USA > Ohio > Representative citizens of Ohio : memorial-genealogical > Part 48
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Editorially one of the Sandusky papers had the following to say, under the caption, "A Good Man Gone:"
"The announcement of the death of William Senn, caused profound sorrow in all circles in this city. Although Mr. Senn's death was not unexpected, nevertheless it caused a shock, and to none more than to the writer of this item who enjoyed the friend- ship of the dead man for several years past, which, indeed, was something of which any man might well be proud. Editor Senn was a writer of marked ability and much vigor, a man of strong moral fiber, and possessed of indomitable energy in the pursuit of his ideals and in the advocacy of truth and justice. Trained
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in the rough school of experience, he was a great reader and rose to the heights of a man of unusual attainments whose society was always helpful and inspiring and whose judgment was often sought by those who knew him. He was a Democrat of the old school, though remarkably independent in politics- local, state, and national. William Senn was a good man. Such men as he leave their impress for great good upon the community in which they live. We have altogether too few citizens of his lofty ideals, his deep-seated convictions of right, honor, truth, and justice coupled with his candor, courage, ability, and fairness in the expression of those convictions."
I. F. Mack had the following to say editorially in the "San- dusky Register," under the title of "A Personal Tribute:"
"With the passing away of William Senn, the German-Ameri- can community of Sandusky, loses one of its most useful and prominent members. He belonged to a class of citizens of his nationality which in the stress of the American life does not lose its native sturdiness and honesty.
The paper he edited was clean throughout, and never purchasable by any clique or class of men. It was a pleasure to look into his honest face and to listen to his views, always strongly expressed but never abusive or intolerant. He chose to differ from men although it lost him business and influential friends. In the reform movement in San- dusky he was a pioneer, always calling attention to the flagrant disobedience of law and the corruptness of municipal life. He hated all shams and hypocrites and seemed at times hard and un- approachable, when he was in reality striving to keep away from all manner of falsehood. He was a self-made man in the best sense of the word, a man whom Sandusky could not afford to lose, and whose place in life will not easily be filled. He was not a religious man in the accepted meaning of that word, but he had a heart that loved and a will to believe. He has passed from doubt to knowledge, from the unknown to the known, from the temporal to the eternal. Among men who love honor more than pomp and pride, who trust more in a man's profession, William Senn's memory will be cherished until they themselves will share with him the reward of a faithful life."
John L. Moore
IE RECORD of the late John L. Moore is that of a man who worked his way from a modest beginning up to a position of considerable prominence by his persistence and the exercise of sound judgment, his efforts having been practically unaided, which fact rendered him the more worthy of the praise that was ever freely accorded him by his fellow men. His life was one of unceasing industry and perseverance and the notably systematic and honorable methods he followed won him the unbounded confidence and regard of all who formed his acquaintance, and in looking over the list of the successful men of northern Ohio of a past generation, es- pecially those known to the railroad world, men who were suc- cessful in their chosen line of endeavor, the biographer deems none more worthy of representation in a work of this nature than that of the gentleman whose name appears above.
Mr. Moore was born in Plattsburg, New York, in 1846. He was the scion of a sterling old family of the Empire State, being the son of Philander and Julia B. Moore. He spent his boyhood in his native city and there attended the common schools. When about fifteen years of age he accompanied his parents from Plattsburg to Sandusky, Ohio, and there the permanent home of the Moores was established. Shortly afterwards our subject en- tered the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor, later attending Williams College, where he made a splendid record for scholar- ship and from which institution he was graduated with the class of 1867. While at college, he did not ally himself with any fra- ternity, but he was subsequently taken into the Beta Theta Psi fraternity.
Thus exceptionally well-equipped for his life work, Mr. Moore returned to his home in Sandusky upon leaving college, and, having a natural bent toward railroading he immediately sought employment in that field and was soon at work in the treasurer's office of the Cleveland, Sandusky & Cincinnati Rail- road, the first road built in the state of Ohio. He remained with that road for a period of twenty-five years, his long retention being sufficient criterian of his satisfactory services. He was regarded as one of the most efficient and trustworthy employees of the road and every confidence was reposed in him by the head
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officials, and he never once betrayed their trust and confidence. As a result of his merit and close application he was soon ad- vanced from clerk to assistant treasurer, later to treasurer and finally to general manager of that road, in which responsible posi- tion he did a most commendable work. For when he first en- tered the employ of the same the road was very badly run down. Mr. Moore seems to have put new life into it, and there is no doubt but that its rapid advancement to an important position in the railroad world was due in no small measure to his able management, judicious council, and wise foresight. He worked early and late, and made everything else subordinate to his duties, and, believing that whatever was worth doing at all was worth doing well, soon had everything operating under a superb system and the road earning large annual dividends, to the grati- fication of the stockholders and the officials. He was a man who understood well the handling of men, and he was admired and re- spected by the other employees of the road, from section hands up to the president. He mingled with his men, sympathized with them, advised them, gave them to understand that he was their friend and not their master, but at the same time he was a rigid disciplinarian, but it was all for the good of the company, and, in- cidentally, the best for the welfare of the employees.
Mr. Moore became one of the best known and most popular railroad men in northern Ohio and his acquaintance extended to other States. He was respected by all who knew him either personally or by reputation for his ability, industry, progressive ideas, and exemplary habits, and genial nature, being a man who not only made friends easily, but retained them without effort. He remained with the Cleveland, Sandusky & Cincinnati Rail- road Company until his retirement from the active duties of life, having made his home in the city of Sandusky all the while, having a beautiful residence there at which he was enjoying the serenity of approaching old age when death summoned him to his eternal rest on June 29, 1905.
Mr. Moore was a quiet, modest, unassuming man, a true friend, helpful neighbor and congenial companion.
The happy domestic life of John L. Moore began in the year 1875, when he was united in marriage to Mary S. Stone, the ac- complished and refined daughter of Judge Walter F. and Cordelia A. (Hitchcock) Stone, an extended sketch of whom occurs in this volume. Mrs. Moore was born and reared in Sandusky and she received the advantages of a fine education and has always been popular with a wide circle of friends.
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The union of Mr. and Mrs. Moore was blessed by the birth of two children; namely, Lawrence, who resides at Detroit, Mich- igan, was graduated from Princeton University with the class of 1902. He is a young man of much business ability, and at this writing is the president of the Krit Motor Company of Detroit. Walter Stone Moore, the second son of our subject, was a student for four years at the Boston School of Technology, Boston, Massa- chusetts, where he made a good record, and he, too, gives promise of great success in future years in a business way.
The pleasant home of Mrs. Moore at 1017 Washington Street, Sandusky, is frequently the gathering place for her many warm friends, who never fail to find her a most agreeable hostess.
hon. Walter Freeman Stone
TANDING out distinctly as one of the central figures of the judiciary of Ohio during the generations that are gone is the name of Hon. Walter Freeman Stone, of Sandusky, who, although long since a pilgrim to "that undiscovered bourne" of which Shakespeare wrote, is well re- membered for his innumerable good deeds. Prominent in legal circles and equally so in public matters beyond the confines of his own jurisdiction, with a reputation in one of the most exact- ing of professions that won him a name for distinguished serv- ice second to that of none of his contemporaries, there was dur- ing the last decade or two of his life no more prominent or honored man in the State which he long dignified with his citizenship. Achieving success in the courts at an age when most young men are just entering upon the formative period of their lives, wear- ing the judicial ermine with becoming dignity and bringing to every case submitted to him a clearness of perception and ready analysis characteristic of the learned jurist, his name and work for many years was allied with the legal institutions, public en- terprises and political interests of the State in such a way as to earn him recognition as one of the distinguished citizens in a community noted for the high order of its talent. A high pur- pose and an unconquerable will, vigorous mental powers, dili- gent study and devotion to duty were some of the means by which he made himself eminently useful, and every ambitious youth who fights the battle of life with the prospect of ultimate success may peruse with profit the biographical memoir herewith presented.
Judge Stone was the scion of a prominent and influential pioneer family of the Buckeye State, and his birth occurred at Strongsville, Cuyahoga County, Ohio, on November 18, 1822. His parents were originally from Vermont, in which State they settled in an early day, and from bleak New England they emi- grated to Ohio when comparatively young and established the permanent home of the family here.
The boyhood of Judge Stone was spent in school, principally at Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and there he commenced the study of law. On attaining his majority, he entered a law office at Cleveland. and after a year's study, in 1845, was admitted to the bar in that city. In 1846, he came to Sandusky and opened an
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office in connection with Judge A. W. Hendry. He continued in practice up to the fall of 1865 with great success, when he was elected judge of the common pleas court, and, having made a commendable record, was re-elected in 1870, serving as such until the fall of 1872, when he was appointed to fill a vacancy on the bench of the supreme court, caused by the resignation of Judge West. The duties of this exalted position he discharged in a manner that reflected much credit upon himself and to the satis- faction of all concerned. In 1873, he was elected by the people for the term, and continued to serve as judge of the supreme court up to the day of the Republican State Convention in August, 1874, when failing health compelled him to resign, after a most brilliant and eminently satisfactory career in that important post. Hoping to prolong his life by a change of climate, he went to California soon after the October election, but failed to find the relief he had anticipated, and gradually declined until death came to end his sufferings on Wednesday, December 23, 1875.
Judge Stone was married to Cordelia A. Hitchcock, in June, 1851. She was the daughter of S. E. Hitchcock and wife and was born in Gosport, New York, in August, 1832. When quite a young girl her father moved to Sandusky and here she grew to womanhood, was educated and married. Being a lady of cul- ture and fine education, she was not only popular among the young people, but with the entire community. Upon his re- moval to Sandusky, S. E. Hitchcock began a successful business career, becoming one of the foremost men of his day and genera- tion in northern Ohio. He was an extensive owner of valuable real estate and also a large grain dealer. He lived in Sandusky during the cholera epidemic and helped nurse the sick. He was a very public-spirited man and a leader in the affairs of his city. He was an active member of the Congregational Church, and he bought a scholarship in Oberlin College when that institution was in its infancy, in fact, the family have had a scholarship there ever since, and while they pay for the scholarship from year to year, none of the family has ever attended that college. Later in life Mr. Hitchcock moved to Alpena, Michigan, where he con- tinued his business activities, and there he donated land to the church, schools, and in fact, helped build the town, and there spent the rest of his life.
Mrs. Cordelia A. Stone was a firm and active member of the Congregational Church. Like her honored father before her she was ever foremost in charitable work, but never showing her liberality in a boastful manner. Her death occurred in Pomona,
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Tennessee, in 1887, having survived her distinguished husband some twelve years. She had made her home in Pomona about a year, and had been in failing health for a period of ten years, and had visited many sections of the country in the hope of find- ing relief. The union of Judge Stone and wife was a most happy and harmonious one, and it resulted in the birth of three children; namely, Walter Hitchcock Stone, an attorney, now deceased, a sketch of whom will be found elsewhere in this work; and Mrs. Mary S. Moore, of Sandusky, widow of John L. Moore, a sketch of whom appears on another page of this work; and Nellie C. Scofield, who married Frank, T. Scofield, and died in 1891.
Mrs. Cordelia A. Stone was left considerable valuable prop- erty by her husband, and among her interests in Sandusky she owned the Stone block, opposite the post-office, dwelling houses, and a large list of other property in the residence and business sections of the city where she spent practically all her life and which she saw develop from a small town to a city of commercial importance.
In the death of Judge Walter Freeman Stone, the city of Sandusky lost its most distinguished citizen, and the State of Ohio a jurist who had entered upon a career of usefulness which reflected new honors upon its bar and bench. In the highest and best sense he was a good man. Modest and unassuming, he had from the beginning of his life work as a lawyer, steadily risen in public esteem, holding without effort the confidence of his fellow men, until he had by regular advance gained the highest judicial position in the power of the people of his State to bestow. As a practicing lawyer, he stood in the front rank of the bar of the State, and when elevated to the common pleas bench, the selection was recognized by men of all parties as one of the wisest and best. His career on the common pleas bench was characterized from his first term of court by that prudence and moderation which gave him the respect of the bar and the litigants. His elevation to the supreme bench was regarded all over the State as a deserved tribute to his worth as a judge, and in no portion of the State did he show so strong a hold on public confidence as in the lower dis- tricts, in which he had served as an attorney and acted as judge. His firmest friends and most active supporters were the lawyers who had practiced before him and the litigants, he had deter- mined by his decisions. All these as well as those more fortunate of his fellow citizens who had not been compelled to go into court, knew him to be an honest judge, and that no feeling of prejudice or partisanship tinged his decisions and rulings. Dur-
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ing his term of service on the supreme bench, from which, as stated, ill health compelled him to resign, he endeared himself to his fellow judges and gained a distinction rare even to men of much longer standing and greater experience. United to honest intention and freedom from prejudice, he was also possessed of a logical and judicial mind, which arrived at conclusions almost sure to be in harmony with the well established precedents of the courts and the fundamental principles of law. With the facts before him, the parties who trusted to his judgment could confi- dently rely upon his arriving at a right decision and could trust to his honesty and impartiality. Defeated attorneys and their clients rarely questioned his decisions, and when they did appeal to the higher tribunals, his judgment was almost universally con- firmed upon a full releasing of the case.
Personally, Judge Stone was a man of commanding presence, affable manners and cheerful disposition. In spite of physical infirmities which had troubled him for many years, he retained his pleasant ways to the last, and was as companionable and gen- tle in his illness as when a young man in full flush of health. To those not intimately familiar with him he sometimes had an ap- pearance of coldness and pride, but when the habitual reserve which was noticeable on slight acquaintance, had worn off, as it did on closer familiarity, he was free of even the appearance of reserve, and became companionable, chatty, and friendly. He was a man of decided character when decision was necessary, and could be, if occasion required, as positive as the most outspoken of his friends. When a friend of the judge presented to a member of President Grant's cabinet Judge Stone's views on certain so- called reforms in the selection of minor officials, the cabinet offi- cial to whom the letter was addressed, remarked, upon reading it, that if all the letters he received on that subject were as pointed and decided, very little trouble would be experienced in arriving at the wishes of the people.
Judge Stone was a pronounced Republican and his advice was frequently sought by candidates and party leaders, and usually followed with gratifying results, and yet he never be- trayed his party leaning while acting as a judge nor in his social intercourse with his friends and acquaintances. His religious views were Evangelical, and as liberal as his belief in the Christian religion could justify. Fanaticism in all its forms was foreign to his nature, and radicalism in those so-called reforms, which are based upon sentimentalism and ignorance, had no friend in the clear-headed, liberal-minded judge who had learned to distrust
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hobbies and despise shams. In his family he was a model father and husband, and in the social circle he was genial to a fault. But he "performed the work the strange God gave him and then passed on to rest," and his faults, which were few, have been for- gotten, and his virtues and the honorable record he made remain as a sacred legacy for his family and friends and for the city and State he honored so well. As an example to young men of what an honest, temperate, and industrious life may accomplish, we offer the life and character of Walter Freeman Stone, the faith- ful friend, the loyal citizen, and the incorruptible judge.
Walalter Hitchcock Stone
T HAS been said that the sons of great men seldom at- tain to distinction, implying that more or less of a handicap is entailed through standing in the shadow of such greatness. This may be true in many cases, the annals of our own as well as other nations showing such to be the fact, but in contradistinction are found so many instances where sons have added laurels to honored names of fathers that there can be naught but perversity of spirit and obliquity of view when it is maintained that the above premise is invariably well taken. An instance is afforded in the career of the late Walter Hitchcock Stone, who was numbered among the leaders of younger legal lights and representative citizens of the city and State that were honored and dignified by the life and services of his distinguished father, the late Honorable Walter Freeman Stone, judge of the supreme court, to whom a memorial is dedi- cated on other pages of this work. He whose name initiates this paragraph achieved much in an individual way not dependent upon hereditary prestige but proving himself worthy as a factor in public affairs, as a patriotic soldier and as a citizen and busi- ness man of the utmost loyalty and progressiveness. Thus as a representative of the family whose name has been identified with the history of Ohio from the early pioneer epoch to the present and whose prominence reached its apotheosis in the labors and services of Judge Stone, the subject of this memoir is well worthy of consideration in this publication, the province of which is to touch upon the generic and biographical history of the great Buck- eye commonwealth. Although his race was short it was brilliant, like the meteor that flames along the horizon for a moment, then disappears in darkness.
Walter Hitchcock Stone was born in Sandusky, Ohio, June 24, 1866. He was the only son of Judge Stone and wife. In his early life he showed the traits of character which in after life made him beloved by his fellow men. In his earliest boyhood, among his companions, he showed that trait of fairness, courage and willingness to do unto others as he would be done by; for that he endeared himself to them. He received his primary education in the schools of Sandusky, in which city he grew to manhood and spent his life. He completed his academic educa- tion at Cornell University, where he was a member of the Zeta Psi fraternity. Following in the footsteps of his father in a
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professional way he studied law with Judge Rufus P. Ranney and in the Cincinnati Law School, where he made rapid progress and an excellent record, and was admitted to the bar on June 18, 1888. He entered upon the practice of his profession in San- dusky, and shortly after became a member of the firm of Bowen & Stone, to which the name of George E. Reiter was later added, and the firm of Bowen, Stone & Reiter continued successfully for several years. Our subject's peculiar, legal mind and natural talents inherited from his distinguished father gave promise of his attaining high rank in his chosen profession, but failing health compelled him to retire from the practice. He was twice the candidate of the Republican party for city solicitor of Sandusky. On the creation of the board of deputy supervisors of elections, he was appointed a member, which office he continued to hold until his death, which occurred on June 5, 1896 at the early age of thirty years, thus closing a life of much promise. He was for a period of eight years connected with the Sixteenth Regiment of the Ohio National Guard, of which he was quartermaster ser- geant during the years 1888 and 1889, and sergeant-major during the years 1890 and 1891, and battalion-adjutant from May, 1893, to the time of his death, discharging his duties in this connection in a manner that reflected much credit upon himself and to the eminent satisfaction of all concerned.
Mr. Stone was a young man of singularly attractive person- ality and of great popularity, with the qualities of a true gen- tleman adorned with the polish of refined courtesy. He was frank in his dealings, honorable, and truthful in his conduct, loyal in his friendships, fearless in his opinions, and generous and kind-hearted to a fault. He was an affectionate son and loving brother.
Taking a delight in the Republican party, Mr. Stone attended every caucus and county, district, senatorial, Congressional, State, and national convention of his party. He was not only active in the councils of the party, but among the common voters, he was often to be seen arguing with them and trying to lead them to believe in the principles which he considered the only principles by which the republic could be sustained. He was no strict partisan in the sense that he would not listen or take into consideration the facts that might be adduced to the op- posite party, but was always ready and open to argument.
In accordance with resolutions adopted by the Erie County Bar Association, the members of that organization attended the funeral of Mr. Stone in a body, together with the county officials
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and the members of Company B, Sixteenth Regiment, Ohio Nation- al Guard. At an adjourned meeting of the bar association the committee on resolutions, S. L. Peeke, Linn W. Hull, John F. M.cCrystal, and D. J. Mackey, prepared a memorial which was adopted, which, after reciting the facts relating to his life record, in a eulogistic manner, concluded in this manner:
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