USA > Ohio > Cuyahoga County > Cleveland > History of the city of Cleveland : its settlement, rise and progress > Part 31
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Immediately after his consecration, Bishop Gilmour took possession of his see and entered vigorously on the heavy labors which nearly two years of an interregnum had pro- vided for the successor of Dr. Rappe. For sometime before his call to the Episcopate he had in hand the preparation of a new series of school readers which he completed in the second year after his appointment. Under the manifold duties of his new office his health broke down and obliged him to seek, in rest and foreign travel, the prolongation of a life so near extinction. In 1876 he returned with restored health and entered anew on the duties of his office. He
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has been most active in directing and encouraging good works. Since then many magnificent churches and fine school buildings have studded the diocese. He has written several stirring pastorals to his people, and frequently mingled with his fellow-citizens of other denominations to discuss and support questions of public importance. He took a leading part in the Provincial Council of Cincin- nati, in 1882, and was among the foremost in shaping the legislation of the Plenary Council of Baltimore, in 1884. Deputed as the agent of the American Episcopate, he went to Rome in 1885 to explain and urge the adoption of the legislation of Baltimore. His mission was fruitful of much good, in that it helped bring the American church under a system of laws adapted to our civil institutions. Nor did it fail to meet the thanks of those who knew and trusted his wisdom.
Bishop Gilmour is a man of large views, progressive ideas and great public spirit. He is a vigorous and pol- ished writer, a clear and forcible orator, a kind and wise ruler, a constant and faithful friend, a staunch Catholic, yet most tolerant of the opinions of others; of stern demeanor, yet with a heart that melts in the presence of suffering. He is a strong man and a patriotic citizen.
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RT. REV. LOUIS AMADEUS RAPPE, D. D.,
R T. REV. LOUIS AMADEUS RAPPE, D. D., the first Catholic bishop of the diocese of Cleveland, was born in the department of Pas de Calais, France, on the second of February, 1801. His parents were of the peo- ple and remarkable for sterling piety and virtue. In early life he tilled his father's little farm and helped his elder brothers in the rugged battle of peasant life. On the eve of his majority his store of learning was but scant, yet with wonderful energy he turned his mind to a profession that required both education and skill. He had completed his twentieth year when he entered the college of the Abbé Haffringue at Boulogne and after four years hard study, matriculated in philosophy at the seminary of Arras. There on the fourteenth of March, 1829, he was ordained a priest by Cardinal Latour d' Auvergne and was imme- diately assigned to a country curacy. In 1834 he was called from the village of Wizme to the chaplaincy of the Ursuline convent at Boulogne. For six years he held that humble but important position, not a moment of which was lost. Ever faithful in the discharge of his duty, he seized every spare moment to store his mind with that practical knowledge which was his great characteristic in after life. He read about the labors of the American missions and the rising glory of the young Republic, and resolved to cross the seas.
On his way to Rome, in 1840, Bishop Purcell, of Cincin- nati, bore a message from his diocese to the Ursulines at Boulogne. Here he met the ardent chaplain and learning his
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desire to serve on the American missions, invited him to his diocese on the banks of the Ohio. The invitation was heeded, and Father Rappe found himself in Cincin- nati in the autumn of 1840, in his fortieth year and totally ignorant of the language of the country. With the inbred courage of a true missionary, he began almost immediately the work for which he had come to a strange land, gathering, as time went on, such a knowledge of the language as enabled him to do the work of his ministry. Having spent a short time at Chillicothe, he was per- manently stationed at Toledo, where he lived and labored amid fever and pestilential vapors for seven years.
In 1847 the diocese of Cincinnati was divided and the diocese of Cleveland established. Among the names selected as worthy to bear its crosier, was that of Louis Amadeus Rappe, whose zeal and success on the Maumee were spoken of through the whole province. He received the appointment and was consecrated at Cincinnati on the tenth of October, 1847. Arriving in Cleveland he found only one church, St. Mary's on the flats, which was then served by the Rev. Maurice Howard. Scattered through the new diocese, which stretches from the Pennsylvania to the Indiana line, and from the lake over one hundred miles southward, were about forty unpretending church edifices. Neither hospitals, asylums, schools nor academies were yet thought of, but in the course of a few years the diocese teemed with institutions of learning and charity. The foundation of the Cathedral was laid in 1848; soon after a temporary seminary for boys and ecclesiastics was opened on Theresa street; the Ursuline sisterhood was
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established in 1850; St. Mary's Orphan Asylum for girls, on Harmon street, opened its doors in 1851, and St. Vin- cent's Asylum for orphan boys was founded in 1852. The building of churches kept pace with the increase of the population of the diocese until the forty-two small houses of worship gave place to thrice the number of temples dedicated to the service of God. Aided by a gen- erous public, Charity Hospital was built and equipped in 1865; the Good Shepherd's reformatory for fallen women began its magnificent work on Lake street in 1869, and a year later, a home for the aged poor received its first guests on Erie street. In calling into existence all these works of religion and benevolence, Bishop Rappe's was .
the active mind, his the guiding hand.
In the autumn of 1869 the aged bishop left Cleveland for Rome. The toil of long years had made inroads on his strong constitution. He had partially lost his eyesight, and the cares of office had bent his frame. The diocese had grown so rapidly and its work had become so toilsome that complications arose, which, added to his physical infirmity, suggested to the bishop the wisdom of laying down his crosier. He assisted at the Vatican Council and at its close, or rather its suspension, prepared to carry his thought into effect. He accordingly resigned his see, retired to Vermont and betook himself once more to the congenial work of a missionary. For seven years he was ever present at his favorite post. The young were catechised, the old were instructed, all were lifted up and consoled. In the damp, uncertain mornings of autumn, when the chilly rain often falls before the rising of the sun,
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he was found traveling from hamlet to hamlet on the banks of Lake Champlain. It was his wont, and no one questioned its wisdom. But the grand constitution and proudly erect frame was wrecked. His death sickness seized him at Grand Isle and terminated at Milton, near St. Albans, on the eighth of September, 1877. His re- mains were brought to Cleveland and after a solemn funeral service, deposited in the crypts of St. John's cathe- dral.
Bishop Rappe was a man of singular zeal in the fulfill- ment of his ministerial duties. Blessed with robust health and a wiry frame, he labored as few men could labor, and wore out both in doing good. He was the true type of a missionary rather than a great or far-seeing bishop, and for that reason made mistakes ; but his errors of judg- ment were few and insignificant when compared to his many deeds of charity and the abiding good works he accomplished. Loving France with a Frenchman's love, he was yet a true lover of his adopted country. During the civil war he was enthusiastically on the side of the Union. He had a soldier's heart, and, were it not for his sacred office, might have died a soldier's death. Courteous in his manners, if he wounded it was done with grace. He endeared himself to thousands, and tens of thousands mourned him when he died.
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HENRY M. CLAFLEN.
T HOUGH at the present time the subject of this sketch is in the prime of mental and physical strength, he has, for the last quarter of a century or more, stood in the front rank of thoroughly capable and successful business men. Endowed with invincible Puritan energy and integ- rity, he brought to the industrial circles of this growing city the fresh and keensightedness so essential to its pros- perity. Henry M. Claflen was born August 17, 1835, at Attleboro, Massachusetts. He traces his lineage to that resolute race of Scotch coventry who contributed so much to the heroic character of the Puritan fathers. His mother was a Thacher of the Mayflower family of that name. Young Claflen was educated in the schools and academy of his native place, but at the early age of fifteen he entered on the business of life on his own account. He had always had a fancy for mechanical pursuits, and in March, 1854, he came to Cleveland and entered into the employ of Thacher, Burt & Company, the great pioneer bridge- building firm. The head of the house, Peter Thacher, was Mr. Claflen's uncle. So thoroughly and assiduously did the young man apply himself to the principles of engineer- ing, as applied to bridge building, that he soon came to be relied on as one of the leading managers of the house. He remained with this concern until 1863, in the meantime becoming a partner of Thacher, Gardner, Burt & Com- pany, proprietors of the Union Elevator. It was in this year that Mr. Claflen, in response to appeals of military engineers, organized a force of men and proceeded to Nash-
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ville, where the rapid advance of the Union armies required the quick renewal of destroyed bridges. The magnitude and importance of his work for the government can but be alluded to in this brief sketch. His first work was the erection of the bridge over Running Water for the trans- portation of supplies and men to Chattanooga. This work accomplished, amidst difficulties well-nigh insur- mountable, was so well done that General Grant made it a subject of personal acknowledgment. Mr. Claflen remained in the service of the government until the close of the war, replacing bridges or building new ones often in advance of armies and often amid great difficulty and danger. His operations called him to Tennessee, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi and Missouri, and so thoroughly was his rapid engineering work done, that many of the bridges he built remain in use to-day.
At the close of the war he returned to Cleveland and organized the firm of McNairy, Claflen Company, for carrying on the bridge building business. This firm in the next few years, did some work of great magnitude. In 1869 it was succeeded by the McNairy & Claflen Man- ufacturing Company, which added car building to bridge construction. Mr. Claflen was the chief manager of this company, which employed constantly from six hundred to eight hundred men. The operations of the house were of great importance, they carrying on the construction of iron and wood bridges in nearly every State in the Union, and building for one railroad system alone over eight thousand cars. The iron portion of the great Viaduct in Cleveland is a monument of their engineering skill. As
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early as 1865 the subject of street paving attracted Mr. Claflen's attention, and this city is indebted to him for the high standard of her block stone pavements, for the now famous Medina block paving stone is the result of his inventive and engineering skill. Though often controlling hundreds of men and in times of depression facing disas- trous strikes, Mr. Claflen has, by superior tact and no little humane consideration, brought himself and his firm through many serious business struggles and at the same time saved the impetuous workmen and their families from suffering. In all enterprises of a public nature he has been a willing adviser, contributor and coadjutor. He was married on May 24, 1863, to Miss Alice B. Hall, daughter of Dr. John Hall, of Toronto. Mr. Claflen has had and still has a very busy life in the management of manifold business operations, yet he has found time to take an active interest in other than business enterprises, if they would in any way contribute to the prosperity of the city he thirty-three years ago adopted as his future home.
DR. GAIUS J. JONES.
T HE paternal ancestors of the subject of this sketch were prominent in the colonial history of the Re- public, and he inherited the characteristics for energy and integrity which gave such eminence to the Puritan fathers. Gaius J. Jones was born in Remsen, Oneida county, New York, Februray 27, 1843. His grandparents came from
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Wales in 1795 and resided for five years in Philadelphia, after which they removed to Trenton, Oneida county, then almost a complete wilderness. Jonathan Jones, the father of Gaius, was a bricklayer and mason, but owned a farm on which his family was reared. Young Jones attended in winter the district schools of his county and the academy at Prospect, working on the farm in the summer months. At sixteen years of age he had made such progress that he passed all examinations before the school commissioner, but he refused him a certificate to teach because of his youth. In the following winter, however, he was given the certificate, though he was then a year younger than the law required. In March, 1861, he secured a position as clerk in Utica, but the firing on Fort Sumter called him to other fields. He was the first from his township to enlist in what afterwards became Company E, of the Fourteenth New York Volunteers, Col- onel James McQuade, afterwards brigadier-general, being in command. After the battle of Bull Run his regiment was stationed on the banks of the Potomac, opposite Washington. Here a severe species of typhoid fever broke out in the regiment, which, by this disease, lost more men than in all subsequent service in the war. Corporal Jones was stricken with the fever and for four or five weeks his life hungin the balance. He was sent home when his friends expected he would soon die, but by careful maternal care he came through. In the following spring he began the study of medicine under Dr. M. M. Gardner, of Holland Patent, New York, and subsequently attended lectures in the Homœopathic College in Cleveland. He began the prac-
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tice of medicine in Liverpool, Medina county, Ohio, in March, 1865, and soon proved a very successful practi- tioner. In July, 1866, he was married to Miss Emma Wil- mot, of Liverpool, and in the following September moved to Holland Patent, where he took up the practice of his preceptor. Things not proving satisfactory, however, he returned to Liverpool in 1867, and in 1871 removed to Graf- ton, nine miles distant. He, however, retained the practice of both places and soon had a professional business second to none in Lorain county. It was in the following year that Dr. Jones was appointed lecturer adjunct to the chair of anatomy in the Cleveland College, and in 1873 was elected to the full professorship. This chair he held until 1878. For two years after his election he remained in Grafton, but then removed to this city. He lectured on surgical as well as descriptive anatomy, and for a time on surgery in the absence of the occupant of that chair. In 1878 Dr. Jones was elected to the chair of theory and practice, which position he still occupies. In 1885 he was chosen registrar of the college, and in 1879 chosen surgeon-in-chief of the Lake Shore & Michigan Southern Railway Relief Association, which office he filled until the dissolution of the organization. In 1882 he was appointed surgeon at Cleveland of the New York, Pennsyl- vania & Ohio railroad, and is to-day a leading member in County, State and National Medical Associations. For eleven years he has been a member of the staff of Huron Street Hospital. In 1884, on the organization of the Fifth Regiment Ohio National Guards, Dr. Jones was elected surgeon, but resigned in 1887. He has rapidlv taken a lead-
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ing rank in medical circles in Ohio, and has now as large a practice as he can attend to with the aid of two assist- ants. For many years he has been a member of the Masonic fraternity, having taken next to the highest degree it is possible to obtain in the order. In other than profes- sional circles Dr. Jones is one of the most eminent citizens of Cleveland, ever willing and active in the success of public or private enterprises which tend to encourage the prosperity of the city.
BRENTON D. BABCOCK.
H ON. BRENTON D. BABCOCK, who was elected mayor of Cleveland in the spring of 1887 by the largest majority ever given a Democratic candidate for the office in this city, was born at Adams, Jefferson county, New York, October 2, 1830.
He was raised on a farm, to which his father moved when he was four years old, and acquired his education at the public schools and at Adams Seminary, upon which he attended as regularly as the farm work would permit until he reached his eighteenth year. Although he by no means despised the honest avocation of the agriculturist, it did not suit his tastes. Therefore, on leaving school he entered the general merchandise store of his father's uncle,. Herman Grinnell, at Adams. In about a year the store was sold and Mr. Babcock went to Utica as clerk in a' similar establishment, but soon left his employment and
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returned home. He soon after engaged in the same bus- iness in Henderson, New York, where he remained until 1853, when he accepted a position as manager of a gen- eral store in Smithville, New York. Though but twenty- three years old, he had full charge of the establishment, and made his first trip to New York city to purchase goods for his firm. In two years, however, the store changed hands, and Mr. Babcock being disengaged was offered and accepted a clerkship in the Erie Railway line of steamers, which position he held for nine years. It was in 1865 that he first came to Cleveland in the employ of Cross, Payne & Co., coal dealers, as bookkeeper. After serving this firm four years, Mr. Babcock went into partnership with Mr. H. P. Card, under the firm name of Card & Bab- cock, for mining coal. In 1875 he sold his interest to Mr. Card and in the following spring engaged with the coal firm of Tod, Morris & Co., as traveling salesman, at a salary equal to that he receives for his services as mayor. He was with Tod, Morris & Co., for three years, when a co-partnership was formed with Mr. Morris, as Babcock, Morris & Co., for mining coal, which firm has continued in business ever since. In 1885 the Babcock & Morris Coal Company was organized and still exists. It is one of the extensive mining companies in the Hocking valley. While with Mr. Card, Mr. Babcock's operations were principally in the Mahoning and Tuscarawas valleys, but since then they have been almost exclusively confined to the Hocking valley. Mr. Babcock has been in other busi- ness ventures than the mining of coal, but the latter has proved the most successful as he gave it his special atten-
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tion, which he did not other enterprises. Mr. Babcock joined the Free Masons in 1859, and has since risen to national prominence in that order. He has not only been an active mason, but is an ardent student of the literature of the order. His valuable library of two hundred and fifty volumes of purely masonic works is loaned to the Masonic Temple Association and comprises the greater part of the temple library.
Mr. Babcock was married November 6, 1867, to Miss Elizabeth C. Smith, daughter of Dr. Geo. W. Smith, of Buffalo. Mrs. Babcock is one of the most active workers in the field of charity in Cleveland. Mr. Babcock has had no children. His brother, Charles F. Babcock, is the able manager of the Camp Creek Coal Co., and resides in this city.
Mr. Babcock is one of the most substantial and highly respected business men in Cleveland, and the executive office of the city government could be placed in no safer hands.
I. N. TOPLIFF.
T T HE Western Reserve owes a boundless debt to sturdy New England. Hundreds of the influential men in all the busy vocations of life in the West came here en- dowed with the moral strength and energy deeply rooted in New England ancestry. Among those who have made Cleveland famous as a manufacturing centre and who
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have sent her products into all the markets of the world, none deserves more eminent note than I. N. Topliff. Born in Mansfield, Connecticut, on January 16, 1833, he was reared on a farm which had been held by the family for nearly two centuries. He is descended from the oldest and best New England stock. He passed his boyhood days in attendance at the district schools and later at Williston Academy, at East Hampton, Massachusetts. But the work of the farm enabled him to gain the advantages of school only in the winter months, and his other knowledge he gathered in his evenings at home. At seventeen, by the death of his father, the care of the farm was thrown on him. For a year he carried on the laborious work, but. determined to broaden his learning and his fields of labor, he went, in 1851, to New Jersey, and took charge of a dis- trict school. This occupation he followed for three years and the discipline then gained was of service to him ever after. His early taste for mechanics, however, led him, in the fall of 1854, to go to Cleveland and from there to Elyria where he had secured employment in a carriage factory. He learned this trade in all its branches, and in 1859 opened an establishment of his own in Adrian, Mich- igan. His mechanical ability and his unusual qualities as a business manager made his efforts in Southern Michigan, despite many difficulties, eminently successful. In the fall of 1869 Mr. Topliff returned to Elyria, where he gave par- ticular attention to the manufacturing of certain inven- tions of his own in carriage hardware. One article alone, the result of Mr. Topliff's inventive genius, is worthy of special note. That is the bow-socket which has, in the
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last dozen years, revolutionized the business of carriage making. The old way of making a buggy-bow was by the use of wood, the upright parts of which were covered with leather. Mr. Topliff's bow-socket is a sheet steel tube. It is a simple thing, but has made the inventor's name known in all parts of the world. So large had the business in which he was interested in Elyria become, that Mr. Topliff, in 1879, established extensive works in Cleveland, which, in a few years, have grown to be the largest establishment in the United States for the manu- facture of specialties in carriage hardware. The sale of its products are in every market in the world, and the number of the bow-sockets sold the present year are enough for two hundred thousand buggies.
Mr. Topliff, while, of course, confining his attention chiefly to his particular line of business, has given his in- fluence to other enterprises, such as manufacturing con- cerns and banking houses. Throughout his long and busy life he has ever found time to pursue his study and gratify his keen literary tastes and love of travel. He was mar- ried December 11, 1862, to Miss Frances A. Hunt, daughter of Hon. C. W. Hunt, of Detroit, Michigan, and has one child, Mrs. Will P. Todd, of this city.
JAMES PANNELL.
I T is interesting to recall the early life of the men who, more than half a century ago, did their part in laying
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the foundations of this great city. But few of those sturdy pioneers to whom Cleveland owes so much canstill be found in active fields of usefulness. In this select list, however, the name of James Pannell stands out in promi- nence. Born on January 12, 1812, he early embarked toward the new west with the determination to make his way among her sturdy people. He set out with St. Louis fixed as his destination ; but reaching Cleveland in 1832, and finding business rapidly recovering the depression of the past season, he easily found employment here as a builder. His prospects appeared so good that he gave up the idea of going farther west. He found fields of usefulness in this little city, and for many years was one of the leading builders in Cleveland. His last important work was the building of what is now known as the old court-house. He was a busy man, however, in other fields, and many public and private enterprises had the influence of his counsel and means. He early became prominent as an advocate of our public school system, and did his best to improve it. He lent a strong hand to the fostering of the military of the city, and during the war lent his time and gave his money to theraising of troops for the service. In early fire department days none were more vigorous in maintaining and supporting an efficient department, and for years he himself was a member of Old Neptune No. 2.
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