USA > Wisconsin > The United States biographical dictionary and portrait gallery of eminent and self-made men, Wisconsin volume > Part 55
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In politics he has always been republican, and like the sect from which he sprang, an uncompro- mising opponent of slavery.
During the late rebellion be served one year in the army, as captain of Company C, 40th Regiment Wisconsin Infantry. Fought at the second battle of Memphis in 1864, and in various other engage- ments and skirmishes. He was also a leading mem- ber of the Union League during the existence of that organization.
He held the office of town clerk of Milton, Wis- consin, during the years 1861 and 1862, and has been a promoter of circulating libraries and other means of disseminating knowledge among the peo- ple
After arriving at years of discretion he embraced the orthodox faith and united with the Congrega- tional church, to which he still adheres.
On the 18th of November, 1861, he married Miss Phebe Ann Barber, daughter of Lillibridge Barber, of Hopkinson, Rhode Island. She died January 16, 1866, leaving three sons surviving, namely, Harry Le Verne, Clarence Walter and Nathan C., junior.
On the 18th of June, 1873, he married Miss Mar- garet Rockwell, daughter of James Rockwell, Esq., one of the first settlers of Chicago.
JOHN BENTLEY,
MILWAUKEE.
T HE subject of this biography, an eminently self-made man, was born March 23, 1822, at Newtown, Montgomeryshire, Wales, the son of Thomas Bentley and Jane nie Jones. He obtained the greater part of his education from reading, observation and intercourse with men, his school- days having been confined to a very limited time in his early boyhood. At the age of ten years he entered a seed-store connected with a nursery, and while there employed his spare time in studying those branches requisite in the business. Five years later, leaving this position, he was employed during one year in a flannel manufactory, and at the expi- ration of that time, in 1838, immigrated to the United States. Arriving in New York, he apprenticed him- self to a plumber and brass worker, with whom he remained about two years. Leaving his employer by reason of ill treatment, he went to the northern part of New York State, and engaged in farm work
and in lumbering; and after two seasons returned on a raft down the Hudson river to New York. His next engagement was Middleton, Orange county, New York, where he became apprenticed to a mason builder, remaining with him three years. Subse- quently he was employed as a journeyman in New York city and at Haverstraw, and at the latter place engaged in business on his own account.
Removing to the West in 1848, he settled at Mil- waukee, Wisconsin, and for the first few years worked as a journeyman, his first engagement being upon Mr. Alexander Mitchell's old residence on Spring street. His desire, however, was to become a builder; and with that will and determination which had charac- terized his former life, he entered his bids among the older builders, and secured contracts for himself. By faithful, constant work he pressed his way in the face of every opposition, and boldly meeting all the vicissitudes and reversions of business life has grad-
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ually risen, until he now holds a first rank among ! the builders and contractors of the Northwest of wide and established reputations. His first impor- tant contract was for the mason-work of the Mil- waukee Female College; next followed the North Presbyterian and St. John's Episcopalian churches, Newhall House, and Music Hall. He also erected the Grand Opera House, Olivet Church, several pub- lic school buildings in Milwaukee, Burnham's Block, the State Reform School buildings at Waukesha, the south wings for the Northern Asylum for the Insane, besides many residences, stores and business blocks in his city and throughout the State. He is at the present time (1876) engaged on the Court House at Racine.
He has been for many years a prominent and an active member of the Independent Order of Odd- Fellows, and has passed the chairs in both branches of the order.
Politically Mr. Bentley is a democrat, and in 1863 represented his district in the State legislature. In
1868 he was elected alderman for two terms of one year each, and again elected in 1873. In 1870 he was chairman of the board of supervisors, and in 1876 was appointed on the board of school commis- sioners.
Mr. Bentley was married May 17, 1845, to Miss Sarah Ann Roberts, of Orange county, New York, and by her has had eight children, namely, Anna Maria, born September 14, 1846, now wife of Stephen R. Smith; Thomas Roberts, born November 14, 1848; Sarah Catherine, now the wife of George Lund, born December 14, 1850 ; Mary Elizabeth, born Decem- ber 28, 1852; John Franklin, born June 14, 1855; Clara Minnie, born January 5, 1858; Nellie Amelia, born April 12, 1860 ; and Jennie Jones, born Decem- ber 7, 1866. The oldest son, Thomas R., became associated in business with his father. He has proved a successful business manager, and now has charge of many heavy contracts. He was married November 14, 1871, to Miss Emily H. King, daugh- ter of Walter King, Esq., of Milwaukee.
GEORGE F. WITTER, M.D.,
GRAND RAPIDS.
G EORGE FRANKLIN WITTER, son of ' Squire P. Witter and Mary Ann née Bowler, is a native of Alleghany county, New York, and was born on the 6th of June, 1831. The members of the Witter family in this country are descendants of William Witter, who came from England about 1640, and settled in Massachusetts. In 1651 he was per- secuted for harboring and for inviting to preach in his house the Baptist ministers, Clark, Crandall and Holmes.
The subject of this sketch cherished in youth a strong desire for knowledge, but had no means for procuring it aside from his own resources. At thir- teen years of age he attended an academy at Alfred Center, in his native county, and continued there for nearly four years, paying his way by doing vari- ous kinds of manual labor, one season rising at four o'clock in order to get through with his chores before school time. At sixteen he commenced teach- ing, a vocation which he pursued for about eight years, attending the academy meanwhile a portion of each year, except the last three, when he devoted his spare time to the study of medicine. He com- pleted his medical studies with Drs. Babcock and
Jones, of Wellsville, and attended lectures in the medical department of the University of Michigan, graduating from that institution in March, 1856. He commenced practice at Wautoma, Waushara county, Wisconsin, where he remained until Feb- ruary, 1859, and then removed to Grand Rapids, where he is still actively engaged in a remunerative and extensive practice.
In 1862 Dr. Witter was appointed assistant sur- geon of the 11th Regiment Wisconsin Infantry, but did not go to the front, because the regiment was then in a malarious district, and he was in poor health. Soon after settling in Wood county he was elected its first superintendent of schools, and held that office eight years. He was also examining sur- geon for pensions nearly the same length of time. He was appointed postmaster in June, 1869, and still holds that office, his deputy performing its du- ties, since his professional labors occupy most of his time. A portion of the leisure at his command he gives to the preparation of papers for medical peri- odicals, and in this manner has rendered valuable service to the profession. He is a member of the . Wisconsin State Medical Society, and some of the
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excellent essays read at its meetings are from his pen. He is also a member of the National Medical Association.
Dr. Witter is a regular attendant upon church ser- vice, but is not a communicant in any religious body, although he inclines toward the Baptists in his sym- pathies.
His wife, who was Miss Frances L. Phelps, is of Friendship, New York. They were married in May. 1860, and have three children.
In all his busy career Dr. Witter has never lost his love of literary and scientific studies, nor his interest in educational matters. He is a member of
the local school board, and the thirty thousand dol- lar school-house which overlooks and adorns Grand Rapids owes its origin to a few such enterprising men as he. He, however, takes no honor to himself in this work, but history would be falsified did he not have the credit of being one of the leaders in the noble system of instruction in his adopted home.
Public-spirited and generous, Dr. Witter is highly esteemed in the community as a citizen, and also enjoys an enviable reputation as a physician and surgeon. In the latter line of his profession he is especially noted, often being called to go fifty and even a hundred miles to attend to difficult cases.
CHARLES A. SINGLE,
I'AUSAU.
O NE of the early lumbermen in northern Wis- consin, a pioneer hotel keeper and one of the best known men in that part of the State, is Charles Alexander Single, a native of London, England. His parents were Benjamin and Mary (Tyler) Single, and he was born June 6, 1819. His father, a Scotch- man, was mail agent, and subsequently a hotel keep- er, in the Old World. His mother was an English- woman. The family immigrated to America near the close of 1835, landing in New York city while the great fire of December 16 was still raging. In April the family started for the West via the Hudson river and Erie canal; took the schooner Sandusky at Buffalo and landed at Milwaukee, then in Michi- gan Territory, on the 15th of May, 1836 (the name was changed to Wisconsin Territory a few months later).
The next year young Single started out for him- self with a full determination to succeed. He went to the lead mines at Galena, which had been brought into wide notice as the Golconda of the Far West, and in that vicinity, part of the time in what is now Grant county, Wisconsin, he spent about five years in the mines, with fair success.
With a few solid "mint drops" in his pocket, in 1841, Mr. Single steered for the pineries of Wiscon- sin, stopping at Grand Rapids, now the county seat of Wood county. He lumbered there for five years, with moderate success, and at the end of that time moved to Big Bull Falls, now Wausau, and assisted his brother Benjamin in building a saw-mill on the Rib river, a tributary of the Wisconsin. He oper-
ated with him there about two years, and then set- tled permanently in Wausau (the place took that name in 1850, which means, in the Indian language, " far away "). Here Mr. Single built and operated a hotel, which he has enlarged from time to time until he can accommodate two hundred guests. At the same time he continued to operate in lumber, having been an extensive dealer. He has conducted this hotel for nearly thirty years, and, money or no money, has rarely turned empty away one who sought shelter or entertainment. In the early days of his inn-keeping all the freighting of provisions, when the river was open, was done by canoes from Stevens Point, a distance by the Wisconsin river of sixty miles. In the winter the ice was used as a highway, no roads being open through the forests.
When Mr. Single settled in Wausau the country was full of Indians, mainly the friendly Chippewas, who made less trouble than some of the whites.
. Here and there one of the latter, when intoxicated, was troublesome, but, upon the whole, the settle- ment was moderately quiet and peaceful. Most of the frontiersmen went there to earn an honest liveli- hood, and some of them remained to accumulate, and, like Mr. Single, are among the most substantial and sterling men of the place.
Mr. Single was a member of the county board of supervisors for several years; is now (1877) in the council and on that board. During the rebellion he was deputy provost marshal.
In politics, he was formerly a whig, and has been a republican since the organization of that party.
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He is a member of the Blue Lodge, in the Ma- sonic order, and is an attendant on Episcopal wor- ship.
is the wife of Alvin Fitzer, a lumberman of Wausau. Letetia is the wife of Charles F. Dunbar, a jeweler of Wausau, and Josephine is unmarried.
Mr. Single has always been one of the most pub- lic-spirited citizens of Wausau. No local enterprise has been originated and completed without his hav- ing a hand in it. He was one of the foremost men in bringing the Wisconsin Valley railroad to this point, and no man rejoices more than he in the On April 11, 1844, he was married to Miss Eliza- beth Taylor, a native of England. They were mar- ried in Milwaukee, and have seven children - three sons and four daughters. The eldest, Benjamin, is married, and lives on a farm three miles west of Wausau. The other two sons, Henry and Charles, | are single. The eldest daughter, Mary, is the wife | growth and prosperity of his early adopted and of Robert E. Parcher, a merchant of Wausau. AAlice , fondly cherished home.
DOUGLAS ARNOLD,
ARCADIA.
D OUGLAS ARNOLD is a native of New York, and was born at Clifton Park, Saratoga county, February 23, 1833. He is the son of Bena- jah D. and Maria (Wilbur) Arnold. He remained at home until about nineteen years of age, assisting his father on the farm and attending school three or four months of each year. He early developed a taste for study, and though having but limited op- portunities, prepared himself for teaching, begin- ning at the age of nineteen. He continued this occupation for about six years, during the winters, and during the rest of the time attended an acad- emy at Charlotteville, and worked on the farm. In the spring of 1857 he removed to Winnebago county, Wisconsin, near Winneconne, and there resumed both teaching and farming; and after about two years cultivated land of his own.
In the spring of 1864 Mr. Arnold removed to Trempealeau county, and settled on a farm near Arcadia, the present county seat, and continued farming until 1871. The year 1875 he devoted to
mercantile business in the town and village of Dodge, Trempealeau county, but returned at the end of the year to his old home near Arcadia.
He was a member of the general assembly of the State in 1869, and during his term of office rendered valuable and efficient service. He was known as a working member, and one who was always at his post, ready to answer to the roll call. During the autumn of 1870 he was elected county treasurer, and assumed the duties of that office on the ist of the following January. He was afterward reelected and held the office, in all, four years, performing his labors in a manner most satisfactory to his con- stituents. He is now (1877) deputy sheriff of the county, making a vigilant and efficient officer.
Mr. Arnold is a Master Mason. In politics he is a thorough and leading republican. In religion he is liberal in his sentiments.
He was married on the ist of May, 1859, to Miss Elizabeth Densmore, of Winneconne. They have two children.
HON. JOSEPH WOOD,
GRAND RAPIDS.
JOSEPH WOOD, in honor of whom Wood county, Wisconsin, was named, was born at Camden, New York, October 16, 1811. His father, Daniel Wood, a mechanic, lived to the age of ninety-three years. His mother was a Sheldon, some of whose ancestors fought for the independence of the colonies. He was raised in a farming community, in Ontario
county, with very poor educational privileges. By a careful use of what time he could command he mastered the rudimental branches, and by the time he had reached his majority he had acquired a fair amount of knowledge. About this period he went on the Erie canal, and ran a boat on the New York and Seneca Lake line six seasons. Starting for the
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West at the close of navigation in 1836 he reached Chicago in January following, and going thence into what is now Lake county, Illinois, near the Wiscon- sin line, he located a claim and there engaged in farming for eleven years. Removing to Grand Rapids in March, 1848, he farmed, dealt in mer- chandise or kept a hotel until 1856, and for the last twenty years has been operating mainly in real estate, with varied success.
Wood county, of which Grand Rapids . is the county seat, was organized in 1856, at which time Mr. Wood was in the lower branch of the legislature, representing Portage and Marathon counties, and drew the bill. He called it Greenwood county, but the senate amended the bill by striking off the first half of the name. Prior to this act of the legislature Portage and Marathon counties extended north- ward to the Michigan line.
Mr. Wood has probably held more official posi- tions than any other man in Wood county, though not all of them in Wisconsin. He was postmaster at Fort Hill, McHenry (now Lake) county, Illinois, being appointed by Amos Kendall, April 9, 1838; was appointed to the same office at Little Fort, now Waukegan, by C. A. Wieklife, in 1841; again at Grand Rapids, under appointment of N. K. Hall, in 1851, and still again, under appointment of A. W. Randall, in 1868. He was clerk of the court in McHenry county two years. In 1840, just after Lake county was set off from Cook, Mr. Wood was appointed coroner. At one time, in 1838, while living at Little Fort and conducting the postoffice at Fort Hill, by a deputy, he had a preëmption right to the present site of Waukegan, and waived it in favor of the county.
Mr. Wood was the first judge of Wood county, receiving his appointment from Governor Bashford, January 19, 1856. He was two years a commissioner of State lands, receiving his appointment during the
administration of Governor Dewey, and probably knows more about section corners, town ranges and the quality of quarter-sections than any other man in his section of country. Mr. Wood has served as justice of the peace, chairman of the board of supervisors and mayor of the city, and, in short, has been a much honored man.
In politics he is a republican, and is lineally descended from old whig stock. He is a strong partisan, and outside of county offices always votes the straight ticket. When Stephen A. Douglas was first nominated for Congress he came into Lake county on horseback. Mr. Wood gave him his dinner, fed his horse and traveled with him three days, having a jolly time, but all the while election- eering against "the coming man."
Judge Wood has had two wives. The first, Miss Hester J. Kirtland, of Seneca Falls, New York, to whom he was united in 1833, died in November, 1842, leaving one child. He was married a second time in December, 1843, to Miss Matilda Compton, of Lake county, Illinois, by whom he has had five children, three of whom are now living. The child by his first wife, Janett, is married to William Bal- derston, of Grand Rapids. Franklin J., the eldest son, holds the office of county clerk, and is a man of much promise. He is married. George N. and Walter are single and live at home.
Since Judge Wood passed through Detroit and Chicago, in the winter of 1836-37, he has seen a wonderful development in the West. Forty years ago those two cities were villages, hardly as large as Grand Rapids is now; to-day Detroit has its hun- dred thousand inhabitants, and Chicago its four hundred thousand. Wisconsin was then the Terri- tory of Wisconsin, hardly a year old, and now it has a million and a quarter of people. To such enter- prising men as Judge Wood the West owes its unex- ampled growth, and the country much of its wealth.
NICHOLAS SENN, M.D.,
MILWAUKEE.
T' THE subject of this biography was born in the canton of St. Gaul, Switzerland, on the 24th of October, 1844, the son of John and Magdalena Senn, and traces his ancestry from one of the oldest families in Switzerland. When Nicholas was seven years old his family immigrated to the United States.
Here he passed through the usual common-school routine, and entered the grammar school at Fond du Lac, Wisconsin. He early developed a fondness for study, and one of his highest ambitions was to enter a profession. To gratify this desire he studi- ously employed every opportunity for learning.
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Later he engaged in teaching, with eminent suc- cess, and having finally decided to enter the medical profession, accepted a clerkship in the drug store of Mr. J. C. Huber, of Fond du Lac. Remaining there one year, during which time he pursued the study of medicine with Dr. E. Munk, he at the expiration of that time, in 1865, entered the Chicago Medical College, from which he graduated in 1868. During his course of study he maintained a high standing, and upon graduating was awarded the first prize, the subject of his thesis being, " The Modus Ope- randi and Therapeutical Uses of Digitalis Purpurea." In the winter of his graduation he was appointed house physician of Cook County Hospital, after a most rigid examination, and served in that capacity for eighteen months.
He next removed to Ashford, Fond du Lac county, Wisconsin, and there established himself in the prac- tice of his profession. He soon built up a large country practice, and became well known as a relia- ble physician. In 1874 Dr. Senn removed to Mil- waukee, and in the following year was elected county physician. Soon after settling in Milwaukee he was appointed physician of the Milwaukee Hospital, and
continues to act in that capacity at the present time (1876). His practice has been remarkably success- ful, and he is widely known as a careful and skillful practitioner. He has always taken a leading part in the various interests of the medical fraternity, who early recognized his merits. He was elected president of Rock River Medical Society, and vice- president of the State Medical Society, and was one of the delegates to the Medical Congress of the United States, held in the summer of 1876. Dr. Senn has been successful, not only in his profession, but also financially, and in the year 1876 erected a fine business block on the corner of ('hestnut and Third streets. The building is four stories high, forty-six by fifty-five feet, and is occupied by stores and offices.
Dr. Senn has a high social standing, and as a man is most highly esteemed for his many estimable per- sonal qualities.
In his religious views he is identified with the old German Reformed church.
He was married on the 22d of February, 1869, to Miss Amelia Muehlhauser, a native of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
GEORGE M. EVERHART, D.D.,
KENOSHA.
G EORGE M. EVERHART, a native of Lou- | besides supporting himself, saved money sufficient to I doun county, Virginia, was born February 9, complete his college course. He graduated from Emory and Henry College, Virginia, with honor, and was appointed, by the faculty of the college, tutor of Greek - a position which he filled with credit and satisfaction for about three years. In 1854 Professor Everhart was called to the presidency of Huntsville Female College, Alabama; and six years later, enlarg- ing his field of action, was, by the Right Rev. N. H. Cobbs, S.T.D., the Bishop of Alabama, ordained a deacon in the Protestant Episcopal church, and in the following year, 1861, was admitted to priest's orders by the Right Rev. J. H. Otey, D.D., Bishop of Tennessee. About this time he was called to the pastorate of Calvary Church, Louisville, Kentucky. During the civil war, claims of a peculiar character necessitated his resignation and removal to North ('arolina, and for the next five years he labored as rector of St. Peter's Church, of Charlotte, in that State. On April 23, 1865, Mr. Everhart preached before Jefferson Davis, his cabinet, and many of the 1826, the son of William and Susan Everhart. His father was a farmer hy occupation. George received his primary education in the private school of a Dr. Hagerty, near his home, and later entered Dickin- son College, Carlyle, Pennsylvania, with a view of fitting himself for a professional life. By the death of his father, while he was yet a boy, he was com- pelled to abandon his studies, and was left to the care and home-teaching of his mother, whom he reverently remembers as "an unusually devoted woman," whose pure life influenced him to grow up to be a God-fearing man, and ultimately to enter the gospel ministry. His first great trouble was his mother's death, which occurred when he was fifteen years old. All hope of gaining a collegiate edura- tion at this time was gone ; but having a fixed deter- mination and a power of will, and'relying upon the education which he had already acquired, he en- gaged in teaching, and during the next four years,
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chief officers of the confederate army, who at that time sought refuge in Charlotte. The occasion was an impressive one. Taking for his text the words " And thus it must be," he earnestly endeavored to impress the lessons taught by the "Lost Cause." I was the last sermon heard by the confederate presi- dent previous to his capture and incarceration.
Aside from his pastoral labors, which were unusu- ally great at that time, owing to the afflictions of his people, and the attendance at hospitals and on refu- gees, Mr. Everhart conducted a publishing house, editing and publishing a weekly called " The Church Intelligencer," and also millions of pages of religious tracts, which were distributed through the army. In 1867 he was recalled to Louisville to become the pastor of St. John's Church, and while here, in 1870, was, in recognition of his worth and attainments, honored by Columbia College, of New York, with the degree of D.D.
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