USA > Wisconsin > A political history of Wisconsin > Part 37
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A POLITICAL HISTORY OF WISCONSIN.
HAMILTON RICHARDSON.
Hamilton Richardson was born at LeRoy, Genessee county, . New York. October 17. 1820. He passed his early boyhood attend- ing the district school and working on his father's farm: but at the age of fifteen he went into the service of a mercantile firm. Two years later, when Michigan was admitted to the Union, the firm moved their business to the new State, taking their young employee with them. They were active in the development of the town of Flint, constructing the first dam across the Flint river, building and operating the first sawmill, platting town lots and conducting the first mercantile house and the first bank. Young Richardson, sustaining confidential relations with the firm, was active in all these operations, and obtained an intimate acquaintance with business which was useful to him in his subsequent career. In 1840. the firm having been forced into liquidation as a result of the widespread panic of 1837, Richardson, then only in his twentieth year. returned to his native town and pursued an academic course of study. In 1842 he came West. and for two years was bookkeeper for a large firm in Milwaukee. In 1844 he opened a hardware store at Racine. At the end of two years he sold out and femoved to Janesville. where he continued to sell hardware until 1850. when, in partner- ship with William Truesdell, he built the Excelsior Mills, afterward known as the Hodson Mills. This was a losing venture, the plant being twice almost destroyed, once by fire and once by flood. In the hope of reestablishing himself financially, Mr. Richardson. in 1851, went to California. where, during four years of legitimate business enterprise and much perilous adventure, he acquired the means to make large purchases of real estate in Janesville, when the panic of 1857 had induced speculative holders to throw their prop- erty on the market. These investments, wisely handled by Mr. Richardson, have ever since been a source of income. He has been a leading citizen of Janesville, interested in many of its large indus- trial enterprises, and always performing more than his share of work in undertakings calculated to benefit the community. In early life Mr. Richardson was a Democrat, but at the opening of the Civil War he became an ardent supporter of the administration
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of President Lincoln. He gave liberally of time and money in rais- ing troops, and was one of the committee of three which enlisted the Thirteenth Wisconsin Regiment. Indeed, there was hardly a com- mittee of which Mr. Richardson was not a member organized in the city of Janesville to aid the Government during the war. In 1864. by the combined voteof Republicans and Democrats, he was elected to the State Assembly. Four years later he was elected to the Board of Supervisors, and served on the committee which had charge of the erection of Rock County Court House. Twice there- after he was elected to the County Board, and, beginning with 1876, he was elected State Senator for three successive terms. In the Legislature of 1879 he introduced the measure which placed all the charitable and reformatory institutions of the State under the super- vision of a Board of Control. In 1881. as Chairman of the Commit- tce on Charitable and Penal Institutions, he introduced a bill for the humane care of the chronic insane, by which was established the present admirable system of combined State and County control and treatment of members of this unfortunate class. In July, 1883, President Arthur appointed him postmaster at Janesville, which office be filled until February, 18SS. Mr. Richardson was married in 1858 to Miss Caroline A. Pease, of Hartford, Connecticut. They have had six children born to them-five sons and one daughter.
CHARLES BARBER.
Charles Barber was born at Burlington, Vermont, September 21, 1851, the eldest son of Ammi P. Barber, a distinguished physi- cian, who removed with his family to Oshkosh in 1857. where the subject of this sketeli has since lived. The young man attended the public schools, and was a member of the first class graduated from the Oshkosh High School. Under the private tutorship of Arthur Everett, the principal of that school, he then went through studies equivalent to a collegiate course, at the same time beginning to read law in the office of Earl P. Finch. He was Assistant and Vice Principal of the Oshkosh High School for three years, and in 1873 went to New York city, where he took the full course. in the Columbia Law School. In 1874, at Oshkosh, he was .
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admitted to the bar. and entered into partnership with his former preceptor .. Mr. Finch. the association continuing till the death of the latter, in 1888, and constituting one of the strongest law firms in Northern Wisconsin. From September, 1874. to Sep- tember, 1875. Mr. Barber was Inspector of the city schools of Oshkosh, an office corresponding to that of Superintendent. He has served as School Commissioner for one term, and in 1883 held the office of City Attorney. With these exceptions he has held no official position, but he has freely given his time when required for the interests of the Democratic party, and has been conspicuous in its councils and conventions. As a lawyer. Mr. Barber's practice has grown to large proportions, extending into the higher courts of Wisconsin and other States and into the United States courts. In 1877 he argued his first case in the United States Supreme Court. It involved the title to school lands in Indian reservations, and settled issues of much importance in the State of Wisconsin. For years he has been local Attorney at Osh- · kosh of the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railway Company and · the Chicago & Northwestern. He is the senior member of the law firm of Barbers & Beglinger, composed of himself, his brother. Henry Barber. and Frederic Beglinger. Mr. Barber is identified with numerous business interests in Oshkosh. He was for ten years president of the Street Railway Company, is a director of the Na- tional Union Bank, was one of the organizers of the German Na- tional Bank, is a stockholder in that and other banking institutions. and is president of The Times Publishing Company, which issues The Oshkosh Times, one of the leading Democratie newspapers of Wisconsin. Mr. Barber married. 1879. Miss Daisy C. Jenkins, a daughter of Captain James Jenkins of Oshkosh. She died in 1891. leaving four daughters. In 1803 Mr. Barber married Miss Mary B. Billings of Oshkosh.
S. D. HASTINGS.
Sammuel D. Hastings, now living in cheerful and dignified ok !! age at Green Bay. is one of the last survivors of the devoted band of writers, orators and philanthropists who were the pioneers in the
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anti-slavery movement. He was a co-worker with Garrison, Whit- tier, Phillips and Hale, all of whom have closed their earthly careers, while he remains. He was conspicuous in early work for the material development of Wisconsin as well as in movements for moral reform. Samuel D. Hastings was born July 24. 1816, at Leicester, Mass. His father was English and his mother Scotch. His boyhood was passed mostly in Boston. From his fourteenth till his thirtieth year he resided at Philadelphia, where he was mar- ried in 1837 to Miss Margaretta Shubert. The remainder of his life has been passed in Wisconsin. He was one of the founders of the Liberty party, and Chairman of its State Central Committee for Pennsylvania. In 1846 he came to Wisconsin, settl'ng in Walworth county. In 1849 he represented the Geneva district of Walworth county in the State Assembly, to which body he was again elected in. 1857 from Trempealeau. In 1857 he removed to La Crosse, where he lived for several years. He was one of the committee which went to Madison to procure the city charter. and the original draft of that instrument was in his handwriting. He was conspicu- ous in the temperance reform movement which carried the State in 1853, and has during all the intervening years been a leading worker in behalf of temperance, his name being known in that capacity wherever the English language is spoken. As an organ- izer of the forces of total abstinence he has crossed the ocean no fewer than eight times, and has delivered speeches in every county and nearly every considerable town in Wisconsin: in nearly every State in the Union, in Canada, in England, Scotland and Ireland, in Tasmania, in New Zealand and in Australia. In 1857, nominated by John F. Potter. he was made the Republican candidate for State Treasurer, and was elected, being reelected three times in succes- sion and holding the office until January 1, 1866. It was during his incumbency and by means of his negotiations that the loans were effected which enabled Wisconsin to procure the funds that enabled it to promptly respond to all the calls for troops which were made upon it during the Civil War. He acted with the Republican party until 1881. when the organization of the Prohibition party was effected, with his advice and cooperation, and in 1884 he was the candidate of that party for Governor. Among the many offices
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of honor and trust which he has held, besides those referred to above, are those of Secretary of the State Board of Charities. Trustee of the State Hospital for the Insane. Treasurer of the Wis- consin Academy of Sciences, Arts and Letters, and Curator of the State Historical Society of Wisconsin. He is an active member of the Congregational church. His family consists of a son, Judge Samuel D). Hastings of Green Bay, and two married daughters.
OLIVER G. MUNSON.
Oliver G. Munson was born in Howard county, Iowa. March 2, 1856; received his education in the common and High schools of Iowa and Minnesota, and came to Wisconsin one year before he reached his majority. From 1876 to 1886 he lived at Richland Center; since then he has been a resident of Viroqua. He is an editor and publisher, having published the Richland Republican. and for a still longer period of time having conducted the Vernon County Censor, one of the most prosperous and influential weekly newspapers in its section of Wisconsin, with which he is still iden- tified. Mr. Munson has served as city clerk of Richland Center. and represented one of the Viroqua wards on the Vernon County Board of Supervisors three years. He was bookkeeper in the State Senate for several termis, and for two terms was assistant chief clerk of the Assembly. In 1896 Mr. Munson was nominated without opposition. and elected on the Republican ticket to repre- sent the Twenty-eighth District, consisting of Vernon. Richlan.1 and Crawford counties. in the State Senate, receiving 9.361 votes against 5.221 votes from B. F. Washburn, the Fusion candidate. and one vote for A. J. Schauff. He has been an active and use- ful member of the Senate. Mr. Munson has never trained with a faction in his party, but has always represented the broad Repub- licanism which demands clean men for official trusts, and which protects at any cost of personal self-sacrifice the higher interests of the party. He believes that the men in place and power are the servants of the people who place them there, and it was in accordance with this belief that in the Republican Senatorial caucus last winter he made the mation, which was carried. pro-
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viding for an open ballot, which would enable every member's constituents to see where he stood and to know that he was keep- ing faith with them. In his legislative work Mr. Munson's vote is recorded on the side of all reforms promised the people in the platforms of his party. He demonstrated that independence, not policy, governed his personal and official acts. The same char- acteristics stand out boldly in his editorial utterances and business affairs.
JOSEPH B. WHITING, M. D.
A man who is widely known and highly respected throughout the State, and whose character and attainments would fit him to ornament any official station, but whose chief delight has always been in the practice of his noble profession of medicine, is Dr. Joseph Bellamy Whiting. of Janesville. Dr. Whiting is of good New England stock, and was born in New Haven, Con- necticut. December 16, 1822. His father died when the son was only three years of age, and the latter owes to the careful train- ing of a wise and devoted mother the strong foundations of moral and intellectual discipline upon which he has built his long and useful life. She survived until 1867, dying at the ripe age of seventy -one. After receiving a common school and academic education, he began teaching at seventeen, in which work he spent five years. Then he devoted another year to literary studies, after which, in the office of Dr. Vincent Holcombe, of Granville, Hampden county, Massachusetts, he began the study of medicine and surgery. In 1847 he matriculated at the Berkshire Medical College, Pittsfield, Massachusetts, and attended his first course of medical lectures. After faithful attendance upon a second course of lectures at the Vermont Medical College, he entered the office of Drs. H. H. and T. Childs, remaining with them until his graduation from the Berkshire Medical College in 1848. His first location as a practitioner of medicine was at Wolcottville. Connecticut, where in 1850 he married Frances A. Hungerford, daughter of John A. Hungerford of that place. In 1852 he returned to Brooklyn, New York. where . he entered upon a promising career which he was obliged
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to relinquish on account of the failing health of his wife, who died in 1854. He then removed to Lee. Berkshire county, Massachusetts, where he enjoyed a large practice, and was for six years Secretary of the Berkshire District Medical Society. In 1860 he married the widow of Edward V. Whiton, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Wisconsin, and removed to Janesville in this State, where he has since resided. Dr. Whiting was a War Democrat, and at the breaking out of the Rebellion he offered his services to his country. After the battle of Fort Donelson, Gov. Harvey sent him to the front to care for Wisconsin's wounded soldiers. He remained on duty in the wards of Mound City Hospital during six months. When the Thirty-third Regi- ment of Wisconsin Volunteer Infantry was raised. Dr. Whiting received a commission as its surgeon. Subsequently he was detailed for special service near army headquarters; then he was made Chief Executive officer, under Surgeon Franklin, of the large military hospital established by order of Gen. Grant at Milliken's Bend, Louisiana, and, not long afterward. Surgeon Franklin being ordered to join his division. Dr. Whiting suc- ceeded him as Surgcon-in-Chief. The hospital was the larges: general hospital in the Mississippi Valley below Cairo. contain- ing about 3.000 inmates, and was in every respect a model insti- tution of its kind. So admirably scrupulous was its financial management that when it was closed in September. 1863, after an existence of nearly seven months there stood to its credit on the books of the Commissary Department. as an unexpended balance, the handsome sum of $10,000, which had been saved to the Government by the efficient administration of Dr. Whiting. He was next appointed Surgeon-in-Chief of the military distric: of Natchez, with that city as headquarters, and in that capacity coped with a small-pox epidemic. The exigencies of the case required his appointment by the military authorities as Mayor of the city, the duties of which office he ably executed for three months, when he was prostrated by a fit of illness which neces- sitated his honorable discharge from the service in July. 1864. Since 1865, when his health became restored, he has practiced his profession in Janesville, enjoying the confidence and respect
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of the people, and being honored by his medical brethren by election to the office of President of the . Wisconsin State Medical Society. He has always had literary tastes and abilities, and has "in various ways manifested an interest in the cause of education. For many years he was Secretary of the Wisconsin Institution for the Education of the Blind.
. GEORGE N. WISWELL.
George Nelson Wiswell, a popular and active Republican, who has held several important offices which he has filled with note- worthy ability, is the son of Christopher Wiswell, a native of New Hampshire, of Welsh descent, and was born in the town of La Fayette, Walworth county, Wisconsin. July 19, 1852. The senior Wiswell, for many years a successful farmer, was one of the organizers of the First National Bank of Elkhorn, and was chosen its President. a position which he filled with fidelity and ability for twenty years. till his death in 1883. From his mother. Almira W'est Wiswell, whose death occurred only three days prior to that of her husband. the subject of this sketch derived a remarkable talent for music, which he has often employed to the delight of his friends. His education, begun in the district school of his native town, was completed in the graded schools of Elk- horn. After learning the trades of tinsmith and plumber. he engaged in the hardware business, which he followed for ten years. In 1886 he was elected Sheriff of Walworth county, and during his first term founded the State Organization of Sheriffs. of which he was Secretary for four years. He was First Assistant Sergeant-at-Arms of the National Republican Conventions at Chi- cago in 1888. at Minneapolis in 1892 and at St. Louis in 1896. In March, 1889. President Harrison appointed him United States Marshall for the Eastern District of Wisconsin, and he held the office till May 1. 1893. In this capacity, by his own personal exertions, he broke up the band of robbers known as the "brush hunters" in Hurley county, and he arrested in Milwaukee. after a six months' search. the notorious counterfeiter and mur- derer, Fred Marsh. He also arrested a noted Prussian counter-
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feiter and forger, taking him to New York and putting him aboard the steamer which took him back to his native country. which had been the scene of his crimes. Since 18)3, Mr .. Wiswell has been Secretary and General Manager of the Fraternal Alli- ance Insurance Association. He is a member of the Masonic order. Wisconsin Consistory, and Mystic Shrine, the Knights of Pythias, the Odd Fellows, the Hoo Hoos and the Loyal Legion -the latter by brevet. He is also a member of the Milwaukee Club, the County Club, the Calumet Club and the Deutscher Club, of Milwaukee. August 28, 1873. he was married to Clara M. Perry, only daughter of John A. Perry, of Elkhorn. They have three daughters-Harriet L., Jean and Marguerite.
D. W. MAXON.
Densmore William Maxon was a well known and influen- tial person in the halls of legislation at Madison from the beginning of the period of Statehood until as recent a date as the first administration of Grover Cleveland. He was a native of Vernon, Oneida county, New York, where he was born September 20th. 1830. He was educated at the Oneida Conference Seminary at Cazenovia, N. Y. He studied both law and civil engineering in his younger days, but never practiced the former profession. His intensely active disposition made him indisposed to confine himself to the practice of the law. Coming to Wisconsin in 1843 he first settled in Milwaukee and shortly afterwards in Washington county, where he entered through the United States Government the land upon which after- wards was located the site of the village of Cedar Creek, a portion · of which land is still retained in the family as the homestead by unbroken title from the Government. Soon after becoming a resident of the Territory of Wisconsin. he was appointed Deputy County Surveyor of Washington, county, which office he held for a number of years. The Blue Book of Wisconsin registers him nominally as a farmer, but he was in reality a man of public affairs. In 18.48 he was elected to the first State Assembly at which the State Constitution went into effect, and he was reelected
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a member of the Assembly in 1852, 1867, 1868, 186. 1870, 1871, IS72 and 1882. For the four years 1857-1861 he was a member of the State Senate. In 1865 he was the candidate of the Democratic party for Lieutenant-Governor. Among the laws of which Mr. Maxon was the father is that which substituted the County Board of Supervisors for the old County Com- missioners, a step recognizing local self-government in county affairs. The bill was known as "A No. 1" and for a number of sessions met defeat, but finally, through perseverance, became the law of the State. He was also the father of the bill requir- ing the State and Federal Constitutions to be taught in public schools, and also the law creating the Northern Hospital for the Insane, and shortly before his death he declared that he wanted no better monument to his memory than this institution. Prior to its construction many insane persons were confined in county jails and in county poor houses. He visited many of these institutions and procured the data upon which he finally succeeded in convincing the Legislature that this unfortunate class were "wards of the State" and ought not to be treated and confined as criminals and paupers. He gave his personal atten- tion to the building of this institution, and was for many years the President of its Managing Board of Trustees. Mr. Maxon also procured the passage of both State and Federal legislation creating the Wisconsin Railroad Farm Mortgage Land Co. and obtained from the C., M. & St. P. R. R. what was then considered a worthless grant. and prosecuted the claim thus obtained in the Interior Department at Washington and in the courts of the United States, which resulted in the recovery of a' quarter of a million dollars for distribution among the farmers who had lost their farmis by mortgages given to the old La Crosse and Horicon Railroad. In 1879 Mr. Maxon was placed in charge of the land grant of the Sturgeon Bay and Lake Michigan canal at a time when it was on the verge of bankruptcy. He so pushed the sales and managed its affairs as to save the enterprise from impending failure. The canal was completed in a few years and is now a much used thoroughfare in the navigation of our inland lakes. He was married to Miss Elizabeth Turck April 6th, 1846, and
R.J. M. Lechan
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died March 21st, 1887, at Santa Cruz, California, while on a visit to his aged mother. He is survived by his widow. who resides at the old homestead. and six children-Captain M. M. · Maxon, who graduated from West Point in 1869 and served on the frontier until 189r. at which time he went upon the retired list on account of disabilities contracted in the service: Gleuway Maxon, of Milwaukee, an attorney at law; Dow Maxon, of Cedar Creek, who owns and operates several creameries in Washing- ton county; Mrs. Dr. J. S. Cutler, of Wauwatosa, Wis .; D. W. Maxon, Jr., and Miss Ada Maxon, who reside at Cedar Lake, Washington county, Wis.
EDWARD SCOFIELD.
Edward Scofield, nineteenth Governor of Wisconsin, was born at Clearfield, Pennsylvania, March 28, 1842. His father, Isaac Scofield, who followed the double occupation of farming and lum- bering, was a Virginian, of English descent. His mother, whose maiden name was Collins, was of Irish ancestry, and a native of Pennsylvania. At the age of thirteen the future Governor gave up going to school, and became a printer's apprentice, in which capacity he worked for three years for his board and clothing. During the three succeeding years he worked in the office of The Brookville (Pa.) Jeffersonian, for $1oo a year and his board. When the Civil War broke out he enlisted in response to the President's first call for troops. This was in April, 1861, and he was just turned nineteen years of age. His regiment, the Elev- enth Pennsylvania Infantry, became part of the Army of the Potomac. Meritorious service led to the young printer boy's promotion from the ranks, first to a lieutenancy, and then to the rank of captain, the latter honor being the reward of gallantry on the field of Gettysburg. At the battle of the Wilderness, May 5th, 1864, he was captured by the Confederates, who held him for ten months, during which he endured privations that nearly · ended his life. He returned home, broken in health. long after his period of enlistment had expired. and found awaiting him a commission as major. At the close of the war he joined a party (37)
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of railroad engineers. In 1868 he became foreman of a lumber mill at Oconto, husbanding his salary for eight years to acquire a capital, and subsequently entering business on his own account. In 1890 he formed a partnership with George R. Arnold, under the name of Edward Scofield & Co., the business being incorpo- rated four years later under the name of the Scofield & Arnold Lumber Company, with Maj. Scofield as president, George I. Scofield as vice-president, and George R. Arnold as secretary and treasurer. The Governor is also financially interested in the lumber firm of McElwer & Co. In 1887 Major Scofield was elected as a Republican to represent the First District in the State Senate. In 1894 his name was strongly presented to the Repub- lican State Convention as a candidate for Governor, but the nomination went to Major W. H. Upham. Two years later, Governor Upham having declined renomination, there were sev- eral other candidates for the nomination, but the friends of Major Scofield rallied in force, and after a spirited contest, his name was placed at the head of the Republican State ticket. It was a presidential year. The canvass was one of the liveliest in the history of the State. When the ballots were counted on election night, it was found that Major Scofield's Democratic opponent, Judge Silverthorn. had received 169,253 votes, while the votes cast for Scofield numbered 264.814. giving him a plurality of 95,551, by far the largest ever recorded for a candidate for Gov- ernor in the history of Wisconsin. His business-like administra- tion of the State finances won the admiration of the people, and though a powerful effort was made to defeat his renomination, his party again made him its standard bearer in 1898, and he was triumphantly reelected. Governor Scofield's administration has been distinguished, and will be more distinguished in the future. for the reform effected in the State institutions and in the general administration of State affairs. Governor Scofield is essentially a business man, and he has applied business principles to the carry- ing on of the State government. He established through the State Board of Control the most efficient system of civil service for the management of the State institutions, which has greatly elevated · the morale of those institutions, and, incidentally, has materially
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