USA > Ohio > The biographical cyclopaedia and portrait gallery with an historical sketch of the state of Ohio. Volume II > Part 64
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company has returned a dividend each year to its stockholders. The business involves a large amount of detail, in the man- agement of which Mr. Crouse excels. He is clear-headed, methodical, accurate in his knowledge of men, and has been remarkably successful in his choice and management of sub- ordinates. Of great industry and energy, doing easily more than one man's work, unsparing of himself, he plans wisely and carries out his plans with rare judgment, so that by the general consent of the community, he is as a business man placed in the front rank. By his sagacious financial man- agement, and his control of agents and agencies, he has given the highest efficiency to his department of the business, and has done his full share in achieving a well-merited suc- cess for the "Buckeye Mower and Reaper." These quali- ties of industry, thoroughness and rare ability, have caused him to be sought by his townsmen for various local offices. Elected a member of the city council, he has served as its president; a member and the president of the Board of Ed- ucation, he has also been three years a county commissioner, and the chairman of the county central republican committee. He has been for some years a vestryman of the Protestant Episcopal church, of which he is a member, while his various public responsibilities have taught him the necessity of ex- pressing his thoughts in manner sufficiently impressive as to be clearly understood and felt by his audience, and this fact has the effect of causing him to be listened to with attention and respect. It is by no fortuitous circumstances Mr. Crouse reached the honorable position he occupies, but rather by rigid devotion to duty, and by incessant application to his various business engagements, laying that foundation upon which has been established his high character for industry and integrity. Thus educated, when opportunities for pros- perous engagements offered, he was ready to take advantage of them, and from this cause his life affords one of the most brilliant examples of the self-made men of his native State. A poor man's son, as a youth he came to Akron from his country home with nothing more than a stout heart and a steadfast determination to make all he could out of himself ; and his successful manhood has been simply the develop- ment of the purposes of his youth. On the 18th October, 1859, he married Miss Martha K., the daughter of Edward Parsons, of Brimfield, Portage county, who was by occupa- tion a merchant. From this union, five children, four daughters and one son, have been the issue. In addition to the business in which he is principally engaged, Mr. Crouse aided and encouraged other business enterprises in Akron, among which were the Whitman & Barnes Manufacturing Company, the Akron Rubber Works, doing business as B. F. Gooderich & Co., and the Akron Manilla Paper Com- pany, doing business as Thomas Phillips & Co., the former being a joint-stock company, in which he is a director and vice-president, and the latter a co-partnership, in which he is a one-third owner. In 1870 he assisted to organize the Bank of Akron, in which he is a stockholder and its presi- dent. In politics a Republican, he carries the same earnest- ness into the partisanship of his political convictions that characterizes him elsewhere. In the various important duties of a citizen he employs his aptness for detail, and is sought by his party for his excellence and influence as a worker.
HAMILTON, EDWIN TIMOTHY, Judge of the Court of Common Pleas, Cuyahoga County, was born in Newburgh (now forming part of the city of Cleveland), Ohio, July 13th,
1830. His father, Justus Hamilton, was born in Massachu- setts, in 1792, and migrated with his father, in 1801, to New- burgh, where he died in 1864. He was for many years a magistrate in Newburgh, a man most highly thought of, and one who bestowed great care in the training of his family, inculcating their minds with the loftiest and strictest ideas of honor and integrity. He was a farmer, whose early ancestry came from the sturdy race of the North of Ireland. Judge Hamilton's mother, Salinda Brainard, was born in Connecti- cut, and was a lineal descendant of Daniel Brainard, who was brought to this country from England, when eight years of age, and became, in 1662, the largest landholder in Had- dam, Connecticut. The subject of our sketch, after receiv- ing a common school education in his native town of New- burgh, entered Alleghany College, at Meadville, Pennsylvania. Early in life imbibing a taste for the law, he decided upon adopting it for his profession. After a due course of study, he was admitted to the bar, at Painesville, Ohio, in 1854. The same year he located, in the practice of his profession, at Ottumwa, Iowa. On account of sickness, however, he re- mained there but a few months, when he removed to Cleve- land, and speedily established himself in what became a large and lucrative practice. In 1862, during the war of the Rebellion, he took up arms in defense of the Union, by en- listing as a private in Company D, 84th Ohio Volunteer In- fantry. In 1873 the town of Newburgh having been incor- porated with the city of Cleveland, as the 18th Ward, he was one of the first two elected from that ward as members of the City Council. In this official position he did good and valuable service. In 1875 he was elected Judge of the Court of Common Pleas. His career on the bench gave such uni- versal satisfaction that he was honored with a re-election in 1880. In politics he is a Republican, having been a mem- ber of that party from its organization, though the etiquette, dignity, and usefulness of his judicial position forbids his being an active politician. February 10th, 1863, he was mar- ried to Mary E. Jones, of Cleveland. They have one son and one daughter: Walter J., born April 14th, 1865; and Florence A., born December Ist, 1866. Of Judge Hamilton it may be said that he is a man without reproach, in both his private and public career. As a lawyer, his arguments were terse and forcible. As a Judge, he is fearless, impar- tial, and righteous in his decisions ; a man of quick perception and keen insight, a clear and logical mind, and thoroughly conversant with the law in all its bearings. In the judiciary of the State he takes high rank, and enjoys the confidence and respect of his brother jurists. He is a ripe scholar ; possessed of a quiet dignity and commanding presence ; and as a private gentleman is honored and respected by the community and beloved by his family. They reside in a beautiful home in the Forest City, where he reaps the reward of his early application to study.
HURD, FRANK, lawyer, was born at Mt. Vernon, Ohio, December 25th, 1841, and living at Toledo, Ohio, May, 1883. He is a son of the distinguished jurist and author, Hon. Rollin C. Hurd, and grandson of Hon. Asahel Hurd, a prominent and influential citizen, who represented Bennington county in the Vermont legislature, and filled other responsible and honor- able public positions. The family was of the old Puritan stock, descended from John Hurd, who came from England- in the "Mayflower," He was educated at Kenyon College, whence he was graduated in 1859, and immediately entered .
Western Biogl, Pub Co
I. Hamilem
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upon the study of law. Soon after his admission to the bar in 1862, he was elected prosecuting attorney of Knox county, the duties of which office he performed with ability. His po- litical affiliations were with the democratic party, and he early became an influential and zealous worker for the supremacy of its principles. He was elected to the State senate, and served two years, during which he secured marked im- provements in some of the Ohio laws. He was the author of the Ohio criminal code of procedure, and obtained the pas- sage of the bill for its adoption. While chairman of the judiciary he introduced a code of offenses and punishments. In 1867 he removed to Toledo to engage in the practice of law, but retaining his prominence in politics he was elec- ted, the year following, city solicitor and filled that office for four years. He was, in 1872, the candidate of his party for a seat in Congress and was defeated by General Sherwood, but in the memorable election of 1874, being again nominated he was elected. In Congress he was a member of the ju- diciary committee and made the majority report on the Hallet- Kilbourne case, as to the power of Congress over recusant witnesses, and the report of a portion of the committee on the distribution of the Geneva awards. He favored the pay- ment of the awards to the insurance companies, a matter of great importance, particularly in the Eastern States. In 1876, he published a second edition of his father's work on " Ha- beas Corpus," and one of his own on "Homestead and other Exemptions." In the State Democratic convention held in Cincinnati, in June, 1876, he was the acknowledged champion of the " specie basis," and made a brilliant speech against the adoption of the so-called inflation platform. In 1878, he was elected member of the Forty-sixth Congress, from the seventh (Toledo) district, and again in 1882.
HOADLY, GEORGE, lawyer, of Cincinnati, the twenty- eighth Governor elected by the people of Ohio, was born in New Haven, Connecticut, July 31st, 1826, the only son of George and Mary Ann Hoadly (daughter of William Walton Woolsey and Elizabeth Dwight Woolsey, of New York). His mother was a great-granddaughter of Jonathan Edwards, a niece of President Dwight, of Yale College, and the eldest daughter in a family which embraced among its members her younger brother, President Woolsey, of Yale College, her nephew, Theodore Winthrop, and her niece, Miss Sarah Woolsey, known in literature as "Susan Coolidge." His father was a man of great integrity and purity of character, ranking high in social and public life. He was at one time Mayor of New Haven, Connecticut, but in 1830 removed with his family to Cleveland, Ohio, where he continued to reside during the remainder of his life, greatly respected by his fellow-townsmen, who also, honored him with an election to the chief magistracy of that city. The subject of this notice received his elementary education in Cleveland, and at the age of fourteen was sent to Western Reserve College, at Hudson, Ohio, where he graduated in 1844. He then entered the law school at Cambridge, Massachusetts, where he passed one year of study, under the tuition of Judge Story and Professor Simon Greenleaf, and after reading a second year in the office of Charles C. Convers, Esq., then a prom- inent attorney in Zanesville, Ohio (and afterward a Judge of the Court of Common Pleas and Supreme Court of Ohio), came to Cincinnati, and entered the law office of Chase & Ball, as a student, in September, 1846, and was admitted to the bar in August, 1847. He soon attracted the attention
and secured the friendship of Salmon P. Chase, afterward Chief-justice of the United States, who was keenly alive to the importance of attaching to himself young men of prom- ise, and in 1849 was admitted to this firm as junior partner (Chase, Ball & Hoadly). Mr. Chase's election to the United States Senate, and consequent withdrawal from professional duty in Cincinnati, in the same year, led to Mr. Hoadly's appearing in important cases very early in his career, and probably contributed to his election, by the Legislature, in 1851, to the office of Judge of the Superior Court of Cincin- nati, for the residue of the term to which that court had been limited by the Constitutional Convention. His predecessors on that bench were Judges Este, Coffin, Johnston, and James, whose legal powers had been ripened by years of study and experience. He labored with zeal to overcome the disad- vantages of his youth and inexperience, and to preserve the high reputation that court had ever held among the lawyers of the State. In 1853 he formed a co-partnership with Edward Mills, was City Solicitor of Cincinnati in 1855-6, and in 1859 succeeded Judge W. Y. Gholson on the bench of the New Superior Court. In 1856 he was offered, by Governor Chase, and again by Governor Tod, in 1862, a seat upon the Supreme Bench of Ohio, but declined both appointments. He was re- elected to the bench in 1864, but resigned in 1866, to establish the firm of Hoadly, Jackson & Johnson, which soon ranked among the actively employed law firms of the country. In the Constitutional Convention of 1873-4, for the revision of the Constitution, to which he was elected without opposition, he took an active part, devoting eight months to its business. In this body he was chairman of the Committee on Municipal Corporations, and devoted his attention principally to devis- ing methods to check the increase of public burdens. Al- though Judge Hoadly was considered one of the hard workers at the Cincinnati bar, he nevertheless found time to labor as Professor in the Law School (in which he has filled a chair for eighteen years), Trustee of the University, and of the Cin- cinnati Museum, member of the Committee of the School of Design, and in other ways to promote the progress of the arts and sciences. He was one of the counsel who, on be- half of the Board of Education, successfully resisted the effort to compel Bible reading in the public schools of Cin- cinnati. Originally a Democrat in politics, he took issue with his associates on the subject of slavery, and this differ- ence led to his separation from that party to become attached to the Republican party, of which he continued a supporter until the end of General Grant's first term. He was a mem- ber, and represented Ohio, in the Committee on Resolutions of the Liberal Republican National Convention, in 1872, but disapproving of the principle and policy which lead to the nomination of Horace Greeley, he refused to join in his support, and voted (with regret) the second time for Grant, as a choice of evils. In 1876, with many other liberal Re- publicans, he joined the Democratic ranks under the banner of reform and the leadership of Tilden and Hendricks, be- lieving that the necessary reforms in the government would be more surely secured by their success than by that of Hayes and Wheeler; and in February, 1877, upon the invi- tation of the Democratic Committee having in charge the Tilden interest, before the Electoral Commission appointed by Congress to settle the disputed Presidency of that year, he appeared as counsel, and argued in favor of the claims of the Florida and Oregon Democratic electors. In 1880 he presided as temporary Chairman over the Democratic
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National Convention. In social and private life Judge Hoadly is beloved as a man, warm in his friendships, and charitable toward those who differ with him. He is the friend of young men struggling for success in the legal pro- fession. In 1883 he was actively engaged in the duties of a large practice, assisted by his partners, Edgar M. Johnson and Edward Colston, both able lawyers and highly respected citizens. In 1875 his alma mater conferred on him the hon- orary degree of Doctor of Laws. At the Democratic State Convention which convened at Columbus, Ohio, June 22d, 1883, Judge Hoadly was nominated for Governor. At the inception of an exciting canvass he was stricken down with sickness, rendering it necessary for him to place himself under the care of the eminent physician, Roberts Bartholow, of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, so that he was unable to make but five speeches during the entire cam- paign, while his opponent, Hon. J. B. Foraker, made a com- plete tour of the State, making one hundred and five political addresses to the people-notwithstanding these unfortunate circumstances, and the very confident feeling of Republicans that their candidate would be triumphantly elected, Judge Hoadly carried the State by a plurality of about thirteen thous- and. In 1851 Judge Hoadly married Mary Burnet Perry, third daughter of Captain Samuel Perry, one of the earliest settlers of Cincinnati. They have issue three children : George (grad- uated, at Harvard University, B. A. in 1879, and LL. B. in 1882), Laura, and Edward Mills, all living in 1883.
STUDABAKER, ABRAHAM, pioneer to Darke county, Ohio, was born in Westmoreland county, Pennsylvania, about the year 1785, and died in Darke county, Ohio, March 16th, 1852. He was brought with his father's family to Ohio in the year 1793, and passed his youth in Clinton county, where his parents died. In the spring of 1808 he became one of the first settlers of Darke county, which was then a wilder- ness, inhabited by wild beasts and Indians. At this time there were but two habitations in the territory that now com- prises the county. He erected a third, a rude log cabin, having a chimney built of sticks cemented with mud, as a home for his family of a wife and one young child. Mr. Studabaker's experience was a good illustration of some of the difficulties that disheartened the early settlers. He brought with him a horse and a cow, and after a while his little stock of domestic animals was increased by the birth of a calf. During the first year he cleared an acre or two of ground, which he planted in corn. He had just gathered this little crop when his faithful horse died of milk-sickness. Shortly
afterward the calf was killed by wolves. Hoping to catch some of these ravenous beasts, he baited a wolf trap with the mangled remains of the poor calf, and the cow, in hunting for her lost baby, put her head into the trap which fell and broke her neck! Soon after the breaking out of the war of 1812, he erected a block-house in the vicinity of Green- ville, as a protection against the Indians. All other families fled the surrounding part of the country, but he remained through the dangers of that struggle. He used to remark that he was "too poor to get away !" For about two weeks after dangers began to thicken he was housed up in this wooden fort,-himself, wife and one young child being the only occupants,-threatened with all manner of barbarities and outrages by the frenzied Indians, against which as a means of defense he had but two rifles and a small amount of ammunition. The second (or garret) story of this structure
projected on all sides a few feet over the first or ground story, thus giving its inmates a fair chance to repel parties attempt- ing to break in, or to fire the building from below. For a protection against this latter mode of attack on the part of the Indians, he kept constantly ready two hogsheads filled with water. After he had for about two weeks been in this isolated and dangerous condition, the government, greatly to his relief, sent six soldiers with arms and ammunition for the protection of his little family. This block-house which Mr. Studabaker had charge of during the war, served as an inn, a post of refuge, official headquarters, and other valuable purposes. Upon one occasion he captured five armed In- dians and turned them over to a government officer. They however, subsequently escaped, and killed two United States soldiers near Greenville, named Stoner and Elliott. While Abraham Studabaker and his family escaped the barbarities of this savage conflict, his brother David was murdered by the Indians near the site of Fort Wayne, Indiana. After the war closed, Mr. Studabaker was employed by the government to furnish cattle to feed the Indians till the treaty of peace could be consummated. Upon the organization of Darke county in 1817, he was placed on the first board of commis- sioners, and served with it for thirteen years. He was also a captain in the early day militia. He was reared and lived amid scenes of pioneer privation and hardship, and as a natural result, his education was exceedingly meagre. He was, however, endowed with fine natural business abilities, and had a most successful financial career. He was largely instrumental in securing the first railroad through Darke county, formerly the Greenville and Miami, now the Dayton and Union. He also advanced the money to build the first court house in the county. He was a man of excellent judg- ment, great sagacity, large hospitality, and of unquestionable integrity. He spoke his mind without reserve, and was very decided in his opinions-in politics, strongly democratic. His first wife was Mary Townsend, daughter of William Town- send, of Clinton county, Ohio, and who bore him seven children. His second wife was Elizabeth Hardman, of Butler county, Ohio, who bore him five children. She died in the fall of 1868. Two sons of this pioneer, David and George, reside in Darke county. David Studabaker, second son by his first wife, was born in the old block-house, September 17th, 1814. On February 13th, 1835, he married Maria, daughter of William Folkerth, of Darke county, who bore him five children. Mrs. Studabaker died in April, 1846. On December 13th, 1849, he married Jane, daughter of Samuel Culbertson, of the same county. David Studabaker was one of the movers in the organization of the county agricultural society, also a prominent participant in securing the first rail- road through the county, and for two years was president of the company. By occupation he is a farmer, and a very active, industrious and good citizen. George Studabaker, second son of Abraham by his second wife, was born in Darke county, Ohio, February 20th, 1835. He is a farmer and stock-dealer. For twelve years he has been an official member of the county agricultural society, two years of that time its president. On January 20th, 1856, he married Eliza- beth M., daughter of James Griffis, of Randolph county, In- diana. Has had two sons and a daughter, the sons deceased. He was one of the organizers of the Farmers' National bank of Greenville, in May, 1865, and in January, 1878, became president. He has been very successful in business, and has ever maintained a good reputation for honorable dealing.
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POWERS, HIRAM, known as the American sculptor, he ' having been the first American who as a sculptor made a name in Europe, was born as the eighth child of Stephen and Sarah Powers, on the 29th June, 1805, at the home of his parents, on the upper one of two farms belonging to his father, near the town of Woodstock, Windsor county, Ver- mont. As a lad his intelligence and ability to fashion toys, or, as his father and mother said, "his knack for tinkering,"- tinkering in his case meaning the invention and manufacture of many playthings for the amusement of himself and his village comrades-gained for him the reputation of being "a very smart boy." His executive ability also made him a great favorite with boys of his own age and even with those several years his senior, and so much so, that when any pro- ject requiring ingenuity was in contemplation he was applied to for advice and assistance, and usually installed leader of the operation. Among the things he constructed were toy cannon, cast in a superior manner, and for which he became famous among his playmates. One of those cannon was used in the service of attempting the removal from the village of a whole family of obnoxious persons, by being loaded to the muzzle, placed between the logs of the house and dis- charged by a fuse while the family were asleep. The act in- dicated the courage of the lad who perpetrated it, while his ready acknowledgment that he alone was guilty so pleased the investigators that he got off with but a simple reprimand. One has to be cognizant of the repulsiveness to industrious New Englanders of a whole family of lazy, dissolute persons present, to realize that so odd a mode of ridding the village of them should be adopted by even the lads and children ; and though this result was not in this instance accomplished, it was noticed that quite an improvement for the better took place in several members of the family, who eventually be- came industrious and good citizens. In consequence of be- coming security for unreliable friends, the father of Hiram Powers, while the latter was yet a lad of twelve years old, lost not only his homestead but nearly all the property he pos- sessed. In consequence he collected what he was able to save and with his family resolved to move " out West." At this time all his family except Hiram and the youngest child were grown and able to do for themselves. The eldest son, Jason, had removed to what was then known as the Holland Purchase, in the western part of the State of New York, where he had bought a farm, and here the family of his father spent the winter, and did not arrive in Cincinnati until the 5th day of May, 1818. A son, Stephen, in chopping in the wood- lot of Jason's farm, had cut his foot so badly that his mother refused to go on until he was able to travel, prefering to stay and nurse him; and when, in the following October, she and her son Stephen reached Cincinnati, she was welcomed by her family with the saddest greeting than can befall an affec- tionate wife-her husband had died on the 29th of the pre- ceding August. In the language of her youngest son whose memoranda furnish us the data for this sketch, "The scene I can never forget. She fell to the floor in a death-like swoon. Mother was older than father some four years, he being but fifty-five at the time of his death, and being always a re- markably athletic and healthy man, the first sickness he ever experienced had occasioned his death. Mother survived him but four years, and died on the 17th of March, 1822." In 1818 Stephen Powers rented the farm of Colonel Bates, northwest of the city, and there Hiram lived with the family until 1820, when a protracted attack of fever and ague induced
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