Portrait and biographical record of Portland and vicinity, Oregon, containing original sketches of many well known citizens of the past and present, Part 42

Author:
Publication date: 1903
Publisher: Chicago, Chapman Pub. Co.
Number of Pages: 946

USA > Oregon > Multnomah County > Portland > Portrait and biographical record of Portland and vicinity, Oregon, containing original sketches of many well known citizens of the past and present > Part 42

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Always interested and active in the Repub- lican party, Mr. Croasman received a deserved recognition of his service for the party by his appointment as postmaster of Portland, May 10. 1898. On the 6th of June he assumed the duties of his position, and during his able administra- tion the receipts doubled in volume. Not only the members of his own party, but others as well. expressed the greatest gratification at the busi- ness-like manner in which the office was con- ducted, system and dispatch being the order of the day. The entire work moved with celerity. yet with accuracy, and when he retired from the position it was with a record unsurpassed in this particular office.

While living in Salem Mr. Croasman married Linnie McCully, by whom he has three children. namely: Mrs. Alice Louise Harder. of Port- land : Lillian and Allen B., Jr. Mrs. Croasman is a daughter of the late A. A. McCully. once a well-known steamboatman and for years presi- dlent of the People's Transportation Company. Since the death of Mr. McCully, which occurred in 1886, his wife has made her home with her danghter in Portland.

Among the organizations with which Mr. Croasman is identified may be mentioned the Arlington Club, of which he is a director. He is a member of the National Association of First- Class Postmasters, and during 1900 attended the convention of that organization. held in Wash- ington. While in Salem he was a member of the city council one term. He was actively asso- ciated with the organization of Capitol Engine Company No. I, and held the various offices in the same, up to and including that of president. which office he held at the time of his removal

from Salem to Portland. For two years he was also chief of the Salem fire department. An in- cident worthy of mention occurred during his incumbency of the latter position. Receiving a telegram from Henry Failing, who at that time was mayor of Portland, calling for the aid of the Salem fire department, Mr. Croasman gave the alarm, and one hour and thirteen minutes later, having covered a distance of fifty-three miles, his men were playing upon the flames. For this remarkable feat the Salem fire department won high honors, and it is universally conceded that it saved the St. Charles Hotel, which was threat- ened with total destruction. Under Mayor George P. Frank, of Portland, he held office as a member of the board of police commissioners. When twenty-one years of age he was initiated into the Independent Order of Odd Fellows of Salem, and is now past grand of Chemeketa Lodge No. 1, also an active member of Samari- tan Lodge No. 2, of Portland. An organization to which he and his descendants are eligible is that of the Society of the Revolution, as his pa- ternal grandmother was a daughter of General McHenry, of Redfarm, for whom Fort McHenry is named. In his various associations, fraternal, political and commercial, he has won the confi- dence of his associates, who esteem him for his manly qualities and sterling worth.

HON. ALFRED F. SEARS, judge of the cir- cuit court of Oregon. is descended from Puritan and Revolutionary stock, the family having been founded in Massachusetts, on Cape Cod. in the days when the rugged men who sailed on the Mayflower ruled the Plymouth Colony. His great- great-grandfather, Zachariah Sears, served as a lieutenant in the Massachusetts militia in 1776. About the same time his son, Joseph Henry. shouldered a musket in the regiment commanded by Col. Nat Freeman of Yarmouth, and served through the Revolution with the American forces in New England. His son, Zebina Sears, in 1816 commanded the brigatine Neptune, a cruiser in the service of the States of La Plata. He made three filibustering vovages between New Orleans and Buenos Ayres. but was finally captured by a Spanish frigate in the Gulf of Mexico. His ship was sunk and his crew executed as pirates, while he and his first officer were carried to Spain for trial. The Spanish court convicted them of piracy and ban- ished them for life to the penal colony of Melilla. on the coast of Morocco. During the passage the first officer died. Captain Sears. being a Mason, received good treatment from the com- mander of the transport, himself a Mason. By similar fraternal aid, he escaped from Melilla to the Moorish coast, and there through the good

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offices of a Mohammedan Moor, who likewise recognized him as a brother Mason, he was res- cued from the hands of a man who, though slavery had been abolished in Morocco, wished to keep him in bondage. The Mohammedan es- corted Captain Sears to the interior of the coun- try, where he turned him over to a Jewish Mason bound for Fez. There he was taken in charge by some English merchants and finally reached his home in Boston, after an absence of three years

In the family of Capt. Zebina Sears was a son, Alfred F. Sears, the fourth among seven chil- dren, and father of the subject of this memoir. His son, Judge Sears, was born at Concord, N. C., September 4, 1852, during the temporary resi- dence of his parents in the south. The years of his boyhood were passed in various places, as his father, a civil engineer, was obliged to make frequent changes of residence. In the academy at Exeter, N. H., he prepared for college, and in 1871 matriculated in Harvard University, where he remained one year. The three suc- ceeding years of his college course were taken in Dartmouth, from which he was graduated with the degree of A. B. in 1875. Immediately after- ward he entered the law department of Bos- ton University, which conferred upon him the degree of LL. B. in 1877. At the same time he was admitted to practice before the bar of Mass- achusetts. After practicing for a year in Bridge- water, in that state, he went to Peru and visited his parents for a year. This was his second trip to South America. the first having been made in 1873.

Upon his return to the United States in 1879. Mr. Sears came to Portland and entered into a partnership with Henry E. McGinn for the prac- tice of law, under the firm name of Sears & Mc- Ginn. Later the firm became McGinn, Sears & Simon, and finally Paxton, Sears, Beach & Si- mon. From 1886 to 1890 he served as assistant district attorney. Previous to this he had served three years in the city council representing the third ward, and acting as president of that body in 1885. The highest honor of his life thus far came to him in 1896, when he was elected judge of the circuit court, Fourth judicial district, de- feating the Democratic candidate, George E. Chamberlain, by nearly one thousand votes. Upon the expiration of his term in 1900 he was nominated by both parties and elected without opposition, entering upon a second term, which will expire July 1, 1906.

In addition to his labors on the bench, Judge Sears has filled the chair of equity in the law de- partment of the University of Oregon since 1899. Like his father, he has been a frequent lecturer on the topics of the day. He has also been a valued contributor to various journals, notably those connected with his profession, including

the American Law Review, the American Law- ver, and the Central Law Journal. He is a char- ter member of the Oregon State Bar Association. before which he has delivered several addresses, one on the Constitution of the United States, and one on the life and character of Judge Deady. At the time of the organization of the Portland Free Library Association he was deeply inter- ested in the project, became one of the founders of the same, and also served for some time as its president. To his labors, together with those of numerous other public-spirited men, may be at- tributed the fact that the library finally was made a free institution. In the organization of the Multnomah Law Library Association he took an active part, and for many years was one of its directors. Among the other organizations to whose interests he is devoted may be mentioned the local chapter of the Sons of the Revolution and the University Club, and of the latter he has served as a member of the board of directors. For twenty years he was a member of the board of trustees of the Oregon Humane Society, and is now president of that body. The Republican party has received his support in national and local elections, but no narrow spirit of partisan- ship has ever marred his influence or detracted from his labors as a jurist.

In Bridgewater, Mass., in 1876, Judge Sears married Ellen Carver, a native of that town and a graduate of the academy there. Her father, Joseph Carver. was a cotton-gin manufacturer, an occupation he had inherited from his father. Elea- zer Carver. The record of her ancestors extends back to the landing of the Mayflower, her original progenitor in this country having been a brother of the first Governor of Massachusetts Bay Col- ony. The family of Judge and Mrs. Sears con- sists of the following children : Alfred F., Jr., a graduate of the University of Oregon, class of 1900, and a civil engineer by profession ; Richard C. : Mary E., a student in Leland Stanford Uni- versity ; and Robert.

Judge Sears' career upon the bench has shown that he possesses in a high degree the faculty of analysis, so essential to the dispensation of jus- tice. Accompanying this power are fearlessness, independence and the growing evidence of a de- termination on his part to render decisions that are as absolutely fair and impartial as possible from the facts in hand. His patience and ur- banity in trying moments is well known, and the members of the bar of Portland acknowledge many considerations at his hands-courtesies which have given them a better insight into his character as a companion of men than might have been obtained otherwise. On the whole, he has won the warm regard and admiration of the bench and bar of Portland, among whom are to be found many of his warmest personal friends

Bra E. Purdin

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PORTRAIT AND BIOGRAPHICAL RECORD.

HON. IRA E. PURDIN, who has been a resident of Oregon since 1854. was born in Boone county, Mo., November 7, 1845, and comes of a family of English lineage. His grandfather, William Purdin, was a native of England, and when seven years of age crossed the Atlantic with his parents, who died soon afterward, leav- ing him an orphan at a very tender age. He be- came a farmer, and after spending a winter in Redstone, W. Va., removed to Ohio, settling in Harrison county, where he remained for two years, when he went to Brown county, that state. continuing to engage in farming there throughout the remainder of his active business career. He died at the age of eighty-eight years, and his wife passed away at the age of ninety-three.

Ira E. Purdin, Sr .. the father of our subject. was born in Redstone, W. Va., and after spending much of his youth in Ohio, went to Maysville. Ky., at the age of seventeen years and learned the cabinet-maker's trade. Early in 1825 he re- moved to Booneville, Mo., where he engaged in cabinet-making for a time and then conducted a grocery store for two years, following which he engaged in the hotel business for twelve years. On the expiration of that period he removed to Linn county, Mo., and when two years had gone by he went to Columbia, where he remained for ten years, devoting his energies to farming. In 1854 he brought his family to Oregon, traveling by way of New Orleans, and thence on the steamer Pampero to Nicaragua. He then con- tinued by way of the Nicaragua route, and while on the river changed boats four times. The journey of twelve miles to the Pacific coast was then completed by the aid of mules and oxen, and at San Juan del Sur he took passage on the Sierra Nevada, which after a voyage of two weeks reached San Francisco, and four days later Mr. Purdin and his family started for Portland, where they arrived at the end of seven days. Captain Flavel acting as pilot over the bars. It was on the IIth of April, 1854, that the party reached their destination, and then the father be- gan search for a location and purchased a place from Benjamin Allen, one mile north of Green- ville. He re-located the donation claim of three hundred and twenty acres and farmed there for eight years, after which he purchased of W. Mulkey a donation claim of three hundred and eighty acres, whereon he lived until his death. which occurred when he was ninety-one years of age. The old home property is now owned hy our subject.

The father was a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church for more than sixty years and a man of sterling worth of character. He was a pioneer of Ohio, Missouri and Oregon and took the first modern wagon to Ohio, where it attracted considerable curiosity. He married

Deborah Patterson, who was born in Shelby county, Ky., a daughter of Major William Pat- terson, who was born in Virginia and served as major in the war of 1812. He settled in Shelby county, Ky., and became a prominent member of the militia of that state. He represented an old Virginia family and his last days were passed in Kentucky. Mrs. Deborah Purdin, who died at the age of eighty-six years, had four sons and two daughters : C. W., who died in Oregon ; Mrs. Mary A. Watson; W. W., who was the first elected county surveyor of Washington county, and died in that part of the state; Mrs. E. J. Barrett : J. P., who died in Oregon at the age of twenty years ; and Ira E.

The last named was a little lad of eight years when the family came to Oregon. After attend- ing the common schools he continued his studies in Tualatin Academy and Pacific University. Later he purchased a farm adjoining and after- ward became owner of the farm which his father had so long owned and occupied. It comprises four hundred and thirty acres of very valuable land, all under fence, and there he is successfully engaged in general farming, having three hun- dred acres under cultivation. He is also a pros- perous horticulturist and has twenty-seven acres planted to orchard-eight acres to apples, eleven acres to prunes, five acres to Bartlett pears and three acres to cherries-and he makes extensive shipments of fruit to Portland. The remainder of his land is devoted to pasturage purposes, and he raises fine Jersey cattle, Cotswold sheep and Berkshire hogs, having graded up his stock until he has the finest of any in the country. He is now renting a part of his farm and makes his home in Forest Grove, locating here in 1902.

In Chillicothe. Mo., in 1880. Mr. Purdin was united in marriage to Miss Alice H. Purdin, who was born in Linn county, Mo., a daughter of Ira Purdin, a native of Bloomington, Ind., and a granddaughter of Charles B. Purdin, whose birth occurred in Delaware and who became a farmer of Missouri, where he died at the age of ninety years. The town of Purdin, Mo., was established on his farm and was named in his honor. The father of Mrs. Purdin, the wife of our subject, was a tinner by trade. In 1884 he located in Portland, where he engaged in business as a tinner and hardware merchant. He married Martha Griffey, a native of Boone county, Mo., and now a resident of Forest Grove. her husband having died in 1900. In their family were ten children. of whom six are living: Alice H. : E. E .. a tinner and hardware dealer of Portland ; Mrs. Bessie Bluerock, of Vancouver ; Frederick A .. a tinner of Portland : Ira G., who is engaged in the grocery business in Portland; and Ovid. a tinner of the same city. The home of Mr. and Mrs. Purdin has heen blessed with four children :

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Cora I., Elmer V., Edna C. and Homer G. The family have a very pleasant home in Forest Grove, and Mr: Purdin's farm is located two miles north of the city. Mrs. Purdin is a most estimable lady, having many friends, and is a loval member of the Christian Church.

Mr. Purdin is a stalwart Democrat in politics and has served as a member of the county com- mittee. In 1878 he was elected on the Demo- cratic ticket to represent his district in the state legislature and aided in electing James H. Slater to the United States senate. He did effective and important service on different committees and in championing different measures, and while he has never been a politician in the commonly accepted sense of the term, he proved a capable officer. He belongs to the Pioneer Society of Oregon, and he and his wife are members of the Gales Creek Grange of Forest Grove, and he certainly de- serves mention among the honored early settlers of the state, for along lines of substantial up- building he has labored for the general good through almost a half century.

ALBERT W. RIGGS. Like certain men prominent in history, more especially the great Lincoln. Albert W. Riggs began his career as a wage earner by splitting rails. This hum- ble occupation evidently had its advantages from the standpoint of health producing, some money getting, and general development, for Mr. Riggs is at present one of the strong and rugged and thoroughly reliable agriculturists and stockmen of Clackamas county. A native son of the county, he was born near Liberal, April 15, 1849, and has spent his entire life within the vicinity of his home surroundings.

At the age of nineteen years Mr. Riggs left his father's farm and began to split rails for the surrounding farmers, thereafter working at shoemaking for about a year. The trade did not appeal to him particularly, and upon the principle that congenial work means suc- cessful work he abandoned it at the end of a year, and continued to farm. After his mar- riage in 1876, at the age of twenty-six, he lived for six years on eighty acres comprising his father's donation claim, then sold his in- heritance, and bought forty acres near the old place, upon which he lived for ten years. This property also was disposed of, and at Canby he worked at carpentering for about a year. On the Hood river he tried his luck for about seven months, and then returned to Canby. engaging in carpentering for four years. In January, 1895, Mr. Riggs bought a place of one hundred and thirteen acres one and a half miles southwest of Macksburg, forty. acres of which he has placed under cultivation, and he

has also erected suitable and commodious buildings. Here he engaged in general farm- ing and stock-raising. until the spring of 1903. when he sold out and moved to Canby, where he is now residing.

Daniel Riggs, the father of Albert W., was born in Platte county, Mo., in 1804, and died in Clackamas county in 1890. His wife, Ma- hala (Einaer) Riggs, was also born in Mis- souri, in Ray county, and died in 1874 at the age of sixty-two years. Daniel Riggs crossed the plains in 1847 with ox teams, the trip from Missouri consuming six months, and being accompanied by the usual incidents of those early days. He settled in East Portland, took up a donation claim, but failed to file on it, and eventually located on the place of Harrison Wright for a year. In 1852 he took up a dona- tion claim of six hundred and forty acres two and a half miles northeast of Needy, and there engaged in general farming and stock-raising. He succeeded in clearing forty acres of land, and about twenty years ago sold his only re- maining eighty acres to Francis Riggs, he hav- ing in the meantime divided up the rest of his property among his children, giving each one eighty acres. At the present time Ben Homs- ley owns the property sold to Francis Riggs. Of the nine children born to Daniel Riggs Francis is deceased : Annie, Mrs. Kesselring. resides in Macksburg: George is farming on the Hood river ; John is living at The Dalles ; Elijah is in Portland : William and James are deceased ; Albert W. lives in Canby ; David is in Crook county ; and Jane Parker is living in Clackamas county. Ore.

Albert Wesley Riggs married Charity E. Offield. who was born in Missouri May 9. 1856. and of this union there have been born two children, Venella, who is deceased, and Elda, living at home. Mr. Riggs has been quite prominent in Democratic politics, and was al- derman of Canby for two years. He takes an active interest in all that pertains to the gen- eral upbuilding of his district, and is accounted one of its most liberal, broad minded and progressive farmers and citizens.

JOHN N. STEWART. Among the most enterprising developers of Clackamas coun- ty may be mentioned the family of Stewart, first represented by Lorenzo Stewart, who came here in 1853, and now by his son, John N. Stewart, one of the most successful agri- culturists of his district. Mr. Stewart was born in this county September 27, 1854, and Lorenzo Stewart was born in Boone county. Ky., in 1808, and died on his farm in Clacka- mas county, August 14, 1872. His wife, Mar-

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garet (Henley) Stewart, was born also in Boone county, Ky., the date of her birth be- ing 1812, while her death occurred in Clacka- mas county October 9, 1889. From Kentucky the elder Stewart removed to Sheridan county, Mo., where he pre-empted land, and where he lived until 1853. With ox teams he made the six months' trip to the coast in the spring of '53. settling on three hundred and twenty acres of land four and a half miles southeast of Molalla, to which he later added eighty acres adjoining, and at the time of his death he owned three farms, comprising one thousand acres. There were practically no improve- ments on this property, and Mr. Stewart cleared twenty-five acres, which he used for general farming and stock-raising. The pa- rents died on this farm, and of the large fam- ily of children which added to their responsi- bilities Polly A., Harriet Larkin and Richard E. are deceased ; Charles is a resident of Long Creek, Grant county, Ore. ; and John N. is the farmer of whom this sketch makes mention.

The youth of John N. Stewart was quietly passed on the paternal homestead in Clacka- mas county. In time he inherited one hundred and sixty acres of the home place, and later he purchased the interest of the heirs and now has four hundred acres. Two hundred acres of this are under cultivation, and though en- gaged in general farming, he makes a specialty of stock-raising, and at present has twenty- six head of cattle, one hundred and eighty sheep and forty hogs. He has been very suc- cessful, and is accounted one of the most en- terprising farmers of the county. Mr. Stewart married Mary L. Pelkey in 1897. He is a Republican in politics, and is fraternally con- nected with the Knights of the Maccabees and the Artisans of Molaila, also Grange No. 40 of Molalla.

MAJOR CHARLES E. McDONELL. The name of McDonell carries one in imagina- tion across the ocean to the highlands of Scotland, where a clan bearing that title long flourished. From that country Donald C. Mc- Donell went with his father, a merchant, to Canada, and there he became extensively inter- ested in lumbering, but while still in middle age he died at Quebec in 1873. Fond of military tactics and a graduate of the Royal Military School in Kingston, Ontario, he bore a part in Canadian volunteer service during the Fenian raids and was a leading member of the Eighth Roval Rifles, in which he served as adjutant. with the rank of captain. His marriage united him with Diana O'Connell, whose father, James O'Connell, was a native of the north of Ireland

and a cousin of Dan O'Connell. She was born in Quebec and now makes Portland her home. Of her three sons and two daughters, all are living in Portland except one daughter.

In Quebec, Canada, where he was born No- vember 12, 1871, Charles E. McDonell attended public schools and took the first year of study in the high school. On coming to Portland in 1886 he secured employment in an upholstery concern, but after a year went with a grocery house, and later for a year was employed as clerk in the auditor's office of the Oregon Rail- road & Navigation Company, until the offices were removed to Omaha. He then became a messenger in the Portland Savings Bank and rose to be teller, remaining with that institution until its failure. His next position was as book- keeper with the United States National Bank. In 1900 the Republicans nominated him county assessor and he was duly elected. In 1902 he was re-elected to the office on the Citizens' ticket, his term to expire in January, 1905.

The military record of Major McDonell is de- serving of special mention. Inheriting from his father a fondness for military activities, he began to identify himself with such movements while still a mere boy. In 1887 he enlisted as a private in Company I, First Regiment, Oregon National Guard, and rose gradually until he be- came first lieutenant of Company I. Later, for nine months, he was captain of Company H. When the Second Regiment, Oregon Volunteer Infantry, was organized out of the Third Regi- ment for duty during the Spanish-American war, on account of the proficiency in drill shown by the members of Company H, they were al- lowed to go out intact, being the only company to whom this privilege was given. For two years the company had held the highest aver- age for general proficiency, and its reputation was merited by its achievements. Governor Lord commissioned Mr. McDonell as captain of the company, in charge of the men during serv- ice in Manila. For a time Company H was on special duty as custom-house guard, and many of the men were detailed as clerks, bookkeepers and assistants in the custom house, he himself being given charge of the seven warehouses con- nected with the custom house. On his return to Portland, the company presenting him with a fine gold watch in recognition of his meritorious services as their commanding officer. Since his return he has been connected with Company G. Third Regiment. Oregon National Guard, of which he was formerly captain, but since June 13, 1902, has been major of the regiment. In 1901 Company G presented him with a gold- mounted sword. From his first connection with the militia until 1892 he had won three gold medals for proficiency in drill. By those com-

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Portrait and biographical record of Portland and vicinity, Oregon, containing original sketches of many well known citizens of the past and present, Part 42

Author: Publication date: 1903 Publisher: Chicago, Chapman Pub. Co. Number of Pages: 946

Author:
Publication date: 1903
Publisher: Chicago, Chapman Pub. Co.
Number of Pages: 946