USA > Vermont > Caledonia County > St Johnsbury > The town of St. Johnsbury, Vt. ; a review of one hundred twenty-five years to the anniversary pageant 1912 > Part 36
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JACOBUS K. COLBY
ACADEMIA PRÆCEPTOR
ECCLESIÆ DIACONUS
HOMER T. FULLER-The Academy of the second quarter- century was as truly an original creation of Principal Fuller as the former had been of his honored predecessor. It was a new insti- tution with the mark of the new age upon it, a visible embodiment of his versatility, breadth of vision and "insatiable appetite for work." Like his predecessor a native of New
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Hampshire and a graduate of Dartmouth, he had first chosen the Christian ministry for his life work ; like him again he fulfilled a Christian ministry of conspicuous usefulness in the field of education and as a man among men.
Mr. Fuller had been urgently desired in other places but he was attracted to St. Johnsbury by the moral earnestness of the men who called him here and who responded to the large ideals that were in his mind. The results of his leadership began to appear in the imposing buildings that rose on the grounds in 1872, in the progressive spirit and modern scientific methods, in the liberal endowment he secured, in the increasing and widely representative enrollment, in the high rank his pupils were taking in New England colleges. All this was a continuation of the fine record of former years but on a broader scale and under higher pressure. The volume of life energy that Principal Fuller poured into this institution in ten years seemed adequate for twice ten years, and indeed the momentum he gave it was felt long after he had gone to expend himself in like manner elsewhere. His mantle fell on fit successors : Charles E. Putney and David Y. Comstock are remembered as accomplished educators, unlike in personality and temperament, alike in their careful and scholarly training of the youth and in their active promotion of good citizenship. Principal Fuller was not only a master in education but a man of affairs. In the church and in the life of the town he was alert, far-sighted, solicitous for the public welfare, ready to serve anywhere, prompt and practical in doing things. ' He was unfailingly courteous and thoughtful for everybody. By his urbanity and wide intelligence he had ready access to men ; his inquisitive mind absorbed varied learning which flowed easily into speech or written papers; his retentive memory enabled him to fringe the most ordinary conversation with instructive facts or figures or illustrations. He traveled widely in this country and abroad and had acquaintance with men of distinction in business and professional life. Scientific and philanthropic societies welcomed him to membership; colleges conferred their honors upon him, the Ph. D. and DD. and LL. D. These he carried lightly, for the honor most prized by him was
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the privilege of being a servant of God called to a life of useful endeavor.
Doctor Fuller's last and most exacting work was the presidency of Drury College, to which he gave the eleven ripest years of his life ; his energetic administration revived its life at a critical time but undermined his own. He died in 1908 at Saranac Lake, New York.
NOTE. That St. Johnsbury has been favored and honored in the work of eminent educators is recognized in the words of Hon. Joseph A. DeBoer incorporated in a document relating to Vermont, issued in 1900 by the United States Bureau of Education :-
"But the Academy, which, of all others, has constantly stood forth as the most progressive, most prosperous, best attended, and for college prepara- tory work, the most successful institution in the state, is the St. Johnsbury Academy. There are many reasons perhaps, why this is so-a favoring loca- tion, a magnificent plant, very complete equipments, eminent instructors- * well-directed, ample, unrestricted private munificence."
TWO GENERALS
ASA P. BLUNT-In 1876 a driveway was opened from Western Avenue to the high bluff afterward known as South Park where Asa P. Blunt had built the square house now the . home of H. W. Blodgett. He was at that time a draftsman in charge of the pattern department of the scale works. In July, 1861, he went to the war as Adjutant of the Third Regiment, the next year he was made Colonel of the Twelfth Vermont. After the capture of Gen. Stoughton he was put in command of the Second Vermont Brigade till General Stannard assumed it. Promotions followed rapidly and in March, 1865, he was breveted Brigadier General of Volunteers for meritorious services in the field. His ability as Quartermaster in different departments re- sulted in his becoming Captain and Assistant Quartermaster in the regular army. For eleven years following 1877 he was in com- mand of the military station at Fort Leavenworth where his administrative abilities brought about important transformations. At this time he was commissioned brevet Major General in the United States Army.
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General Blunt is remembered by his St. Johnsbury friends as a man of slight build, soldierly bearing and winning personality. As a patriot soldier he filled with credit to the end of his life in 1889, official positions of responsibility and honor.
WILLIAM W. GROUT-While St. Johnsbury did not have the name of General Grout on the check-list he seemed essentially a citizen among us, tho he had to cross the town line a few rods to reach his Sabine farm in Kirby on the ancestral acres cleared in 1799. His business, post office, political, church and social rela- tions centered in this town, to which he first came as an Academy student in 1853. He began the practice of law in Barton where he enlisted in 1862, and later was made Lieut. Colonel under Colonel Redfield Proctor of the Fifteenth Regiment which was in Stannard's Brigade at the battle of Gettysburg and other engage- ments. After the St. Albans raid he was commissioned brevet Brigadier General of Vermont Militia and assigned to the pro- tection of the Canadian frontier.
General Grout was especially known for his services as rep- resentative from the Second District; he was a member of five Congresses from 1880 to 1891, having several times received unanimous renomination. He was an active and tireless worker as Congressman, keenly alive to the public interests of the com- mon people; he secured the enactment of the bill protecting dairymen from the fraudulent marketing of oleomargarine or chemical butter ; he obtained suitable recognition of Vermont maple sugar in the Mckinley tariff. Through his efforts the U. S. Fisheries Station was established at St. Johnsbury. He was a rigid teetotaler, an incorruptible legislator, loyal always to his con- victions, a man of large, generous heart. He was defeated in his aspirations for the Senate in 1900; reverses that followed he bore manfully ; he died in 1902 and was buried in Grove Ceme- tery at East St. Johnsbury.
General Horace K. Ide-see page 284.
TWO LIEUT .- GOVERNORS
HENRY C. BATES-The law firm of Bates and May was well known in the town for twenty years. During that period Mr.
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Bates was twice State's Attorney, once Representative and recog- nized leader of the House at Montpelier; twice Senator from Caledonia ; Lieut .- Governor 1898-99.
His most important work however was in the Philippines, when in 1901 he was sent by President Mckinley to be Judge of the Court of first instance in Iloilo, Island of Panay. This position he held in a manner that merited praise from Washing- ton, till obliged by considerations of health after six years to re- turn to America, where he died in 1909 at Berkeley, California. Of his standing and work at Iloilo an intelligent estimate was given by his fellow townsman, Hon. Henry C. Ide of Manilla : -
"It was not an easy thing to go among a people alien in race, customs, traditions, laws and language, and win the respect and love of the people. But this Judge Bates did. There was universal confidence in his integrity, fairness and ability. His district was one of the most important in the Philippine Islands, embracing 400,000 people, or more than the entire state of Vermont, and he was the only Judge for all these people, except on an appeal to the Supreme Court. He was courteous on the bench and off it ; fair, patient, of open mind, willing to listen, with a strong sense of justice. He left the Islands with the universal respect of all who had been brought in contact with him."
Note. Another official on those Islands was Charles A. Willard, a native of this town who in 1901 at the age of 44 was made an associate justice of the supreme court at Manilla. He had a seat in the National re- publican convention of 1904 as delegate from the Philippines. For a year or more after his graduation from Dartmouth he was librarian of the Athenæum; He died in 1914 at Minneapolis where he had been judge on the U. S. district court.
LEIGHTON P. SLACK-The law-firm of Dunnett and Slack had a record of eighteen years of substantial business, during twelve of which years the town committed its legal affairs to Mr. Slack. He was State's Attorney two years and in the Legisla- . ture of 1904 was Senator from Caledonia. Important constructive work devolved on him while in the Senate. He drafted the act which created the office of Attorney General, and had a leading hand in formulating the elaborate bill regulating the traffic in in- toxicating liquors called for by the referendum of 1903. Governor Proctor placed him on the Commission to make a study of the
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taxation problem the report of which was submitted at the legisla- tive session of 1908. In 1914 he was appointed one of the judges of the Superior Court.
ALEXANDER DUNNETT-was appointed United States District Attorney for the four years' term by President Roosevelt in 1906, and the appointment was renewed in 1910 by President Taft. The District comprises the State of Vermont.
TWO FEDERAL JUSTICES
HENRY C. IDE-gained early recognition as a lawyer of judicial gifts and at the age of forty-five was on the way to parti- cipate in a delicate mission on the other side of the globe. Governmental troubles in the Island of Samoa occasioned the appointment of a commission created by Great Britain, Germany and the United States to secure if possible a solution of the points at issue. Mr. Ide was selected by President Harrison to represent this government and he was made chairman of the Commission. 'He was chiefly instrumental in formulating and testing a scheme of adjustment which met the entire approval of the King of Samoa and others involved in the disputes. Under joint appointment of the three powers he held the position of Chief Justice of Samoa for a term of years till 1897. Three years later President Mckinley placed him on the Taft Commission charged with organizing a form of civil government in the Philip- pine Islands. Here he became successively secretary of finance and justice, vice and acting governor, and in 1905 Governor General of the Islands. He reorganized the monetary system of the island on a permanent gold basis ; formulated the land and registration act, the internal revenue law, the code of procedure in civil actions and some three hundred minor laws enacted by the Commission. At a banquet tendered him 1903 on the eve of a vacation, Gov. General Taft remarked :-
"The independent, clear-sighted, keenly analytic mind of Judge Ide has saved the Commission from doing a good many foolish things. He has been the watch-dog of the treasury keeping expenses down. The code of civil procedure which is working so well, is wholly the work of Judge Ide.
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There is no harder working commissioner than he, and his work is done solely with a view to the public interests of the Islands."
When William H. Taft became President of the United States he found in Mr. Ide a man whose standing and services in the former Colonial possessions of Spain rendered him peculiarly persona grata to the Spanish government; he was sent as envoy extraordinary and minister plenipotentiary to the Court of Spain, which position he held till the incoming of the democratic administration.
WENDELL P. STAFFORD-St. Johnsbury Academy 1880 and Harvard Law School 1883, began and continued his professional life in this town till in 1904 he was called to Washington by President Roosevelt to be Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the District of Columbia. This took him from the Su- preme Bench of Vermont on the fourth year following his appointment thereto. While holding strictly and ably to his judicial duties he has accepted invitations to address distinguished audiences on commemorative and other occasions in New York, Brooklyn, Buffalo, Boston and Washington. He interpreted the lessons of the hour at the Tomb of General Grant, at the Wendell Phillips Centennial, at the Lake Champlain Ter-centenary, in our State Capitol rehearsing the heroic story of Vermont. A volume issued from the Caledonian press containing twenty-seven of these addresses, shows mastery in many fields, breadth and finish of culture and a versatility of expression as varied as the many sorts of themes passing under review. In the volumes en- titled North Flowers and Dorian Days are grouped selections from Mr. Stafford's verse-the latter as with inspirations from Parnassus, presents both classic and current themes in the lyric measures and spirit of the Hellenic poets.
At the 110th anniversary of Middlebury College Mr. Stafford was called to deliver the poem of the occasion; his subject felici- tously chosen was-VERMONT. Referring to this, one of the keenest-minded men of the State remarked :- "I consider it the noblest and most finely phrased tribute of veneration which any son of Vermont has ever brought to an alma civitas, and, for that
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matter, know of nothing more eloquent, heart-searching and loyal, ever given by any laureate to the country of his birth." A few lines from this poem are here given :-
VERMONT
DEAR LITTLE STATE among the dark green hills, Who for thy never-changing bounds didst take The long, bright river and the azure lake, And whose deep lap the short-lived summer fills With sudden sweetness till its wealth o'erspills,- How shall we sing thee for thy beauty's sake, Or praise thee in a voice that shall not break For pathos of the theme wherewith it thrills ?
Thou sit'st with loins upgirt, like those that wait, Not those that slumber ; and round thy knees True sons of thine, scorners of fear and ease, Make music of their toil, early and late ; For thou art fitly compassed in thy state By fields of clover, reddening to the breeze, Hummed over by the blithe and laboring bees And guarded by the mountains calm and great.
Swarm after swarm thy children have gone forth But still the old hive keeps its golden store, Filled by the same bright service as before With frugal bounty and unwasted worth.
And thou dost watch with sweet solicitude The plowfields putting on their green attire, The blue smoke curling from the cottage fire, The little school house, many-scarred and rude, Half shrinking in the shadow of the wood, And, ringed with loving elms, the tall white spire.
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Mother of Men ! whom the green hills enthrone, From whose bright feet the rivers haste away, Thou of the ages art-we of a day, Yet we have loved thee and thy love have known, And if with too faint breath our reeds are blown To carry the great burden of our lay-
Yet some true notes among our measures play- The shame will all be ours, the honor thine alone.
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ONE MAN
Public service in private life
There was a man who carried the uplift of the people as a burden on his heart. Limitations of vitality and business cares did not check his lavish expenditure of thought and effort for public betterment. It was early influential in the Sunday School and church ; later in educational and civic matters, in village im- provement, in originating and shaping the plan of an Academy ; later still in the legislature, securing among other things an Act for the Improvement of our Common Schools. This was but the beginning of toils for the schools of Vermont, kept up for years in voluminous correspondence with Ex-Gov. Eaton, first Super- intendent of Schools, in tireless efforts to awaken public senti- ment, in organizing state and county associations, in establishing the Vermont School Journal, subscribing for 100 copies for this county and later guaranteeing a thousand, in a constant quiet way of making up various deficits. Partisan interests in the legis- lature of 1851 nullified the School law-a heavy blow to its orig- inator, who, contemplating the state now bereft of a Superinten- dent of Schools, remarked : "I had so loved Vermont and felt so proud of her reputation wherever I have traveled in other states of the Union that I can hardly endure the thought of her degradation." The toils of these years however were not with- out ultimate permanent results, tho he died without the sight thereof ; the efficient public school system of later years owed more than most men have ever known to his far-sighted plans and unremitting efforts.
His activities for the public benefit took wide range. He was aboundingly and modestly benevolent distributing multitudi- nous gifts anonymously and with a fine sense of adaptation. He served the church universal with ardent devotion. In quiet ways and in all directions he was influencing public opinion toward gen- eral improvement. Hundreds of pages of letters and press articles went out from his pen on almost every theme of current importance, such as agriculture and stock-raising, the attractions and opportunities of Vermont, the value of scientific methods,
ʻ
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phenomena of nature, books, reading and libraries, home life, current issues in religion and politics, education, slavery, temper- ance, morals and health, world-wide Christian missions. Self- seeking was as far from his thought as the planet Mars.
Some things he advocated before their day had come, not in- frequently the hand that gave an initiative impulse was undetected. As early as 1845 he urged the legislature of Vermont to petition Congress to take initiative measures in favor of international ar- bitration, suggesting that a congress of nations be called for the purpose. He wrote to Washington Irving, then at the height of his fame, imploring him as the leading American man of letters to crown his work and serve his countrymen by preparing a History of the United States of America. In the pages of Irving's Life of Washington covering the birth and establishing of the nation, we of this town may be allowed to detect an initiative im- pulse that reached the Sunnyside study from the south end of St. Johnsbury Plain. A similar impulse from the same hand advo- cated in one of the Boston papers the founding in that city of a free public library two years before the corner stone of that institution was laid.
These multiplied activities were carried on without detriment to the daily business efficiency or to the important and delicate trusts committed to him in his own town. But his vital resources were prematurely exhausted, too soon the silver cord was loosed and his work among men was done. If the world's need could have kept him he had not gone so soon.
In filial remembrance of JOSEPH P. FAIRBANKS.
XXXIII
UTILITIES
"Every person in the state has a direct or indirect interest in the proper management of our public utilities." The Outlook
MAIL SERVICE-BANKS-TEL AND TEL-STREET LIGHTS-FIRE
TRUCKS-FISHERIES-CEMETERIES
Water supplies and fire engines which would naturally fall under this head have been treated on pages 297-304.
THE POST OFFICE
For thirteen years, during which time there was no Post Office in the town, mail was brought in irregularly by post riders or anybody else, and deposited at the tavern or store, as narrated on pages 173-176. In 1803 an Office was located at St. Johnsbury Plains, and Joseph E. Dow was made Postmaster. Like David Dunbar of Danville, he may have found that this government berth was "not as profitable as a good farrow cow," but it gave a man distinction in those days to hold a commission issued from Washington City. Some of these old commissions have survived the changing administrations and are now on file at the Athe- næum-"Confiding in the Integrity, Ability, and Punctuality of Daniel Chamberlin Esq., I do appoint him a Postmaster and authorize him to execute the duties of that Office at St. Johns- bury, State of Vermont," etc .; so runs the document given out March 30, 1820, by Return Jonathan Meigs Jr., Postmaster Gen- eral under President Monroe :-
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NOTE-This was Return Jonathan Meigs 2nd. His grandfather, Jona- than Meigs of Connecticut, when paying attentions to one of the daughters of the land found her so coquettish or unpersuadable that he finally mounted his horse saying he should not return again. As he rode slowly down the lane she followed, and at the gate, called out, "Return, Jonathan ! Return ! and I will marry thee !" He returned, they were married, and the first born son, 1740, was named Return Jonathan Meigs. His son, born 1765, became Chief Justice and Governor of Ohio, and was the Postmaster General Return Jonathan Meigs Jr., whose signature is on the commission of the St. Johns- bury Postmaster of 1820.
This is the story as narrated in Appleton's Cyclopedia of Biography and noted in the Meigs Journal of the Expedition against Quebec, 1775. A letter addressed to the Boston Tran- script in 1912 asking further information, brought out the same ver- sion from two correspondents, one of whom had it verbally from Dr. Return Jonathan Meigs of Worcester, Mass., a lineal descendant. But this is the age of relentless historical criticism and another writer in a later issue of the Transcript affirmed on apparently substantial grounds, that the story was mere frostwork of the imagination melting away under the sunlight of truth.
But we of this latitude, who let in the winter sunlight thro glass windows, have some appreciation of the decorative functions of frostwork thereon, and are kindly disposed to some touches of it in the traditions of the town. The prosaic statement that a Meigs signature has been found among our town papers would not take vivid hold of the imagination unless embellished with some footnote frostwork of tradition or fact, whichever it may be.
Inasmuch as St. Johnsbury was not in 1820 a remarkably temperate town, it may not have been the one referred to in the following incident. A printed circular issued during Monroe's administration by the Post Office department carried at the bot- tom of the page the autograph in facsimile of Return J. Meigs. A county postmaster mistook this signature for a postscript order, reading "Return your Mugs." He wrote the department that he "had the honor to report that no mugs were used in his office."
Chamberlin's first quarterly report April, May, June, 1820, shows receipts of $30.10 ; of which $3.5472 was postage prepaid
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on letters mailed at this office, and $26.5572, nearly eight times as much, was postage on letters unpaid or underpaid received at this office. Postage on letters at this date was from ten to twenty-five cents. The appointment of February 25, 1829, in Jackson's administration was as follows-"The Honorable Mr. Buck, Representative from Vermont, is informed by the Post- master General that he has this day appointed Joseph P. Fair- banks Esq. to be Postmaster at St. Johnsbury Plains, Vt., vice Ephraim Paddock." Opposite Abel Rice's tavern was the small building near the present bank block where J. P. Fairbanks had his law office, book store and the Postoffice all in one. His suc- cessor in 1832 was Moses Kittredge, who kept the office in his store where the Brown block now stands, and here it remained twelve years. In his time "there were three mails a week and sometimes there would be as many as a dozen letters in a single day" as Frank Brown the lively clerk once told me. Reduced rates of postage were then welcomed ; only six cents to Danville, ten to Montpelier, twelve and a half cents across Lake Champlain, eighteen and three-fourths cents to Boston.
DIMICK SORTS THE MAIL
Under President Polk the office went to Victor M. Dimick. He had no place of business and the best he could do was to lease the basement of a small house a little way down the street. This was probably under the old law office and bookstore. The en- trance was thro a bulkhead on the south side, and from the door- sill there was a step down before reaching the floor. The room was very small ; it contained a few pigeon holes for mail, a chair or two and a single bed for the postmaster. During the day the bed was jacked up against the wall, when let down it would be directly front of the door. Stages arrived at 9 o'clock P. M., 6 o'clock A. M. The postmaster used to get up, sort the mail, then lie down again for a nap. This he was doing one mid-winter morning, 1846. A near-sighted man happened along that morn- ing with the mail from the Fairbanks counting room. It was cold and dark. A dim lamp twinkled inside. In his haste the mail carrier quite forgot about the step below the door, and plunged
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