USA > Ohio > The biographical cyclopaedia and portrait gallery with an historical sketch of the state of Ohio. Volume II > Part 53
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54 | Part 55 | Part 56 | Part 57 | Part 58 | Part 59 | Part 60 | Part 61 | Part 62 | Part 63 | Part 64 | Part 65 | Part 66 | Part 67 | Part 68 | Part 69 | Part 70 | Part 71 | Part 72 | Part 73 | Part 74
feated. His election to the mayoralty was the inauguration of the boom for the Democratic party, and he can justly be styled " The Mascot " of the Ohio Democracy ; for it brought good luck to his party. He is known to be sensitive and high-spirited, but is never more quiet and deliberate than when deeply moved. Modest, calm, strong, and confident, he never feared to face a responsibility, nor turned aside from duty in order to swim with the current and go with the multitude. The administration of Mayor Means was marked by unusual executive ability. He fearlessly enforced hon- esty, economy, and efficiency in all the departments of the city government. He reduced expenditures, increased re- ceipts, initiated practical reforms, and never hesitated to assume a responsibility which the good of the city re- quired. His father early remarked of his son that William did his own thinking. In retiring from the office Mayor Means received a most flattering popular approval of his course. The local legislature, composed of the Boards of Aldermen and Councilmen, were in session; every available foot of space was occupied by an assembly of interested citi- zens and friends of the retiring officer. The president's desk and the space in front of the clerk's desk were filled with floral tributes, beautiful in design and charming in effect. The demonstration was intended as a parting tribute to Mayor Means, whose official service for the past two years was about to close. After a brief farewell address to his official staff and the representatives of the various municipal bodies present, Mr. Means was about to introduce his suc- cessor, when Hon. Michael Ryan, ex-President of the Board of Aldermen, arose and addressed Mr. Means, in the presence of the Common Council and other citizens who had gathered, in the following words : .
" MR. MAYOR MEANS-Now that your term of office is ended, it has been deemed appropriate by your many friends to compliment you on the high standard of honesty, integrity. and capacity which has characterized your administration of affairs. None of your predecessors in office has left it with cleaner hands or with a clearer record than you have made. Your rule has been mild, yet firm, dignified, honorable, and just. You have commanded the respect and confidence of all our citizens, of every shade of political opinion, and now that your official term is closed, you can return to your duties as a private citizen, with the proud consciousness of having done your duty well and nobly as chief magistrate of this city. In the name and on behalf of your hosts of warm friends and admirers, I am requested to present you with these floral tributes as a mark of their esteem and regard. The flowers will soon perish, it is true, but the services you have rendered your fellow-citizens will be ever gratefully remembered, and this slight token of appreciation will serve you through life as a pleasant memory of the closing moments of your term of office as Mayor of Cincinnati."
Evidently taken by surprise, Mr. Means looked more closely at the beautiful tribute before him, and said:
"MR. RYAN-Your language, graceful and eloquent as it is, is not yet so eloquent and expressive as these fragrant tokens, and I am utterly at a loss to express my feelings at the sentiments you have expressed and for these testimonials from my fellow-citizens. I know not who have done this, but I do not hesitate to assert they are from the law and order loving citizens-in fact, that they represent the best people of Cincinnati. As you have so kindly and compli- mentarily referred to my record as a public officer, I may venture to allude to it, and say that it is made; it might have, and I wish it could have, been better; and it might have been worse-but such as it is, it must remain forever. There it stands on the one side, my enemies and calumniators on the other; the people can take their choice. My great- hearted, eloquent friend and the noble contributors of those silent testimonials, have made their choice. and that choice
494
BIOGRAPHICAL CYCLOPÆDIA AND PORTRAIT GALLERY.
represents people who would uphold no unworthy record, and into such hands I cheerfully consign it. I can now lay my work down with satisfaction and without regret. I ap- preciate, in my soul, the honor that has this day been con- ferred upon me, and regard it as one of the greatest victories of my life. And to you, sir, to all my officers, and members of the municipal bodies represented here, permit me to ex- press the hope, as I have been made happy to-day with flowers, that the thorns may be removed, and your paths scattered with flowers henceforward and forever."
The next day the Cincinnati Commercial Gazette-the Com- mercial having most persistently opposed his election-gave public indorsement of the official career of Mr. Means in the following editorial :
" Mayor Means retired from office yesterday. He pledged himself when elected to be Mayor, not of a party, but of the whole people, and his administration largely redeemed his promise. He made enemies, of course, as any man will do who is a man and refuses to be controlled by people who have political debts to pay, or ward workers who think they ought to control the municipal offices within the gift of the Mayor. One of the predictions made when Mr. Means was elected was that he would be as clay in the hands of the potter, and that a set of political managers would master him. Those who knew Mr. Means were aware that the weakness of submitting to management was not part of his character. As a business man he ranked among the foremost, and firmness was one of his characteristics. These qualities he displayed as the chief executive of Cincinnati, and he retires from the office with a clean record and with no enemies, ex- cept among those who would not be friends except upon conditions that an honest and high-minded man could not submit to. During the two years of his administration no one dared to approach him with a dishonorable proposition, and every dollar that came through his office is accounted for to the last cent. Fortunate indeed will it be for his suc- cessor, Mr. Stephens, if he shall be able during two years to represent the whole people as Mr. Means has done, and leave his office in as clean a condition as he finds it. If he shall do this, he will have many enemies, and bitter ones, among the bummer element of his own party, but he will at the same time have the satisfaction of knowing that he did right, and secured the respect of all classes whose good opinion is worth having. Mr. Means retires from office to business, and we wish him that success in the future which has always crowned his labors in the past, and that is all his best friends could desire for him."
The summer residence of Mr. Means, at Yellow Springs, is one of the most beautiful in the State, which is made more delightful by a charming family circle; and the elegant hos- pitality of "The Woods," directed by Mrs. Means, has be- come proverbial. Mr. Means has not only served the city in the capacity of chief executive, but he has never hesitated to discharge the duties of good citizenship in other positions. He was a Commissioner of the Cincinnati Industrial Exposi- tion and Chairman of the Committee on Rules for five suc- cessive years ; Vice-president of the Chamber of Commerce ; and as one of the corporators of Music Hall was very instru- mental in securing funds for the completion of the Exposi- tion buildings. He is now president of several incorporated companies in Ohio and other States, the most important of which is a company of capitalists formed to co-operate with a French syndicate for investments in this country. Mr. Means declined a re-election to the office of Mayor, and, although his name was prominently mentioned as a strong and available candidate for Congress in the First District and also for Governor of the State, he retired from politics to assume the presidency of the Metropolitan National Bank, to which he had been elected before the expiration of his term of office. He continues in this position of trust and confidence.
MCGUFFEY, JOHN G., lawyer, Columbus, Ohio, was born in Madison township, Franklin county, Ohio, September Ioth, 1832. He is the second son of John McGuffey, a sketch of whose life, containing the genealogical history of the fam- ily, is printed in another part of this work. In that sketch it will be seen how the parents of our subject made their own start in life among the wilds of Madison township, and how necessary it was for all the family, and especially the "first born," to exert every energy in the development of the new country. Of course John G. came in for his share of farm labor, to which he was inured, and continued at this with little interruption, from his infancy till he was twenty- two years of age. About a year and a half of this time was spent in academic schools and in the Central and Delaware Colleges, and one year he was engaged in teaching. At twenty-two he entered the Ohio University at Athens, and there graduated in the class of 1857. Soon after his gradu- ation he began reading law in the office of Messrs. Geiger & Andrews, at Columbus. He pursued a zealous course of- reading till October, 1858, when he entered the Law School at Cincinnati, whence he graduated in 1859, immediately thereafter being admitted to the bar at Cincinnati, and at once opened an office in Columbus, and entered regularly upon the practice of the law, and has continued in the prac- tice of his profession ever since. The first three years of his professional career he practiced alone ; from 1862 to 1868 he was in partnership with Judge E. F. Bingham, and from 1868 to 1875 Hon. John D. Burnett was his professional partner. Since the latter date he has been alone. September roth, 1862, he was married to Miss Lida H. Snow, third daughter of the Rev. William T. Snow, of Worthington, and an intel- ligent and refined woman. The fruits of this marriage are the Misses Mary V. and Josie A. McGuffey, two bright and accomplished young ladies. Mr. McGuffey is a man of great energy and sagacious business capacity. He is a clear- headed and learned lawyer, and while his special merit, perhaps, lies in his ability as a fine pleader, he is also for- midable as an advocate when debating legal propositions before a court. His arguments are always forcible and well delivered. His mind is largely analytical, and he delights in meeting and combating a good reasoner at the bar. When listening to an able, clear, and logical argument, he is wont to remark, " Plato, thou reasonest well," and then takes up the weakest points of his adversary and puts them to the severe test of an analytical argument. Mr McGuffey is as far removed from the shyster or pettifogging style of practi- tioners as it is possible for a man to be. He is free from every feature of hypocrisy, subterfuge, or chicanery, and as a result he always commands respect from judge and jury. Whatever success he has acquired at the bar has been the result of the justness of his causes and an honest and fair application of the law and the testimony to such actions. As a probate attorney he has served hundreds of clients, and is known as a kind and faithful servant to the poor and dis- tressed. But it is not alone in the realm of jurisprudence that Mr. McGuffey claims our consideration. He is well versed in the natural sciences, history, and polite literature. Socially he stands very high. He is possessed of an agree- able, sympathetic, and generous nature, and has many warm personal friends, for all of whom he has a word of kindness and good cheer. He is a kind and beneficent husband and father, a firm friend and a good neighbor, a scholar, and a i gentleman.
John G. M. Huffer
Wester- Pri Pub La
1883.
495
BIOGRAPHICAL CYCLOPÆDIA AND PORTRAIT GALLERY.
JONES, ELIJAH P., President of the First National Bank, of Findlay, Ohio, born in Genesee County, New York, March 6th, 1820, is descended of New England families, the ancestors of whom on the one side were English, and on the other Scotch. Both of his parents were natives of Con- necticut, and his grandsires-paternal and maternal-were, in their generation, prominent citizens of the same State. His mother, whose maiden name was Hannah Pelton, was a granddaughter of Ebenezer Pelton, a commissary of the Revolutionary army. He was a son of the Connecticut Pelton-one of the three brothers of that name who came from Scotland, and settled respectively at Milford, Con- necticut ; Boston, Massachusetts; and Brooklyn, New York. Elijah Jones, the father of Elijah P., went from the Con- necticut homestead to Pennsylvania. He was interested in the timber lands of that State, and shipped from there large quantities of lumber to Baltimore and other Southern cities. He subsequently removed to Genesee County, New York, where, in Rochester, he engaged in mercantile pursuits, and also projected and carried on, among other industries, a pearlash works, the product of which found its principal market in the countries of Europe. In 1826, when the sub- ject of this sketch was six years old, his parents moved with him to Ohio. They settled at Willoughby, Lake County, near the then infant city of Cleveland. It was there the lad passed eight years of his boyhood, attending such schools as the place afforded, and embracing all the educational advan- tages within his reach. He was a steady youth, learned rap- idly, grew in the favor and confidence of the neighbors, and at the age of sixteen was tendered the principalship of a district school. He taught in the winter months and during vacations prosecuted his own studies, until 1838, when he accepted a situation as clerk in the Cleveland Post-office. He was then eighteen. Three years later he quitted the post-office, and, desirous of increasing his knowledge, entered Norwalk Academy, his teacher being that eminent scholar, Rev. Edward Thomson, afterward bishop of the Methodist Episcopal Church of the United States. Finishing the aca- demic course, young Jones was appointed agent of the San- dusky and Mansfield (Baltimore and Ohio) Railroad. In that capacity he served until a year later, when he accepted the position of agent for the Mad River and Lake Erie (now the Indianapolis, Bloomington and Western) Railroad. The duties of both of these situations were discharged with marked ability, and he proved himself an efficient and ac- ceptable officer. In 1849 he became the lessee of the Carey and Findlay Railroad. It was then just completed, and Mr. Jones took a lease for a term of two and a half years. That term having expired, and being satisfied with the results of this, his first, venture, he had the lease extended, and thereby operated the Carey and Findlay Road, in all, between seven and eight years. In 1852, attracted by the emigration to the Pacific Coast, he became interested in an extensive enter- prise there. Associating with him as partners, his brother George and E. N. Cook, he embarked in general merchan- dising in Oregon, with headquarters at Salem. The under- taking was hazardous, as goods had to be shipped by sea from New York, around Cape Horn, and landed in a country of wild and hostile Indians. For four years the expedition progressed satisfactorily. But in 1855, the Indians being on the war-path, an improvised army was raised to suppress them. Having no commissary stores, the volunteer troops made incursions into the settlements for forage and clothing.
They seized mills and grain wherever found, took possession of the warehouse and store of the Messrs. Jones & Cook, and appropriated the contents for their imaginary as well as for their real wants, amounting, in all, to sixty thousand dollars. The officer in command of the volunteers gave a receipt for the goods taken, which, as Oregon was then a Territory, was ratified at Washington, and the claim for damage of Jones & Cook was, in its own way, adjusted by the federal govern- ment. In 1857 the partnership was dissolved, and going to New York, Mr. Jones acted in the capacity of a broker. By adopting the calling of broker he made no mistake. His foresight, sound judgment, coolness, and especially his un- flinching integrity to every promise, drew to him numerous patrons and secured a large and lucrative business. He next
turned his attention to banking, and when the National Bank Bill became a law he at once applied for a charter. He was the first applicant-so Secretary Chase told him-and although he tendered the required bonds, and presented an application in due form, yet the Treasury Department was not in a shape to perform its new functions-to receive the bonds or file the application-else Findlay would have had the first bank chartered under the act, in the country. Soon thereafter, however, Mr. Jones had the First National Bank, of Findlay, incorporated, and upon its organization was elected its presi- dent ; and since then (1863) to the present (1883) he has con- tinued to preside over the institution, and has been at all times its chief stockholder. The bank was the first to be re- chartered under the present national bank law, and conse- quently holds the oldest national bank charter in the United States. He owns lands throughout Hancock County, pos- sesses valuable real estate in the city, and has interests in the enterprises that have had for their object the substantial welfare of Findlay. He has been careful, methodical, and punctual in all his business relations, and although full of energy, and prompt to act when occasion requires, yet his motto seems to be " Never do to-day what can be put off till to-morrow." In religious faith he is a Presbyterian, and he contributes liberally to the support of that denomination, but he responds with his funds to demands upon him to assist other Churches, and educational and charitable establish- ments of the place. Politically he is a Republican. January 15th, 1862, he was married to Mellie E. Johnston, who comes of a prominent family of Scotch-Irish origin. She was the daughter of John S. Johnston, of Piqua, Ohio, and granddaughter of William Johnston, one of the pioneers of the same place. She is an accomplished scholar, and was graduated at the Wesleyan College, Delaware, in the classical class of 1861. Mr. Jones has had three children, two daugh- ters and a son, all living. They are Cornelia Frances, Mary Gertrude (both attending Vassar College, New York), and George Pelton, the youngest. Mr. Jones is temperate in his habits, is thrifty, and his bearing is gentlemanly and unas- suming. He is tall-fully six feet-and possesses a physique that indicates good health and a robust constitution. He resides in Findlay, where he has a beautiful home, the sur- roundings of which show evidence of affluence and refined taste.
WAYNE, GENERAL ANTHONY, was born in Chester County, Pennsylvania, on the Ist of January, 1745. He was the son of an Irishman, who emigrated to this country in the year 1722, and afterward became a member of the Provincial Assembly, and an officer in the various military expeditions
496
BIOGRAPHICAL CYCLOPÆDIA AND PORTRAIT GALLERY.
which were fitted out against the Indians. After leaving school, in which his attention to the mathematical sciences was marked, Anthony Wayne became a surveyor. That calling he followed for a number of years, devoting part of his time, however, to various county offices to which he had been chosen. In 1774 he was one of the Provincial Deputies who met in Philadelphia to deliberate upon the state of affairs, and was also a member of the convention and of the Legislature. In 1775 he was a member of the Committee of Safety. Before the close of that year he had raised a regiment for immediate service, and, as its commander, he joined General Sullivan, for duty in Canada. He was in the engagement of Three Rivers. He had command of five regiments at Ticonderoga and Mount Independence, until May, 1777, when he joined General Washington, in New Jersey, and aided in driving the enemy out of that State. He was defeated at Paoli by a superior force, when in com- mand, as brigadier-general, of fifteen hundred men. General Wayne led the attack of the American right wing at Ger- mantown, and gave much efficient service to the American cause. He fought nobly at the battle of Monmouth. When Stony Point was to be captured, General Wayne was fixed upon by Washington as the proper man for the service, and he fulfilled the expectations of his commander. The place was defended by six hundred men and a strong battery of ar- tillery. At midnight he led his troops, with unloaded muskets, flints out, and fixed bayonets, and without firing a single gun, carried the fort by storm, and took five hundred and forty-three prisoners. He was struck in the attack by a musket ball, in the head, and was supposed to have received a mortal wound. He called to his aides to carry him for- ward, and let him die in the fort. But he did not die. He recovered his health in time to take part in the Southern campaign, in 1781. After the surrender of Cornwallis, Gen- eral Wayne was assigned to the command of Georgia, and succeeded in driving the enemy from that State. When the war closed he remained in Georgia, being a member of the Constitutional Convention of that State, and also served, for a short time, as a member of Congress. After the defeat of St. Clair, General Washington looked for some man who could recover the laurels we had lost by that disaster. His choice was finally fixed upon General Wayne. In the summer of 1792 that officer repaired to Pittsburg, when he proceeded to recruit and discipline an army. On the 30th of April, 1793, General Wayne moved from his winter-quarters to the neighborhood of Fort Washington. They set out for the North on the 7th of October. The next summer they nego- tiated with the Indians, but unsuccessfully. The British had promised them aid, and the red men relied upon them. On the 28th of July, Wayne having been joined by General Scott, with sixteen hundred mounted Kentuckians, moved forward to the Maumee. By the 8th of August the army had arrived near the junction of the Auglaize with that stream, and commenced the erection of Fort Defiance, at that point. The Indians, having learned from a deserter of the approach of Wayne's army, hastily abandoned their head-quarters at Auglaize, and thus defeated the plan of Wayne to surprise them, for which object he had cut two roads, intending to march by neither. At Fort Defiance, Wayne received full information of the Indians, and the assistance they were to derive from the volunteers at Detroit and vicinity. On the 13th of August, true to the spirit of peace advised by Washington, he sent Christian Miller, who
had been naturalized among the Shawnees, as a special messenger to offer terms of friendship. Impatient of delay, he moved forward, and on the 16th met Miller on his return with the message that if the Americans would wait ten days at Grand Glaize [Fort Defiance], they (the Indians) would decide for peace or war. On the 18th the army arrived at Roche de Bœuf, just south of the site of Waterville, where they erected some light works as a place of deposit for their heavy baggage, which was named Fort Deposit. During the 19th the army labored at their works, and about eight o'clock on the morning of the 20th moved forward to attack the Indians, who were encamped on the bank of the Maumee, at and around a hill called Presque Isle, about two miles south of the site of Maumee City, and four south of the British Fort Miami. The loss of the Americans in this battle was thirty-three killed and one hundred wounded-including five officers among the killed, and nineteen wounded. One of the Canadians taken in the action estimated the force of the Indians at about fourteen hundred. He also stated that about seventy Canadians were with them, and that Colonel McKee, Captain Elliott, and Simon Girty were in the field, but at a respectful distance, and near the river. When the broken remains of the Indian army were pursued under the British fort, the soldiers could scarce be restrained from storming it. This, independent of its results in bringing on a war with Great Britain, would have been a desperate measure, as the fort mounted ten pieces of artillery, and was garrisoned by four hundred and fifty men, while Wayne had no armament proper to attack such a strongly fortified place. While the troops remained in the vicinity there did not appear to be any communication between the garrison and the savages. The gates were shut against them, and their rout and slaughter witnessed with apparent unconcern by the British. The Indians were astonished at the lukewarm- ness of their allies, and regarded the fort, in case of defeat, as a place of refuge. On the 27th Wayne's army returned to Fort Defiance, by easy marches, laying waste the villages and corn-fields of the Indians for about fifty miles on each side of the Maumee. The battle of Fallen Timbers ended the Indian wars, and was followed the next year by the treaty of Greenville. This was a substantial and well-observed compact, and the people of Ohio and Eastern Indiana had no cause to complain of the Indian tribes until just before the war of 1812. It covered the Wyandots, Delawares, Shawnees, Miamis, Ottawas, Chippewas, Pottowattomies, Kickapoos, Kaskaskias, Weas, the Eel River tribe, and the Piankeshaws. General Wayne died at Presque Isle (now Erie), Pennsylvania, of gout, while on his way from Detroit to Philadelphia, December 14th, 1796, a few days before he was fifty-one years of age. His remains were interred, at his own request, under the flag-staff of the fort, on the shore of Lake Erie, but were removed by his son, Colonel Isaac Wayne, in 1809, to Radnor churchyard, near the place of his birth, in Delaware County, Pennsylvania, where an elegant monument was erected in his honor by the Cincinnati Society of Pennsylvania. "Mad Anthony " was one of the best generals of the Revolution. He was a man apparently of great rashness, and yet no one acted, in a time of emergency, with greater coolness and foresight. He thoroughly under- stood the Indian character, and was not deceived by their strategies. He kept the savages in check, and by one de- cisive blow crippled their power forever. His name is insep- arably connected with the history of this State.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.