USA > Wisconsin > The United States biographical dictionary and portrait gallery of eminent and self-made men, Wisconsin volume > Part 50
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WILLIAM MONROE, M.D., MONROE.
W ILLIAM MONROE, the oldest practitioner of Green county, Wisconsin, was born in Circleville, Ohio, July 30, 1818, and is the son of William Monroe and Harriot Thurston, both natives of New York. His father was a thoroughly educated physician, and after obtaining his diploma, moved to Ohio, married a wife, settled down to his profes- sion and gave promise of a long and brilliant career, but he was suddenly stricken down by disease con- tracted from exposure in his professional duties and died at the age of thirty-two years, when our sub- ject was but two months old. Left comparatively unprovided for, his early years were embittered with toil and privations, and yet the discipline thus acquired trained him to a vigorous exertion of his faculties, while perhaps a more easy situation would have released the generous springs of his soul and left them dissolved in indolence.
He received a very limited common-school educa- tion in his native town and worked at whatever came to hand for the support of himself and his widowed mother, till he attained his twelfth year, when she married Dr. John Loofbourow, of Dela- ware county, Ohio; after which the family moved
to Mineral Point, Wisconsin, where our subject en- gaged as a miner, which occupation he followed for a period of six years with reasonable success, and saved a small sum of money. His mind had been for years turned toward the profession of his father, and to attain this was now the highest object of his ambition. He had been a diligent student of such books as he could procure, was a close observer of men and things, and at the age of twenty-four was a fair English scholar and had read some medical works. At this time he abandoned mining and entered the office of Dr. O. E. Strong, of Mineral Point, as a student, where he continued some five years. Meantime he attended the usual courses of lectures at Rush Medical College, Chicago, from which he graduated with credit in 1844, and soon after began the practice of his profession in La- fayette county, Wisconsin, where he continued six years, establishing for himself an enviable reputa- tion as a skillful and successful practitioner.
In the year 1850 he was drawn into the overland tide which was then flowing toward the Golden State, his intention being to resume for a time his former business of mining; but on arriving there he
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found much sickness prevailing, the cholera com- mitting fearful ravages. His profession, therefore, seemed to offer the most urgent, if not the most profitable, field for his labors, and he accordingly devoted two years of unremitting toil to the practice of medicine among the miners. Meantime his own health became impaired, making a return to his former home imperative. In 1853 he resumed his practice in Lafayette county, Wisconsin, which he continued with increased success and popularity until the year 1868, when his country practice becoming too laborious for his physical powers, he removed into the city of Monroe, Green county, where he has since been the leading physician, enjoying the confidence and esteem of all who know him.
In politics, Dr. Monroe was early identified with the whig party, and on its dissolution naturally became a republican, and has been a firm supporter of the principles of that body during the last twenty years, having been an abolitionist of the most radical type.
In 1862 he was appointed examining surgeon, preparatory to the draft in southern Wisconsin, and in 1863 he made a visit to the 31st Regiment Wis- consin Infantry, quartered at Columbus, Kentucky, giving his professional services gratuitously for a month to his old friends and neighbors of that regi- ment. In 1866 he was elected to represent his county (Lafayette) in the State legislature, where he figured conspicuously as the opponent of a meas- ure intended to confer on county judges a similar jurisdiction to that exercised by circuit judges, the effect of which would have been to keep court and jury in session the year round, which would have
entailed an enormous burden upon the tax-payers. The defeat of this bill was largely due to the efforts and influence of Dr. Monroe. Since the close of the war he has held the office of pension surgeon for his district. He is a member of the State Medical Society and of several county medical societies; he is also a distinguished member of the Masonic fra- ternity, having attained to the royal-arch degree.
When young he was admitted to membership in the Methodist Episcopal church, but later in life he united with the Christian church, of which he is now a member. He is a gentleman of noble and generous impulses, original and perhaps eccentric in some of his habits and manners, but a most genial and entertaining companion. His character is irre- proachable and his influence wide and powerful.
On the Ioth of November, 1841, he was married to Miss Mary Jane Beebe, a native of Vermont, of early colonial stock, whose ancestors are noted for great longevity. Her uncle, Colvin Beebe, died at Troy, New York, November, 1876, at the advanced age of ninety-nine years and nine months. They have two sons and two daughters. The elder daughter, Hattie L., is the wife of the Rev. M. B. Balch, of Saratoga, New York, and the younger, Metta J., is the wife of James Harvey Eaton, an attorney-at-law in Monroe. The sons, William B. and Zera W., are still young.
The paternal grandfather of Dr. Monroe was a native Scotchman, who emigrated to New York soon after the revolution and served in the war of 1812, while his mother is descended of New England co- lonial stock, General Green, of revolutionary fame, having been closely related to her father, Daniel Green Thurston.
ALSON ATWOOD, M.D.,
TREMPEALEAU.
T HE subject of this sketch, for thirty years a practicing physician in Wisconsin, is a native of Brandon, Vermont, where he was born July 5, 1821, of Isaac and Betsy (Farr) Atwood, farmers by occupation. His paternal grandfather, Isaac At- wood, served five years in the continental army.
Alson lived at home until eighteen years of age, receiving an ordinary common-school education, and afterward spent three years in study at the Castleton Seminary and prepared for college. After
spending one term at Middlebury, he abandoned his college course on account of ill health, and in 1843 began the study of medicine with Dr. Perkins, president of the Castleton Medical College, he at- tended six courses of lectures there, held semi- annually, and received his diploma in June, 1846.
Thus thoroughly prepared for beginning his med- ical practice, Dr. Atwood entered on his profession at Bristol in his native State, where he spent one year. Shortly afterward he removed to Juneau,
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Dodge county, Wisconsin, and practiced nine years. He was the first physician to settle there, and built the third house in the place. He witnessed the growth of a pleasant little village, saw the county well settled, and his practice extending over half of its territory. He had excellent success. He became very prominent among the physicians in that vicinity, and had a fine reputation as a skillful practitioner. His health, however, again becoming impaired, he deemed a change necessary, and ac- cordingly removed to .Trempealeau in September, 1857, but with no intention of resuming practice. Here his health began to amend, and requests for professional visits began to multiply, and for nearly twenty years he has been steadily employed in his profession. His rides sometimes extend fifteen miles or more away, but most of his business is nearer home. He has an excellent practice on the Minne- sota side of the Mississippi river, as well as in Wis- consin, and is popular in both States. He has a kindly disposition, visits the rich and the poor with the same ready heart and cheerful face, and has probably ridden as many miles as any physician in his part of the State, without any hope of reward except the satisfaction of relieving pain or prolonging life.
Dr. Atwood is of whig antecedents. He has acted with the republican party since its existence, but would never accept any but town offices.
He was at the head of the school interests while at Juneau, and has been on the school board at Trempealeau half of the time since settling there. In educational matters, and in other important local enterprises, he is one of the leaders, and there are few more valuable citizens in Trempealeau county.
He attends the services of the Congregational church, but is not a member.
On the 15th of September, 1847, he was married to Miss Arvilla Doud, of Bristol, Vermont, and of seven children, the fruit of their union, six are living, five daughters and one son. Aristine, the eldest child, is the wife of Albert F. Booth, edit- or and proprietor of the Houston County, Minn., "Journal"; Ella is the wife of Henry F. Pond, a merchant of Trempealeau; Cora is the wife of Adelbert Batchelder, who is with Sprague, Warner and Co., of Chicago; Ada is the wife of Edward C. Nettleton, a merchant of Trempealeau ; Stella, the youngest daughter, is unmarried, and Carroll, a graduate of Ripon College, is studying law with Judge Newman, of Trempealeau.
REV. GEORGE W. ELLIOTT,
MILWAUKEE.
G EORGE W. ELLIOTT is a native of Grafton T county, New Hampshire, and was born Sep- tember 18, 1796, and is the youngest son and only surviving member of a family of thirteen chil- dren. His parents, Lt. Ezekiel and Sarah Elliott, were among the first settlers of Grafton county ; and prior to the revolution his father was employed in surveying the northern part of the State of New Hampshire. It was while thus engaged that his attention was directed to a beautiful valley on one of the branches of the Merrimac river, five miles in width and thirty-five miles in length. With a rich and fertile soil, and almost entirely surrounded by high mountains, it is not strange that he selected it as his future home. At the opening of the war of independence he entered the service, and continued as militia officer until its close. George W. passed his boyhood on his father's farm, engaged in agri- cultural pursuits.
In 1815, when nineteen years of age, he united
with the Congregational Church of Campton, New Hampshire, and soon after began a course of clas- sical study, preparatory to his entering the gospel ministry. Graduating at Auburn Theological Sem- inary, he was commissioned to the sacred office by the Presbytery of Geneva, New York, and soon after temporarily filled the pulpit of one who a short time before had zealously aided in clothing him with the sacred badge of the gospel ministry. Here Mr. Elliott labored a few months, when he accepted a call from a church in Onondaga county, New York. His labors in this church were crowned with gratify- ing success. Within the first two years of his pas- torate more than eighty members were added to the church upon profession.
Mr. Elliott labored in New York seventeen years, the first five of which was marked by that wonderful and wide-spread work of grace, still remembered by many. Soon after entering the ministry he was married to Miss Nancy Fitch, of Auburn, New York,
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a most estimable and devoted lady. The union was a happy one, but was severed at the end of eight years by the death of Mrs. Elliott, which occurred September 20, 1834. She died at Brockport, and is entombed in the cemetery of that city. Of their three children, but one, Georgia, is now living. Rowena M. died July 19, 1849, and Edward Payson, March 18, 1838. Mr. Elliott afterward married Mrs. S. Caroline Cowen, widow of Dr. Cowen, and daughter of Hon. David S. Bates, of Rochester, New York. This happy union continued twenty-three years, when, on November 21, 1858, she, too, was called to her last home. They had three children. S. Caroline died in 1839, in infancy ; the others, Theodore Bates and Eugene S., are now engaged in business in Milwaukee, the former a member of the well-known law firm of Jenkins, Elliott and Winkler, and the latter a practicing attorney at the city of Milwaukee.
After closing his labors in central New York, Mr. Elliott was, during the next thirteen years, pastor of a church in La Salle county, Illinois. In 1851 he was appointed to take charge of a mission agency in Wisconsin, a work in which he was engaged in plant- ing churches, and supplying and obtaining supplies for churches destitute of pastors. He acted in this capacity until he was invited to the general agency of the American Bible Society, in the State. After devoting five years to this work, at a time when the distant portions of the State could be reached only by private conveyance or public stage, he was com- pelled, by reason of failing health, to retire from pro- fessional labors, though his whole subsequent life has been devoted to the service of the church. He has always been identified with the Presbyterian denom- ination (New School). When Mr. Elliott took up his residence in Milwaukee, he found but one pres- bytery of this connection. This was recently organ- ized, and comprised four ministers and two churches,
namely, the First Presbyterian and a new mission recently gathered on Walker's Point, and called the Second Church. The ministers were Rev. E. S. Hunter, D.D., and Rev. Wm. H. Spencer, pastor of the First Presbyterian Church, Rev. -. Steel, act- ing pastor of the Second and pastor of a church in Racine. At an early date a presbytery had been gathered from different parts of the State, and ab- sorbed in a body called the Presbyterian and Con- gregational Convention, and an Old School Presby- tery about this time organized. At once identifying himself with this new presbytery, Mr. Elliott began working for its extension. During the first year eight churches were collected, seven of which were newly organized. Other presbyteries were speedily gathered, and at the end of three years a large and strong synod spread its influence over the entire State. This was soon followed by the uniting of the Old and New School bodies which at the present time (1876) harmoniously occupy the entire field.
The subject of this sketch has now attained the ripe age of eighty years, of which more than sixty years have been passed in active and highly success- ful work in the service of the Master.
The life of a faithful minister of the gospel pre- sents few salient points of interest to those outside his immediate circle of friends and acquaintances. It is quiet, unobtrusive, modest. The peaceful victories won against the foes of religion and of human pro- gress are heralded neither by the ringing of bells nor booming of cannon. They pass unnoticed save by a few, and rarely furnish a subject for the historian's pen. But they have ample reward in the inefface- able impress which a life of devoted and self-sacri- ficing labor leaves upon society, in the remem- brance of good work well done, and in the well founded hope of receiving, when all is over, the divine welcome, " Well done, good and faithful ser- vant."
FRANK L. LEWIS, M.D., ARCADIA.
F RANK LORIN LEWIS, a native of Vermont, was born in Hardwick, Caledonia county, Sep- tember 22, 1840, and is the son of John B. and Betsy (Mason) Lewis. His grandfather Lewis died a prisoner at Quebec during the war of 1812, and his paternal great-grandfather died a prisoner during
the war of the revolution. Until sixteen years of age Frank divided his time between study and farm work, and both before and after this age attended the Hardwick Academy, and completed his literary education with two terms at a high school in Mont- pelier. He spent eight months in the study of
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medicine with Dr. W. H. H. Richardson, of Mont- pelier, and at the end of which time, the war of the rebellion having begun, enlisted as a private in the 6th Regiment Vermont Volunteers, but before going to the front was appointed hospital steward. He was in the field two and a half years, part of the time with General U. S. Grant's army, and part with General Sheridan in the Shenandoah valley, serving in the same position through the whole time. His experience in hospitals was an excellent school preparatory to the further prosecution of his med- ical studies. Upon his return from the South, by reason of impaired health, he did but little studying for two years, but later attended lectures at Ann Arbor, Michigan, and Rush Medical College, Chicago, and graduated from the latter institution in March, 1869. He first established himself in practice at Eureka, Winnebago county, Wisconsin, where, however, he remained but a short time. On the 18th of August, 1870, he settled at Arcadia, Trempealeau county, where he has built up a very large and lucrative practice, both in medicine and surgery - the largest of any practitioner in his vicinity. For a physician of his age his diagnoses are remarkable. He studies
a disease very carefully, and reads its nature almost by intuition. Few men in the State, with the same amount of experience, have been so successful. His rides are extensive, reaching, in difficult cases of fracture, etc., into other adjoining counties. The Doctor is very careful in all his practice, and withal is a close student and a rapidly growing man. He is preëminently a self-made man. All his attain- ments, scientific and medical, have been obtained by his own exertions, without a dollar of aid from any source. He is now in partnership with Dr. J. R. Brandt, the firm being Lewis and Brandt.
Dr. Lewis is a Master Mason, and in politics he is a firm republican, but lets neither secret society nor politics interfere with his chosen life-profes- sion.
He was married in May, 1867, to Miss Jennie J. Brandt, of Eureka, Wisconsin, and by her has two children.
Dr. Lewis has attained his present standing by constant study and work ; he has no vacation - no respite from labor; and as a reward of his efforts, enjoys the confidence, respect and high esteem of his fellow-citizens.
A. CLARKE DODGE,
MONROE.
A. CLARKE DODGE was born in Barre, Ver- mont, November 6, 1834, and is the son of Joseph and Lorenda (Thompson) Dodge. He is half-brother to J. T. Dodge, whose biography ap- pears in another part of this volume, and whose lin- eal descent from Richard Dodge, an Englishman, who became an inhabitant of Salem, Massachusetts, August 29, 1636, is established by authentic records in the possession of the family. Lorenda Thomp- son was the sister of Azubah Thompson, the de- ceased wife of Joseph Thompson. She was a woman of quiet disposition and unostentatious man- ners, deeply religious, yet unsectarian and charita- ble, caring little for the "pomp and circumstance " of fashion. She died May 15, 1844, leaving the impress of her kindly character and unselfish traits upon her son.
Our subject was reared on a New England farm, by strictly religious and exemplary parents, whose influence gave tone and color to his principles, hab- its and manners in after life. He received an aca-
demic education at the seminary of his native town, whose principal, J. S. Spaulding, LL.D., was one of the foremost educators of his day, and under whose guidance he became an excellent English and Latin scholar, as well as an accurate mathematician. He was a prominent member of the public lyceum of the institution, and counted among its ablest debators, giving unmistakable indications of the possession of rare talents and fair promise of an honorable and successful career. He was early im- bued with the New England idea of industry, and excepting the time spent at the academy, his em- ployment upon the farm was constant and unremit- ting, until his nineteenth year, when his father disposed of his farm and left his son free to follow the oft-repeated advice of the distinguished journal- ist, H. G., and " go west." In 1854 he arrived at Chicago, and remained there during the winter, and in the spring of 1855 removed to Wisconsin. The first five years of his western life were mainly de- voted to teaching, varied in the summers by clerk-
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ing and such other employment as he could obtain. During the last eleven years he has been engaged in the lumber business, with eminent success. He was one of the organizers of the Monroe Manufac- turing Company, one of the largest and most suc- cessful agricultural implement manufactories of the West, and during the first two years of its existence was its president. His career has been marked by energy, intelligence and public-spirited enter- prise. He is especially noted as the friend and promoter of education, and for the last eight years has been a member, and, for three years past, presi- dent of the Monroe Board of Education, whose school system, as evinced by the character of its teachers and the attainments of the pupils, is infe- rior to none, and superior to most, in the State, a result which is largely due to the influence of Mr. Dodge. He has also been honored with other local offices of trust, by his fellow-citizens of the county, and every interest and public enterprise with which he has been connected has in turn shown the im- press of his energy and judgment.
He has been an active Odd-Fellow for more than ten years past, having successively occupied the chairs of both the lodge and encampment. He was also a member of the grand lodge and grand en- campment of the State.
He was brought up under strict Methodist influ- ence, but in later years a review of the questions separating between the orthodox and more liberal believers led him to assimilate with the views of Wm. E. Channing and Robert Collyer, rather than with those of Jonathan Edwards and Dr. Patton.
He was raised in the hot-bed of Abolitionism, and early imbued with anti-slavery sentiments, his father being one of the founders of the Abolition
Society of 1844. Hatred of slavery grew with his growth and strengthened with his strength, until that stain upon our nation's honor was wiped out -that deep disgrace to our humanity abolished. Since the formation of the republican party he has been one of its staunchest supporters. He has been frequently a member of and chairman of republi- can county conventions ; often a delegate to con- gressional and State conventions, and is at present chairman of the republican central committee of the county.
In 1873 he was nominated by his party for the State senate, but was defeated by seven votes.
In private life he is genial, benevolent, kind- hearted and generous. It has come to be a proverb in Monroe, that if A. C. Dodge can grant a favor or do a service to any human being, it is sure to be done. His ear is always open to the cries of the poor, and his hand ever ready to relieve the wants of the needy. Nor is his beneficence of that cheap and heartless character which costs no sacrifice or inconvenience to the giver. He is, moreover, a gentleman of high mental endowments, having a clear, analytical and discriminating mind, and as a consequence is quick in his deductions and de- cided in his opinions, but void of all uncharita- bleness.
On the 4th of November, 1860, he married Miss Sarah E. Kidder, daughter of Joseph B. Kidder, Esq., of Fulton, Wisconsin, and in the year follow- ing moved to Monroe, Green county, where he has since resided.
The fruit of his marriage with Miss Kidder is two children, one son and one daughter,-Charles Sumner, born July 31, 1861, and Flora Elizabeth, born February 25, 1874.
CAPTAIN FRED PABST,
MILWAUKEE.
F RED PABST, president of the Phillip Best Brewing Company, of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, was born at Nickolausrieth, Prussia, March 28, 1836, and is the son of Gotlieb and Frederica Pabst. He was brought up on a farm and edu- cated in a common school at the place of his nativ- ity until he arrived at the age of thirteen years. Upon his arrival in America he attended the com- mercial college for a few months for the purpose of
acquiring a knowledge of book-keeping. He came to Wisconsin in 1848, and resided at Milwaukee a short time, thence removing to Chicago, where he found employment in the National Hotel, working one year for his board. The next year he was em- ployed at the Mansion House at five dollars per month. His next occupation was that of cabin-boy on the steamer Sam Ward on the lakes, and then captain and part owner of the steamer Comet. In
Fred Pabst.
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1864 he sold his interest in the boat and invested his funds in the business of the Best Brewing Com- pany, and four years afterward he purchased a half interest, and Captain Pabst became its president and general manager. Success has attended all of his enterprises until he has become one of the wealthy men of Milwaukee.
In his religious sentiments Captain Pabst is a Lutheran, although not a very strict attendant upon the services of the church. He is essentially a self- made man, of well-developed physique, capable of undergoing much manual labor, practical in his views, ardent in his temperament, self-reliant and energetic; he could scarcely fail of success in any enterprise he would undertake. He is a man of
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