USA > Rhode Island > Providence County > Providence > Men of progress; biographical sketches and portraits of leaders in business and professional life in the state of Rhode Island and Providence plantations > Part 6
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of Representatives of the General Assembly in 1872-73. He has been Grand Master of the Inde- pendent Order of Odd Fellows of Rhode Island, and is a member of the Grand Lodge and Grand Chapter A. F. & A. M. of Rhode Island. He was Medical Director of the Department of Rhode Island G. A. R. for three years. He is a member of the Massachusetts Commandery of Loyal Legion. In 1894 he was assistant surgeon-general of Rhode Island Militia, with the rank of Lieutenant-Colonel. He is a member of the Society of the Sons of the American Revolution, and of the Rhode Island Medical Society. In politics he is a Republican.
HORTON, HORACE FRANCIS, real estate dealer, Providence, was born in Rehoboth, Mass., Janu- ary 2, 1838, son of Ellis and Mary Eliza (Craw) Horton. He received his early education in the public schools and at Schofield's Commercial Col- lege, Providence. He first engaged in the grocery business in co-partnership with Major E. S. Horton,
HORACE F. HORTON.
from 1859 to 1861, and from 1864 to 1872 with Henry J. Anthony. From 1872 to the present time he has been engaged in the real estate, mortgage and insurance business, giving special attention to the development of land in the vicinity of Provi-
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dence. He has taken an active part in the religious work of the Baptist society, and has been for twen- ty-three years Superintendent of the Sunday School of the Jefferson Street Church. He was President of the Rhode Island Baptist Sunday School Con- vention in 1878 and 1879, and was President of the Rhode Island Baptist Social Union in 1893. He is a director in the executive board of the Rhode Island Baptist State Convention. He married, Jan- uary 15, 1862, Miss Susan M. Anthony ; they have six children : Henry F., Annie M., Clarence H., Fred E., Marion L. and Laura E. Horton.
HOWARD, HIRAM, manufacturer of silverware, was born in West Woodstock, Windham county,
HIRAM HOWARD.
Conn., November 26, 1834, son of Warner and Mary (Taft) Howard. He is descended from good old New England stock, and is connected with the Taft, Olney, Knowlton and Ellis families of Massachusetts, Connecticut and Rhode Island. He received his early education in the public schools of his native town, at the academies at Ashford and South Wood- stock in the same county, and at Dr. Cook's private school for boys in Webster, Mass. At the age of eighteen he left school and settled in Providence, where he commenced his business career. In 1857 he went to New York, where he engaged in the
wholesale jewelry business until the breaking out of the war in 1861. September 18, 1861, he enlisted in the Second Regiment of Artillery, New York Volunteers, serving at first as Second Lieutenant, and afterward as First Lieutenant and Adjutant. He remained in the army until July 1864, nearly three years, when he returned to New York, and again engaged in the jewelry business. In 1881 he returned to Providence and embarked in the manufacture of jewelry, which he conducted suc- cessfully for several years, and then engaged in the manufacture of sterling silverware. At the present time he is president of the Howard Sterling Silver- ware Company, Providence, his son Stephen C. being associated with him in the management. He has taken an active interest in public affairs and in the social and economic questions of the day. In May 1877 the New York Free Trade Club was formed and he became a member in July of the same year, retaining his membership until it was merged into the Reform Club of New York, of which he is consequently one of the oldest members. In 1890-91 he was elected a Representative to the General Assembly from Providence on the Demo- cratic ticket, and in 1889 was the candidate of his party for the Mayoralty. He was appointed and served as a member of the Rhode Island Commission to the Columbian Exposition at Chicago. In politics he has always been a staunch Democrat, as were his father and grandfather before him. He is a mem- ber of the Advance Club, the Providence Athletic Association, the Providence Press Club, the Reform Club of New York, and other societies and organ- izations.
HOLBROOK, ALBERT, manufacturer, Provi- dence, was born in Providence, February 5, 1813, son of Abel and Sally (Hopkins) Holbrook. He was one of the originators of the firm of A. & C. W. Holbrook, manufacturers of raw-hide goods, princi- pally at first of loom pickers, but developing into numerous other articles composed of that material. This business is at the present time managed by his three sons, George A., Albert, Jr., and Charles W. Holbrook 2d. At its origin, in 1842, the firm name was the same as to-day, the Charles W. Hol- brook associated with him being his brother, about six years his junior. His paternal ancestral line, so far as known, starts from Thomas Holbrook, who emigrated from England in 1635 and settled in Weymouth, Mass., and runs through John, Ichabod,
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Albert Hollyvon
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David," Ichabod, Nathaniel, Abel and Albert Hol- brook. The ancestral home was soon changed to Braintree, Mass., where Abel was born April 5, 1788. About the year 1812 Abel removed to Prov- idence, where he became acquainted with Sally Hopkins and made her his wife. Sally's ancestral line ran from Thomas Hopkins, son of William and Joanna (Arnold) Hopkins, born in England, April 7, 1616, and continuing through Thomas, Amos, Uriah, Sally and Albert. Four children were born to Abel and Sally : Albert, February 5, 1813; Harriet, June 23, 1814 ; Charles, July 21, 1816 ; who died in childhood ; and Charles William, Jan- uary 6, 1819. Mr. Holbrook's early life was very inauspicious, being left fatherless when six years old and motherless before the age of twelve. In his twelfth year, November 1824, he was sent to live with Benjamin Lewis, who had married a rela- tive, with the understanding that he was to serve an apprenticeship with Mr. Lewis, learning the trade as a mason. This arrangement was early, and it might be said prematurely, entered upon, for in the early summer following his twelfth birthday he was found engaged as a bricklayer on a building being erected at the North End in Providence, by Wil- liam Randall. This was followed up by a continu- ance in the various branches of the mason trade, which then embraced many features now divided up into separate and special pursuits and vocations. For about ten months in 1827-8 he labored upon the Providence Arcade, and at the time of this writing (1895) is probably the only living person who was engaged in this department of its construction. Among other prominent buildings in the construc- tion of which he was engaged was the Newport Steam Factory, in the summer of 1831, followed in the autumn of that year by a short service on the Number One Mill of the Lonsdale Company in Smithfield. In 1833, April 30, at the solicitation of his uncle, Benjanian Holbrook, who was a mem- ber of the firm of J. Cunliff & Co., manufacturers of loom pickers, he entered into their employment and continued in this position until August 1842, when he associated with his brother, as before noted. This connection lasted until June 1868, when Charles retired, and Albert's sons, as hereto- fore stated, joined with their father in the contin- uance of the business. Advancing age with its infirmities prompted his retirement from the firm after his three sons were established, but his per- sonal interest in its growth and success remains un- abated. He has also been greatly interested in
genealogical and historical matters, and for the past twenty years or more has devoted much time to re- search and investigation in this line of study, em- bodying many of the results of his labors in publi- cations of various kinds, through the press and peri- odicals as well as in pamphlet and book form. His efforts in this line of work have been of great public value and widespread interest, generally taking a broad range, covering a large field, and his services have been ever and freely at the command of any and all inquirers who have approached him with general or specific queries relating to his favorite subjects in which they were interested. That such service has been keenly appreciated is evidenced by the many authors whose acknowledgments ap- pear in their publications, and by the multitude of letters of inquiry he has received from different persons resident in the state and abroad. The class of historical matter, outside the genealogical, to which he has especially devoted himself, is mainly confined to details pertaining to the North End, in Providence. A serial of several numbers, en- titled " Ancient North End Landmarks, by an Old Resident," covered a large field and showed up the forgotten origin of many old homesteads, with de- tails of the personal history of some of the people connected with them. In the genealogical field, one of his most interesting works was published in 1881, entitled "One Line of the Hopkins Family," covering the line of Governor Stephen Hopkins and his brother the Commodore, but not the one from which the author descended ; although compara- tively brief, it embraces nearly every male member belonging to the line that bore the name of Hop- kins, and all females born of that line. The line to which the author belongs were more numerous - excessively so ; he intended to follow this out, but the task was beyond his strength, with his num- erous other cares, although under the title of "Notes on the Hopkins Family" he contributed several articles to the Narragansett Historical Reg- ister. At an early period in his life he was very familiar with the famous Commodore's family then living, and was frequently sent to the old homestead on errands, briefly alluded to in the genealogical work referred to. As his grandfather Uriah Hop- kins and the Commodore were second cousins, the association between the author's people and the Commodore's descendants continued until most of the latter had passed away. The subject of this sketch was married, January 8, 1838, to Miss Abby Olney Angell, who was born June 23, 1811, and
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died December 24, 1886 ; five children were born to them : George Abel, October 14, 1838, grad- uated at Brown University, class of 1861 ; Frank Pinckney, May 14, 1842, died young ; Albert, Jr., October 7, 1845 ; Charles William, September 10, 1848, and Uriah Hopkins Holbrook, November 10, 1850, graduated at Brown University 1874 and at Harvard Medical School in 1877, entered into practice as a physician in Providence with promis- ing success, but died suddenly May 8, 1884.
HORTON, JEREMIAH WHEELER, furniture manu- facturer and dealer, Newport, was born in Rehoboth,
J.UW. HORTON.
Mass., April 8, 1844, son of Tamerlane Wheeler and Amanda (Walker) Horton. He received his early education in the public and private schools of Rehoboth. He lived on a farm until he was eighteen years of age, and then went to Perryville, Mass., to learn the trade of wood-turning. Two years later he came to Newport, and was employed by J. L. & G. A. Hazard, furniture manufacturers ; he remained in their employ until 1884, when the firm dissolved and he was appointed to settle the business, which occupied a year. He then en- gaged in the business with G. A. Hazard, under the firm name of Hazard & Horton. Eight years. later
he purchased Mr. Hazard's interest, and took F. A. Ward as a partner, under the firm name of J. H. Horton & Co., furniture manufacturers and dealers, which still carries on the business. He is a mem- ber of the First Methodist Episcopal Church, and was its Treasurer for eighteen years. He is chair- man of its board of trustees, and Superintendent of the Sunday School, a position he has filled for a quarter of a century. He was a member of the School Board of Newport for six years, and served on the Board of Overseers of the Poor and Asylum for several terms. He was a member of the Board of Aldermen for two years, and Mayor of Newport in 1893, declining to accept a re-nomination. He was a Representative in the General Assembly for three years, and in 1894 was nominated for Senator but declined. He served the state in its militia for twenty-six consecutive years as a member of the Newport Artillery Company, and held commissions as Captain, Major, Lieutenant-Colonel and Colonel, and is now on the retired list. He was master of St. Paul's Lodge A. F. & A. M. for three terms, is a member of Washington Commandery Knights Templar, and is a Past Grand of Rhode Island Lodge I. O. O. F., and was its Financial Secretary for fifteen years. He is a member of the Busi- ness Men's Association, the Newport Historical Society and the Redwood Library and Athenaeum. He is President of the Coddington Savings Bank. He is President of the G. K. Warren Post Associates Grand Army of the Republic. He is a member of the Rhode Island Hospital Corporation. In politics he is a Republican. He is not married.
HIGBEE, EDWARD WYMAN, editor and printer, Newport, was born in Newport, N. H., December 26, 1854, the son of John Hitchcock and Adeline (Emmons) Higbee. His ancestors on the paternal side were among the early settlers of Connecticut, and his great-great-grandfather Stephen and great- grandfather Charles served in the war of the Revo- lution. On the maternal side his ancestors were among the early settlers of New Hampshire. He received his education at New Hampton Institute, New Hampton, N. H. In 1871-72 he was em- ployed in the Smith & Wesson Arms Works at Springfield, Mass. He then learned the printer's trade and worked on Newport and Providence newspapers. He was the Newport correspondent of the Boston Globe for upwards of twelve years. He is now associate editor of the Newport Mercury,
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and President of the Newport Mercury Publishing Company. He represented the second ward in the Newport Board of Aldermen from 1889 to 1891 in- clusive. In 1893 he was unanimously elected by the Newport City Council a member of and clerk
E. W. HIGBEE.
to the Board of License Commissioners. In 1895 he was elected a Representative in the General As- sembly from Newport. He is a member of Red- wood Lodge Knights of Pythias, of Newport Asso- ciates N. M. R. A., Malbone Lodge N. E. O. P., Gen. G. K. Warren Associates and Treasurer of the Lawrence Club. In politics he is a Republican. He married, in 1883, Miss Alice E. Thompson ; they have three children : Alice Francis, Edward Wyman and Margarita Emmons Higbee.
JACKSON, CHARLES AKERMAN, artist and portrait painter, Providence, was born in Jamaica Plain, Mass., August 13, 1857, son of Charles E. and Caro- line E. (Akerman) Jackson. His paternal ancestors were William and Sarah Jackson of Portsmouth, N. H., and on the maternal side Charles and Lucy E. Akerman of Providence. He received his early education in the public schools of Boston (Jamaica Plain). He entered the wholesale drygoods trade at the age of sixteen, as stock boy, and at twenty
was a traveling salesman, traveling and visiting the largest cities in the West and South. He traveled extensively as road salesman, until he decided to adopt the art of portrait painting as a profession. He always had this predilection for art, and at the age of ten painted a portrait of his mother; but his parents did not favor the profession for a liveli- hood. Having strong musical tastes, they allowed him tuition on the church organ under W. J. D. Leavitt of Boston. At one time he thought he would make this his profession ; but he was passion- ately fond of portraits, and during his spare time kept up his practice of painting and drawing. Many spare moments during his travels he spent in visiting studios, and in observing artists of repu- tation at their work; also in private study with artists, among whom he greatly values the teaching of his friend, John N. Arnold. He also studied numerous text books, among which he considers those of Rubens and Bouvier the most valuable. With many misgivings, he commenced to devote a portion of his time to portrait painting ; and soon
1
C. A. JACKSON
after, in 1891, he began devoting his entire time to the painting of portraits, and has met with un- questionable success. His style is refined and chaste, and his portraits of women and children excel in that subtle delicacy of flesh tones so
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charming to the eye and so alluring to the senses. His portraits of men are carefully finished and truthfully painted, and show a positive avoidance of the "impressionist " school. Confining himself solely to portraiture, and having inborn that natural gift, so rare, of obtaining a likeness, it is but natural that the demand for his portraits should be large and that demand constantly increasing. Among his more prominent portraits are those of S. N. Lougee, ex-President of the West Side Club ; Mayor Frank F. Olney, for the City Hall ; City Messenger Edward S. Rhodes, for the City Hall ; John Whipple Potter Jenks, for Brown University ; Stephen W. Griffin, Town Clerk of Coventry, for Town Hall ; Col. W. W. Brown, for the Infantry Veteran As- sociation ; Prof. Thomas Metcalf for State Normal University, Ill. ; Albert Metcalf, Treasurer Dennison Tag Company, Boston, and Dr. A J. Gordon of Boston. He is a member of Suffolk Council Royal Arcanum of Boston, and also a member of the West Side Club of Providence.
JACKSON, FRANK HUSSEY, attorney-at-law, Provi- dence, was born at Nobleboro, Lincoln county, Me., July II, 1843, son of Joseph Jr., and Arletta G. (Flagg) Jackson. He is the eldest of nine children. His father was the son of Joseph Jackson, and he was the son of Captain Jackson, a Revolutionary soldier, whose father came from the north of Ire- land. His mother was the daughter of John Flagg, and he was the son of Rev. Samuel Flagg of Boston, Mass., a Revolutionary soldier, who was in the battle of Bunker Hill, and continued with the army until the British surrendered at Yorktown. His parents removed to Jefferson, Me., when he was about a year old, and lived on a small farm. His father was a farmer and ship carpenter. He at- tended the common schools and high school at Jefferson. After he was twelve years old he worked on the farm and attended school until 1861, when he worked for a neighboring farmer for six dollars a month during the summer season, attending school the next winter. In the summer of 1862 he worked on a farm for nine dollars a month, and in the winter of 1862 and 1863 taught school for fifteen dollars a month. In the fall of 1863 he entered Lincoln Academy, Newcastle, Me., receiving his education at that institution, and supporting himself by teach- ing school. In 1856 he entered the law office of Henry Farrington, Esq., Waldoboro, Me., and on the eighth day of May, 1867, entered the law office
of Hon. Lorenzo Clay, at Gardiner, Me .; was ad- mitted to the Kennebec bar, November 1867. He taught school the following winter and summer of 1868, was nominated for Clerk of Courts for Lin- coln county on the Democratic ticket and received the largest vote of any of the candidates on the same ticket, only lacking thirty-four votes of an election in a total vote of over five thousand. In September 1869 he opened a law office at Hallo- well, Me., and was City Solicitor of Hallowell from 1870 to 1878. He supported himself all the time he was at Lincoln Academy and a law student by
F. H. JACKSON.
teaching school, and received no aid from any one. January 1, 1879, he came to Providence and was admitted to the Rhode Island bar. He entered into partnership with Colonel Daniel R. Ballou and the co-partnership continued until July 1895, having during his practice at Hallowell and in Providence enjoyed a large and lucrative business. In 1880 he was admitted to the bar of the United States. In 1870 he was the junior counsel for the defendant in the celebrated case of State vs. Hos- well, who was indicted and tried at Augusta, Me., for the murder of John Laflin. The State was represented by Hon. Thomas B. Reed, then Attor- ney-General of Maine, and the Hon. Wm. P. Whitehouse, County Attorney, now Justice of the
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Supreme Court of Maine. The jury returned a verdict of manslaughter. In Providence he has been engaged in several important damage cases and has enjoyed a large practice. He never was a candidate for any office in Rhode Island ; he has been offered nominations by his party, but always declined them. He joined Olive Branch Lodge, I. O. O. F., in 1882 at Providence and is now a member of the order. He is a member of the Providence Athletic Association and the Rhode Island Business Men's Association. In politics he was always a Democrat, and took an active part in the election of 1884-1888, the Congressional election of 1890 and the election of 1892. He married, January 27, 1875, Miss Ella A. Owen, of Waltham, Mass .; they have two children : Frank H., Jr., and Walter N. Jackson.
JONES, AUGUSTINE, Principal of the Friends' School, Providence, was born October 16, 1835, in China, Me, the son of Richard M and Eunice (Jones) Jones. His father's and mother's families, both Jones, were united some generations previous. The family, which is of Welch origin, settled in Hanover, Mass., where his great-great-grandfather, Thomas Jones, a Quaker, was residing in 1730. His father's mother was Susannah Dudley, descended directly from Thomas Dudley, the second Governor of Massachusetts, who fought as a captain under Henry IV of France. He received his early educa- tion at the district schools, at the Friends' School in Providence, and at Yarmouth Academy, Me. He entered Bowdoin College and graduated in the class of 1860, the largest the college ever had. Among his classmates were Hon. Thomas B. Reed, Hon. W. W. Thomas, United States Minister to Sweden, Judge Joseph W. Symonds of Portland, Me., and Gen. John M. Brown. As a boy he worked on the farm until the age of sixteen, and supported himself during his educational course by teaching district schools and academies. He entered the Harvard Law School and graduated in 1867. He was ad- mitted to the Suffolk bar the same year, and began practice in the office of Gov. John A. Andrew, with whom he had previously been a student for a year and a half. He continued in practice there for twelve years, until 1879, when he came to Provi- dence to become Principal of the Friends' School. He was administrator of the estate of Governor Andrew, and, with his associate Albert B. Otis, took into the office Hon. John F. Andrew, the eldest
son of the governor, recently deceased, who remained there three years and a half, and with Mr. Otis re- tained the office after 1879. He had great fondness for the law and good success in it, but was induced to give himself for the remainder of his life to the in- struction of the rising generation. In 1874 he was named by John G. Whittier, at the request of Rev. James Freeman Clark, to deliver an essay at the Church of the Disciples, on the Society of Friends, it being the eighth in the series by different denomi- nations upon the "Universal Church." This essay
AUGUSTINE JONES.
was published, and vigorously attacked by certain orthodox Friends, but Whittier said, "There was nothing to be added to it or taken from it as a state- ment of Quaker doctrine." He read a paper on Nicholas Upsall before the New England Historical- Genealogical Society, which was printed in the Register for January 1880, and published in pam- phlet form. Whittier wrote of this, "Thou hast done an essential service to truth and justice." He was a Representative in the Massachusetts Legislature from Lynn, Mass, in 1878, but the next year was beaten by Gen. Benjamin F. Butler and the green- back craze in an exciting election after receiving more votes than in his previous election. In 1890 he was sent by the Friends' Society and the Ameri- can Peace Society as a delegate to the London
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Peace Congress. Regarding his work in the Friends' School, the following is an extract from the Phoenix Park, published by the students of the Friends' School in 1889 : "The school goes on, old students yielding their places to the new and ever carrying with them the remembrance of the kindly influence and true examples of the good old school. But a history of the school would not be complete without some mention of its Principal, to whose influence and energetic efforts its success in latter years has been due. Augustine Jones, LL. B., was formerly a law student of the late John A. Andrew, the War Governor of Massachusetts. In answer to the need of the school he became its Principal in 1879, leaving a flourishing law practice in order to do so He devoted himself with all his powers to the advancement of the school, and the improve- ments of the last few years have been in a large part due to his earnest endeavors and personal assistance. His views of education are broad and liberal and his every thought is given to the ad- vancement and progress of the institution. Beloved as he is by all who have felt his influence, and honored by his pupils, I can only echo the wish of one of the alumni who has said : -
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