USA > Pennsylvania > Prominent and progressive Pennsylvanians of the nineteenth century. Volume III > Part 19
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
247
248
SYLVESTER H. MARTIN.
and official of the city, he recognized his duty and faithfully performed it. He fairly won and retained the respect and esteem of all with whom or under whom he labored, and he is as highly thought of by those who work under his direction. Being in charge of a greater number of miles of streets and highways than is the Chief of any similar bureau of the country, he personally directs the important work of keeping them clean and endeavors at all times to hold the contractors to their fullest measure of duty.
SYLVESTER H. MARTIN was born in Chester County, Pennsylvania, August 9, 1841, his parents being Michael Martin, son of Samuel Martin and Sarah (March) Martin, daughter of John March, both being old Chester County families. His parents moved to Philadel- phia while he was still young, and he entered the public schools some time afterwards. He was a pupil of the school situated on Lombard Street east of Seventeenth, and later, of the old Southwest Grammar School near Twenty-third and Lombard streets. As a pupil he was very quick to learn, for, in 1850, at the age of nine years, he was attending the higher grade school. That year he was compelled to leave his studies and was put to work in the brickyard of Thomas Irvin. During the summer season he was thus employed, and during the winter engaged in textile mills until the War of the Rebellion broke out in 1861. Up to this time he had been employed by Thomas Irvin, brickmaker, and Thomas Drake and Caleb Milne, manufactur- ers. Scarcely had the War begun when, in April, 1861, he enlisted as a private in the Twenty-third Regiment, Pennsylvania Volunteers, and served for three months. In September of the same year he was again enrolled as a soldier, this time as a private in the Eighty-eighth Regiment, Pennsylvania Volunteers. When the period of enlistment of this command expired, in 1864, he re-enlisted and served during the remainder of the War. He was honorably discharged in June, 1865, as Captain of his company. He had earned the chevrons of the non- commissioned officer, with the shoulder straps of Lieutenant and Cap- tain for bravery in the field of battle, and the proper discharge of all the duties of the soldier. Twice was he wounded in battle-the first time at Antietam, September 17, 1862, the second time at Hatcher's Run, Virginia, February 7, 1865. In the latter case the ball entered
249
SYLVESTER H. MARTIN.
below the right shoulder and was extracted from the left side of the body. He was virtually shot through. The bullet was not found until a week after the shot had been received.
He was highly complimented by his Regimental Commander and by General Reynolds, Commander of the First Corps at the battle of Chancellorsville, for services in command of a detail who brought from between the battle lines of both armies certain entrenching tools which were subsequently used to protect the right of the line from an enfil- ade fire of the enemy's artillery.
Returning to Philadelphia at the close of the War, Mr. Martin, in 1866, secured a position as clerk in the Cold Spring Ice and Coal Company, of which Thomas Cahill was President, and afterwards was employed in the textile mill of James Erben. Two years later he was appointed to a minor inspectorship in the Health Department, in which position he served for five years, when he was made Chief of Street Cleaning under the same Board. The place of Chief of the Bureau of Street Cleaning was given to him in 1888, a responsible position, which he still retains.
On March 7, 1864, Mr. Martin and Sarah Sykes were married. She died in October, 1877. On November 27, 1879, he wedded Mary E. Westerman. She died in December, 1896. The fruits of these marriages are Hannah S., Sylvester H., Jr., George S., Sarah Leona and Laura M. Mr. Martin and his interesting family reside at Logan, one of Philadelphia's many pretty suburbs.
G. BETTON MASSEY.
6 NE of the most important developments in medical science during recent years has been that branch which treats of electro-therapeutics, a departure in the methods of scientific investigation which prac- tically marks an era. Among the most ardent disciples of electricity in the treatment of nervous diseases, abnor- mal growths and the ailments of women is Dr. George Betton Massey, the subject of this biography. Doctor Massey is not only well known in Philadelphia as a private practitioner and physician to the Gynecological Department of the Howard Hospital, but his fame has extended largely throughout the medical fraternity in the United States.
GEORGE BETTON MASSEY was born near the village of Massey, in Kent County, Maryland, November 15, 1856. For nearly two hundred years his ancestors were prominent in that section of the State, and his father was descended from an early Maryland settler who cast his fortunes on American soil in 1714. His early education was gained mainly under the guidance of his mother, who was a mem- ber of a well-known Florida family, named Betton, and the son's love of scientific subjects was early developed. At the close of the War, with all its consequent changes in social conditions, Doctor Massey sought occupation and further opportunities for self-education in a country school in Anne Arundel County, Maryland, as a teacher, when not yet sixteen years old. In the autumn of 1873 he went to his maternal uncle, the late George W. Betton, and began a year of pre- liminary medical studies, having determined to follow the profession of medicine as a vehicle for his ambition. During the winter of 1874 and 1875 he was a student at the Medical College of South Carolina.
250
The Prabran: 2 \ _ Phila
Beton Markey
25I
G. BETTON MASSEY.
He took a prize there for proficiency in chemistry, and the final year of his undergraduate medical education was passed at the University of Pennsylvania, from which he graduated in 1876. Upon leaving the University he went with Doctor Betton, his preceptor, as an assistant, but, when opportunity offered itself, he accepted a position as Assist- ant Physician in the State Hospital for the Insane, at Danville, Penn- sylvania. He remained there until 1879, when he resigned to begin practice.
He was for a time, during his early practice in Philadelphia, Assist- ant in the Gynecological Clinic of Prof. William Goodell at the University, and also Assistant Physician in the Orthopedic Hospital and Infirmary for Nervous Diseases, where he had an opportunity for observing the work of such world-famed . authorities as Drs. S. Weir Mitchell, Wharton Sinkler and Morris J. Lewis. In 1880 the position of electro-therapeutist was created by the Board, and Doc- tor Massey was appointed to the post, which he filled until 1887. In this department, where he had unrivaled opportunities for the study of electricity as a curative agent of nervous diseases, he made his greatest progress and obtained a reputation which placed him in the advance guard of latter-day scientific searchers. He was the assistant of Doctor Mitchell in electric treatment, and as this had been recognized for years as a remedy for nervous diseases, Doctor Massey devoted himself at first exclusively to its development in this field. When the news came from Paris, about 1885, that it was successfully employed to reduce fibroid tumors of the uterus to an innocuous condition, Doctor Massey began experimenting in this new direction. He resigned the position at the Infirmary, in 1887, to accept the post of Physician to the Department of Diseases of the Mind and Nervous System at the Howard Hospital, which, however, did not furnish the requisite mate- rial for the development of his experiments with electricity. But through the scientific zeal of Dr. T. Hewson Bradford he was enabled to practice at the Out-Patient Department of the Pennsylvania Hos- pital, where he prosecuted his studies with great effect. One of the most important works relative to electricity in the treatment of the affections peculiar to woman, "Electricity in the Diseases of Women," was issued by Doctor Massey in 1889, embodying the data which he
252
G. BETTON MASSEY.
gathered in this Hospital, and it was the first complete treatise on the subject ever published. He was later made Physician to the Gyneco- logical Department of the Howard Hospital, where he has since maintained a clinic for the demonstration of electro-therapeutics in gynecology.
It is possible that his most enduring reputation will, however, rest upon his latest contribution to human knowledge, which is the dis- covery that mercury may be disseminated through a cancerous growth by electricity ; and as this substance, or rather its nascent oxychlorides, is a most powerful antiseptic and kills the growth, it is made evident for the first time that cancers are of microbic origin.
Doctor Massey's long and earnest devotion to the specialty of electricity in medicine, and his advocacy of its merits throughout the United States, and, in fact, before the Pan-American Congress, has given him a national prominence, and has stamped him as a man of great powers of research and scientific investigation. His reputation as a leader in his branch of science has been maintained by a series of papers and treatises which have been widely circulated in the medi- cal profession. In 1890 he took the initiative in the formation of the American Electro-Therapeutic Association, of which he became Presi- dent in 1891, and which he still serves as a member of the Executive Council.
In 1885 Doctor Massey was married to Harriet L. Stairs, of Phila- delphia, and has two sons and a daughter. Doctor Massey con- tinues in his zeal for the advancement of his profession, and to-day occupies a leading position in the medical world.
-
WWW-Brandlang Co Ph. :
WILLIAM L. MATHUES.
ILLIAM L. MATHUES was born in Middletown Township, Delaware County, Pennsylvania, on the 24th day of March, 1862. He is the son of William F. and Emeline Mathues, whose maiden name had been Emeline Willis. His family is of German extraction, the original American ancestor settling in Pennsylvania prior to the Revolutionary War, in which great contest his paternal great-grandfather took an active part. His son, William Mathues, the grandfather of the subject of this biography, was born in Baltimore County, Maryland, in 1795, and, when eighteen years of age, enlisted in the American Army for the War of 1812. After the cessation of hostilities and his discharge from the military service of his country, he settled in Chester County, Pennsylvania, where he married Susan McHenry, and reared a family of seven sons and one daughter, three of whom are still living. He died in Media, Pennsylvania, in 1878. One of his sons, William F. Mathues, the father of William L. Mathues, was born in Chester County, Pennsylvania, on the 25th day of February, 1825. He, following the patriotic instincts of his ancestors, served the nation for three years during the Civil War, as a member of the Fifty-fourth Pennsylvania Volunteers, enlisting as a private and being promoted to the position of Hospital Steward. For many years he was one of the most prominent of Delaware County citizens, and received a number of marks of the confidence of the community. Soon after the War he was elected to the responsible position of County Treasurer of Delaware County, and so well did he fulfill the obligations of this office, that he was elected Sheriff in 1884. His children were William, Susanna J., Mary J., Alice, Emma K.,
253
254
WILLIAM L. MATHUES.
William L., Charles W. and Allen C. W. He died on the 15th day of December, 1894.
The early days of the subject of this biography were spent in Delaware County, where he grew to manhood upon his father's farm. His education was acquired in the public schools of the neighboring town of Media. Here he made such excellent progress that a professional career was pointed out as his walk in life. Accordingly, upon his completion of the course in these institutions, in 1880, when Mr. Mathues was eighteen years of age, he entered the law office of John M. Broomall, an active figure at the Delaware County Bar. Mr. Mathues was admitted to practice in the courts of Delaware County on the Ioth day of November, 1884. He had scarcely qualified himself, however, for the active practice of his profession, when the responsible post of Deputy Sheriff came to him, and, from January, 1885, until January, 1887, he devoted the bulk of his time to the duties incumbent upon him in this office. So competent did he prove, and so thorough was his attention to the demands of his position, that, upon the completion of his term of service therein, the office of Deputy Prothonotary was offered to him, and he entered upon its duties immediately, filling the position for five years, and until January, 1892. Here, as in his former public position, he made such an excellent record that his political associates in the Republican party nominated him for the office of Prothonotary and Clerk of the Court of Quarter Sessions, and he was elected in the fall of 1891, taking the oath of office on the first Monday in January, 1892. He was re-elected in 1894, and again for the third term in 1897.
Since the age of eighteen Mr. Mathues has taken an active part in the political affairs of Delaware County, early allying himself with the Republican party and taking a prominent part in its councils. So thorough was the appreciation of his ability by the party leaders and his constituents, that the Republicans in the Convention, in the spring of 1896, broke the two-term rule in order to permit him to be nominated for a third term in the office of Prothonotary. In secret society circles Mr. Mathues has found many congenial associations and made many warm friends. He is a member of Lenni Tribe, No. 86, Improved Order of Red Men; Media Lodge, No. 749, Junior
.
255
WILLIAM L. MATHUES.
Order of United American Mechanics; Capt. Isaac Johnson Camp, No. 18, Sons of Veterans ; Militia Commandery, Knights of Malta ; as well as of the Media Fire Company, No. I, and of a number of political organizations. He served as Aide on the staff of the Com- mander-in-Chief of the United States, Sons of Veterans.
Mr. Mathues was married, September 24, 1884, to C. E. Goodley, daughter of 'Charles Goodley, of Delaware County. She died in 1891, leaving three sons, William Franklin, Samuel G. and Earnest Paul. In 1893 he was united in marriage to Marguerite R. Louden, daughter of P. B. Louden, of Delaware County. They have one son.
EDWIN A. MERRICK.
HE office of General Superintendent of the House of Correction is of the utmost importance, inasmuch as it exercises a direct and powerful influence on the good government of the people in general and the management and control of the vicious classes in particular. To hold such a post, a man must be specially endowed with all the qualities which severally combine to make a strong mind, a sturdy will and a steadfast faithfulness. Edwin A. Merrick has all of these, and is a Philadelphian whose career and character are in every sense praiseworthy.
EDWIN A. MERRICK was born, February 15, 1829, in the old district of Southwark, and resided within its boundaries for upwards of forty-eight years. He is the son of Capt. Alexander P. and Ann Merrick. Captain Merrick contracted the yellow fever and died in Mobile, Alabama, leaving the son fatherless when he was two years old. Edwin A. Merrick's mother, whose maiden name was Bickham, lived to be eighty-nine years old. The Bick- hams were Quakers; but early in life the mother of Edwin embraced the religious teachings of Emanuel Swedenborg, under the influence of which the son received his early training and the moulding of his character. His first educational training he received as a student in the Ringgold Public School, from there entering the Philadelphia Central High School. He graduated at the closing of a two years' term, in order to enter early upon life's sterner duties.
At the age of sixteen Edwin A. Merrick obtained employ- ment in a dry-goods commission house, a business conducted by Cyrus Hillborn, in Church Alley, and remained there until he
256
The Rembrandt Eng. Co. Phila.
257
EDWIN A. MERRICK.
reached manhood, after which he accepted a position as book- keeper for the firm of A. & R. See. He remained with this firm a number of years and continued with them after they became the owners and publishers of Graham's Monthly Magazine, and until they disposed of their ownership to Mclaughlin Brothers, with whom he was employed for a short period before entering business on his own account. Mr. Merrick has been connected with three of Philadelphia's banking institutions in the capacity of Director, and is a senior member of the Board of Directors of the Southwark National Bank. In the fall of 1864 he was nominated by the Union Republican party and elected to the office of Clerk of the Orphans' Court. In 1876 he was elected by the Councils of the city of Phila- delphia a member of the Board of Managers of the House of Correction, Employment and Reformation. In this important institu- tion he has ever since found his leading interests, and from that time dates a career of great service to Philadelphia.
In 1877 the Board of Managers of the House of Correction, Employment and Reformation, desirous of correcting abuses and the defective discipline at that time existing in the institution, and impressed with Mr. Merrick's peculiar characteristics and adaptation for such a service, prevailed upon him to accept a position specially created, with power conferred, under rules unanimously adopted, to aid in accomplishing the objects specified. Shortly after Mr. Merrick entered upon his duties, the desired changes in the administration of the institution's affairs became apparent and discipline has been always since maintained.
In his younger days Mr. Merrick took an active interest in politics, serving the Republican party and his friends in ward, city and State executive committees and nominating conventions for several years. He was instrumental, whilst a member of the City Committee, in having a convention called to revise the rules and create division organizations. He was a leading spirit in working to consolidate all the elements of opposition to the Democracy, and was a member of one of the three conventions assembled, viz .: Native American, Republican and People's. These each nominated the same ticket, headed by Alexander Henry for
III .- 17
258
EDWIN A. MERRICK.
Mayor. Mr. Merrick was a member of the City Committee during this campaign, which was one of the most important in the city's political history.
On February 22, 1854, Mr. Merrick married Susan Crowell, daughter of the late Thomas E. Crowell, attorney-at-law. He is the father of two daughters and three sons : Ida A., Emily J., Edwin A., Howard Lincoln and Herbert Garfield, the latter two bearing the names of the assassinated Presidents.
-
GEORGE W. MILLER.
Xxx
T HE rewards which are to be reaped from honorable politics are so many and so great that it is not to be wondered at that some of the best men of Pennsyl- vania have preferred to direct all their energies and ambitions into that channel rather than into those of trade and commerce. Among the brightest pages in the archives of the Commonwealth are those which furnish the life stories and political histories of men who, during the past score of years, have made and fashioned the laws of the State, administered them or enforced them. The innumerable details which are contingent upon our system of self- government demand the undivided time and attention of all who are actively concerned therein ; and that Pennsylvania has to-day, among its political chiefs, some of the brainiest men in the country is the result of this condition. George W. Miller, the subject of this biography, has for twelve years past been actively known as a Repub- lican of unquestioned fealty and a local statesman of no mean ability. His nomination and election as Clerk of Courts of Allegheny County in 1896 was one of the most notable personal triumphs recorded in Western Pennsylvania politics for many years.
GEORGE W. MILLER was born, December 8, 1850, at New Haven, Fayette County, Pennsylvania, of parents who were among the best known people in that section of the State. His father was Benjamin Franklin Miller, and his mother Nancy Whitehill Miller. When he was nine months old they removed to Pittsburg and later to Allegheny, finally, however, returning to the former city, where they permanently settled. Their son, George, attended the public schools in the Third and Fourth wards, Allegheny, and the First Ward, Pittsburg. He obtained a common school education, after receiving which he
259
260
GEORGE W. MILLER.
obtained employment with a spike and rivet concern, intending to learn the trade. In 1869 he went to work as a brakeman on the Penn- sylvania Railroad, in turn becoming a passenger conductor. In this capacity his uniform attention to business gained for him the favorable recognition of his superiors and he was promoted to the post of Assistant Station Master, succeeding later to the position of Night Station Master in 1872. While serving as Assistant Station Master the railroad riot of 1877 occurred, and, during that exciting time, Mr. Miller was constantly on duty. Notwithstanding the dangers which threatened him daily and nightly, he gave the same careful attention to the responsibilities of the post as distinguished his occupancy of it in peaceful times. As an indication of the high esteem in which he was held by the strikers, Mr. Miller, unmolested by them, was per- mitted to run several trains, and he was the only person whom the strikers would allow this privilege. Succeeding the riots, he became a conductor on a through train, and, while in that position, he was appointed by Chief Bigelow as Superintendent of the Bureau of Water Assessments, on April 1, 1888.
By this time Mr. Miller had displayed quite an activity in the politics of the party of his choice. His services and his popular personality were devoted, in their fullest extent, to the interests of Republican doctrines, and this fact was officially recognized when he was made Secretary of the Republican County Committee, which position he held for a long time. In 1892 he was appointed Internal Revenue Collector of the Twenty-third Pennsylvania District, by President Harrison, after a bitter party fight, from which Mr. Miller emerged entirely triumphant. He held the Collectorship but a com- paratively short time, owing to the Democratic national victory of that year ; but so thorough was the confidence in his ability enjoyed by his constituents, that, in June, 1893, he was nominated for Clerk of Courts of Pittsburg, and in the following November was elected. Continuing in this office, Mr. Miller was made the recipient of many honors by his party from time to time, which served to show the high estimation in which he was held by his large constituency. In the office of Clerk of Courts, he displayed, in their highest degree, those qualities which up to that time made him so popular politically. It
261
GEORGE W. MILLER.
was not strange, therefore, that, in 1896, he again received the Republican nomination for the office. He was elected with a vote of 74,012 as against 28,033, polled by J. E. Leslie, the Democratic candidate. Mr. Miller is now filling the office of Clerk of Courts to the complete satisfaction of all who helped to elect him, and his term does not expire until 1900. To show the high esteem in which he is held and the appreciation of the many courtesies to the "old soldiers," he has been elected an honorary member of G. A. R. Post 236. This honor is very seldom conferred upon a citizen, and he feels highly honored by their action.
Mr. Miller has been for years a Director of the Pittsburg and West Virginia Clay Company, and is also a Director and one of the largest stockholders in the Crystal Water Company of Pittsburg, and several other corporations. On April 13, 1868, Mr. Miller was married to Bella Collins, daughter of John F. and Jean Livingstone Collins, old residents of Pittsburg. They have twelve children, who range from four to twenty-eight years of age, there being between each of them a period of exactly two years. Two of the sons and one daughter are married. Mr. Miller has two grandchildren. His residence is at the corner of Penn and East End Avenue, Pittsburg. Socially, as well as politically, Mr. Miller is highly popular, and as he is still in the prime of life he undoubtedly has many honors before him.
CHARLES MOHR.
OMŒOPATHY has been rapidly gaining in favor and winning its way into general appreciation, and no branch of the medical profession has more thor- oughly kept pace with the progressive spirit of the times than it. Though a bold departure from all previously recognized methods of professional procedure and an entirely new school of medical practice, the earnestness with which the disciples of Hahnemann have entered upon the study of thera- peutics, from the viewpoint of the eminent founder of homoeopathy, has produced its fruits in a vastly wider knowledge of the materia medica and a correspondingly great increase in the efficiency of the new method of treatment. Philadelphia has long been a recognized center for homœopathists and homeopathic instruction, and in the front rank of this important branch of medical practice stands Dr. Charles Mohr, of the Hahnemann Medical College, a brief sketch of whose useful career follows.
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.