USA > Pennsylvania > Prominent and progressive Pennsylvanians of the nineteenth century. Volume I > Part 12
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
While at Willard Hospital, Dr. Chapin proposed a plan of segre- gating the insane, a system some features of which have been adopted by nearly all the asylums of the United States, and which has practically influenced the care and treatment of patients throughout the country. It was Dr. Chapin's plan to separate the insane in
143
JOHN BASSETT CHAPIN.
cottages, according to their mental condition, and, sometimes, their physical requirements. It was found to be a wise departure from the plans usually approved, and it was the beginning, in fact, of an entirely new system of management of insane patients. Dr. Chapin is one of the persistent opponents of the idea of mechan- ical restraint, and, in 1890, recognizing his noble work in behalf of the mentally afflicted, Jefferson College honored him with the degree of Doctor of Laws. Since identifying himself with the Penn- sylvania Hospital for the Insane, Dr. Chapin has been instrumental in the erection of the Williamson Wards; the villa, which was espe- cially constructed for the accommodation of a small number of patients, who desired more liberal advantages, with special service, and in the erection of the wards recently opened for the care of the refractory and demented classes.
While Dr. Chapin has given his chief interest for the past decade to the affairs of the Pennsylvania Hospital for the Insane, yet he has continued his identification with the outside medical world, particularly as it is connected with his special studies. He has been President of the American Psychological Association (the association of American Superintendents of Asylums and Hospitals for the Insane) ; he is an honorary member of the Medico-Psycho- logical Association of Great Britain; an honorary member of the Belgian Society of Mental Medicine; a Fellow of the College of Physicians, and other societies. Dr. Chapin lives in an interesting house, erected over a hundred years ago, on the grounds of the Hospi- tal, and fashioned in the interior, in many of its apartments, similar to the Mount Vernon residence.
Dr. Chapin was married on March 18, 1858, to Harriet E. Preston, of Clyde, New York, whose ancestors emigrated from Con- necticut to New York. They have four children, of whom three are daughters. All are married, one to Rev. Wm. M. Gilbert, rector of St. Paul's Church, Yonkers, New York; one to Dr. Mosher, of the State Hospital Service in New York, and now of Albany, New York; and one to Charles E. Bodine, a prosperous and well-to-do merchant of Lodi, New York. John J. Chapin has studied mechanical engineering. The Doctor has grandchildren.
*
ISAAC H. CLOTHIER.
A MONG the sturdy pillars which uphold the pros- perity of Pennsylvania must be numbered the several great commercial houses which come in direct contact with the people of the Common- wealth through their vast retail business. One of the largest establishments of this nature in the State, and, in fact, the country, is that of which the subject of this biography, Isaac H. Clothier, has been, until recently, a leading member for more than a quarter of a century. But it is not alone as one of Philadelphia's leading merchants that Mr. Clothier is prominently known, but as a financier of marked ability, a captain of industry and a citizen of public worth.
ISAAC H. CLOTHIER was born in Philadelphia, November 5, 1837. He was educated at the Friends' schools, and at the age of seventeen years entered the importing dry-goods house of George D. Parrish & Company, where he obtained his first insight into commercial principles and acquired the habits of business which later in life brought him wide-spread fame as a merchant and a large fortune. He remained in this house until two years after attaining his majority, when he formed a partnership with George Morris and Edmund Lewis and established the firm of Morris, Clothier & Lewis, dealers in woolen goods. In 1868 he accepted a proposition to join Justus C. Strawbridge in a retail dry-goods busi- ness, already established on a most moderate scale at Eighth and Market streets. From that time the business commenced to make extraordinary progress, and each year marked a constantly ad- vancing growth. In 1874 the store building was purchased by the firm, and the next year the first enlargement took place, followed I44
AEFrancis& Ca
145
ISAAC H. CLOTHIER.
by repeated and constantly growing additions almost every year, through the purchase of adjoining properties on Market and Eighth streets, until, in 1880-1882, the firm had acquired all the property that could be had, contiguous to them, and their building extended from Market Street northward to Filbert and westward to the large wholesale dry-goods house of Hood, Bonbright & Co., one of the greatest in Philadelphia.
The requirements of the rapidly growing business had made it apparent for some time that this building would be needed, and it was finally secured. Early in 1887, after most extensive altera- tions, improvements and furnishings, it was thrown open to the public and became the largest retail store devoted to dry-goods in the United States. During these years of intense activity in organizing and building up an immense business, Mr. Clothier was the active man of the house and gave close and uninterrupted attention to the management of the immense business for over a quarter of a century, both in shaping the general policy of the house and in the carrying out of details. To the advertising of the business he gave personal attention for many years, and one element of the success of the house has been the forcible, inter- esting, but always strictly truthful advertisements which appeared for many years over the firm name. Another element of success has been the profit sharing with the various heads of departments, which Mr. Clothier personally originated in this country a number of years ago, a principle since adopted by other houses with sig- nal advantage to all concerned. He has always made it a point to encourage among his employés a personal enthusiasm in the service of the house. Various associations for mutual advantage among the large force of employés, such as the Relief Association, the Saving Fund, and others, have been fostered by him in every way. After conducting his business to the height of success, both in the way of money making and the highest and widest com- mercial repute, and after a most engrossing business career of thirty-four years, over twenty-six of which were in the firm of Strawbridge & Clothier, Mr. Clothier concluded, in 1894, to retire from business, and, accordingly, dissolved his connection with the
146
ISAAC H. CLOTHIER.
firm, December 31st of that year. In this important move he was actuated partly by a desire to preserve his health and vigor while still in the prime of life, and partly that he might give increased attention to many matters, educational and otherwise, in which he has long been interested. The opportunity to indulge his taste for study and literary pursuits was another consideration. While for many years few men have been better known in mercantile and financial quarters, as well as in all circles of business life, yet his attention and activities have not been limited thereto, but he has been largely engaged in various directions for the public good. He has long been a liberal patron and active manager of Swarthmore College, a manager of the Merchants' Fund, a Direc- tor of the Girard Trust Company, of the Keystone Watch Case Company, and has lately become a member of the Board of Trus- tees of the Pennsylvania Museum and School of Industrial Art, and of the Executive Committee of the Public Education Associa- tion. Though far from a club man, his tastes being for quiet home life, he is a member of the Union League, of the Merion Cricket Club, the Country Club and the Radnor Hunt. His home, "Ballytore," a fine castellated structure on the Pennsyl- vania Railroad, at Wynnewood, is one of the best known residences near Philadelphia, and here he delights in dispensing an old-fash- ioned liberal hospitality. His summer home, "Harbor Entrance," opposite Newport, Rhode Island, as its name indicates, is situated at the entrance of Newport harbor and Narragansett Bay, and is one of the most delightfully located and noted of the residences of that famed region. Mr. Clothier is a member of the Society of Friends and is an active member of the Meeting at Fifteenth and Race streets. He married, in 1864, Miss Mary C. Jackson, and they have a large and interesting family of nine children.
Es. Column.
The Rembrandt Eng. Co Phila
JAMES P. COBURN.
NCONQUERABLE energy has made James P. Coburn, of Bellefonte, a master spirit in whatever field of endeavor he has entered since he attained man's estate. The courage with which he has com- batted every obstacle encountered could have had none but a suc- cessful and satisfactory issue, and the fact that he has won so many friends in social, political and mercantile circles proves that to his eminent gifts of mentality are coupled sterling qualities of heart and genial affability of manner, traits of character that have given him deserved prominence as a lawyer, banker, and a rail- road director, besides opening to him the broad field of political activity. Although he has always taken a deep and sincere interest in governmental affairs and participated therein as became a public- spirited citizen, he has aspired to no office and sought no recog- nition for his services. While uneventful, his career is by com- mon consent placed among the most useful of his section.
JAMES POTTER COBURN was born on the IIth day of July, 1831, at Aaronsburg, Centre County, Pennsylvania. He was the son of Dr. Charles Coburn, who was born at Windham, Connect- icut, on the 30th day of October, 1785, and who came to Penn- sylvania in 1800. Here he practiced his profession with conspicuous success, attaining a wide reputation as one of the ablest physicians of the old school. He died on the 25th day of April, 1858. His wife and the mother of the subject of this review was formerly Miss Margaret Huston, who was born in Centre County, Pennsyl- vania, on the 18th day of September, 1800, and who died on the 2Ist day of August, 1861. The father was a scholarly and accom- plished man who thoroughly appreciated the benefits of a complete
147
148
JAMES P. COBURN.
education, and he determined that his son should enjoy all the advantages possible to aid him in the acquisition of knowledge. With this object in view and since he deemed that the common schools of the neighborhood were not, at that time, graded to a sufficiently satisfactory extent, he sent the son, when but eleven years of age, to the Owego Academy, in New York State, where the lad took up a thorough course. Upon leaving this institution he was enrolled as a student in the Harrisburg Academy, Harris- burg, Pennsylvania, in which school, as in Owego, he made most commendable progress and achieved the reputation of being a bright and apt and industrious pupil. From Harrisburg he went to the Tenant School, which was situated on the site of the Old Log College, near Hartsville, Bucks County, Pennsylvania, where he finished his classical education.
The first employment secured by Mr. Coburn after leaving the educational institutions in which he had laid the foundations for that broad, scholarly knowledge for which he is now distin- guished, was as a clerk in a store. In this establishment he gained a clear insight into the principles governing business opera- tions and soon embarked in mercantile pursuits in his native town on his own behalf. This store he ran for several years, but the occupation of merchant not proving particularly congenial, he abandoned commerce and entered the law office of Curtin & Blanchard, two well known attorneys of Bellefonte, Pennsylvania, as a student. Here he delved into the intricacies of common and statutory law from 1857 until 1860 inclusive, and was admitted to the Bar of Centre County in 1861. Although his knowledge of the law is a thorough one and while he gave every promise of attaining high eminence in the profession, he paid but little atten- tion to legal practice, spending most of his time and best energies for thirty years or more in securing the construction of the Lewis- burg and Tyrone Railroad, which was finally laid through Penn's Valley, in Centre County. Mr. Coburn's active efforts were largely instrumental in securing the aid of the Pennsylvania Rail- road Company, which subscribed to the extent of $2,500,000. The road still has Mr. Coburn's efficient aid in its Directorate.
149
JAMES P. COBURN.
It is seldom that any one individual represents three such widely diversified interests as law, railroads and banking, but Mr. Coburn's active career has covered all these three great fields of endeavor. In financial circles he is widely and favorably known as the President of the First National Bank of Bellefonte, in the guidance of the affairs of which institution he to-day finds his chief interest ; indeed, the prosperous condition of the affairs of the bank may justly be said to be as largely due to the financial foresight of its distinguished President as to any other contribut- ing cause. In a quiet, diligent and modest way Mr. Coburn, for more than a quarter of a century, has been steadily giving his best efforts and endeavors to advancing the interests of the people of the county where he resides in every possible way, both public and private. While he has naturally gained many friends he has never been ambitious to enter public life, although he was an active worker in the Whig party, and on the dissolution of that organi- zation allied himself with the Republicans. While performing his duties as a citizen in the most thorough way he has always shrunk from public office, as is aptly illustrated by his declination of a nomination by the Republicans of his district for the Congress of the United States. Practically, the only public office in which he has ever consented to serve was as a member of the Cottage Hos- pital Commission during the administration of Governor Beaver. Four hospitals were erected in different parts of the State during his occupancy of this office.
Mr. Coburn was married on the 17th day of October, 1860, to Miss Jane E. Huston, the daughter of Thomas Huston, a prom- inent resident of Centre County, Pennsylvania. They have no children.
BENJAMIN B. COMEGYS.
T HERE is no more important branch of public pros- perity than that which is found in the financial institutions of the country. It is in such centres that the great public movements are brought into action. Panics make their first appearance there, and a redundancy of national wealth is at once reflected there as well. It has proved necessary to the continued prosperity of a community that its financial institutions be maintained at as high a standard as possible. Pennsylvania has been particularly fortu- nate in this respect and out of the entire State, Philadelphia especially so. The Philadelphia National Bank is one of the greatest organizations of its kind in the country, and this is chiefly owing to the fact that its affairs have been administered throughout its entire history by men eminently fitted for such service. President Benjamin B. Comegys has conducted the man- agement of the bank since 1880 as its President. He entered the bank as a junior clerk in 1848, when but a young man, but step by step he rose until he reached the highest round of the ladder.
BENJAMIN B. COMEGYS was born in Dover, Delaware, May 9, 1819, and his parents were among the best known people of that State. He received his early education in the public schools near the place of his birth, and he remained in his boyhood home, pursuing this educational course, until 1837. In January of that year his father was inaugurated Governor of the State of Dela- ware and Benjamin Comegys came to Philadelphia, where he entered upon a business life wherein he was afterwards to attain such great success. At that time he was not quite eighteen years of age, but he was fired with the ambition of youth and a deter-
150
١٠٠٠
A.E-Francis v CE
B. B. Comeque
I51
BENJAMIN B. COMEGYS.
mination to succeed which had been greatly fostered by the example set him by his father, who was one of the most repre- sentative men of the times. For eleven years Mr. Comegys served in Market Street counting houses, the greater part of the time being with the dry-goods firm of Thomas C. Rockhill & Company. This training in mercantile pursuits fitted him for an active career in the financial department of the business world, and, in May, 1848, he entered what is now the Philadelphia National Bank, as a junior clerk, and passed through the various stages one step after another until he attained to the highest position which that great and successful organization could give him, namely, the Presidency. In August, 1851, he was elected Cashier; in 1866 he was made Vice-President, a post he occupied for a period of four- teen years, during which time he so successfully participated in the administration of the institution's affairs that it advanced with rapid strides to the front rank of similar corporations in the State of Pennsylvania. In 1880 he was elected President of the bank, and he has held that office ever since. While Mr. Comegys was progressing in that direction as an official, he also became identi- fied with other institutions of a like nature, and while still a comparatively young man, he became one of the best known in Philadelphia through his official connections. In 1869 he was elected a Director of the Philadelphia Trust, Safe Deposit and Insurance Company, of which organization he was made Vice- President in 1890. Since 1858 he has been a member of the Clearing House Committee of Banks, and now he is the only surviving original member of that Committee.
Mr. Comegys, in 1873, was appointed a Manager of the Western Saving Fund Society by the Judges of the Court of Common Pleas, and, in 1881, he was made a Director of the Board of City Trusts having charge of Girard College. In May, 1873, the Mayor of Philadelphia appointed him a Manager of the House of Refuge. In 1884, upon special invitation, he addressed the National Bankers' Association at Saratoga, and, in 1894, at Baltimore, he received a similar honor. The first of his subjects was "Safe Banking," and the second, "What Manner of Man should a Banker I .- II.
152
BENJAMIN B. COMEGYS.
be ?" Mr. Comegys was elected a Director of the Pennsylvania Railroad Company, November 9, 1887, and made a member of the Finance Committee. In this capacity he has indicated the posses- sion of those peculiar qualities and talents which denote the financier, and the Pennsylvania Railroad Company contains in its organization few men of wider financial experience than Benjamin B. Comegys. On May 9, 1894, the degree of LL.D. was conferred upon him by the Jefferson College.
In a certain field of letters Mr. Comegys is perhaps almost as well known as he is in the financial world. While he has a particular talent for literary work, most of his productions have been of a semi-religious character. He is an active member of the Presbyterian Church and one who makes the world the field of his labors of love in training the young to ways of honor and usefulness. Mr. Comegys is one of the Advisory Board of the Pennsylvania Railroad Young Men's Christian Association of Philadelphia. Some of Mr. Comegys' books are: "Talks with Boys and Girls, or Wisdom Better than Gold;" "Beginning Life ;" "How to Get On;" "Old Stories with New Lessons ;" "Girard College Addresses;" "Turn Over a New Leaf;" "A Tour Round My Library;" "A Primer of Ethics " (translated in Italian, Arabic and Japanese languages); "A Manual for the Chapel of Girard College;" "A Manual for the Chapel of the House of Refuge;" "An Order of Worship, with Forms of Prayer for Divine Service;" "Public Worship;" "Household Worship;" " Prayers for the Chapel and Family;" "Scriptural Prayer Book for Church Services;" and a number of others by which he is quite well known as a writer upon religious subjects. He pos- sesses one of the finest private libraries to be found in Philadelphia.
On April 20, 1847, Mr. Comegys was married to Miss Sarah P. Boyd, whose parents were of Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, and who died in June, 1896. They have had three daughters and one son, who died in November, 1884. Mr. Comegys' chief inter- ests at present are found in the management of the Philadelphia National Bank and in his other financial connections.
000000000000000000 XX
WILLIAM CONNELL.
ILLIAM CONNELL, President of the Connell Coal Mines, has put the impress of his energy and sagac- ity on many of the business, industrial and public institutions of Scranton, and not many men have built, with so humble a beginning, the success that he has reared. As a Pennsylvanian, he is to-day, viewed in every light, a credit to his State. He was born in Cape Breton, Nova Scotia, September 10, 1827, of Scotch parents who emigrated to Luzerne County, Pennsylvania, when he was seventeen years old. He went to work in the mines, for his family was poor. Handicapped thus, the boy made his start in life in surroundings that would probably have blighted the ambition and determination of many another lad. His education had been very limited indeed, but he had an inborn love of self-improvement, and a faculty of master- ing any subject in which he became interested. He quickly saw the advantage that he would gain from a scientific knowledge of mining, and was prompt to take up this study, to which he gave his every leisure moment. The Wyoming Valley and Susque- hanna Railroad and Coal Company, by which he was employed, found that the boy who had been put on its pay-roll as a car- tender was made of better material than usual, and gave him a trial in the mine offices. Mr. Connell here made the best of the oppor- tunity, and his advance was a rapid one. In 1856, twelve years after he entered the company's employ, he was placed in full charge of all its mines, an office in which he continued with suc- cess and credit for fourteen years. He became an influential citizen in Scranton, and by his business talents gradually amassed a small fortune that was soon to serve him well. In 1870 the
I53
I54
WILLIAM CONNELL.
charter of the Coal Company expired. Mr. Connell saw his oppor- tunity, and by a stroke of the boldness and enterprise that has characterized his subsequent career, secured the full control of the mines that had been so long under his management. On this occasion, as well, perhaps, as at any other time in his life, Mr. Connell showed of what stuff he was made. By this Napoleonic move he placed himself in the proprietorship of some of the largest mines in the State, and these vast interests he still controls. Mr. Connell's wonderful business capabilities may be best understood by the enumeration of his active interests. He is President of the Connell Coal Company; of the Third National Bank, of Scranton ; of the Lackawanna Mills; of the Scranton Button Com- pany; of the Weston Mills Company; of the Hunt & Connell Company, and of the Meadow Brook Land Company. He is a heavy stockholder and powerful director in the Lackawanna Iron and Steel Company; the Dickson Manufacturing Company; the Clark & Snover Company; the Lackawanna Trust and Safe Deposit Company; the Lehigh Salt Mining Company; the Scran- ton Packing Company; the Scranton Forging Company; the Lackawanna Lumber Company; the Colliery Engineer Company, and the Scranton Tribune. He is also a heavy stockholder in numerous other financial and industrial institutions. It is hardly necessary to add that Mr. Connell is one of the most conspicuous figures in the financial, manufacturing and mining affairs of northern Pennsylvania, and that his magnificent business talents have made themselves felt in more than one instance for the good of such institutions as he has been identified with.
The city of Scranton owes more, perhaps, to William Connell than to any other single man within its borders. He is one of the acknowledged leaders of the Republican party in northeastern Pennsylvania, although, until lately, he has never been a candi- date for any political office. In 1895 he strongly advocated the appointment of Judge Willard, and Governor Hastings, who had for years been his close friend, granted the request. Factional dissension in the Legislature blocked the approval of the appoint- ment, and the affair became an open issue. In the breach that
I55
WILLIAM CONNELL.
resulted Mr. Connell was by force of circumstances placed at the head of an important element of the Republicans of his section, and from that time has remained their leader. Mr. Connell at present represents the Eleventh Congressional District in the House of Representatives and is universally recognized as a wise and sagacious statesman. In addition to his business duties, he has found time to give to benevolent purposes, and to foster educational and religious institutions. He is a Trustee of Wesleyan University, of Syracuse University and of Drew Theo- * logical Seminary, and many humble charities are indebted to his thoughtfulness. Mr. Connell follows the religious convictions of his family, and is a practical member of the Methodist Episcopal Church. In religious affairs he is very liberal, and his wisdom has substantially aided in the upbuilding of his church, as well as his own business interests. Being thus identified so actively with all the institutions of society-business, religious, social and educational-and lending to each the counsel of his years and experience, as well as the material support of his finances, it but follows, as a matter of course, that William Connell is one of the most respected and powerful men in northern Pennsylvania. In the historical annals of the State his works must be enumerated as instances of model pluck, perseverance and ambitious effort.
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.