USA > Pennsylvania > Encyclopedia of contemporary biography of Pennsylvania, Vol. II > Part 37
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
He had, therefore, in addition to the task of un- raveling the tangle they were in, to organize and put in force a system for keeping and rendering them in the future. By dint of unremitting atten- tion and labor, often prolonged far into the night for months, he succeeded in bringing order out of chaos, and establishing a method of accounts which has been eminently practical and effective, so much so that the accounts of the Pennsylvania Company, now lessee of the Pittsburgh, Fort Wayne & Chi- cago Railway, and other equally important lines, are still kept and rendered according to that method. Besides this, it is in force with many other companies, especially west of Pittsburgh, among which it is known as the " Messler System of Accounts." Mr. Messler continued as Auditor of the Pittsburgh, Fort Wayne & Chicago Com- pany, following it through all its different phases of bankruptcy, receivership and reorganization, un- til 1863, when he was appointed Comptroller. In 1866 the Vice-President, Hon. Samuel Hanna, died, when Mr. Messler was appointed Assistant to the President. This office he held until July 1, 1869, when the road was leased to the Pennsylvania Rail- road Company, and thereupon he entered the ser- vice of tlic lessee as Comptroller, in which position he continued until April 1, 1871, when the Penn- sylvania Company was organized for the purpose of operating all the lines of railroad west of Pittsburgh, controlled by the Pennsylvania Railroad Company. This included the Pittsburgh, Fort Wayne & Chi- cago Railway, Cleveland & Pittsburgh Railroad, Erie & Pittsburgh Railroad, New Castle & Beaver Valley Railroad, Lawrence Railroad, Pittsburgh, Cincinnati & St. Louis Railway, Chartiers Railway, Cincinnati & Muskingum Valley Railway, Little Miami & Columbus & Xenia Railroad, Columbus, Chicago & Indiana Central Railway, Indianapolis & Vincennes Railroad, and the St. Louis, Vandalia & Terre Haute Railroad, besides a half interest in the Indianapolis & St. Louis Railroad Company, which was the lessee of the St. Louis, Alton & Terre Haute Railroad. The Pennsylvania Company subsequently sold its half interest in the latter to the Cleveland, Columbus, Cincinnati & Indianapolis Railway Com- pany, and also acquired the control by lease, or otherwise, of the Pittsburgh, Youngstown & Ash- tabula Railroad, North western Ohio Railway, Way- nesburg & Washington Railroad, Pittsburgh, Wheel- ing & Kentucky Railroad, Ohio Valley Railway, Jeffersonville, Madison & Indianapolis Railroad, East St. Louis & Carondelet Railway, Cincinnati & Richmond Railroad, Cincinnati, Richmond & Chi- cago Railroad, Ohio Connecting Railroad, South Chicago & Southern Railway, and the Calumet
178
CONTEMPORARY BIOGRAPHY OF PENNSYLVANIA.
River Railway; also the Newport and Cincinnati and Louisville Bridges, being a total, including the Grand Rapids & Indiana Railroad Company sys- tem, referred to hercafter, of thirty-five hundred miles, and earning in the aggregate about forty mil- lion dollars per annum. Mr. Messler was made Comptroller of the Pennsylvania Company at the time of its organization in 1871. In 1876 he was clected Third Vice-President of the company, also of the Pittsburgh, Cincinnati & St. Louis, and *Columbus, Chicago & Indiana Central Railway Companies, and since that time he has been elected President of most of the other corporations con- trolled by the Pennsylvania Company, besides be- ing a Director in all of them. He is also a Director and Chairman of the Exccutive Committee of the Grand Rapids & Indiana Railroad Company. This corporation is the lessee of the Cincinnati, Ricli- mond & Fort Wayne Railroad, Grand Rapids & Muskegon Railroad, and Traverse City Railroad, and, by its affiliation with the roads of the Pennsyl- vania Company south of Richmond, Indiana, con- trols a line extending from Cincinnati to the Straits of Mackinaw, and to Traverse City and Muskegon on Lake Michigan. It is operated through its own organization, the Pennsylvania Railroad Company controlling it by virtne of a contract, nnder which it guarantees fonr million dollars of the first mort- gage bonds of the Grand Rapids Company. Mr. Messler has passed through all these promotions, and has attained his present responsible position in the railroad service, by reason of his intelligence, energy and peculiar fitness for the offices he has been called upon to fill. He is recognized as one of the most valuable officers in the service of the com- panies with which he is connected, and has demon- strated unnsual ability in the consideration and determination of the many important questions, financial and otherwise, that must of necessity arise in so vast and extended a system as that of the Pennsylvania Company. His leading characteris- tics in this respect are patient and persevering ap- plication, careful and thorongh consideration, fol- lowed by a calm and dispassionate judgment of the subjects in hand. These traits, added to his exten- sive knowledge in the realm of finance, and his broad and comprehensive views of matters in gen- eral, have made him a reliable and trusted counsel- lor; while the facility with which he is able to dis- patch current business, owing to his thorough knowledge of details, and his rare executive quali- ties, united to an uncommon talent for organization,
all combine to render him an unusually able and valuable railroad officer. Although his dutics as such have been of the most engrossing nature, he has found time, through his orderly methods, to give more or less attention to affairs outside his strictly official sphere. His natural aptitude for business has enabled him to acquire a personal for- tune. He was one of the original Trustees of the Dime Savings Institution of Pittsburgh, organized in 1862, now known as the Pittsburgh Bank for Savings, and which has had a very successful career, its deposits amounting to $2,300,000. He is a Director in the Merchants and Manufacturers National Bank of Pittsburgh, originally organized as a State Bank in 1833; also a Trustce of the Shadyside Academy of that city, a chartered insti- tution, designed to fit young men for entrance into any of the higher colleges and advanced scientific schools in the United States, and which, though but comparatively of recent origin, is enjoying a most successful career. He is also connected with other financial institutions in which he is interested, to all of which, as his coadjutors will testify, he gives the same intelligent and careful attention as he be- stows upon the more exacting and far-reaching questions arising in the service of the Pennsylvania Company. He has also found time, in the midst of his official and social duties, to cultivate a taste for study and fine arts. Besides his intimate and ex- tensive acquaintance with the so-called classics, and the works of English anthors, he is a fine French scholar, and has a comprehensive knowl- edge of that literature. His library is one of the largest and choicest personal ones in the city of Pittsburgh, while his beautiful residence is adorned with subjects in engravings, paintings, ceramics and other objects of virtu, that betoken a rare ap- preciation of art. While not a politician in the or- dinary sense of the word, Mr. Messler has positive political convictions. He was born and educated in the faith of the Democratic party, but until the War of the Rebellion broke out he took little in- terest in politics. Indignant, not only with the position and action of the leaders of that party, but of the party as a whole, in that great and absorbing issue, he at the outset of the war allied himself with the Republican party, and has ever since continued to act with it, believing it repre- sents the best intelligence, progress and patriotism of the American people. Personally, Mr. Messler is by instinct and education a gentleman. No person can come into his presence and fail to recognize at once this trait in his character. Dignified, affable and courteous to individuals in every condition of life, he enjoys the respect and esteem of all those
*NOTE .- In 1883 this corporation was reorganized under the name of the Chicago, St. Louis & Pittsburgh Railroad Company.
179
CONTEMPORARY BIOGRAPHY OF PENNSYLVANIA.
who know him. He loves his home and family, but at the same time takes great pleasure in social in- tercourse with his neighbors and friends, and his beautiful residence in the suburb of Shadyside is often the scene of refined and attractive social gatherings, presided over by his estimable wife. Her maiden name was Maria Remsen Varick, of Poughkeepsie, New York, and she was a descend- ant of the well-known Knickerbocker family of that name. Colonel Richard Varick, of General Washington's staff, and afterwards Attorney-Gen- eral of New York, and Mayor of the city of New York, was her great-uncle. Mr. and Mrs. Messler have but two children, Remsen Varick Messler, who is a rising yonng attorney at the bar of Pitts- burgh, and is also a member of the Holland Society, and Engene Lawrence Messler, who is being pre- pared at the Shadyside Academy for entrance to Yale College.
SAMUEL M. FELTON, JR.
SAMUEL MORSE FELTON, JR., an emineut American railway expert, and at present First Vice- President of the New York, Lake Erie and Western Railroad Company, is the eldest son of the late Samuel Morse Felton, Esq., at the time of his de- cease the distinguished President of the Pennsyl- vania Steel Company (a sketch of whom appears in Vol. I of this work, pp. 72-74), and was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, February 3, 1853. On both sides he is of New England ancestry, his father being a native of West Newbury, Essex County, Massachusetts, and his mother, born Maria Low Lippitt, of Providence, Rhode Island. At the time of young Felton's birth, and for many years after- wards, his father, who had been for a number of years a successful civil engineer and Railroad Superintendent, was President of the Philadelphia, Wilmington and Baltimore Railroad, the affairs of which he was still managing when the Civil War broke out. This road being " the only direct means of communication between the northeastern portion of the conntry and the National Capital," became of vast importance upon the commencement of hostili- ties and it required the incessant care of its loyal and vigilant President to maintain it in a constant state of efficiency, owing to the repeated attempts of the enemies of the government to impair and cripple its usefulness. This task was successfully carried out by Mr. Felton, although in doing so he seriously jeopardized his life. His services were of the highest importance to the Nation and have al-
ready been commemorated in brief in historical writings. Following what was doubtless an in- herited taste, the subject of this sketch, having acquired an excellent English education at private schools in his native city, engaged in railroad engineering abont the middle of his sixteenth year, taking the position of rodmau on the Chester Creek Railroad. In 1870 he was appointed to the position of leveler and assistant engineer on the Lancaster Railroad, and in the following year entered the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, at Boston, graduating in 1873, his previous studies and active ex- perience in engineering enabling him to complete the conrse, which usually occupy four years, in exactly half that time. The vacation period of the summer of 1872 he spent in the field as engineer in charge of the surveys on the Chester and Paoli Railroad. After graduation in 1873 and during the first half of 1874 he served as chief engineer of the Chester and Delaware River Railroad, and in August of the lat- ter year was appointed General Superintendent of the Pittsburgh, Cincinnati and St. Louis Railway by the late Thomas A. Scott. During the railroad riots at Pittsburgh, in July, 1877, Mr. Felton was in personal charge of the Pittsburgh, Cincinnati and St. Louis Railroad, keeping his road open and traffic moving until noon of Sunday, when the great fires occurred. On Saturday afternoon was the shooting at Thirty-third Street, at night the sacking of the gun stores, the battle of the round honse and the burning of the freight cars in the Pennsylvania yards. No trouble occurred in the Pan Handle yards until Sunday afternoon, when the rioters burned the round house, freight depots and offices. During this time Mr. Felton was on duty, directing the storage of freight and the care of the equipment in the yards, remaining in his office until driven out by the flames. He saved all of his office records and papers of value, assisting in removing them from the building and taking them to his apart- ments, although hunted for by the rioters. All but two of the locomotives were run out of the round house and stored in the tunnel under Pittsburgh, being disconnected to prevent their removal by the rioters, and were in this mauner saved. One hnn- dred cars loaded with merchandise freight were stored in Cork Run tunnel. After the burning stopped Sunday evening, Mr. Felton organized a guard for the protection of this property, armed them, and personally commanded the one at Cork Run on Sunday night. By his display of personal bravery and cool judgment he inspired the majority of his men with loyalty, saving property, and quickly reorganizing and resuming operations, thercby quieting others and restoring order at Pitts-
-
180
CONTEMPORARY BIOGRAPHY OF PENNSYLVANIA.
burgh. While there was trouble with part of the forces at Dennison, Newark and Columbus, and at other points in sympathy with trouble on the other roads, the loyalty of the men directly under Mr. Felton, at the seat of trouble, soon had its good effect and rapidly quieted all of the forces. He was ably assisted at Pittsburgh by lis officers, several of whom risked their lives on more than one occasion. When the trouble was over at Pittsburgh, the Pan Handle was first to resume business, never having lost its loyal organization. The position of General Superintendent of the Pittsburgh, Cincinnati and St. Louis Railway was held by him until 1882, and during this period the Cincinnati and Muskingum Valley and the Little Miami Railroads were added to his charge. The wonderful improvement in the physical condition and in the results of the operation of these roads while under his superintendence was largely due to his intelligent and efficient work. In 1882 Mr. Felton was selected for his peculiar fitness, for the place of General Manager of the New York and New England Railroad, then undergoing recon- struction, and he left the Pennsylvania system against the wishes of the officers in charge. The advantage of his experience and practice was quickly seen in his new field of duty, and after a period of great trial and activity, led to his services being sought by the New York, Lake Erie and Wes- tern Railroad Company, as assistant to the President, with special charge of the New York, Pennsylvania and Ohio Railroad. He accepted this flattering offer, and in November, 1884, he was chosen General Manager of the New York, Pennsylvania and Ohio Railroad. On January 15, 1885, he was elected a Vice-President of the New York, Lake Erie and Western Railroad and placed in charge of the traffic of the Erie lines; and on October 15 following he was made first Vice-President of the entire system. Mr. Felton's careful education and training specially fitting him for his life work, his correct habits, qnick perception, strong physique and great indns- try, together with his absolnte loyalty to the trusts confided to him, have always produced beneficial results to the properties placed in his charge, and have brought credit and honor to himself. By superior merit he has risen step by step throngh all subordinate grades in railroad construction and management to his present most important position ; and, at an age when a large number of men are only entering upon a career of responsibility, he can point to achievements in his profession greater than many of his seniors in it have accomplished in a life- time. Few men at any age have proved themselves more competent for the positions they have been called to fill; and judging from the past, it is
scarcely presumptuous to predict that, however grave and weighty may be the duties entrusted to him or the obligations he assumes, they will be dis- charged with prudence and ability and to the great profit of all concerned. His complete success is the best illustration of the advantages of a thorough scientific and technical education in contradistinction to the mercly practical, for the complicated business of railroad management. There is no branch of the business of which he does not understand the science and theory as well as the practice, and no duty in which he is not personally competent to instruct his subordinates of every grade. On October 21, 1880, Mr. Felton married, at Allegheny City, Pennsylvania, Miss Dora Hamilton, daughter of the late George P. Hamilton, a prominent member of the Pittsburgh bar.
JOHN S. WILSON.
JOHN SAWYER WILSON, President of the Poughkeepsie Bridge Company, and the Central New England and Western Railroad Company, for- merly General Traffic Manager of the Pennsylvania Railroad Company, and well-known in all parts of the United States through his long and prominent connection with American railroads, was born in Washington County, Pennsylvania, May 25, 1832. Mr. Wilson began his business career at an age when many young men are still at school. His first position was the subordinate one of shipping clerk in a wholesale grocery house in St. Louis, but the qualities he displayed in the discharge of its duties so impressed his employers that in a few months they put him at work as a traveling salesman. In this capacity he visited nearly every city and town in the West and Southwest, confirming and strengthening by his success the good opinion of his capabilities entertained by his employers, and earn_ ing a reputation as a salesman which brought him advantageous offers from several other firms. The most liberal of these contained an offer of partner- ship made by Messrs. Kilgore & Co., a wholesale grocery firm in Philadelphia. It was a high com- pliment to the energy and push of the young sales- man, and he accepted it without hesitation, remov- ing, of course, to Philadelphia, where he established himself. His influence in the sections where he had previously traveled was so great that he found it far from a difficult task to control the trade with which he was acquainted, and by throwing himself heart and soul into the work he built up in a short time a very prosperous business. Everything was pro-
John & Wilson
181
CONTEMPORARY BIOGRAPHY OF PENNSYLVANIA.
gressing favorably when the commercial disturb- ances which followed rapidly upon the opening of the Civil War brought ruin and failure to his firm. But this calamity, deplorable as it was in fact, did not extinguish the natural resources and self-reli- ance of the man. Appointed by President John W. Garrett, of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad Com- pany, freight agent at Philadelphia, he undertook the duties of this position with energy and judg- ment, being greatly aided in their discharge by an intimate kuowledge of the country, acquired during his experience as a traveling salesman. In 1869, upon the reorganization of the Philadelphia, Wil- mington and Baltimore Railroad Company, he was promoted to the position of Through Freight Agent ; and a few years later his superior ability was still further recognized by his elevation to the post of General Freight Agent. His general aptitude for the railroad business, the readiness with which he mastered its details and solved the most difficult problems in trausportation, were sufficient evidence that he had found a life vocation. With character- istic judgment he bent all his energies to the work in hand, impressed himself upon his supcriors and eventnally proved not only that the position he filled held latent possibilities far beyond the ordin- ary supposition, but also that he was the person to develop them. Abont this time a radical change in the system of transportation took place, the steam- ship lines, during the navigation season, becoming the favorite means of transit for both freight and travel. It was not long before their influence be- came a decided menace to the prosperity of the railroads, the cars of which stood unnsed upon the tracks, while the steamers plying between Philadel- phia and Baltimore were taxed to their full capacity. The circumstances were well calculated to rouse the utmost energy and watchfulness on the part of Mr. Wilson, and notwithstanding the many obstacles he had to contend with, he gradnally turned the tide of traffic in favor of his road and eventually increased it many fold. In this contest the position of freight manager was shown to be one of vital importance, and its incumbent at the time a man of unconquera- ble determination and infinite resources. In 1880, the Philadelphia, Wilmington and Baltimore Rail- road, heretofore an independent corporation, passed under the control of the Pennsylvania Railroad Company, which in this way gained a great victory over its active competitor-the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad. Mr. Wilson was one of the officers who were retaincd in their old positions. So well pleased with his work were his new employers, that in 1882, upon the resignation of Mr. John McC. Creighton, he was made General Freight Agent of the Penusyl-
vania Railroad, and as such continued until 1888, wheh he voluntarily retired from the position to as- sume grcater responsibilities elsewhere. In 1885 his department was reorganized, three assistants being appointed to manage the more onerous details, while he himself was designated General Traffic Manager and placed in full control of the whole freight business of the corporation. A writer in one of the principal railroad journals of the coun- try, fully informed as to Mr. Wilson's labors in this position, says: "Mr. Wilson made the greatest possi- ble improvement in all departments of the business. From a condition of more or less chaos when he en- tered upon his duties, he brought it to a state of efficiency which was the admiration of all railroad
men and of the public. Very few people have any conception of the magnitude of the freight traffic of the Pennsylvania system. Two-thirds of all the earnings of the company are from freight, and the gross earnings are one-seventh of those of the entire railroad system of this country. The coal and coke traffic in the last year of Mr. Wilson's service amounted to between fifteen and sixteen million tons. The rapid increase of business and the per- fect system attained, are sufficient proofs of the ability of Mr. Wilson as a manager." A most im- portant part of Mr. Wilson's labor in connection with this position, was the fixing of freight charges. With the enormous tonnage of the road a single error in judgment would have cost the company heavily and have led doubtless to complications which might have seriously impaired the yearly dividends. For the proper discharge of the duties of this position rare judgment and great decision of character, also, were prime requisites, yet both would have been of little avail without that inherent quality, called executive ability, which Mr. Wilson possesses in an extraordinary degree, and which, combined with his other attainments and attributes, gave him the reputation of being " the ablest traffic manager in the country." All the details of this vast business being at last perfectly systematized, Mr. Wilson's deputies, under his watchful control and management, carried them out successfully ; and his owu time was largely occupied in discussing and arranging with the President and Vice-Presi- dent of the road the great questious of general policy, upon which the profits and permaneuce of the corporation depended. It is scarcely to be doubted that he was the hardest working man in the employ of the company. From an early hour in the morning until long after the usual business hours he was daily eugaged with his task, and nothing save vigorous health and a well-ordered life could have enabled him successfully to withstand
I82
CONTEMPORARY BIOGRAPHY OF PENNSYLVANIA.
the heavy strain, both mental and physical. A
feature of Mr. Wilson's management of the local traffic in Pennsylvania and contiguous States was the impetus given by it to various industries which were largely dependent upon the transportation facilities afforded by the Pennsylvania Road. With what seemed intuition, but was really the outcome of the most earcful study of the local requirements, Mr. Wilson met cvery demand as rapidly as it was made, and it was not too much to assert that the rapid increase in many of their industries and the growth and expansion of those already established along the line of the road, were directly due to his untiring efforts and liberal as well as energetic man- agement. While lic was at the head of this great department the Inter-State Commerce Commis- sioners frequently sought his opinions on the problems which confronted them in their official investigations. In the summer of 1888 he was for- mally requested to appear before the Commission and enlighten it on details of general railway and freight traffic. His testimony on this occasion was of the utmost value and upon the subject of through export freight rates, in particular, was considered by all parties concerned, as one of the ablest state- ments of this exceedingly difficult and intricate sub- ject ever made public. Early in the fall of 1888 Mr. Wilson tendered his resignation as General Traffic Manager of the Pennsylvania Railroad, and with great reluctance it was accepted by the company on October 10th of that year. At the meeting of the Board of Directors held on that date, the following entry was made upon the minutes by unanimous action :
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.