A history of Cleveland and its environs; the heart of new Connecticut, Part 45

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 45

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For a number of years Mr. Corlett has taken an active interest in boys and boys work, and in social settlement work at the Rainey Institute and the Hiram House. He was formerly a member of the Lakewood Yacht Club, the Dover Bay Club and the City Club. Since 1903 he has been a member of the Euclid Avenue Congregational Church. He joined Phi Gamma Delta fraternity in 1908 and was secretary and treasurer of the Cleveland Graduate Chapter of that frater- nity until his enlistment in the army. In November, 1912, he became a member of the Phi Delta Phi, international legal fraternity.

When the United States entered the world war, he enlisted in the machine gun company of the old Fifth Ohio Regiment. Politically Mr. Corlett is a republican.

HENRY DU LAURENCE NIEDZWIEDZKI. Un- til a few decades ago the romance of America consisted in the battle of physical brawn with the forces of the wilderness. Wave after wave and generation after generation of strong and forward looking men pursued their course steadily westward until the ringing blows they struck at the fastnesses in nature aroused only faint echoes in this middle western country. In modern decades the chief source of roman- tic interest, at least up to the time of the pres- ent great war, was found in the adjustment of the individual to the complexities of modern existence. Many of the most dramatic and intense situations and circumstances found in literature have been portrayed in different ways to describe the adjustment of individual character in men and women who have come out of the older centers of Europe and made themselves parts of America.

The most interesting and stimulating facts in the career of the successful Cleveland law- yer above named are concerned with the proc- esses of adjustment by which a well born, edu- cated, but moneyless young Pole succeeded in

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winning for himself in a few brief years a position of influence and success in Cleveland.

Mr. Niedzwiedzki was born in Galicia, March 18, 1865, son of William and Bronislawa Niedzwiedzki. His parents were land owners, people of good birth and of good station in their native land, where they spent all their lives. The mother died there in 1908 and the father still remains in a country which has been one of the important theaters of the pres- ent world war.

The son attended primary schools, and also that combination of high school and college which in Central Europe is called a "Gym- masium." He graduated in 1885 and then en- tered in the University of Vienna for the study of law. He was there two years.

The vacation of 1888 he and some student friends spent in Paris. A correspondent of a Cleveland paper told the story some time ago of how one of this happy party, while seated around the table in a Paris cafe, suddenly announced that he was going to extend his vacation visit to America, and how a few minutes later young Niedzwiedzki determined to accompany him. Thus they sailed for New York, intending to return to Vienna in October of that year, where Mr. Niedzwiedzki would complete his law course. But the circum- stances of destiny interfered to prevent that return. His money gave out in the United States, his parents were indignant over his truancy, and rather than appeal to them for funds he determined to find a means of liveli- hood in the New World. His father and mother in fact never became reconciled until some years later when in September, 1892, he received his diploma as a lawyer and could convey to them definite proof that he was do- ing as well if not better in America than he could have done in his native land.

At this point it will be well to quote the story of his subsequent experience as told in the Cleveland paper above mentioned :

"Lean days and disillusionment began for the young student when he decided in New York to go to work. He found services were not so much in demand as he had imagined they would be. Sleeping in a bakery wagon with clothes turned inside out lest the marks of flour betray him when seeking employment, swinging a twelve-pound sledge ten hours on an empty stomach until he received his first wages of a dollar a day, carrying hod in a New Jersey city, were a few of his experi- ences during months of adversity.

"Mr. Niedzwiedzki's selection of Cleveland as his permanent place of residence was a pure matter of accident, or perhaps coincidence by destiny. 'I was working in a department store in Toledo about two years after I came to the United States, when I took a boat trip to Cleveland. I was sitting on deck, when an elderly gentleman approached and engaged me in conversation. He seemed to be a just, kindly, solicitous man, interested in his fellow- men. He said judging from my accent I was not an American, and asked me how many languages I commanded. I told him I was a Pole and ventured the assertion I probably knew more languages than any man in Cleve- land ; that I was versed in all the Slavie lan- guages, especially Polish, Russian, Bohemian, and that I spoke German, French and Italian with equal fluency. He said, "Young man, why don't you go to Cleveland? With your knowledge you ought to have no trouble in finding a better position than you have. If I were in your place I would go up to Hull & Dutton and see if they couldn't use you." I thanked him and said I would do as he suggested. And when I came to Cleveland that is what I did. I went to the big depart- ment store on Ontario street and asked for Mr. Hull. I was told Mr. Hull was in California. Mr. Dutton, they said when I asked for him and stated my business, saw no one on em- ployment matters. I said I would see Mr. Dut- ton anyway and probably the emphatic way in which I said it carried conviction. At any rate I gained an audience. And who should Mr. Dutton prove to be but my elderly ac- quaintance from the boat. This started my career in Cleveland for Mr. Dutton employed me as a salesman.

"""'During all of my two years in this country I had read law during my leisure hours. I also studied Blackstone with a firm in Toledo and later with Skeels & Bejeek in the old Wick Block in Cleveland. When the Western Re- serve Law School was opened in a small frame building at the corner of Euclid Avenue and Adelbert Road I enrolled in the first class formed. On account of my two years of study in the law school in Vienna and the prepara- tory work I had done evenings I was admitted to the bar a year later, in 1893, graduating third in a elass of sixty-six.' Thus briefly told the experience appears to have been a much simpler matter than it really was. Many a time Mr. Niedzwiedzki walked from down- town out to Western Reserve Law School and

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back simply because he did not have the five cents car fare. For six months while attend- ing school he studied twenty hours a day. He was up at four in the morning, studied until breakfast, put in the daylight hours at school, and then went back to the books in his small room until midnight. When qualified for practice Mr. Niedzwiedzki did not possess a dollar. Mr. C. A. Bejcek, one of his old preceptors, loaned him two dollars and the fol- lowing week Dr. Aaron Hahn made him a loan of fifty dollars. Ont of his first week's income as a lawyer he paid twenty-five dollars on office rent, twelve dollars for a set of statutes, twenty dollars for a second hand desk and chair, five dollars for office stationery and still had six dollars left. The old Wick Block in which he had his first office was on the Public Square, where the Illuminating Build- ing.now stands. After two years he moved into the Cuyahoga Building and now has one of the well furnished suites on the eighth floor of that office structure. He has long since attained rank as one of the leading lawyers in Cleve- land and has a practice which amply recom- penses him for his adventurous trip to this country and subsequent hardships and priva- tions. He was the first Pole admitted to the har in the State of Ohio. While engaged in general practice he has perhaps appeared most brilliantly as a criminal attorney. He has appeared in upwards of forty murder cases and has always succeeded in litigating the se- verity of the law to some extent for his clients.

"Probably the most noted murder case in Ohio was one against Adam Lange. Lange killed a man at the Standard Foundry Com- pany, in the presence of from about 75 to 100 people. Young Niedzwiedzki about one year after his admission to the bar was retained to defend him. The more he studied the case the more he saw the hopelessness of his client's position. Finally after studying the family history he came to the conclusion that somnambulism was the only defense to make. He had only two precedents to go by : one de- fended by the famous Rufus Choate in Mas- sachusetts in 1866 and one in Kentucky in 1877. He had to buck against such men as W. A. Neff, who was prosecuting attorney at the time in the case. It was necessary to go to Detroit to take depositions of about 30 or 40 witnesses who knew Lange from his child- hood. The trial, before old Judge Hamilton, lasted eight days and resulted in Lange's go- ing for one year to the penitentiary. The pa- pers were full of it at the time, coming out

with headlines as 'DuLaurence's Novel De- fense.' When young Niedzwiedzki succeeded in getting his first murder case out with one year penalty he considered himself the best lawyer in the United States.

"Another notorious case was The State vs. Kalinowski * * * Ignatz Kalinowski was charged with killing his wife and a man by the name of Schmelter. The prosecution hold- ing that the case against the wife was the stronger, tried it first. The trial lasted eleven days. Niedzwiedzki's argument lasted for seven and one-half hours and at the end of it two bystanders in the Courtroom had fainted dead away and there wasn't a juror whose eyes were dry. After twenty-six hours' delibera- tion Kalinowski was acquitted and the jury then took out Kalinowski and feasted him. * After the acquittal the Schmelter case was nollied.

"Mr. Niedzwiedzki has been a resident of Cleveland since 1891, a period of twenty-seven years. During all this time he has constantly worked for the uplift of his people and their betterment, and has well merited the high honors that have been given him by American Poles. For two years he was Vice-Censor of the Polish National Alliance of America, an organization comprising over a hundred twenty thousand Poles in the United States, Canada and South America. This is the sec- ond highest office in the gift of the Polish peo- ple of this continent. In 1913 he was even named for the highest office, that of Censor, but declined the honor on account of his press- ing engagements as a lawyer. Mr. Niedzwiedzki is now president of one of the branches of the Polish National Defense Committee of Amer- ica."

February 22. 1904, he married Miss Victoria Mrukowski, of Chicago. Their three children are Henry. Jr., Helen S. and Lucia J. The family reside at 6844 Broadway. Mr. Nied- zwiedzki formerly found his favorite hobby in horseback riding, but follows the modern cus- tom of motoring and takes keen delight in garden work during summer.

REV. OLIVER BURGESS. The happiness and welfare of mankind are promoted not so much by single individual achievements as by the long sustained devotion and service that is made up of innumerable commonplace duties faithfully performed and each one per- formed as an item in a general scheme ani- mated by high purpose and an ambition to be of the greatest possible use to the world.

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It was such a life and career that was lived by the late Rev. Oliver Burgess, who died at his home in Cleveland, 2680 Euclid Avenue, January 9, 1900, at the age of 82. For over half a century he was a minister of the Gos- pel, chiefly with the Methodist Church. He was an early day circuit rider, and enjoyed the associations of the famous preachers who were distinguished in the leadership in the Ohio Conference, and in those of adjoining states.

He was born in Frederickstown, Maryland, in 1817. He early showed those traits of character which subsequently brought him into the ministry of service to his fellowmen and to the church. At the age of twelve years it is said he would gather the slaves about him on his father's plantation and pray with them and talk to them, again and again re- minding the negroes of the time when they would be free. His earnestness so impressed his father that long before the Civil war the slaves were sold and the family removed to the free State of Ohio, locating at Mount Vernon. From the old home there Oliver Burgess entered Ohio Wesleyan University and also attended a school at Norwalk.

He was only eighteen years of age when he was licensed to preach in the fall of 1835. He was ordained a deacon in 1838, and in 1840 was ordained an elder at Norwalk. During his active ministerial career he had not less than twenty-six different charges in Ohio, Michigan and Iowa. From 1854 to 1860 he served the Congregational Church, but then returned to the Methodist denomination. In 1869 he came to Cleveland from Burling- ton, Iowa, and in Cleveland spent the remain- der of his years. He was at one time pastor of the Wilson Avenue Methodist Episcopal Church, which later became the Epworth Memorial Church in Cleveland. He continued in the active ministry for fifty-three years. A number of years of that time were spent as an old time circuit rider, carrying the Gos- pel on horseback among the log cabins, school- houses and crossroads settlements of sparsely populated communities. Animated with great zeal for the cause, he seemed to take delight in the physical hardships and circumstances of such a work. In fact, to the end of his days he delighted to recall these rides on horseback over the various circuits, with his wife and child in front of him, and on such long rides he was constantly talking of what this or that place most needed for the im- provement of its moral condition.

In one of Stevenson's famous prayers is an expression of a desire to live and enjoy a "green and vigorous age." Rev. Mr. Burgess truly attained and preserved the fire and earnestness of his youth to later years, as is well testified to by a letter which he wrote to a friend in 1896, in which he said: "I have just completed looking over the files of the North Ohio Conference of 1854. As I think of these men and my association with them long ago, how the old time fire stirs my heart, and how I wish I were young again and could earnestly engage in the fight against wrong for the good and true and beau- tiful. We old men, after walking about Zion so long, do not want our trumpets to get rusty and will preach every time the churches and preachers will give us a chance."

After he retired from the active ministry he devoted his time to writing for religious publications. Although with him the church was always first, he was intensely interested in civil and political affairs. He was a con- spicuous figure at the regular Monday meet- ings of the Methodist clergymen of the city, of which organization he was secretary for a long time.

In 1838 Rev. Mr. Burgess married Miss Caroline M. Cogswell. She shared with him much of the arduous work of his circuit riding and preaching, and their companionship was continued into the quiet scenes, which envel- oped life at Cleveland for many years. In 1888, twelve years before death sundered the ties of their marriage, they celebrated their golden wedding anniversary in the presence of their five sons and five daughters and numerous oth- er relatives and friends. These wedding anni- versaries were always very happy and not- able occasions.

Rev. Mr. Burgess died in January, 1900, and a little more than six months later his wife and companion of over sixty-two years followed him to the Great Beyond. She died at Cleveland, July 26, 1900, aged eighty-one. She was a native of New York State, but had lived in the Middle West for sixty years. She was a quiet Christian woman, devoted to her family aud church, and in these she found all the vital interests of her long life.

HOWARD H. BURGESS was at one time a Cleveland editor, served six successive terms as city clerk, but for the last fifteen years has been best known because of his relationships with business affairs. Through these connec- tions, his active part in the Chamber of Com-

ArSchauffler

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merce and in other local organizations his name could be placed in any group of live and constructive Cleveland business men.

He was born in Huron County, Ohio, Sep- tember 10, 1860, a son of the late Rev. Oliver Burgess and Caroline (Cogswell) Burgess. His father devoted his long life to the service of the ministry, was one of the early circuit riders of the Methodist Episcopal Church in Ohio and worked unceasingly in that canse for sixty years. In the family were ten chil- dren, five sons and five daughters, all living except three daughters, and all of them reached mature years.

The youngest son and next to the youngest of the family, Howard H. Burgess grew up in Cleveland, attended the Brooks School and Baldwin University. Entering newspaper work he became city editor of The Sunday Voice, and also assistant city editor on The Herald, publications with which the older generation of Clevelanders are familiar. For four years he also did work as a political writer with the Cleveland Plain Dealer.

In the spring of 1889 Mr. Burgess was elected city clerk of Cleveland for the regu- lar term of two years. His record is almost unique in that he was chosen to that office six times in succession, and for twelve years his office and duties were in the City Hall.

Since leaving office Mr. Burgess has applied himself to private affairs and varions busi- ness organizations. His offices are in the Citi- zens Building. Mr. Burgess was president of the Cleveland Desk Company a number of years. Later he was secretary and treasurer of the Bankers Surety Company until that became the property of the Maryland Casual- ty Company. Following that he was presi- dent of the Federal Oil Company until Janu- ary 1, 1917, when the principal interests of the company were transferred to a New York syndicate. The Federal Oil Company is now a $4,000,000 corporation, with Mr. Burgess still on the board of directors. He is a direc- tor of the Cleveland Tanning Company, vice president of the Cleveland Business Univer- sity, president of the Stockwell Tax Table Company of Cleveland, and for nearly ten years was treasurer of the Tippecanoe Club, the big social organization of Cleveland re- publicans. Mr. Burgess was for fully a quar- ter of a century an active member of the Cleveland Chamber of Commerce, and prior to that had been identified with the old Cleve- land Board of Trade. He is affiliated with Halcyon Lodge of Masons, is a member of the

Union Club, Shaker Heights Country Club, City Club, Civic League and an attendant at St. Paul's Episcopal Church.

Mr. Burgess and family reside on Lake Shore Boulevard in Bratenahl. On Febru- ary 26, 1885, he married Miss Alice I. Hill. Her father was the late Colonel H. E. Hill, who died August 1, 1917, and was long a prominent figure in Cleveland business and military circles. Mrs. Burgess was born in Boston, Massachusetts, but received her edu- cation in Cleveland and in the Painesville Seminary. She is an active member of St. Paul's Episcopal Church, the Brooks Society, the Woman's City Club, and in the local Red Cross organization. Mr. and Mrs. Burgess have one daughter, Helen Hill Burgess, now the wife of George Clark Johnson. Mr. John- son is a graduate of Yale University, is presi- dent of the Enamel Products Company of Cleveland, and member of one of the oldest families of this city. Mrs. Johnson was born in Cleveland, was educated in Miss Mittleberg- er's School of Cleveland and at Rye Seminary at Rye, New York, and spent a year in a finishing course at Paris, France.

THE SCHAUFFLER REALTY COMPANY. A Cleveland institution that in its growth and success illustrates the value of specialization in one field is The Schauffler Realty Company, in the Leader-News Building. The only peo- ple who have business dealings with this of- fice are those who are primarily and ex- cInsively interested in factory and business properties. There are a good many phases of the real estate business in general with which members of this company would con- fess no acquaintance or ability to advise what- ever, but in their own special field their service is unexcelled.

The membership of the company comprises Fred Schauffler, president of the company ; J. D. Kunkle, vice president ; C. H. Schauffler, secretary and treasurer, and S. L. Garlock and L. W. Mackenzie. The company is not an old organization. The business was begun by Mr. Fred Schauffler in July, 1911, with a single desk in an office in the Williamson Building. His purpose was to deal in in- dustrial and manufacturing properties and sites with track facilities, a business for which his previous experience qualified him already as something of a specialist. For the previous three years he had been traveling agent for the land department of the New York Central lines between Buffalo and Chicago. In that

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capacity he had fixed the value of numer- ous pieces of land rented or leased by the Lake Shore & Michigan Southern, the Michi- gan Central and Nickel Plate lines to manu- facturers and other patrons. Thus he ac- quired the ability of an expert appraiser of this class of land. He had negotiated leases with industrial concerns occupying railroad locations in New York, Ontario, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana and Illinois, and through that he came to know all the requirements for ideal manufacturing locations.

The reasons that caused him to select Cleve- land as the center of his operations were stated by Mr. Schauffler as follows: "Be- fore I picked out Cleveland as a location I considered well the probable industrial growth of four or five other cities. I chose Cleve- land as offering the best opportunity." Even before renting his first desk in the William- son Building he had come to the determi- nation to specialize. It was his opinion that any man should become an expert in one line of business, and considering his previous experience it seemed the logical thing for him to handle factory property exclusively. As Mr. Schauffler has said, "When a man wants his watch repaired he prefers to go to a man who does nothing else but repair watches, in preference to one who is also a jewelry repairer, optical goods man, etc. A small town may not have room for a specialist, but in the city you find a man who does one thing only and you expect him to be more competent than the man who does several dif- ferent lines of work. This applies with equal force to the real estate business."

Early in 1912 The Schauffler Realty Com- pany was organized and incorporated. Mr. Fred Schauffler is also president of The Fac- tory Building Company, a $25,000 corporation which assists small manufacturers in securing plant sites. It is well known that banks prefer to make loans on dwellings, commercial or apartment buildings, and many worthy small manufacturers find it difficult to secure build- ing sites, since all their capital is required for the operation of the business. It is to supply this service and source of capital that The Fac- tory Building Company was organized. The Schauffler Realty Company has been instru- mental in bringing many industries to Cleve- land. One of them is the new Chandler Motor Car Company, which built its plant on the Belt line. The company has handled more land along the Belt line than the Belt line itself. The Schauffler Realty Company moved

its headquarters into the Leader-News Build- ing before it was complete, a special suite having been furnished and equipped for their use on the third floor in advance of most of the other floors.

One of the most notable displays in the Perry Centennial parade in September, 1913, was The Schauffler Realty Company's "Fac- tory Float." This represented a brick fac- tory in full operation with the shadow of the revolving wheels on the windows, smoke com- ing from the stack, and a constant clanging and grinding of machinery. It was carried on an automobile, and it received loud ap- plause all along the line of march.

The business of The Schauffler Realty Com- pany naturally leads to many observations and deductions regarding the growth and de- velopment of American enterprise, and es- pecially of industrial cities. It is the object of such a company to save time for the busy men of affairs who frequently lose a great deal of valuable time in seeking locations con- cerning which the expert realty man has in- stant information. All of this is due to the rapid transformation within the past twenty- five or thirty years of the United States from an agricultural to an industrial nation. Nearly every big city is vitally related to and de- pendent upon its industries. Factories are the backbone of American cities, and it is for that reason that Chambers of Commerce, Boards of Trade and Business Men's Associ- ations are organized and working unitedly to secure the location of new factories. The advent of a new factory to a city employ- ing say 200 men, has a vital significance. The result is not a mere increase of population. It means that another grocery store, another meat market, another carpenter, another street car conductor, another milk man, another school teacher, doctor, lawyer and preacher must be grouped around available and access- ible in order to supply their services to this new element of population. It has been the policy of many towns and cities to offer bon- uses as an inducement to manufacturing con- cerns. and some have been willing to donate land, and others both land and buildings and even cash in addition. In the experience of The Schauffler Realty Company this policy has not altogether been a wise one. An in- dustry that is incapable of establishing itself on a self supporting basis almost from the start is worth little to any community. In the words of Mr. Schauffler, an industrial con- cern "that accepts an unsatisfactory location

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A history of Cleveland and its environs; the heart of new Connecticut, Part 45

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