USA > Ohio > The biographical cyclopaedia and portrait gallery with an historical sketch of the state of Ohio. Volume I > Part 24
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BIOGRAPHICAL CYCLOPÆDIA AND PORTRAIT GALLERY.
made over seventy speeches during the campaign, in five States. Early in the commencement of the war, with the true martial spirit of his ancestors, he shouldered a musket as a private soldier, but was immediately promoted to a majority, and in June, 1863, was again promoted, to a lieu- tenant-colonelcy. At the battle of Nashville he commanded a brigade, and for gallant service on the field was recom- mended for promotion by General Steedman, whose recom- mendation was thus indorsed by General Geo. H. Thomas: " Respectfully forwarded and earnestly recommended. Lieu- tenant-Colonel Grosvenor has served under my command since November, 1862, and has on all occasions performed his duties with intelligence and zeal." He was then breveted colonel and brigadier-general. In April, 1865, he was raised to the full rank of colonel, with the brevet title of brigadier- general. At the close of the war General Grosvenor returned to Athens, and resumed the practice of his profession, and was nominated for the State Senate, but did not secure an election. In 1873 he was elected to the General Assembly from Athens county. While acting with this body, he served on the committees on the judiciary, on insurance, and on revision ; was also a member of the select committee on ex- press companies and telegraphs and on the investigation of public works. At the election of 1875 he was re-elected to the House of Representatives, and at its organization was chosen speaker of the House. As a legislator General Gros- venor made an exceptionally high record. His great orator- ical powers, united with indefatigable industry and a remark- able conception of requirements, rendered him a formidable antagonist in debate. A republican of the pronounced type, he was jealously watchful of the interests of his party, as many of his speeches attest. His speeches are replete with sentiment and sound logic, and the manner of their delivery forcible and convincing. In a public speech delivered at Hillsboro, Ohio, August 24th, 1878, in his arraignment of the democratic party, he uttered the following characteristic sen- timent, occasioned by a former determined opposition on the part of the democracy of Ohio to the establishment and maintenance, as a State institution, of the Soldiers' Home:
"The Bashi Bazouk stays his murderous hand at sight of the yellow flag of the hospital, the Cossack his thirst for blood and vengeance in the presence of helpless women and children. The red hand of the commune of Paris, which had destroyed the Louvre and defiled the grandeur of the Tuileries, and covered itself with the blood of the saintly archbishop of Paris, stayed its wild career and was awed into stillness at sight of the Hôtel des Invalides. Think you, if the trained and bronzed hordes of the rebel army of Northern Virginia, under Lee and Early, in its famous campaign of 1863, had reached Washington, that the hands of its brave men would have been laid in vandalistic destruction upon the Soldiers' Home, the work of Scott and his compeers ? Nay, verily ; the latent angel of Southern chivalry, blinded and defiled as she was by the fierce hates and heart-burnings of that time, would have stood across the avenues of approach to that sacred spot, and, with her flaming sword, have driven back even the stragglers, who, perchance, shrinking from sight, might have been tempted to desecrate one flower or blade of grass found within its sacred precincts."
The Maine campaign of 1879 has been reverted to as the "greatest speaking campaign of modern times." At its in- auguration most republicans considered the State hopelessly democratic-a conclusion forced upon them by the fact that the democratic-greenback majority in that State the year pre- vious was fully 13,000 votes. The Hon. James G. Blaine and other distinguished republican leaders in that State appre-
ciated the need of effective speakers for that campaign. Mr. Blaine dispatched a very urgent request for the services of General Grosvenor. General Grosvenor accepted the invi- tation, and left Ohio for Maine August 10th, and spoke at Portland on August 13th. He spoke, in all, thirty times, his stay covering a period of several weeks, in which he fully vindicated his reputation as one of the most eloquent and popular orators of the day-an orator after the people's own heart. The following is a reproduction of a portion of his speech delivered at Searsmont, Maine:
" I appeal to you that you stand by the record this grand old Pine-tree State has made since 1861. I appeal to you that you go not back upon the record you made in war. I conjure you, by the pride you have in your past, in making the history of the great rebellion, you do not undo the re- sults your gallant dead lost their lives to achieve. Could they to-day look down upon these scenes of political strife, and hear the bitter utterances of the Blackburns and Ste- phenses of the late rebellion from that 'eternal camping- ground' where their 'silent tents are spread,' they would join me in this appeal. You owe something to the glorified dead of your proud State.
"'The dead of Maine! The dead of Maine ! On every field they lie- On every field of strife made red With bloody victory ! Their bones are on our Northern hills, And on the Southern plain ; By brook and river, mount and rills, And in the sounding main.'
"Stand by the record this State has made in the councils of the nation in all this long night of reconstruction and res- toration of national credit. Stand by the men of your State who, in Congress and cabinet, have shed unfading luster upon your name. To your State has been assigned more than once in Congress the post of leader, when great ques- tions have been met and settled. To the strong and unerring statesmanship of your sons, and the audacious but patriotic and wise leadership of the peerless 'plumed knight' of the gallant old State of Maine, the people of this country owe a debt they can not pay."
December 2d, 1880, the republican presidential electors of Ohio, and other distinguished citizens, visited President- elect Garfield, on which occasion General Grosvenor was chosen the spokesman of the party to convey to Mr. Garfield their congratulations on the successful issue of the campaign just closed. He was married, December Ist, 1858, to Sa- mantha Stewart, of Athens county, who died April 2d, 1866, leaving issue of one child, a daughter. He was again mar- ried, May 21st, 1867, to Louise H. Currier, also a native of Athens county, and has two children (daughters) of the latter wife living.
SHAEFFER, S. THEODORE, of Lancaster, probate judge, was born in Fairfield county, Ohio, August 9th, 1842. He is a son of Jacob and Elizabeth (Martens) Shaeffer, na- tives of Ohio, and of German ancestry. His father was a farmer in Fairfield county, where the boy's early life was spent. He was brought up to the labors of the farm, and his educational facilities were such only as were afforded in the common schools of the community where his father resided. However, he improved every opportunity in and out of school for the acquisition of knowledge, and at the age of nineteen had received sufficient instruction to begin teach- ing in the public schools of his county. In this vocation he was more successful than most men, and having a liking for the calling, he continued to teach for seventeen successive years. In the meantime, from the ages of twenty-six to thirty-six he was a magistrate in Clearcreek township,
Dowles
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BIOGRAPHICAL CYCLOPÆDIA AND PORTRAIT GALLERY.
where he then lived. Here he first made apparent the superior judicial character of his mind, filling the office so acceptably that it quickly became evident that sooner or later he would be called to more important stations in life. This came in the spring of 1878, when, without his seeking, and, in fact, against his protest, he was made the democratic can- didate for probate judge of Fairfield county, and, at the fol- lowing election in October, he was chosen to that office. Soon after his election he moved to Lancaster, where he has since resided. He assumed his new responsibilities with con- fidence, and is now discharging the duties of the place in such an acceptable manner as to call forth the highest enco- miums from the attorneys at the Lancaster bar. To say that the future has still greater successes for him is but to repeat the almost universal statement of those who know him best. Judge Shaeffer is democratic at all times, and is a member of the Evangelical Lutheran church. He was first married to Miss Louisa C. Barr, daughter of Samuel and Catherine Barr, March 6th, 1866. His second marriage was to Miss Nannie A. Barr, September 12th, 1878. He is the father of four children, all of whom are living. Few persons furnish so conspicuous an example of a self-made man as does the subject of our sketch, and none are more entitled to a place in American biography than Judge S. Theodore Shaeffer.
COWLES, EDWIN, editor, of Cleveland, Ohio, was born in Austinburgh, Ashtabula county, Ohio, September 19th, 1825. He is of Puritan and Huguenot descent. On the Cowles's side he was descended from John Cowles, one of three brothers who emigrated to this country about 1635, and settled in the town of Farmington, Connecticut, where his grandfather, Rev. Giles Hooker Cowles, D. D., was born. Rev. Thomas Hooker, the first clergyman of Connecticut, was one of his ancestors. On the side of his grandmother, Abi- gail White, a native of Stamford, Connecticut, he was de- scended from Peregrine White, who was the first white child born in New England. His great-grandmother, on the White side, was descended from a Huguenot family by the name of De Grasse, which name was subsequently changed to Weed. On his mother's side he is a descendant of Nathaniel Foote, the first settler of Wethersfield, Connecticut. His father, Dr. Edwin W. Cowles, was a practicing physician, and died at the residence of the son, in Cleveland, in the year of 1861. His grandfather, the Rev. Dr. Cowles, was a Congregational clergyman, who, after having preached in Bristol, Connecti- cut, eighteen years, emigrated to Austinburgh in the year 1810. He erected the first church edifice with a steeple on it on the Western Reserve, if not in Ohio. In this pioneer church he preached till 1830. Mr. Cowles accompanied his father to Cleveland in 1832, and was there educated and learned the trade of a printer. At the age of nineteen years, in partnership with Mr. T. H. Smead, he embarked in the print- ing business on his own account. This copartnership lasted until 1853, and upon its dissolution he became a member of the firm of Medill, Cowles & Co., established as the publish- ers of the Daily Forest City Democrat. This journal was the result of a consolidation of the True Democrat and Forest City, which, as losing ventures, had been published separ- ately by Messrs. Joseph Medill and J. C. Vaughan. On the formation of the firm of Medill, Cowles & Co., the printing office of Smead & Cowles was added to the Forest City Dem- ocrat property, and in 1854 the name of the journal was
changed to the Cleveland Leader. The year following, his partners disposed of their interest in the business to him, emigrated to Chicago and purchased the Chicago Tribune- of which his brother, Alfred Cowles, became the business manager-leaving him sole proprietor of the Leader. During the winter of 1854-55, the germ of the great republican party was first formed in the editorial room of the Leader, result- ing in the first republican national convention ever called, which was held in Pittsburgh. The gentlemen who were first connected with the movement were Messrs. John C. Vaughan, Joseph Medill, J. F. Keeler, Richard C. Parsons, Judge R. P. Spalding, and some others. This movement resulted in the consolidation of the know-nothing, whig, and free-soil parties all into one great party-the history of which is well known. He carried on the paper alone until 1866, when he organized the Leader Printing Company, in which he re- tained the controlling interest. For several years he acted only as business manager of the paper, and it was not until 1860 that he assumed the chief editorship. From this time he steadily rose to prominence as an editor because of the strength and boldness of his editorial utterances; and his progressive and decided views on popular topics soon made his journal one of the most powerful in the West. His pen was especially potent in the cause of republicanism immedi- ately after the election of President Lincoln, when he was among the first of the editors of the country to take a firm stand in favor of using the army and navy of the United States to suppress the heresy of secession. He was severely denounced by republican, conservative, and democratic jour- nals for what they termed his precipitate action; but he held on unflinchingly until the subsequent history of the nation had justified his course. In 1861 he was appointed postmas- ter of Cleveland, an office he ably filled for five years. Dur- ing his administration he established and perfected the system of free delivery of mail matter by carriers, and under dis- couraging circumstances succeeded in making it so effective that the returns to the department showed a larger free de- livery business than did those of almost any other city of the size of Cleveland, and was held up by the department at Washington as the pattern for other post-offices. The Leader was the first paper to come out in favor of the nom- ination of David Tod for governor of Ohio in 1861, and was the first to publicly suggest the name of John Brough for the same office in 1863. It was in 1861, shortly after the battle of Bull Run, that he wrote and published, in the columns of the Leader, his article entitled, "Now is the time to abolish slavery," which called forth the severest denunciations of numerous journals of both shades of politics. Some of them even called upon the President to remove him from the post- mastership as a peace offering to the South, for his having doubted the immunity of slaves, over all other property, from interference by Federal military authority. In the article named, he took the ground that the South, being in a state of war against the general government, the latter had the right to abolish slavery, as it had to capture and destroy property, burn towns, etc., as a military policy. In less than one year after the publication of this article, Mr. Lincoln issued his emancipation proclamation, which embodied pre- cisely the same views that were contained in Mr. Cowles's editorial. In the winter of 1870-71, he was the first to sug- gest, in his journal, the erection of the great viaduct five- eighths of a mile long and seventy feet high, at a cost of $3,000,000, to connect the west side of Cleveland with the
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BIOGRAPHICAL CYCLOPÆDIA AND PORTRAIT GALLERY.
east side, and thus avoid the necessity of crossing the "valley of death"-a name given to the flats on account of the great danger incurred in crossing the numerous railroad tracks which traverse them. His plan met with the strongest oppo- sition at first, but it was ultimately submitted to a popular vote and adopted almost unanimously. From the date of his assuming the editorial control of the Leader a rapid suc- cess was achieved, and the influence of the paper was made apparent in a circulation which reached two hundred thou- sand readers. His chief characteristic as an editor was his fearlessness in treating all questions of the day, and, like most men of his decided views and determined character, he had bitter enemies as well as warm friends. It was his aim and ambition to have the Leader take the lead in the pro- mulgation of advanced and progressive ideas; to elevate humanity to as high a scale as possible, and to oppose in every shape tyranny and injustice, whether of church, state, capital, or trades-union. His success in life has been attained under extraordinary disadvantages. From his birth he was afflicted with a peculiar defect in his hearing, causing the impediment he labors under in his pronunciation. His hear- ing is somewhat of the nature of color-blindness, and it was not discovered till he had reached the age of twenty-three, when Professor Kennedy, a distinguished elocutionist, became interested in his case. He made the discovery that Mr. Cowles never heard certain sounds of the human voice, that he has never heard the sound of bird's music since he came into the world, and that until then he had always supposed the music of the bird was a poetical fiction. A room may be filled with canary birds, and they may all sing at once, and he would never hear a note, but could hear their wings flutter. He never hears the hissing sound of the human voice, consequently not knowing of the existence of that sound, he grew up to manhood without ever making it in his speech. A portion of the consonants he never hears, yet he can hear all the vowels. He never could distinguish the difference between the soft and hard sounds of "s" and "g," consequently, in his conversation, he mixes those sounds sadly. He was taught arbitrarily how to make the hissing sound, but never hears it in his own voice; consequently he frequently omits that sound in his speech without knowing it, and when he does make it he labors in doing it, which accounts for the peculiarity of his pronunciation. Many words he pronounces literally according to their spelling, which gives an additional peculiarity to his speech. For in- stance he used to pronounce the word "parochial," just as it is spelled, until he was corrected, and he now pronounces it "parokial." He can not hear the difference between the sounds of "ch" and "k" when embodied in a word. Before he was taught to make the hissing sound his pronunciation sounded the same to other people that theirs did to him. About a quarter of the sounds of the human voice he never hears, and he has to watch the motion of the lips and be governed by the sense of the remarks in order to understand what is said to him. Take the sounds of the consonants "b" "t" "d" "p" "c" "g" "v." If he was not governed by the words in which they were embodied, or by the motion of the lips, or by the sense of the sentence, he would only hear the sound of "e," which is embodied in those letters; in other words, they would all sound alike to him if pro- nounced each by itself with his eyes closed, so as not to see the motion of the lips. He never hears the upper notes of the piano, violin, and other musical instruments, and yet he
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could hear all the notes below the seventh octave. The fife, in martial music, he never hears, although he would hear the drum. He has stood by the side of a policeman and seen him blow his whistle and not hear it, when it could be heard half a mile away. He has consulted aurists and sur- geons in reference to ascertaining the cause of his peculiar hearing, and they all tell him that there is not a similar case reported in the books. When he writes he is frequently in doubts when to place a terminal letter "s" when not gov- erned by grammatical rules. The letter "r" sounds like "ah," and he used to give the latter sound to that letter till he was corrected. From this it can be seen how Mr. Cowles's deafness has affected his pronunciation. Yet he is generally understood without any difficulty. Owing to his deafness and peculiarity of speech, he was the butt of the office in which he learned his trade, and many a hard-fought battle did he have to go through to defend himself from abuse. He fought grown-up journeymen printers as well as apprentices of his own age. Out of the ten or twelve printers who were in the habit of abusing him on account of his physical impediments, not one prospered in life, and most of them were their own worst enemies. As a citizen he is ever active in all benev- olent and charitable enterprises, giving liberally to them according to his means, and devoting the influence of his journal to their support and encouragement. In 1849 he married Miss Elizabeth C., daughter of the late Hon. Mosely Hutchinson, of Cayuga, New York, and they have five children.
TAYLOR, JOHN, was born in Shenandoah county, Virginia, December 25th, 1796. He was the son of John and Barbara Taylor, who left Virginia to get rid of slavery, and removed to East Tennessee-not, however, finding it much better 'there. One day Mr. Taylor heard the screams of a slave who was being whipped. It excited him, and he remarked to his wife, "I can't stand this ; we will have to move again." So, in 1807, they moved to Champaign county, Ohio, where they remained until the period of their deaths. The subject of our sketch had but little education, as there were so few advantages where he lived at that time, both as regarded schools and teachers, as to preclude his attend- ance. He lived with his father until he was twenty-one years old, and then went on a piece of land given him by his father, which he worked until 1834; then selling it and buying another tract, which he improved. In turn he sold this, adding to his capital by hard labor and each transfer. He next bought one hundred and sixty acres in Concord township. In 1848 he went to Defiance county, taking up five hundred and twenty acres of land at one dollar and fifty cents per acre-all wild. On this he went to work and cleared up a farm. Others thought the land was worthless, because it was so wet; but he saw that it could easily be surface drained, as it sloped on two sides from the middle. His first crop of wheat brought him thirty-three bushels to the acre. He lived on his farm until 1875, when he went to live with his son in Richland township. The first office he held was that of constable in 1827. In 1830 he was elected justice of the peace. In 1837 he was appointed by Gov- ernor Lucas to fill a place on the common pleas bench for the remainder of a term of three years. He gave such good satisfaction in every respect that he was honored with the next full term of six years, making nine consecutive years on the bench, where he received more education than
Jetanden
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BIOGRAPHICAL CYCLOPÆDIA AND PORTRAIT GALLERY.
during his whole previous life. In 1843 he was appointed assessor of damages by the State board of public works, the chief duty of his office being to appraise damages to the farm- ers caused by breaks in the canal. He served in this office five years. In 1848 he was commissioned by President James K. Polk as register of the United States land office. Soon after this Governor Chase appointed him director of the Ohio penitentiary, where he served three years. In 1852 he was elected to the State senate by the democrats. In 1854 he went to a democratic convention, held for the purpose of nominat- ing a State senator, and found it packed with land sharks. He refused to act with them, and withdrew. The people took him up, running him as an independent candidate, and elect- ing him by eight hundred majority. He did some good work for the people while in the senate. His acts in public life were always marked with a true honesty of purpose. The masses could always trust him as their friend and champion. Monopolies looked on him as their enemy. He was brought up a Hard-shell Baptist, and is still a member of that church, but does not believe in close communion. His heart is too large for such an illiberal doctrine. He is inde- pendent in politics, siding with neither party. He supports the candidate who, in his judgment, is the best man. He was married November 6th, 1817, to Anna, daughter of Ezekiel and Dolly McCollister. The fruit of this marriage was seven children-William, born January 10th, 1820; James, born December 14th, 1821; David, born May 13th, 1825, who, at the solicitation of Salmon P. Chase, served as paymaster in the army with the rank of colonel, until he died February 2Ist, 1879; Polly, born June 15th, 1827 ; Nancy, born October 16th, 1829; Benjamin, born November 30th, 1831; Sarah, born April 7th, 1836. The children lost their mother De- cember 21st, 1875. Mr. Taylor has been a granger for many years, and was appointed deputy-master of the Ohio State grange, July, 1881. He feels very proud of the fact that he has shaken hands with every governor of Ohio. His character is of the highest. He has always maintained a high moral character in public life as well as private. He has, during his long and active career in Defiance county, had the respect and esteem of all who know him, and is thoroughly liked.
SANDERS, JOHN CHAPIN, M. D., physician, Cleveland, Ohio, was born in Peru, Huron county, Ohio, July 2d, 1825. His father, Moses Chapin Sanders, M. D., whose biography appears in this work, was a practitioner of med- icine and surgery of forty years' experience, and distinguished for energy, endurance of toil, accurate judgment of disease and superior skill, and one of the pioneers of the Western Reserve. His mother, whose maiden name was Harriet M. Thompson, died during his infancy. His academical studies were pursued at Milan, Ohio. His professional studies were under the pupilage of his father, who took great pains in his training. When his studies were sufficiently advanced, he entered the medical department of the Western Reserve col- lege, at Cleveland, Ohio, and graduated therefrom at the close of the session of 1847-48. This was a period in the history of the college distinguished by the teachings of Profes- sors Kirtland, Delamater, Ackley, and St. Johns, who were then in the prime of their powers, and constituted an extra- ordinary corps of teachers searcely equaled by any other faculty in the country. After graduating in medicine, he engaged in the practice of his profession with his father. He
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