USA > Oregon > Multnomah County > Portland > History of Portland, Oregon : with illustrations and biographical sketches of prominent citizens and pioneers > Part 50
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HISTORY OF PORTLAND.
With a view of giving himself a broader sphere in which to exercise his mercan- tile sagacity, Mr. Hirsch came to Portland in the fall of 1864, and in partnership with L. Fleischner and A. Schlussel, under the well remembered firin name of L. Fleischner & Co., bonght out the wholesale general merchandise house of Haas Brothers. They continued the business with great success until 1874, when the same partners formed a new partnership with Jacob Mayer under the firm name of Fleischner, Mayer & Co., and from that time have conducted a wholesale dry goods business. Their business rapidly grew in magnitude, and for many years they have liad the largest establishment of its kind on the Pacific Coast, outside of San Francisco. All of the original partners are still connected with the firm, making it one of the oldest in the city. Mr. Hirsch has contributed liis full share toward the work of building up the large business of this firm, and the gratifying success attained has been largely due to his careful supervision and excellent business judgment.
Mr. Hirsch has always been an ardent Republican, and during late years has borne a prominent part in shaping the political affairs of the State. His first active work in the political arena was in 1864, when he secured the selection of his brother, Mayer Hirsch, as a delegate to the Republican National Convention, which nomin- ated for a second term the lamented Lincoln. In 1872 he was elected a member of the Lower House of the Legislature from Multnomah County, and as an acknowl- edgement of his well known financial ability was appointed a member of the committee on Ways and Means. In the long and exciting Senatorial contest of that year he took a leading rart, his course thronghont this bitterly waged fight being in accord with party usages, and such as met with the approval of a large hody of his constituents. He introduced and secured the passage of a bill providing for the establishment of a public school to be taught in the German language. Under this bill such a school was opened in Portland and has since been maintained. In 1874 lie was nominated by the Republicans of Multnomah County for the State Senate, and was the only candidate elected in opposition to the Independent ticket then in the field, notwithstanding the high standing and popularity of his opponent, Judge William Strong. So satisfactory to the people was his discharge of the duties of this office during his term, that in 1878 he was again nominated for the same position, and elected by a largely increased majority over the vote he received in 1874. His efforts during his second term were largely in behalf of a bill, which in Oregon would take the place of the National Bankrupt Act, the latter having expired by limitation.
Senator Hirsch's bill provided for a pro-rata division of the property of insolvent dehtors among creditors. The bill was strongly opposed, but was finally passed. Under the workings of this law the results have been such as to meet with the heartiest approval by the commercial community. So thoroughly was Senator Hirsch identified with this important measure that it is often referred to as the Hirsch Assignment Law. Owing to a popular demand for a change in the statutes of limita- tions as to real estate, Senator Hirsch introduced a bill during the session of 1878, which became a law, providing that ten instead of twenty years of peaceable posses- sion should constitute an incontestable title to property.
In 1880, Senator Hirsch was honored by receiving the unanimous vote of his party associates, both in the caucus and open session, for President of the Senate.
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He made an excellent presiding officer, and by his firmness and impartiality won the esteem of both political sides of the Chamber. While occupying the position he delivered the address of welcome to President R. B. Hayes, and other distinguished guests who were tendered a reception in the Senate Chamber during their memorable visit to the Northwest.
Much against his will and protest Mr. Hirsch was nominated for a third term in the. Senate in 1882, and although he devoted little time to a personal canvass he was elected by nearly 1,200 majority, the largest majority ever given in the State on the election of a State Senator. This was a magnificent compliment, and showed the appreciation in which his past services were held by the people. Daring the State political campaign which followed his nomination, Mr. Hirsch's time and energies were almost solely given up to the State campaign, to the total disregard of his personal interest. The Republican Delegation from Multnomah County to the State Convention which met in Portland in April, 1882, unanimously recommended him as a member of the State Central Committee from this county, and he was afterwards unanimously elected as Chairman of that organization. From that time until the election closed he was indefatigable in his exertions for the success of his party. His successful management of the campaign is a matter of history, the defeat of the Democratic party being as disastrous as was the success of the Republican party brilliant. Never was a campaign in this State better managed, its organizations more complete, its work more effective and its result more successful, for which in a large measure credit was freely given to the judicious labors of Senator Hirsch. For the first time since 1870, the full Republican State ticket was elected, while a Republican majority was secured in both branches of the Legislative Assembly.
During the Legislative session of 1885, Mr. Hirsch, at the request of inany friends, consented to the use of his name as a candidate for the United States Senate, and in open session on several ballots received within one vote of an election. The balloting was continued for many days but no candidate received the requisite number of votes, and the Legislature was compelled finally to adjourn without a choice being made. A special session was afterwards called, when the present Senator, John H. Mitchell, was elected.
At the expiration of liis third terin in the Senate, Mr. Hirsch refused to become a candidate for another term, but he continued to be an active power in politics, preferring, however, to work in the ranks withont expectation of reward for his services. During his legislative career he was one of the most active and useful officials in the service of the State. A man of calm judgment, of marked intelli- gence, of keen perceptive faculties, abounding in sensible practical ideas and of unsullied integrity, his opinions never failed to receive the careful consideration of his colleagues. The interests of his constituents were carefully and conscientiously protected and his entire record met the heartiest approval of the most intelligent, liberal minded element of the entire community. He was especially active in securing appropriations for the State Board of Immigration and in securing several important amendments to the pilot laws.
In December, 1888, Mr. Hirsch made a journey to Europe. While located at Karlsbad, Germany, he was surprised to receive the announcement of his appoint- ment as Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary to Turkey, by President Harrison. This was an honor which was most unexpected and entirely unsolicited,
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HISTORY OF PORTLAND.
not having heen an applicant for any position of a political nature. His appoint- ment was speedily confirmed by the Senate and most favorably endorsed by the leading journals all over the country, while the people of his adopted city and State, regardless of party lines, hailed his selection as an honor worthily bestowed and which his high character and conceded fitness richly merited, Soon after his confirmation, Minister Hirsch proceeded to Constantinople where he was received hy the Sultan, after which he was granted a leave of absence to return home and make the necessary arrangements for taking up his residence with his family at the capitol of Turkey, where he is now stationed. Possessed of a large fortune, a man of broad, liberal views, cultured mind, polished manners, and of the most pleasing personal address, Minister Hirsch is by nature and cultivation well calculated to worthily uphold the dignity and honor of the United States in its relations with one of the oldest and most important powers of the Old World. The people of his State who in the past have delighted to honor him, will watch his course with pride, knowing that he will be equal to all the requirements of his new and exalted station.
The career of this gentleman which has been here but briefly outlined, presents inany strange contrasts. Thirty-five years ago a poor boy, seeking a new home in a foreign land, he arrived in the city of New York, a stranger in a strange land. The years roll by and he makes a right use of his opportunities; gains wealth, is the recipient of the lionor, esteem and confidence of his fellow men in the home of his adoption, and to-day, to crown a life in every way worthy of emulation we find him selected by the chief magistrate of the greatest and strongest government of modern times, as the representative at the court of one of the oldest powers of Europe, of the very country to whose shores, a comparatively few years ago, he came a poor and friendless boy. Such achievements as have followed his career would be possible in no other country but America, where every avenue is open to true merit and where the best types of manhood are created and developed. It is impossible not to admire the courage which no adversity could crush, the patient, persistent devotion to a high and worthy purpose from which no temptation could allure him, such as have been so conspicuous in all the acts, public and private, of Mr. Hirsch. The elevation of such men to positions of power and influence is a tribute to true manhood, and serves as an incentive to stimulate the ambition of every youth who is compelled by his own unaided efforts to work out his own destiny.
Mr. Hirsch was married in 1870 to Miss Josephine Mayer, daughter of Jacob Mayer, of Portland. She is a lady of culture and refinement and well adapted to grace and adorn the high social sphere she has been called upon to fill as the wife of the United States Minister at Constantinople.
CHATTUCK, ERASMUS D. Judge E. D. Shattuck was born in Bakersfield, Franklin County, Vermont, December 31, 1824. He spent his boyhood and youth on a farm and was prepared for a collegiate course at Bakersfield Academy. In 1844 he entered Vermont University, pursued the full classical course and graduated in 1848. While in college he was dependent upon his own resources for means to prosecute his studies, and during vacations and some part of term time he taught school in the country or had private classes in the village. Notwithstanding these disadvantages and interruptions he completed the college course in the prescribed time and stood third in his class on final examinations.
C. M. Wiborg
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BIOGRAPHICAL.
On leaving college Mr. Shattuck was employed for a year as teacher of Latin and mathematics in Bakersfield Academy. He then went to Georgia and taught a year in Newnan Seminary, situated about twenty-five miles from the city of Atlanta. While in Newnan lie employed his leisure in reading law in the office of Archibald Mckinley, at that time oue of the leading lawyers in that part of the State.
In 1851 he returned north and located in Malone, New York, where lie applied himself to the study of law in the office of Parmelee & Fitch. In the Spring of 1852 he went to New York City and entered the office of Abner Benedict, where he remained reading law and acquiring the details of practice until October, 1852, when he was admitted to the bar.
Soon after his admission to the bar he decided to come to Oregon, at that time almost an unknown region. He did not purpose to come alone, and returning to Vermont he was united in marriage to Miss Saralı A. Armstrong of Fletcher. January 5, 1853, Mr. Shattuck and wife started for Oregon by the Istlimus of Panama, arriving at Portland on the 15th day of February. For about four years after his arrival in Oregon Mr. Shattuck was engaged chiefly in teaching, having been appointed professor of ancient languages in the Pacific University at Forest Grove. In 1855 he was elected county superintendent of common schools in Washington County, and in 1856 probate judge for the same county. In 1857 he was elected delegate for Washington County to the constitutional convention, and sat in that body and took part in framing the Constitution of the State.
After the adjournment of the Conventiou he formed a co-partnership in the practice of law with David Logau and removed to Portland, where he has ever since continuously resided. I11 1858 he was elected to represent Multnomah and Wash- ington Counties at the last session of the Oregon Territorial Legislature. In 1861 he was appointed United States District Attorney, and in 1862 was elected Judge of the Supreme and Circuit Courts for the Fourth Judicial District, holding the latter office until November, 1867. In 1874 he was again elected Judge of the Supreme Court and continued in office until the re organization of the State Judiciary by the Legisla- tive act of 1878. In 1886 he was elected Judge of the Circuit Court for Department No. 1, in the Fourth District, a position he still worthily fills. Besides the offices named, Judge Shattuck, at different periods, has served as member of the Portland City Council, as a member of the Board of Directors of the Portland school district, and was one of the founders and early trustees of the Portland Library.
It will be seen that Judge Shattuck has been almost constantly in the public service since his arrival in Oregon, and during all these years his record has been such as to win the confidence and respect of his fellow men. He is a studious reader, a profound thinker, and au earnest aud logical talker. He has been a hard worker in his profession. His patient industry, his power of incisive analysis, and his large kuowledge of the principles of law are conspicuous in all the fields of learning and practice, but appear to best advantage in the sphere of a judge. His mind is judicial in tone and temper; in no one could there be better harmony between mental and moral forces than in Judge Shattuck. In all the elements which constitute the worthy citizen, he excels. He is a man of strong convictions, of great sincerity and liigh sense of duty. He follows his convictions regardless of personal consequences; is firm, without being dogmatic, but maintains his opinions fearlessly. In modes of thought and life he is eminently practical, and abounds in domestic affection and is
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HISTORY OF PORTLAND.
earnestly loyal to principles and friends. Although reared under the teachings of the Christian faith, he is hardly "orthodox" in matters of religion, but has due respect for the views of others, and the utmost veneration for all agencies which tend to elevate the standard of morality and to make men lead better and purer lives.
In politics Judge Shattuck was originally a whig, but joined the republican party on its first organization in this State, acting with it until 1872, when he united with the so-called independent movement and worked earnestly against tendencies which he found objectionable in the policy of the regular party leaders. In the presidential election of that year he was a candidate for elector on the Greeley-Democratic ticket. Since that time he has acted and voted chiefly with the democratic party, although he is classed among the independent voters and has never been considered much of a partisan. He is one of the best known and most highly esteemed citizens of Oregon; in the soundness of his judgment and in his personal and official integrity, all men have full confidence, and no man has done more than he to establish and maintain the high character of our judicial tribunals. His reward is the universal esteem of his fellow men.
"LISAN, RODNEY, M. D. Rodney Glisan, physician of Portland, son of Samuel G and Eliza Glisan, was born at Linganore, Frederick County, Maryland, January 29, 1827. His ancestors were among the first English settlers of Maryland.
He was graduated in the medical department of the University of Maryland, in 1849, and after passing a severe competitive examination before a medical board, was appointed a medical officer of the United States Army, in May, 1850. Having served in this capacity for about eleven years on the plains, and in Oregon during her Indian wars, he resigned his commission and settled in Portland, where he has ever since been in the successful practice of his profession. In recognition of his services during the Indian hostilities in Oregon from 1855 to 1860 he was, in 1886, elected surgeon of the Grand Encampment of the Indian War Veterans of the North Pacific Coast, and still holds this honorary position.
While stationed in Oregon as an army surgeon, Dr. Glisan had an excellent opportunity to ascertain the efficiency of volunteer soldiers and unlike a certain class of regular army officers, he has ever entertained the highest opinion of their soldierly qualities.
Dr. Glisan was a professor in the first medical institution ever formed in Oregon, the Oregon Medical College, which subsequently assumed the name of The Medical Department of the Willamette University, in which he was for a long time a lecturer, and is still an emeritus professor. While an active member of this college, he felt the need of American text books in his department of obstetrics, none having been written for several years, and regretted the general use by American schools of the text books of Great Britain and continental Europe. In his effort to supply this deficiency he published in 1881, and again in 1887, his Text Book of Modern Midwifery. This was well received both in the United States and Great Britain. Its author had the pleasure of seeing a copy of it in the library of one of the most distinguished professors in Paris. He also saw his book in the libraries of several German professors at Vienna. A well known American practitioner has said of it: "that from the concise yet clear style, and the correctness of the teaching, the
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student of midwifery will find it a profitable work for study, and the busy practitioner a satisfactory work of reference," while the London Medical Times and Gazette said of it: "We have read the book with much pleasure, and regard it as a valuable addition to obstetric literature. Its great merit seems to us to be this: that it is the work of a man who thinks for himself. Dr. Glisan not only shows a habit of inde- pendent judgment, but an amount of common sense which makes his opinions worth careful attention." The London Lancet gave the work the following endorsement:
"The first thing that strikes us in the book is independence; hardly an idea is adopted, in a work which must naturally consist largely of compilation, without digestion and assimilation, and the result or digested product bears the impress of the author's mind, the main characteristic of which is common sense."
Dr. Glisan is also author of a Journal of Army Life, and Two Years in Europe, the latter being his last work in book form. It is a book of travel and was very flatteringly received by the press; the Literary World, of Boston, in reviewing it said:
" Dr. Glisan, who is an Oregonian, covers a wider range of topics than Dr. Holmes, and detains his readers for a much longer period. He is sedate and sober, too, in comparison with Dr. Holmes, though his narrative is too instructive to be called commonplace, even when placed alongside the sparkling 'Hundred Days.' Dr. Glisan, who traveled in a deliberate and rather generously American fashion all over England and the Continent, skips about in his story in a way that would be rather destructive to the order of time-tables and guide-books, but is observing and jndicions, manly and sensible. He is more plain-spoken as to the signs of the 'social evil' in London and Paris, than some less strictly professional travelers would care to be in print; in particular, he is emphatic in his opinion of the moral dangers to which young medical students are exposed in Paris, Berlin and Vienna; he preserves his total-abstinence habits throughout his trip, and ridicules the common caution not to drink water; he showed himself a bold man inspecting the crater of Vesuvius, and a plucky one in handling a pickpocket at Amsterdam. * *
* Dr. Glisan received many attentions and saw something of society and inner life, and the pictures which embellish this handsome book are good engravings of photographs. The great centres of European life may be instructively and agreeably visited in his company."
Dr. Glisan has taken an active interest in the efforts put forward to elevate his profession through medical organizations. He was president of the Medical Society of the State of Oregon in 1875-6, and his address in rhyme delivered before the society attracted wide attention. It has since appeared in a volume entitled, "Medical Rhymes," edited by Hugo Erichsen, M. D. For many years Dr. Glisan has been a member of the American Medical Association. He took an active part in the Seventh International Medical Congress held in London, England, 1881, and was also a member of the Ninthi International Medical Congress, which convened in Washington, D. C., in 1887. His paper, read by invitation before the latter Congress, elicited favorable cominents in all the principal medical journals of America and Europe.
Dr. Gilsan has written many articles on professional subjects for the leading medical journals of the United States, which are of great value as outlining in certain diseases peculiar and independent modes of successful treatment. Perhaps
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the most prominent of his contributions to this class of literature appeared in the U. S. Army Statistics, (1855 and 1860), and in the American Journal of the Medical Sciences, (1865, 1878 and 1880). He has performed many important surgical operations. Among his notable cases were the first amputations of the shoulder and thigh, and the second operation for strangulated inguinal hernia, ever performed on the North Pacific Coast. Although relinquishing this branch of the profession, he is still a busy general practitioner.
Dr. Gilsan has been one of the most industrious of men. He is especially noted for the unconquerable persistence with which he pursues whatever he undertakes. He possesses fine business qualifications united to great prudence, and has accumulated a large fortune. In everything pertaining to business or his profession, he is very methodical and always appears cool and collected. Owing chiefly to his temperate habits, he has always enjoyed good health, and has not for more than half a century refrained from duty, civil or military, for a single day on account of ill health, although exposed by day and by night in all climates, to the inclemency of the weather. He is religious, as the result of the clearest and most deliberate of convic- tions. He was originally a Methodist in faith, but since his residence in Portland, has been a member of Trinity Episcopal Church, where for over twenty years he has been warden. His views of men and affairs have been broadened by observation and by mingling with men of many countries. Although he has traveled extensively in Central and British America, in the United States and in Europe, he has seen no country that he prefers as a home, to Oregon. His personal character as a man of probity and high sense of honor, has been firmly established. In addition to his attainments as a physician, he is a thinker and writer who has shown a literary capacity of superior order, united to soundness of judgment and grace of expression which give to his writing and public utterances particular valne. While he is in every sense a practical man, there is in his nature an element that is genuinely poetic. It is the vein of gold in the quartz of his more rugged virtues. Large property interests and genuine affection for his adopted city and State, have combined to make him an important factor in their material advancement, to which he has largely contributed.
The domestic life of Dr. Glisan has been one of singular congeniality and happi- ness. He was married in December 3,1863 to Miss Elizabeth Couch,a native of Massa- chusetts and the youngest daughter of Captain John H. Couch, one of the founders of Portland. Mrs. Glisan is a lady of culture and refinement and devotes much of her time and energies to philanthropic and charitable work.
Dr. Glisan's career in Portland has been alike useful to the city and honorable to himself.
ELLINGER CHARLES B. Judge Bellinger was born in Maquon, Knox County, B Illinois, November 21, 1839, and at the age of eight years came to Oregon with his parents and grand-parents. After receiving the advantages of a common school education, supplemented with some two years at the Willamette University, he began to read law at Salem, in the office of B. F. Bonham, at present United States Consul at Calcutta, and was admitted to the bar at the September term of the Supreme Court, in 1863. He immediately thereafter engaged in the practice of law at Salem,
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