USA > Pennsylvania > Portraits of the heads of state departments and portraits and sketches of members of the legislature of Pennsylvania, 1893-1894 > Part 4
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The Senate.
ILLIAM HOOD HACKENBURG, of Milton, Northumberland county, who represents the Twenty-seventh district, was born May 14, 1859, and was educated in the public schools. He learned the printer's trade and afterwards began the study of the law, being admitted to the bar of North- umberland county in February, 1881. He was a justice of the peace at Milton from May 1, 1881, to September 18, 1884, when he resigned. During the years 1884 and 1885 he was chief burgess of the borough of Milton. Mr. Hackenburg was a delegate to the State Republican Convention of 1886, by which General Beaver was nominated for Governor, and of the convention that four years later nominated ex-Senator Delamater for the same honor. In 1891 he was a candidate for the Republican nomination for president judge of Northumberland county, and went into the con- vention with more than one-third of the delegates, made a hard fight and was de- feated by a narrow majority. He was elected a member of the Senate in 1892, defeating his Democratic opponent, Harry E. Davis, by 638 votes.
Recognizing his ability as a lawyer, President pro tempore Gobin, at the inan- guration of Senate appointed Mr. Hackenburg chairman of the Committee on Ju- dicial Apportionment, a position he is thoroughly competent to fill. He is also a member of the Committees on Judiciary General, Railroad, Mines and Mining, Judiciary Local and Library. Among the most important bills introduced by Mr. Hackenburg are the following : Giving chief burgesses the veto power and providing for organization of councils ; taking the granting of liquor licenses out of the hands of the court, dividing the state into license districts and providing for a license board equally divided, politically, to grant licenses. He is an eloquent and logical talker, a ready debater and a lawyer of great promise. Mr. Hackenburg takes a prominent part in the conncils of his party in the Senatorial district which he has the honor to represent, and is destined to become one of the most conspicaons party leaders in the Senate.
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The Senate.
G ERARD C. BROWN, who represents the Twenty-eighth district, or York county, is of Puritan, colonial and revo- lutionary stock and is a direct descend- ant in the seventh generation from Thomas Brown, Esq., of Rye, county of Essex, England, who emigrated to Con- cord, Mass., in 1632. The family is a younger branch of the Browns, of Beech- worth, county of Kent, England, which was founded by Sir Anthony Brown, created Knight of the Bath at the corona- tion of Richard II. in 1377. Senator Brown's great-great-grandfather, Major Hachaliah Brown, commanded the West- chester levies in the French and Indian war of 1757-8, at the siege of Lewis- burg, under General Lord Amherst. His great-grandfather, second son of Major Brown, served under Washington in the LEVYTYDEPÁ PHILA revolution. His father, Benjamin F. Brown, was born in Somers, New York, January 11, 1799, and spent twenty-five years of his life in traveling. In 1841 he married Mary Sophia, daughter of Alfred Cops, of the Tower of London, where, on November 12, 1842, his eldest child, Gerard Crane Brown, was born. In August, 1845, he returned to the United States with his family and re-occupied his farm in Carmel, Putnam county, New York, where he died September 25, 1881. Senator Brown received his education at the North Salem Academy, Westchester county, N. Y., Phillip's Academy, Andover, Mass., class of 1859, and Yale College, class of 1863. He left Yale Col- lege when eighteen years old, on the day following the bombardment of Fort Sumpter, and began raising a company on April 15, 1861, before Lincoln had issued his call for 75,000 volunteers. Senator Brown served as first lieutenant and was wounded at Bull Run July 21 and honorably discharged September 20, 1861. On February 8, 1872, Mr. Brown was married to Caroline Victoria, daughter of Dr. J. W. Barcroft, of Fairfax county, Virginia. He has five children, Benjamin and Gerard, and Mary B. B., Eva W. and Carolene. He has followed farming since the close of the war. He has been deputy of the state grange for York county for seventeen years, lecturer of the Pennsylvania State Grange from 1886 to 1890 and a member of the legislative committee of the Grange from 1890 to 1893. He was first elected State Senator in 1886, re-nominated by acclamation and re-elected in 1890. He did active work as a speaker during the recent presiden- tial campaign in West Virginia, New Jersey, New York and Connecticut. In the Legislature of 1893 he served on the Committees of Agriculture, Finance, Game and Fish, Insurance and Library. 'He was the Democratic caucus nominee for President pro tempore. Among the bills he introduced were those to enforce the anti-oleomargarine law of 1885 ; to create a dairy and food commissioner ; to en- large the powers of the State Board of Agriculture ; to enforce article seventeen of the constitution ; to legalize eel weirs and to equalize taxation.
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The Senate.
L UTHER RILEY KEEFER, of the Twenty-ninth district, who is now (1893) serving his fifth term as a State Senator, was born March 5, 1834, at Harrisburg. His father, Andrew Keefer, a descendant of the French Huguenots, was a cabinetmaker and merchant at Harrisburg until 1847 when he moved to Schuylkill Haven. He attended the public schools of his native city, and in his new home after removing to Schuylkill Haven he was admitted into the higher classes of the public schools of that place. He pursued an academic course in a private school at Schuylkill Haven after he had completed the course at that time taught in the public schools. In 1849 he was apprenticed to learn the trade of foundryman at the Colebrook- dale iron works, in Berks county, of which W. W. Weaver was proprietor. After an apprenticeship of four years Mr. Keefer, in 1853, returned to his honie and soon afterwards established a foundry and machine shop, with his brother, Jolın B., at West Haven, now Cressona, Schuylkill county, Pa., and carried on this business very successfully until 1875 when he withdrew from active manufac- turing business. From his earliest manhood Mr. Keefer was an enterprising and progressive citizen and his neighbors held hint in the highest esteem. He was called upon to serve the community in which he resided in various capacities and was in turn elected a member of councils, burgess and school director. When the war broke out, though Mr. Keefer's business was such as to require his personal attention, but he arranged it so that in 1862 he could enter the service of the gov- ernment and during that and the following year he was enrolling office for the United States government in his district. When the rebel forces invaded Penn- sylvania in 1863 he enlisted for the emergency campaign, in company A, Twenty- seventh regiment Pennsylvania volunteers. Was afterwards appointed Deputy United States Marshal for the Fourteenth sub-district of Pennsylvania. Mr. Keefer is not an orator in the common acceptation of the term, though he is one of the most industrious and successful legislators in the body of which he is a mem- ber, and has served on the Senate Committee on Railroads as its chairman for twelve years. He is at present on the Committees of Finance, Appropriations, Pensions and Gratuities, Corporations, Apportionment, Mines and Mining and Elections. In 1880 he served on the special committee to examine into the alleged misappropriation of money by the State Treasurer, and in 1888 was on the special committee to draft a general revenue bill, and also during the session of 1889 was a member of the special elections committee of the Senate to determine the election contest in the Third Senatorial district, Philadelphia, in the case of Osbourn r. Devlin. Senator Keefer is a genial companion and very popular. He is a member of the board of trustees of Pennsylvania College at Gettysburg, a member of the board of trustees at the Kutztown Normal School and takes great interest in educational affairs.
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The Senate.
B ERNARD J. MONAGHAN, . who represents the Thirtieth district, was born at Ashland, Schuylkill county, March 31, 1861. lle attended the schools of his native town and Shenan- doah and subsequently Villanova Col- lege, Delaware county, and Bryant & Stratton's Business College, Philadel- phia. From the three last-named in- stitutions he graduated. In 1877, when he was sixteen years old, he entered the mercantile business under the firm name of John B. Monaghan & Sons, and has re- mained in it ever since. He is also the senior member of the firm of Monaghan Brothers & Co., which is engaged in the grain, coal and lumber business at Hawarden, Iowa. Senator Monaghan's parents were born in Ireland, but they came to this country when very young, LEVYTYPE CO. P the father being only five and the mother only two years of age. He never held any other office but Senator, and had for his opponent for the nomination in 1890, when he was made the Demo- cratic candidate for the position he holds, ex-Senator Watson, a relative by mar- riage. His opponent, in the fight for election, was a cousin of Mr. Monaghan. His district takes in the northern portion of Schuylkill county. At the session of 1893 he served on the Committees of Municipal Affairs, Insurance, Elections and Centennial Affairs. He introduced among other bills one to provide that life in- surance companies shall not be permitted to issue their policies or contracts of insurance in this state unless they shall clearly set forth upon the policies a true and correct copy of the representations made by their agents or proper officials to the insured at the time of the signing of the application.
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The Senate.
JOSEPH MILLIKEN WOODS is the only man who has been re-elected Senator from the Thirty-first district, composed of Perry, Juniata and Mifflin counties. He was born on January 5, 1854, at New Berlin, Union county, Pa. His father was an attorney-at-law, and the Senator's paternal grandmother was the youngest daughter of John Witherspoon, a signer of the Declara- tion of Independence. The Senator at- tended school in Lewistown, Pa., until 1870, and then spent three years as a student in the Bellefonte Academy. In 1873 he entered Princeton College, from which he graduated in 1876. He has been practicing as an attorney-at-law at Lewistown, since 1878. He was elected district attorney of Mifflin county in 1880, and in 1888 he was chosen State Senator, defeating George Jacobs, the Democratic candidate, who, in 1890, made the speech nominating William A. Wallace for Governor at the Scranton Convention, which made Robert E. Pattison the Democratic gubernatorial nominee. Mr. Woods was re-elected to the Senate by 296 majority in 1892, when his Democratic opponent was Joseph C. McAlister, whom Perry county elected district attorney. Mr. Woods was a dele- gate from the Thirty-first Senatorial district in the Republican State Convention of 1883. He is chairman of the Senate Committees on Judiciary Local and Game and Fish, and also a member of the Committees on Appropriations, Centennial Affairs, Judiciary General, Federal Relations, Canals and Inland Navigation, and New Counties and County Seats. Among the important bills which he intro- duced at the sessions of 1893 are those to reimburse to counties money expended to re-erect the bridges destroyed by the floods of 1889 ; to extend the limitation of action to the right to mine iron ore ; and to prevent deception and fraud by owners or agents controlling any stallion left for service. Among the societies to which Senator Woods belongs are the Odd Fellows, the Apprentices' Literary Society of Lewistown, and the Patriotic Order Sons of America. He is an athlete and was formerly an expert baseball player. He has been conspicuous in securing legislation beneficial to the fish and game interests of the state.
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1895324
The Senate.
W ILLIAM PENN LLOYD, of the Thirty-second district, was born in Lisburn, Cumberland county, Pa., Sep- tember 1, 1837. His father was Wil- liam Lloyd and his mother Amanda Anderson Lloyd. His ancestors, on his father's side, were Welsh Quakers, or Friends, and came to this country in 1682, a few months prior to the arrival of William Penn, and settled on the "Welsh Tract " in Delaware county. About the close of the war for Indepen- dence, his grandfather, Isaae Lloyd, re- moved to Cumberland county. On his maternal side he is of Seotch-Irish ex- traction, and traces his lineage baek to those sturdy pioneers who, pushing westward from Chester county, estab- lished the first permanent settlement west of the Susquehanna river about the year 1720. Three of his great uncles, Jolin, James and George Anderson, served in the Continental army during the Revolutionary war, and their father, George Anderson, was a lieutenant in Colonel William Moore's Chester county regiment during the Braddoek campaign of 1755. Mr. Lloyd spent his youth on a farm, received his education in publie and private schools, and taught in the former for eight terms. He enlisted as a private in the First Pennsylvania cavalry September 1, 1861, and was discharged as adjutant, with his regiment, September 9, 1864, serving frequently, during the last year, as adjutant general of a brigade. He participated in all the campaigns, and in a large number of the battles of the Army of the Potomac during this period ; was commissioned division inspector of the National Guard of Pennsyl- vania with the rank of lieutenant colonel in 1873 ; was commander of the Grand Army Post of Mechaniesburg for seven years and is the author of the history of the First Pennsylvania cavalry. He studied law with Colonel William M. Penrose, of Carlisle, and was admitted to the Cumberland county bar in 1865. In 1866 he was appointed United States Collector of Internal Revenue for the Fifteenth Con- gressional district of Pennsylvania. This office he resigned in 1869 to accept a position in the Dauphin Deposit Bank of Harrisburg, which he held for nearly tif- teen years. He quit the bank in 1884 and has been engaged in the practice of his profession in Mechanicsburg and in the management of' extensive financial and agricultural interests since that date. The only elective political office for which he has ever been a candidate was his present position as Senator. His majority over his Republican competitor was 3,143. The usual Democratic majority in his district is about 1,200. He is a member of the Judiciary General, Corporations, Finance, Military Affairs, Pensions and Gratuities, Centennial Affairs and Agri- cultural Committees, and has been prominently identified, while in the Senate, with the legislation on the subjects of public roads, common sehools, fenee laws, equalization of taxation, Sunday laws and municipal government. His argument on the question of jurisdiction in the extraordinary session of 1892, indicates care- ful research and a clear comprehension of the subject. At the present session he led the opposition in the Senate against any change in the Sunday laws, and it was largely through his vigorous efforts that the fence bill was defeated. As speaker and writer, he has, for years, given much attention to the discussion of social and economie subjects, and especially to our agricultural interests. He is now also filling a number of important positions of public and private trust.
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The Senate.
W. U. BREWER, of the Thirty-third district, was born in Montgomery township, Franklin county, on April 3, 1844. His father was a farmer, and his early years were spent in the labors inci- dent to that occupation. Receiving his early education in the schools of Green- castle, Pa., he taught for a number of years in Franklin and Lancaster coun- ties and then attended the Millersville State Normal School, graduating in the scientific course. After his graduation he was connected with the normal school for nearly three years as instruc- tor in mathematics. He returned to Franklin county in 1868, and having, while teaching, taken up the study of law, was admitted to the bar on Decem- ber 12 of that year. From that time he has been actively engaged in the prac- tice of his profession and has won envi- able and honorable prominence as a lawyer. His business is not confined to the courts of his own county, but extends to the adjoining county of Fulton, and for the past eight years he has been retained in a large number of the cases appealed from the lower to the supreme courts. An ardent and active Republican, he has always taken a prominent part in politics, and has done effective campaign work in many parts of the state, but he was never an aspirant for public office until 1892, when, as the Republican candidate for State Senate in the Thirty-third dis- trict, composed of the counties of Franklin and Huntingdon, he was elected by a majority of 1,812, the largest ever cast therein for that office. On entering upon his duties, Mr. Brewer was made chairman of the Committee on Federal Relations and given a place on the important Committees on Judiciary General, Judiciary Local, Congressional Apportionment and Library. From the first he has taken an active and useful part in legislation, and his legal training and experience, and incisive logical powers as a debator have given him a prominence and influence not often won by a Senator in his first session. Regular in attendance and thor- oughly acquainted with the character and scope of the measures as they come up for consideration and disposal, he is prepared to vote upon a discriminating knowl- edge of their merits. His reasons for advocacy are clearly stated, his opposition made withi courtesy and freedom from acrimony, and these qualities, added to a respect for his ability and sincerity, and esteem as a man, have conduced towards making Mr. Brewer a popular and influential member of the Senate of Pennsyl- vania.
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The Senate.
P GRAY MEEK, who represents the . Thirty-fourth district, composed of the counties of Clinton, Centre and Clearfield, is of Scotch ancestry. He is a descendant of Robert Meek, who emi- grated from Edinburgh to this country before the revolutionary war, and who had six sons in that conflict, three of whom lost their lives. Captain George Meek, his son, was a companion of James Harris in his early surveying expeditions. William Meek, son of George, was the grandfather of Senator Meek, and the latter's father was Reu- ben H. Meek, on whose farm the sub- ject of this sketch was born, July 12, 1842. Senator Meek's education was obtained in the common schools. He began life as a school teacher at Lun,ber LEVYTYPE CO PHILA City, Clearfield county, in the winter of 1855 and 1856. After passing a short time as clerk and doing a little farming, he, in May, 1861, became the junior editor of the Democratic Watchman, of Bellefonte.
He was not only a senten- tious but courageous writer, and his free criticisims of the manner in which the war was being conducted involved the proprietors in trouble, compelling him to sever his connection with the paper. In the following July he purchased a half interest in the Watchman, and from that time his impress was sensibly felt on the paper, which has gradually grown in popularity until it is unequaled among the country weeklies in the state. During the war Mr. Meek was several times ar- rested for his outspoken denunciation of the policy of the Republican adminis- tration then in control of the government. He was imprisoned in the cotton factory barracks in Harrisburg, and then discharged on parole without being informed as to the charges against him or the cause of his arrest. His con- stitutents never lost confidence in him, and in 1867, 1868, 1870 and 1871 they elected him to the House of Representatives by large majorities. During these years he secured the passage of a lumberman's lien law, and an act requiring rail- roads to fence their lines in Centre county or pay for stock killed, both of which measures have proven of material benefit to the laboring men and farmers of his section. In 1872 he was secretary to the Democratic State Committee. In 1873, 1875 and 1876 he had the endorsement of his county for State Senator, and subse- quently he was defeated for the Democratic Congressional nomination by Governor Curtin by only two votes. In 1882 he was editorial secretary of the Democratic State Committee, and served as one of its secretaries during the campaign of 1883 and 1884. He was elected chief clerk of the House of Representatives, January, 1883, and filled that position during the memorable regular and special sessions of that year. In 1890 Mr. Meek was elected to the Senate by a majority approxima ting 5,000. He was made a member of the Committees on Appropriation, Banks, Insurance and Congressional Apportionment, and prepared the congressional and senatorial apportionment bills presented and advocated by the Democrats. His principle efforts during this session was put forth to secure some legislation taxing unnaturalized persons for poor purposes. At the session of 1893 he served on the Committees on Banks, Congressional Apportionment, Insurance, Legislative Ap- portionment, Public Printing and other committees. He was the author of the Democratic bill to apportion the state into congressional districts, which was arranged with great care, and particular reference to contiguity of territory and made the population in each district as nearly equal as possible.
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The Senate.
JOHN A. LEMON, of Blair county, of the Thirty-fifth district, was born in Cambria county, Pa., and has resided in Blair county all his life. He received a common school education at Hollidaysburg. For years Colonel Lemon has been a coal operator and railroad contractor, and of the thousands of employés under him while in active business there is not one who does not regard him as a personal friend. Colonel Lemon was once elected burgess of Hollidaysburg. In 1872 he was nominated for Sen- ator in a strong Democratic district. So great was his popularity that the Democrats declined to nominate a can- didate in opposition to him and he was unanimously elected. In 1876 his con- stitutents demanded that he again rep- resent them in the Senate, giving him a majority of 691 in a district usually Democratic by one thousand. Colonel Lemon's name was frequently mentioned in connection with State offices, but he usually declined the honor until 1880, when he was elected Auditor General by a handsome majority. Returning to his home at the expiration of his term of three years, he was again returned to the Senate, and has been a member of that body continuously ever since. He was elected to his third term in the Senate by 1,906 majority. His re-election in 1892, when his defeat was confidently predicted by the Democratic opposition, was secured by a majority of 1.655. Senator Lemon is a member of these committees-Agriculture, Centennial Affairs, Fi- nance, Public Printing and Railroads. His modest ways and courteous treat- ment of his associates have made him one of the most popular members of the Senate. While making no claims as an orator, he is still successful in securing for his constitutents the best results in legislation, and the interests of the people at large are safe in his hands.
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The Senate.
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NORMAN BRUCE CRITCHFIELD, of Somerset county, who represents the Thirty-sixth district in the State Senate, was born in Somerset county, l'a., July 20, 1838. His great-great- grandfather came from Wales about the middle of the eighteenth century, and settled in New Jersey. At the close of the war for Independence, in which he served, his great-grandfather went to Virginia, where he married and soon afterward took up his residence in Som- erset county, Pa. His great-grand- father, grandfather and father were farmers, and Senator Critchfield also followed that avocation. His early edu- cation was obtained in the public and normal schools of Somerset county. In 1856 he entered the Ohio University at LEVYTYPE ČO. PHÍLA Athens, Ohio, and the following spring returned to his native county and spent the summer in a private school. He taught school for a number of years and was superintendent of schools in Somerset county from 1866 to 1869. From 1885 to 1889 he was prothonotary of common pleas and clerk of criminal courts of his county, and in 1890 was elected to the Senate from his district, consisting of Som- erset. Bedford and Fulton counties, by a plurality of nearly 1,700. At the session of 1891 he was chairman of the Committee on Accounts, secretary of the Commit- tee on Agriculture and a member of the Mines and Mining, Health and Sanita- tion and Education Committees. Two years later he was made chairman of the Committee on Agriculture, and was given a place on the Appropriations and . Health and Sanitation Committees. He introduced bills to make the Secretary of the State Board of Agriculture ex-officio a member of the board and to prevent the spread of the disease known as tuberculosis among domestic animals. What is known as the agricultural delegation of the Legislature, consisting of about one hundred members, elected him its secretary. Senator Critchfield has not only a civil record of which he may feel proud but he performed creditable service in the war of the rebellion. He served three years m the Union army and participated in the coast campaigns in East Virginia and South Carolina and in Sherman's famous campaign which culminated in the capture of Atlanta and Savannah. He also served with General Sherman in his march through the Carolinas and Vir- ginia, ending at Washington, at the close of the war.
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