USA > Washington > King County > Seattle > A volume of memoirs and genealogy of representative citizens of the city of Seattle and county of King, Washington, including biographies of many of those who have passed away > Part 72
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a venerable age: Anna is the wife of Andrew Sharp, of that state; and James also lives in Michigan.
William Beattie was reared on the old homestead farm in Livingston county, Michigan, early beginning to contribute his quota to the work of reclaiming and cultivating the same, while his educational privileges were such as were afforded in the district school, two miles distant from his home, his attendance being limited to the short winter months, as was the case with the average farmer boy of the locality and period. He continued to assist in the work of the farm until he had attained the age of eighteen years, when he decided to adopt the vocation of a mechanic, with which object in view he entered a blacksmith shop at Howell, Livingston county, where he served a three years' apprenticeship and then remained for the succeeding four years in the employ of his instructor. Within this period, on the 18th of February, 1859, he was united in marriage to Miss Jeanette Melvin, who was born in Howell, a daugher of Rodney and Melvina (Sharp) Melvin, both of whom were natives of the state of New York. From Howell Mr. Beattie removed to Marshall, Michigan, where he was engaged in the work of his trade for three years, then returning to the employ of his old master in Howell for an equal period, thereafter passing three years in Ionia, same state, after which he again removed to Howell, where he purchased the entire business of his former employer, who was then carrying on an excellent busi- ness in the manufacturing of carriages and wagons, this having been before the machine work of the later years had displaced the old and reliable hand productions in this line. Mr. Beattie continued to conduct the enterprise suc- cessfully, and that his operations were of no inconsiderable scope may be recognized when we revert to the fact that he had in his employ about twenty workmen.
In the year 1870 Mr. Beattie met with a most grievous loss and be- renvement, his wife being fatally burned by the explosion of a lamp, leaving him with four motherless children. He then left the three younger children with their maternal grandparents and, in company with his eldest son, Wal- ter J., started for Sonoma county, California. Upon his arrival he engaged in the work of his trade at Cloverdale and there remained about three years, then taking passage for Portland, Oregon, on the ill-fated steamer Great Republic, which was stranded and burned on the lower Columbia river, our subject and his son, with the other passengers, being rescued from the wreck by a government boat. while several of the crew lost their lives. Mr. Beattie engaged in the work of his trade at Roseburg, Oregon, for a time, and then, in December. 1880. came to Washington, spending one season in the Ruby
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Stake country and then locating in Seattle, where he opened a blacksmith shop and where he has ever since maintained his home. His first shop was located in Madison street, near Railroad avenue, and there he built up a good business in blacksmithing and general repair work, but he lost all that he had accumulated in the great fire that swept the city in 1889. his loss aggregating about six thousand dollars. Not daunted by this great misfortune, he opened business in another shop, on the site of the present Times building, and his enterprise was conducted with such ability and discretion that its growth has been very gratifying. In 1901 Mr. Beattie erected his present building. which is two stories in height and sixty feet square, and here he is associated with his sons, Walter J. and Frank R., in the conducting of a general black- smithing and repairing business and also the manufacture of the best grade of delivery wagons and heavy trucks, employment being given to a corps of ten capable workmen.
In politics Mr. Beattie gives an unfaltering support to the principles of the Democratic party, in whose ranks he has been an active worker, having been a member of the county central committee and a delegate to various party conventions. He has never sought official preferment in the gift of his party since coming to Washington, but while living in Michigan he held a number of local offices. Fraternally he was identified with the Independent Order of Odd Fellows while a resident of Michigan, but has never main- tained active affiliation in the west. Of the four children of our subject we enter brief record, as follows: Walter J. is the junior member of the firm of Beattie & Son; Frank is also connected with his father in business; Elbert is an electrician in Seattle; and Minnie is the wife of Grant Bicer. a stockman of Hunter's Hot Springs, Montana.
GEORGE W. TIBBETTS.
The history of the lives of some men who have won success in life contains very little that could be termed "sensational," while that of others. equally successful, has so many varied and interesting phases that it is almost like a romance; George W. Tibbetts has had a career of unusual interest and he has experienced many of the ups and downs of a long course of public and commercial activity. His father, Daniel, was born in the same house as he himself, in the year 1782, of Scotch-Irish lineage, fol- lowed farming as an occupation. and died in 1855: his wife was of the same stock, was born in the same place about 1824 and died in December, 1845. when the son George was not a year old.
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George Tibbetts was born at Acton. Maine, on January 22, 1845. When four years of age he went to live with his uncle, Josiah Whitmore, in Strafford county, New Hampshire, and there received his education in the public schools ; but when he was fifteen years of age he ran away from home and for a year worked on a farm near Great Falls, New Hampshire. At the age of sixteen, in July. 1861. he enlisted in Company F, Fourth New Hampshire Infantry, in which he served till the close of the war and re- enlisted as a veteran on February 20, 1864, at Morris Island, South Car- olina; the first three years of his service was in the Tenth Army Corps, Department of the South, and on leaving South Carolina he joined the Army of the James under General Butler. He participated in the principal battles of that great conflict and on the 12th of August, 1864, at the battle of Deep Bottom on the James river, near Richmond, he was taken prisoner, and for nearly a year endured all the frightful sufferings of northern soldiers in the prisons at Libby, Belle Isle and Salisbury. He was mustered out of the service as a paroled prisoner at Concord, New Hampshire, on June 30, 1865.
Prison life had so undermined his health that he was advised to go west, and so in the fall of 1865 he went to Moniteau county, Missouri, where he attended school for six months. He then entered into partner- ship with Lorain Baker, of Ohio, and they conducted a general merchandis- ing business in Moniteau and Morgan counties. Then selling out to his partner, Mr. Tibbetts for six months carried on a store alone at Butler, Bates county, Missouri: he then went to Newtonia. Newton county, and became the senior member of the firm of Tibbetts, Wilson & Company. en- gaged in general mercantile and banking business; this was continued until 1870, when he disposed of his interests and moved to Clackamas county, Oregon, where for one year he farmed. In 1871 he bought one hundred and sixty acres of land in King county, Washington, in Squak valley, near the head of Squak lake (now called Sammamish lake), and he has made this his permanent home ever since.
Mr. Tibbetts made many improvements on this place and for years was extensively engaged in hop-raising, dairying and general farming, be- sides his own place having a number of rented farms; in 1881 he erected an extensive hotel and store on the farm and in 1882 established a stage line from Seattle to Lake Washington, thence by boat to Belmont and Lake Sammamish, and from there by stage to North Bend, operating in con- nection with the Columbia and Puget Sound Railroad; on the completion
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of the Seattle, Lake Shore and Eastern Railroad to North Bend in 1889 he discontinued the stage line. In 1888. when the town of Issaquah was laid out, Mr. Tibbetts put up a large two-story building, and moved his business to this point, which was the first business house in the town and which for several years has been occupied by the Issaquah Coal Company. In 1889 he built a store at Snoqualmie, and later in company with S. D. Gusten erected the Cascadia Hotel and store at North Bend. In 1893, when in the full enjoyment of great prosperity, the financial panic which wrecked so many swept away nearly all of his extensive possessions; at that time besides his stores and other business interests he had about two thousand acres of the finest land in King county under cultivation ; his losses in hard cash amounted to over one hundred thousand dollars. The hard work and the shock resulting from the loss of the accumulation of years impaired his health, and for six years he practically retired from active work; but in 1901 he started in to restore his fortunes by establishing a general store at Issaquah and has since enjoyed a thriving trade. Among the various lines that he engaged in was the dairy and hop business, from 1896 to 1903, being president of the Dwamish Dairy Association of King county, and he shipped the first can of milk ever sent to Seattle.
Mr. Tibbetts has been a life-long Republican and for nearly thirty years has been prominent in the public affairs of King county. In 1876 he was elected to the territorial legislature, was the first postmaster at Ren- ton and was justice of the peace there from 1875 to 1878, and was the postmaster at Squak from 1878 to 1886; in 1884 he was elected brigadier general of the Washington State National Guards and served for two years; he was chairman of the Republican county central committee; in 1888 he was nominated by acclamation for representative of his state, but he de- clined. He was elected a member of the constitutional convention that framed the state constitution in 1889: In November, 1902. he was elected to the house of representatives of the eighth legislative assembly of Wash- ington and is now a member.
In 1899 he was elected department commander of the Grand Army of the Republic for Washington and Alaska, which he had helped organize in 1878, being the first senior vice commander of Stevens Post No. I. at Seattle. He joined the Masonic order at Falls City, Washington. in 1890. was a charter member and one of the organizers of Myrtle Lodge at Issa- quali in 1899. and holds membership in the Scottish Rite chapter of the order at Seattle. In 1883 he joined Harmony Lodge, Knights of Pythias, at Seattle and transferred to Triangle Lodge at Issaquah in 1888. being
Les James
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a charter member also of the Rathbone Sisters. In 1875, he became a member of Olive Branch Lodge of the Independent Order of Odd Fel- lows at Seattle and demitted to Gillman Lodge at Issaquah in 1889. being past chief patriarch of Unity Encampment No 2, of Seattle, and member of Rebecca Lodge at Issaquah. He belongs to the Order of Washington . at Issaquah.
On March II. 1868, at Carthage, Jasper county, Missouri, Mr. Tib- betts became the husband of Rebecca A. Wilson, who was born in Moniteau county of that state on August 15. 1849, and was the daughter of S. W. Wilson, a prominent farmer of that county. Of the seven children born to them, three are now living: Ida M., who is the wife of John M. Goode. a mereliant at Noah Bend, was born in the first log cabin built in Squak valley, made historical by the murder of the Castro family there on No- vember 7. 1864: the cabin was built by Thomas Russel in 1863. George Wilson was born at Renton, Washington, on June 18. 1877, was educated in the schools at Issaquah, and until 1897 remained at home, a valuable assistant in his father's business; in that year he and his brother-in-law, John M. Goode, made a trip to Alaska with a lot of goods which they dis- posed of so advantageously that they returned and in 1899 bought the store and hotel at North Bend which had been established by Gusten and Tibbetts in 1891; he is now the postmaster at that place. Fred S .. the youngest son, is in business with his father at Issaquah.
GEORGE JAMES.
George James is the senior member and manager of the Variety Iron Works Company, iron founders and manufacturers. This business was established by Mr. James in 1889 and has been under his control since that time. In 1899 it was incorporated. Mr. James continuing as manager. The enterprise has become one of the most representative of the industrial inter- ests of the northwest. All the products of the factory are of a superior grade, both in casting and manufacturing.
The width of the continent separates Mr. James from the place of his birth, for he is a native of New York city, born on September 17, 1858. of a family of English lineage. Alfred James, his father, was a native of Eng- land. but becoming a lover of civil liberty he joined a charter movement in England and because of this was obliged to leave his native land and come to America. He was married in London to Miss Martha Porch, whose father was a celebrated artist : the one child born to them in London. Adrian
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Rienzie. is now in New York city. Thirteen children were added to the fam- ily circle in America's metropolis, where for a number of years the father was a prominent merchant tailor. He was ever a lover of liberty and op- posed to oppression in every form, and the first Cuban rebellion was planned in his house, and he became a filibuster and went to Cuba in 1869. Their ship, the Hornet, was captured by the United States authorities while coaling at Wilmington, North Carolina, and he then returned home, where he died from the effects of a surgical operation made necessary by ill health. Of the fourteen children in his family eight are now living, and his wife also sur- vives him in the seventieth year of her age.
George James was educated in New York and learned his trade in that city, after which he engaged in business there and later in Chicago. He arrived in Seattle in October, 1889, with seven and a half dollars in his . pocket. He had not enough money to bring his wife and two children with him from Chicago, but he had earned enough within six weeks in this thriv- ing city of the northwest to send for them, and it was a happy meeting when they reached him in his new home on the Pacific coast. He had been mar- ried in 1877 to Miss Mary McCastland. Charles, George and Maude were born to them in Chicago, Fred, who was born in Chicago, is dead, and Min- nie, born in Seattle, is also deceased. His good wife, who passed with him through all the early trials and was ever an able assistant, departed this life on October 17, 1900. This had been a happy married life, covering a period of twenty-three years, and her loss was most deeply felt by husband and children.
Mr. James' path to success in this city was not a flowery one, although it started out in a promising manner. He secured a position with a firm in Ballard, but not long afterward his employers failed, and he then began work for the Washington Iron Works, but was forced to leave because he was not a resident molder, although he was a member of the union, their opposition being because he was an eastern man. He then found a man who had a little shop in the woods, and there he began the manufacture of iron special- ties in plumbing goods. The next seven months was a hard struggle, but at the end of that time a gentleman bought out Mr. James' partner, and the Dwyer Manufacturing Company was organized. After they had conducted this for twenty months they built the present plant on the tide flats. In 1894 Charles Mulcahey purchased the interests of the Dwyer Brothers, and with Nr. James' interests organized the Variety Iron Works, and under this ar- rangement it grew in volume as the city increased in population. J. B. C. Lockwood finally purchased Mr. Mulcahey's interest, and the business was
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then enlarged, and under the direction of Mr. James they branched out into the manufacture of machinery and did jobbing work. The shop was equipped for a heavy class of work and success attended the enterprise. A little later Mr. Lockwood sold his interest to Charles Fleehart, and after some months Mr. James purchased the latter's interest. Some time later he sold a half interest to the Puget Sound Machinery Company. and the busi- ness was incorporated with J. H. Perkins as president. Thomas Green as secretary, and Mr. James as manager. From the time of the incorporation the business of the house has steadily increased in volume, and they now manufacture all kinds of the heaviest work in iron, and have placed machin- ery in many of the leading business blocks of the city and a number of saw- mills in the state and furnished the iron construction for many of the county bridges. Their trade extends all over the state and even into other states. Mr. James has prospered with the growth of the enterprise and with the growth of the city, and as his financial resources have been enlarged he has made judicious investments, until he now owns considerable city property, including various tide-land lots and residences. The company's plant, which is located on the tide flats at 1241 to 1245 Utah street, covers two full lots, and is one of the best equipped in the northwest.
Mr. James is a member of the Modern Woodmen of the World and of the Manufacturer's Association. He is an expert molder, thoroughly reliable in business, a good citizen, and is deeply interested in the welfare of Seattle. His career is certainly a creditable and honorable one, for in the face of op- position, meeting untold difficulties and obstacles, he has steadily advanced, and to-day stands among the prosperous men of the northwest, enjoying success and also the respect and confidence of all with whom he comes in contact.
C. E. JOHNSON.
C. E. Johnson has always resided upon the Pacific coast, and the true spirit of western progress and advancement is exemplified in his career. He was born in Woodland. California, May 8, 1866, a son of Corbley and Jennie (Pool) Johnson, the former born in Ohio in 1825 and the latter in Indiana i11 1845. In early life the father engaged in merchandising, following that pursuit in Ohio, Indiana, Wisconsin, Kansas and Texas. In the early six- ties he went to Woodland, California, and later to Paso Robles, where he has since been engaged in farming, he and his wife still residing there.
In the public schools of his native state C. E. Johnson acquired his early
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education, which was supplemented by study in the University of Southern California at Los Angeles, where he was graduated in the class of 1883. Through the three succeeding years he was engaged in farming in San Luis Obispo county, California, and from 1887 until 1890 he made his home in Los Angeles. In the latter year and in 1891 he worked for the Electric Improvement Company at San Jose, California, and from 1891 until 1900 was with the construction department of the Edison Electric Light & Power Company of San Francisco. In May of the latter year he came to Seattle to accept a position with the Seattle Electric Company, and in September, 1901. he took charge of the sub-station of the Snoqualmie Falls Power Com- pany at Issaquah, acting as patrolman from Renton to the falls, a distance of nineteen miles.
Mr. Johnson is an active worker in the Republican ranks and was ap- pointed police judge by the Issaquah town council in January, 1902. He is always interested in everything pertaining to the welfare and improvement of the town and has co-operated in many movements for the general welfare of the community. In San Francisco, in 1897, Mr. Johnson was united in marriage to Miss Elmira Scofield, who was born in Watsonville, California, and they have one child. Dorothy, aged four years.
CHARLES H. BEBB.
Charles H. Bebb, of the firm of Bebb & Mendel, is one of the leading architects of Seattle and a man whose standing in the business community might well be envied. His work is of the highest order, and when he under- takes a commission it is a guarantee that it will be conscientiously performed. He first came to Seattle in 1890, as supervising architect for the firm of Adler & Sullivan, of Chicago, to take charge of the construction of an opera house and hotel building that was projected for the corner of Second avenue and University street, but the plan was not consummated, owing to the failure of Baring Brothers. Returning to Chicago, he remained with Messrs. Adler & Sullivan as head superintendent until the fall of 1893. when he was again induced to come to Seattle. accepting the position of archi- tectural engineer with the Denny Clay Company, who at that time enlarged their plant by the establishment of a branch for the manufacture of archi- tectural terra cotta. He remained with the firm for five years.
A native of England, Mr. Bebb was born in Surrey. April 10, 1858. After passing through King's College, London, and a preparatory school in Switzerland, he passed into the University at Lausanne, but soon afterward
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returned to London to a private tutor. He next took up a course of civil engineering at the School of Mines, but before his graduation went to South Africa, where he was connected for five years with the engineering depart- ment of the Cape government railways in the western division. A tempo- rary cessation of construction was the cause of his return to England, and it was shortly afterward that he decided to come to Chicago, having in project a position with the Illinois Central Railroad, then being built in Texas. Upon arriving in Chicago, however, and studying the then existing con- ditions he felt that better opportunities existed in that city than railroad work in Texas might offer. It was just about this time that the modern high steel construction fire-proof building was evolving, the art of fire- proofing as applied to buildings being in its primitive stages. The subject was one that might well have appealed to any engineer, and it appealed to him forcibly and at once. He became connected with the Illinois Terra Cotta Lumber Company, and in a very short time was appointed construc- tion engineer for the firm, with full charge of all their work. The part taken by this company under his management in the development of fire- proof construction is well known in the middle west. It was a question in those days not of securing work, which was plentiful, but of making a rec- ord of thorough and practical efficiency in the manner and methods of carrying out the work, so that it might be said of any of the fire-proof build- ings that the last one built was most practically fire-proof. Mr. Bebb de- voted all the thought and energy of an active mind in this direction, and in 1888, when the contract for the fire-proofing of the great Chicago Audi- torium was awarded to his company through his individual exertions, he appreciated fully the reward of his efforts, this contract being the largest of its kind at that time ever awarded in this or any other country. The Chamber of Commerce building and the Monon block are others among a long list of important buildings fire-proofed under his direction. In addition to his regular work he contributed articles to the technical press, among them being a paper entitled "Fire Losses in Fire-proof Buildings." issued in the Engi- neering Magazine in February. 1893. which received general comment throughout the country and is being reprinted in Europe and Australia.
When the Chicago Auditorium was nearing completion Mr. Bebb re- ceived an offer from the architects of the building. Messrs. Adler & Sullivan, which he felt would be to his advantage to accept, and he assumed the duties of superintending architect in their office. During the years he was with them he had full charge of their important work, among which may be men- tioned the Schiller Theatre. the Crane Elevator Company's factory. the
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foundations for the Cold Storage Exchange. the Synagogue on Thirty-first and Indiana avenue, the Wright & Hill's Linseed Oil Company's plant, the Meyer building and many others. It was to take charge of the projected Seattle Theatre building for the same company that Mr. Bebb first came to this city. Opening an office of his own as an architect in 1898 in the West- ington block, Seattle, his efficiency in his profession and his thorough busi- ness methods soon became established, and his patronage increased rapidly. Among a partial list of the many fine residences constructed from plans from his office are those owned by Frank W. Baker, Judge Harrison Bostwick, Miss Lenora Denny, James D. Hoge, Clarence Hanford, H. A. Kyer, Daniel Kelleher, N. B. Nelson, Dr. James Shannon. Dr. George M. Horton, Fred S. Stinson, Albert S. Kerry, Charles Frye and Mrs. J. F. Nadean, while among the business blocks are the new Times building, the Denny building, the A. W. Denny building, and in course of construction the five-story Se- attle Athletic Club building and the six-story office building on Second avenue for Messrs. Hamon & Schmitz, also the factory building for the Pacific Coast Syrup Company of San Francisco, the large printing establishment for Tucker Hanfor, covering a ground area of one hundred and twenty by one hundred and twenty feet, and the Colonial Hotel for Stinson Brothers. A list of these buildings, while incomplete, indicates the character of his work and evidences the fact that he enjoys to a large degree the confidence and respect of the public. In JOCI he took into partnership Louis L. Mendel.
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