cleveland-Akron Bag Com- pany, The Valley Steamship Company, The Standard Oilcloth Company, The Cuyahoga Telephone Company, The Guardian Savings and Trust Company, The Cleveland National Bank, The Standard Parts Company, The Paragon Refining Company, The Cleveland Metal Products Company, and others.

He is a member of the Cleveland Chamber of Commerce, the Cleveland Athletic Club, the Union Club, Cleveland Automobile Club, City Club and the Castalia Trout Club of Castalia, Ohio. His recreations are golf, fishing and other outdoor sports. Mr. Mathews has the commanding presence of the successful busi- ness man, and at the same time the modest and unassuming deportment which goes well with a career of such experience and ample ful- fillment.

He has enjoyed a notable record in Masonry. He is senior past master of Newburg Lodge, No. 379, Free and Accepted Masons, member of Webb Chapter, No. 14, Royal Arch Masons, Cleveland Council, No. 36, Royal and Select Masters, past eminent commander of Holy- rood Commandery, No. 32, Knights Templar, and member of all the Scottish Rite bodies. He is a charter member of Lake Erie Con- sistory and an honorary member of the Su- preme Council of Sovereign Grand Inspec- tors General of the 33rd and last degree for the Northern Masonic Jurisdiction of the United States of America, and has been ac- tive in nearly all the Masonic bodies. He is also a member of Al Koran Temple, Nobles of the Mystic Shrine, and president of the board governing the widows' benefit fund.

Mr. Mathews married at Hudson, Ohio, October 30, 1872, Miss Ida Farrar, daugh- ter of Horace Edward and Lucinda M. Far- rar of Hudson. They have one daughter, Lena Farrar Mathews, who finished her edu- cation in a private school at Amherst, Mas- sachusetts.

SPENCER DUDLEY CORLETT, Cleveland law- yer with offices in the Society for Savings Building, is a native of Cleveland, was reared and educated here, and since beginning prac- tice has fully justified his choice of a vocation and has opened a promising career.

Mr. Corlett was born at his parents home on East 9th Street, March 17, 1891. His grandfather, Daniel K. Corlett was a Cleve- land pioneer, coming to the city in 1835 with his brothers John, William and Philip. The

Corlett family has been well known in the city for over eighty years. The lawyer is the son of George W. and Clara ( IIechtman) Corlett. His father has spent all his life in Cleveland. His mother is a daughter of the Minnesota pioneer and legislator, Henry Hechtman.

Spencer D. Corlett was educated in the Cleveland public schools and in Adelbert Col- lege and the Franklin T. Backus Law School of Western Reserve University. Admitted to the bar, he began practice in the summer of 1915.

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A history of Cleveland and its environs; the heart of new Connecticut, Part 44

Author: Avery, Elroy McKendree, 1844-1935; Lewis Publishing Company Publication date: 1918 Publisher: Chicago, New York The Lewis Publishing Company Number of Pages: 904

Author: Avery, Elroy McKendree, 1844-1935; Lewis Publishing Company
Publication date: 1918
Publisher: Chicago, New York The Lewis Publishing Company
Number of Pages: 904