USA > Vermont > Vermonters : a book of biographies > Part 4
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Jacob Collamer served his town, county and state in a variety of capacities and with marked ability. Four times he represented Royalton in the Vermont legislature; for three
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years he was state's attorney of Windsor County; from 1833 to 1842 he was a justice of the Supreme Court of Vermont. Declining a re-election to the bench, he was elected a year later to the National House of Representatives. At the end of his third term in that body he declined a re-election and was appointed Postmaster General in the cabinet of President Zachary Taylor, holding that office until the President's death in July, 1850, when all the members of the cabinet ten- dered their resignations.
On his return home from Washington he was almost im- mediately elected a circuit judge, as the presiding judges in the county courts were then called, an office he held until, in 1854, he was elected, as a candidate of the recently organ- ized Republican party, to the United States Senate. He was re-elected in 1860, but died shortly before the expiration of his second term. So highly was he esteemed by Vermont that he was given a complimentary vote for the presidential nomi- nation by the Vermont delegation in the national convention which nominated Abraham Lincoln. He was for a time Pro- fessor of Medical Jurisprudence in the Vermont Medical Col- lege at Woodstock. In 1849 his alma mater conferred upon him the degree of Doctor of Laws, and in 1855 Dartmouth College honored him with the same degree.
Such, in brief, is the formal record of his distinguished public career. His professional work absorbed him in so far as his official duties would permit. As a lawyer Judge Colla- mer, as he was familiarly called at home, built up a solid repu- tation. While not more learned in the law than some of his contemporaries, he was excelled by none in the skill and thoroughness with which he prepared his cases for trial. He had the essential qualities of the natural trier of cases in court, __ tact, intuitive judgment, tireless energy.
His judicial work was of a high order; especially did he excel as a nisi prius or county court judge. Here his well- balanced mind, keen analytical judgment and strong sense of
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justice made him the ideal presiding judge; while his opinions as a member of the appellate court were characterized by clarity, terseness of statement, and firm grasp of legal princi- ples. His pre-eminence as a constitutional lawyer was uni- versally recognized in Washington.
In the National House of Representatives he was a consci- entious and highly useful, if not brilliant member, perform- ing arduous committee service with distinction and illuminat- ing every subject to which he addressed himself in debate. But it was in the Senate that his statesmanship came to full frui- tion. His service there fell in the stormy decade between 1855 and 1865,-a period characterized by passionate debate upon the vital issues which divided the North and the South. As a member of the Senate Committee on Territories it was incumbent upon him to make a profound study of the consti- tutional status of the territories of the United States in respect to slavery. The admission of Kansas into the Union, with or without slavery, was pending, and this bitterly contested issue inspired Senator Collamer to make two of his most famous speeches,-that of March 1 and 2, 1858, on THE KANSAS QUESTION, and that of March 8, 1860, on SLAVERY IN THE TERRITORIES. The former was a powerful argument against the passage of the pending bill for the admission of Kansas with the famous pro-slavery Lecompton Constitution; the latter, one of his most elaborate forensic efforts, dealt with the whole question of the rights of slave-holders in the territories of the United States. In debating these momentous issues he met on even terms such distinguished senators as Douglas, Benjamin and Mason. In an cra when congressional oratory was apt to be turgid and ornate, Collamer's speeches were plain, direct, closely-reasoned .- serving to convince by solidity of logic rather than to sway by emotional appeal. He made no pretense to oratorical gifts, but his contemporaries in Con- gress bear witness to the weight of his arguments, and the record attests his forensic skill in the heat of debate.
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His fame as a statesman rests, however, not so much upon his contributions to debate as upon the fundamental quali- ties of his mind. Political friend and foe alike recognized and paid tribute to his unquestioned integrity, his wisdom in dealing with the business in hand, and his pre-eminent fair- mindedness. No senator of his time appears to have won more completely the esteem of his colleagues, or to have estab- lished a more enviable reputation for the wisdom that pene- trates to the heart of a question.
His distinction in the field of national statesmanship was won by solid merit. He was not facile in trimming his sails to the political winds; on the contrary, within the broad lim- its of the representative function, his purpose was to lead rather than to follow. Known to be intellectually as well as morally honest, he commanded universal respect and admira- tion in an era unhappily characterized by bitter political strife and sharp personal antagonisms. No greater tribute could be paid a statesman.
"His influence," said Judge James Barrett in a memorial address before the Vermont Historical Society, "was not that of the zealot, or the party leader, or the popular favorite; it was not exerted through political management, or by resort- ing to expedients; it was not the result of personal favor towards himself, begetting a disposition on the part of others to gratify his wishes; but it flowed from the broad practical good sense of his views, the amplitude and clearness with which he developed them-the strength of reasoning and the earnest faithfulness with which he maintained them, his moral integrity, his conscientious uprightness, his unfailing purpose to be right himself, and to be fair and just towards those who differed from and opposed him."
This generous tribute was from an old friend and profes- sional associate; even more appreciative was the eulogy pro- nounced upon him in the Senate. In an obituary address his eminent colleague, Charles Sumner, referred to Senator Col-
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lamer as "the Green Mountain Socrates," and pronounced him the wisest and best balanced statesman of his time.
CALVIN COOLIDGE
By Darwin P. Kingsley
TF there is such a person as a typical Vermonter, Calvin Coolidge is surely that person. He is nationally recog- nized as an embodiment of the qualities, characteristics, pecul- iarities and virtues of the Vermont Yankee. I use the word Yankee as a term of distinction. It may be, as Israel Zang- will once said, that one of the great functions of the United States is to serve as a melting pot for the fusing of diverse racial elements. Certainly the admixture of racial strains in every other state of the union gives some ground for the melt- ing pot theory of the slow but sure development of an Ameri- can race which, in the dim future, will be distinguished from other races of mankind. But Vermont for one hundred and fifty years has remained almost pure Yankee. This is doubt- less because for that long period it has remained almost solidly an agricultural state, unaffected by the industrialism which has modified the rest of New England.
Vermont gets its sobriquet of the Green Mountain State from the French derivation of its name which came from the original French explorers under Champlain in 1609. But, with the exception of a few geographical titles like that of its capital, Montpelier, and in spite of later French immigration from Canada, there is little left in the state of its French an- cestry, --- nothing, that is, save a possible subconscious appre- ciation of natural beauty. This feeling, so characteristic of the French, perhaps explains why in its State Capitol at Mont-
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pelier, Vermont possesses one of the most perfect public buildings architecturally in the United States.
Calvin Coolidge, significantly Anglo-Saxon in his self-control and his avoidance of loquacity and sentimentalism, once burst his bonds of reserve and gave utterance to the Vermonter's innate love of beauty in an impromptu public address. In the last months of his presidency, as he was passing through his native state, he spoke as follows, from the rear platform of his car, to a group of many hundreds of his fellow-citizens who had gathered to greet his train at Bennington :
For two days we have travelled through the State of Vermont, we have been up the east side, across the state and down the west side, we have seen Brattleboro, Bellows Falls, Windsor, Bethel, White River Junction. We have looked towards Montpelier, and returning we have seen Rutland, and I have had an opportunity to visit again the scenes of my childhood. .
Vermont is a state I love.
I could not look upon the peaks of Ascutney, Killington or Mansfield without being moved in a way that no other scene could move me.
It was here I first saw the light of day; here I received my bride; here my dead lie pillowed upon the everlasting hills.
I love Vermont because of her hills and valleys, her scenery and in- vigorating climate, but most of all, because of her indomitable people. They are a race of pioneers who almost beggared themselves for others. If the spirit of liberty should vanish in the union and our institutions should languish, it all could be restored by the generous store held by the people in this brave little State of Vermont.
It would be superfluous and intrusive to comment on the granitic vigor and mystical tenderness of such a tribute.
No one, even if he be a native of some other part of the country, can travel through the state of Vermont, from Ben- nington to Derby Line or from Lake Champlain to Wells River, without feeling the geographical and racial unity of the state. Industry, thrift, simplicity, order, plain living and high thinking are observable everywhere. There are no great riches,
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but there is no great poverty. A responsible historical authority has said that "the state was more democratic from the begin- ning than any other of the New England states."
Calvin Coolidge manifests these Vermont qualities both in his person and his career. In the little hamlet of Plymouth, which nestles in the foothills of Killington Peak, the thirtieth President of the United States was born on July 4, 1872, which date, by a not insignificant coincidence, was an anniversary of the birth of the Republic and of the death of his two great predecessors in office-John Adams and Thomas Jefferson. Beginning his active life as a young lawyer he early and nat- urally displayed that interest in. politics which he regards as the civic duty of every voter in a democracy. His first elec- tive office was that of councilman in the city of Northampton in Massachusetts. From that official position, by the elective choice of his community and fellow-citizens, through the grades of Northampton city solicitor, clerk of courts in Northampton, member of the lower house of the Massachu- setts Legislature, mayor of Northampton, member of the Massachusetts State Senate, lieutenant governor of Massachu- setts, governor of Massachusetts and vice president of the United States, he rose steadily to the presidency. A thorough- going Republican in party affiliation, no president,-not even Jefferson or Lincoln-has held a more democratic belief than he, that the source of governmental power and authority is in the people. Since his retirement from public office he has said: "We draw our presidents from the people. It is a whole- some thing for them to return to the people. I came from the people. I wish to be one of them again."
Columns have been written to interpret Calvin Coolidge's personality and to expound and explain his political philoso- phy. But he has done it himself better than anybody else can do it for him. When he was inauguarated as president of the Massachusetts State Senate on January 7, 1914, he said with characteristic and epigrammatic brevity :
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Do the day's work. If it be to protect the rights of the weak, whoever objects, do it. If it be to help a powerful corporation better to, serve the people, whatever the opposition, do that. Expect to be called a stand- patter, but don't be a stand-patter. Expect to be called a demagogue, but don't be a demagogue. Don't hesitate to be as revolutionary as science. Don't hesitate to be as reactionary as the multiplication table. Don't expect to build up the weak by pulling down the strong. Don't hurry to legislate. Give administration a chance to catch up with legis- lation. . .
Statutes must appeal to more than material welfare. Wages won't satisfy, be they never so large. Nor houses; nor lands; nor coupons, though they fall thick as the leaves of autumn. Man has a spiritual nature. Touch it, and it must respond as the magnet responds to the pole.
It is the universal judgment of Calvin Coolidge's fellow countrymen that he has consistently practiced what this creed preaches; that it contains the elements that have made his public career, one, not of meteoric glitter but of steady growth; and that it explains the respect and esteem in which he is held by men of all ranks and of all parties.
JOHN COTTON DANA
By Harrison J. Conant
O F American librarians, few have been more widely known and of greater service in their profession than John Cotton Dana. He was born in Woodstock, Vermont, August 19, 1856, the fourth child in a family of six children, five of whom were boys. His father, Charles Dana, married at the age of thirty-five Charitie Loomis, the daughter of Jeduthan Loomis of Montpelier who was highly respected as probate judge. In both his father's and mother's lines of descent, Mr. Dana, came from old New England families that first came to
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this country around the year 1640. On his father's side Mr. Dana was descended from the Huguenots of France.
John Cotton Dana illustrates in a striking degree the value and importance of a good inheritance. Both his father and mother were unusually gifted and had strong religious feel- ings. Although his father was a merchant in a small town all his life, his intellectual gifts won such recognition that both Dartmouth College and the University of Vermont granted him an honorary degree.
He was educated in the public schools of Vermont and Dartmouth College. After graduation from college he re- turned to Woodstock and began the study of law in the office of Warren C. French. His health soon broke down, and although later he completed his study and was admitted to the bars of Colorado and New York, he spent many years in the West, where he engaged in various undertakings. It was at this period that as a surveyor he discovered the ruins of the Cliff Dwellers in Colorado.
At the age of thirty-three, the year after he married Adine Rowena Waggener of Kentucky, he was appointed librarian of the Denver Public Library, and during the ensuing nine years, he increased the size and service of the library many times and won for himself even thus early a national reputation. He boldly advocated and put into practice many reforms in library practice, all tending to make the library of greater influence and service to the community. In every way possible he sought to extend the use of the library. He was the first libra- rian in this country to start a separate children's department ; the first to have a picture collection; and one of the first to allow the public access to the stacks of the library. So great was the recognition of his services that in 1896, while still in Denver, he was elected president of the American Library Association. In 1898, he became librarian of the Springfield (Mass.) Public Library and four years later he was appointed librarian of the Newark Public Library, where he remained
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until his death. His services to the people of Newark during his residence of twenty-seven years were so great that he was known as "the First Citizen." He did not confine his activi- ties to his professional work, but was ever alert to undertake projects for bettering the life of the community.
His work in Newark, aside from extending the circulation of his library from 300,000 a year to nearly 2,000,000, or six fold, is distinguished principally for three things : first, the es- tablishing of a business branch which is conveniently located in the business district and furnishes books and information of special interest to men engaged in commerce, manufacture and finance; second, the special emphasis placed upon library service to children, both in their school work and outside reading; and, last, and this became the pet project of John Cotton Dana, the establishing of a museum of popular appeal. He was a great advocate of applying art to industry and the facts of everyday life. He prepared many exhibits showing the arts and crafts of other nations. Along these lines, with the help of five hundred persons and organizations, he spent three years in preparing an exhibit of Chinese life and ex- hibited it in over twenty large cities. He was able to arouse so much interest in the Newark Museum that it came to con- tain over 150,000 exhibits valued at over one million dollars.
The importance he placed upon library work among chil- dren is shown by the following quotations from his writings: "Schools are in part established that they may tell the young how to enjoy this feast" of books; "In the long run, he learns most who studies much and is taught little."
John Cotton Dana wrote many books and magazine articles on library work and made a great many speeches on the sub- ject. He was instrumental in founding the Special Libraries Association and became its first president in 1909. He was also a member of the State Library Commission of New Jer- sey and president of the New Jersey Library Association for several years.
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He possessed a charming personality, was kindly, tolerant of the opinions of others, and had a keen sense of humor. He had a remarkable faculty of arousing enthusiasm and obtaining co-operation from others.
In common with most Vermonters, John Cotton Dana re- tained a love for his boyhood home and surroundings, and returned to Woodstock every year for his vacations. It was during his last journey to Vermont, while in the New York railroad station that he was stricken with his fatal illness. He died in a New York City hospital on July 21, 1929, and is buried in Woodstock.
THOMAS DAVENPORT
By Walter Rice Davenport
T - HOMAS DAVENPORT was born in Williamstown,
Vermont, July 9, 1802, being descended from a long line of Puritan forbears, his immediate parents being Daniel and Hannah Davenport. Thomas was the eighth of a family of children which ultimately numbered twelve. He knew the pangs of poverty from birth until death, and was one of the chief supports of his mother from the age of ten to fourteen, as his father died of spotted fever, when the lad was ten. Four years later the family was broken up and Thomas was apprenticed to Messrs. Abbott and Howe of Williamstown to learn the trade of blacksmithing. As the regular form for indenturing apprentices gave the boy but six weeks of school- ing per year, and he himself says that he had very little chance at home, it is probable that he had no more than three years of schooling, all told, as schooling is reckoned today.
At the completion of his apprenticeship, at the age of twenty-
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one, he went to Brandon, and, with the aid of his brother Barzillai, purchased a blacksmith shop and tools and set up in business for himself, a bit later moving to Forestdale, a separate settle- ment in Brandon, coming into prominence because of the opening of an iron mine. He settled down to steady work and soon gained a good trade, paid for his shop, bought a house, married Emily Goss, a remarkable young woman, and became the father of two fine boys. Everything then looked as if he would have a good career in life.
Hearing that there was a strange contrivance at Crown Point, a town twenty-five miles away in New York, he went thitherward in the winter, being carried by his brother Oliver in his tin peddler's cart. He went to purchase iron for his shop and also, and chiefly, to see the wonderful apparatus which, although weighing but three pounds, could suspened "between Heaven and earth" an anvil weighing 150 pounds. When he first saw this appliance in operation, he was entranced and made a bit of a speech to the men there present, saying that here was a discovery of a new power which would ulti- mately supersede steam in the machinery of the world, as it is rapidly doing today.
This apparatus was called a "galvanic battery" but would today be styled a "magnet," although the power came from two cups of mercury to each of which a wire extended down from the horseshoe magnet. He inquired if, should one of the wires be broken, the power might not be immediately re- stored by simply connecting the two ends of the severed wire, and was told that no such thing could take place. So he deter- mined to purchase the magnet for himself, the price being seventy-five dollars, a small price today but a colossal sum for a poverty stricken blacksmith. It took all of his money, and all his brother had, the sale of the tin ware in the cart, and a sum obtained by the swapping of horses, to secure the magnet.
No sooner was it his then he at once cut one of the wires,
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thus shutting off the power, but, when he just touched the two ends together again, the power was the same as before, so that he then and there discovered the principle now in univer- sal use of stopping and starting an electric light, or power over any electric wire. He took the magnet back home with him that night; and, before he slept, he took it entirely apart, his wife Emily writing down with great exactness just how the wire was wound around the horseshoe magnet. Then he went to his shop and made another horseshoe magnet three times as large, and, with the assistance of his wife, and the use of her silk wedding dress, wound it properly, connected the wires with cups of mercury and water, and it "worked."
The incidents of this day showed that this young man had an extraordinary mind, and, once awakened, it never again slept or allowed him to go the old easy way of living. Always after this he was experimenting to find new ways of doing things that thereby the heavy burdens on the weary shoulders of the workers of the world might be lessened. What was now needed was to produce rotary motion by electricity; that he knew. But there were no books of any kind, and no magazines of that nature within his reach. Nor were any such in print at the time. But he kept on until, in 1834, he succeeded in producing a rotary motion of a wheel a few inches in diameter which travelled thirty revolutions per minute. This was useless save as a toy, and Davenport knew that years of experimentation must follow before success could crown his efforts. Hence, although the direst poverty was his lot, and the scorn of neighbors his reward, he kept on until, February 25, 1837, he was granted a patent for the first electric motor. This was an era in all human history, as any one will recognize when he thinks of the millions of motors at work today.
But even then the end had not been reached, as the motion was not sufficiently rapid, or the power sufficiently cheap, so he kept on in his task, being aided by Orange Smalley and
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others, from time to time. At one stage in his work he in- vented and made the first model in human history of an elec- tric trolley, his motor running an actual car on a small circu- lar track. One of these models which he made is preserved at Washington by the Smithsonian Institute. And when it is remembered that when he made this electric car and motor, there was not even a single mile of steam railroad in Vermont, his achievements are seen to be all the more remarkable.
Before Davenport could obtain any adequate return for his inventions he died in poverty and disappointment, but he lived long enough to write his name among the very few really great inventors of the world.
Note what he did :
Made the first electric motor in history, and obtained a patent for the same; made the first motor-driven car in his- tory; ran the first printing press by electricity; established and printed the first electric magazine in history, and blazed a trail over which increasing millions are treading every year.
And this man, Thomas Davenport, did this with but three years of schooling, with an absolute absence for many years of all books and papers relating to his work, and with scorn and obloquy from those, many who should have been his helpers. What an incentive to Vermont boys and girls of all subsequent generations! If he could succeed, who could not?
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JOSEPH A. DE BOER
By Dorman B. E. Kent
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