USA > Wisconsin > The United States biographical dictionary and portrait gallery of eminent and self-made men, Wisconsin volume > Part 58
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When, in the summer of 1837, at a meeting held in the court-house, a church was formed by the Rev. Mr. Ordway, and it was decided by vote that the church should be Presbyterian, Deacon Brown, though by conviction and training a Congregation- alist, was chosen one of its first elders.
His long experience as a master builder made him a man of affairs, and led him to take a lively interest in all that tended to advance the prosperity of the place. He has been the friend of education in this city, having served long and well as school commissioner. He has been the friend of the poor, especially of that little circle of tenants which in later years has been gathered upon his land about his own door. He was the friend of the slave. He was a man of marked Christian simplicity. In all the best meaning of those words, he had the heart of a child. When he spoke he meant just as he spoke it, and for Christ's sake. He was a man of marked fidelity as a Christian, and his was a fidelity which went through the entire life. This city, though comparatively few of its thousands knew him per- sonally, has good reason to deplore his loss, for his hand planted many of the first seeds that have ripened into the fruits of these score of Christian churches.
He gave some ten years of his life to the con- struction of the La Crosse railroad, and was one of the directors. He was a member of the city coun- cil of Milwaukee some four years, and was a mem- ber of the legislative assembly of Wisconsin one year. In whatever capacity he acted he brought industry and zeal to accomplish the end in view, and was generally successful. In all the relations of life, as citizen, husband, father and friend, he commanded the respect and won the esteem of all who knew him. He died full of years and of hon- ors, after a well-spent life here and in full faith of. the life to come.
REV. THEOPHILUS P. SAWIN, JUNIOR, JANESVILLE.
T THE subject of this sketch was born at Lynn, Massachusetts, January 14, 1841. His father, the Rev. T. P. Sawin, a minister in the same com- munion, is now preaching in the "Church on the Green " in Middleboro', Massachusetts, and is one of the most distinguished and useful divines of the period. His mother, Martha McIntyre Mason, a woman of culture, yet especially domestic in her nature, is the daughter of a revolutionary soldier,- Frederick Mason,-who was a participant in the battle of Saratoga and a witness of the surrender of Burgoyne at Yorktown. Mr. Sawin is a scion of
one of the oldest families in Massachusetts, his ances- tors having come over from Lancashire, England, in 1632, and settled in Boston.
He received a good elementary education from his father, and prepared for college at Meriden, New Hampshire. Like many of the sons of New England ministers, he was early thrown upon his own re- sources, and was obliged to work his own way to an education. Prior to entering college he served as a clerk for two years in the counting room of the Amoskeag Manufacturing Company, in Manchester, New Hampshire. In 1860 he entered Yale College,
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where he remained two years, being amongst the most advanced of his class, and developing rare traits as a student. At the end of this period, how- ever, his college career was prematurely brought to a close by want of means to proceed; and when this difficulty was met, a serious attack of illness, followed by nervous prostration, prevented the completion of his course. On his recovery he accepted a position in the Mount Washington Collegiate Institute, New York city, where for two years he taught Belles-Let- tres and history. In the winter of 1864-5 he was engaged in literary labor which brought him to the West. He located at Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and after some time spent in literary and reportorial work, he accepted a situation in the Milwaukee Classical Academy, where for six years he taught Latin and the higher mathematics. During the last named period he employed his spare time in the study of theology, paying attention also to philoso- phy, literature and criticism. He was active in the Young Men's Library Association, and served at various times on the board of directors of that or- ganization.
In 1871 he determined to follow the bent of his inclinations, and, without ever having attended a theological seminary or receiving any private direc- tion in his studies, applied to the Milwaukee district convention of Congregational ministers for examina- tion and license to preach the gospel. He passed a successful examination and was granted an unlim- ited approbation to preach. In October of that year he accepted a call to the pastorate of the First Con- gregational Church in Racine, Wisconsin, and was ordained to the ministry December 1, 1871. Here he served four years with great acceptance and suc- cess, when he accepted a call to the pastorate of the First Congregational Church of Janesville, one of the largest congregations of that denomination in the State, and was installed in June, 1876. His religious views are such as are usually held by the Congregationalists, although he confines himself to no set system, but walks freely on a "broad gauge." As an orator his style is marked by elocutionary exactness, not strainedly so, but pleasing. His ideas are of the same model,-well considered and grace- ful; his expression and his argument are appre- hended at once, for the vigor of his mind and the culture of his mode are both akin and sympathetic. He takes hold of ministerial labor with the hearty relish and abandon of a boy at a game of foot-ball, but systematizes his work like an experienced man
of business - his previous occupation having done more to fit him for the duties of a pastor than a reg- ular course of theological study could have done. It has given him a practical knowledge of human nature and of the world with which he has to deal, which could not have been otherwise obtained, and which are invaluable to the Christian worker. He is well read in modern science and general literature, and while his mind is impartially open for the recep- tion of every new truth, even though it may conflict with preconceived opinions.
In style he is clear, terse and vigorous, thinking more of the matter than of the manner of his re- marks. Rhetoric is his servant, rather than his mas- ter. How best to express the thought so as to carry conviction, is his great aim. He wastes no time on exordiums or perorations, but goes at once to the lesson to be enforced, and stops when he has done. He is intensely individual; has never been run in a mould, and never will be. He has sufficient masculine combativeness to contend valiantly for truth, freedom and righteousness; and yet too much geniality to be disagreeably pugnacious. He is a perfect illustration of a sound mind in a sound body His physical development is now so strong and vig- orous that it is difficult to believe that he could ever have been a sufferer from nervous prostration, so full of fresh, hearty, cheerful vitality is he. A man of warm sympathies, genial nature, broad charity, and independent vigorous thought, he is well calculated to meet the wants of the congregation of to-day, which cares more for duty than dogma, for common sense than for abstruse metaphysical polemics. He is eminently practical, believing that " faith without works is dead," and preferring works to faith where he cannot have both. He has no place in his con- gregation for lazy Christians. He possesses large magnetic powers, a quality which is due to his super- abundant vitality, ready sympathy and breadth of thought, by which he is able to enter into the feel- ings of people of widely different character and habits. He is social alike with old and young, and possesses in a high degree the rare capacity of adapt- ing himself to different natures, and winning the affections and confidence of all. He is still in the full vigor and freshness of youthful enthusiasm; phys- ically and mentally developing a strong, healthy manhood, his spiritual nature as yet less fully devel- oped than his intellectual, the discipline of sorrow having not yet been experienced by him; but his heart is so sunny that when it comes it will ripen,
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mellow and sweeten, rather than embitter and blight its rich fruitage. With abundant ready resources and a solid educational basis, together with that moral fibre that is begotten of a Pilgrim strain,- all stimulated by that energy which onty a western life can give, right energetically is he proving and estab- lishing the validity of his calling.
He takes radical grounds in politics, being a firm republican, having inherited an abhorrence of the institution of human slavery. He is also very much
interested in the work of education. Has been appointed lecturer before the normal institutions of the State, and is at present (1877) one of the board of visitors of the Normal School at Whitewater.
On September 28, 1864, he was married to Miss Emeline Theresa Ferroll, a native of England, and a descendant of Christopher K. Ferroll, who traces her lineage to Spanish origin. They have one child, a daughter, named Cara Angenette, born February 19, 1876.
SAMUEL S. JUDD, M.D.,
JANESVILLE.
SAMUEL S. JUDD was born in Bethel, Fair- field county, Connecticut, March 14, 1828, and is the son of Samuel Judd and Anna née Barnum, a cousin of P. T. Barnum, the celebrated showman of Bridgeport, Connecticut. This branch of the Judd family is descended from the original Thomas Judd, who came from England in 1634, and settled in Cambridge, Massachusetts, where he became a very influential gentleman, and for twenty-two years held a seat in the colonial chamber of deputies. The father of our subject, Samuel Judd, was a carpenter and joiner by trade, but in middle life turned his attention to farming, at which he was quite success- ful. He was a man of sterling worth and great amiability of character, and gave all his children the best education which the district schools and neighboring academies afforded. He was a mem- ber and an active worker in the Protestant Episcopal church, and brought up his family in that faith. He filled many local offices of honor and trust, and was highly respected as a citizen.
Samuel S. Judd attended the district school until he was twelve years of age, after which he was sent to an academy at Coldspring, near West Point, New York, where he remained two years, boarding with his maternal uncle Starr Barnum. After this he re- moved to Bridgeport, Connecticut, where he spent several years at an academy and collegiate institute, clerking in his cousin's store mornings and evenings to pay for his board and lodging.
On the ist of September, 1846, he removed to West Greenville, Pennsylvania, and entered the office of an elder brother, Dr. F. H. Judd, as a student of medicine. He remained there until the winter of 1848, when he entered the medical college
of Cincinnati, Ohio, and attended a course of lec- tures. In the spring following he removed to Wells- ville, Virginia, where he taught writing, and arith- metic for some time, to earn money with which to continue his medical studies. In October of the same year (1849) he placed himself under the in- struction of Dr. Wm. Payne, of Warren, Ohio, enter- ing into partnership with him in the practice of medicine. He remained with Dr. Payne until August, 1852, being by this time well versed in the science of medicine. Thence he returned to West Greenville, Mercer county, Pennsylvania, and formed a partnership with his brother, Dr. F. H. Judd, both in the drug business and in the practice of medicine, the latter having at that time an exten- sive practice. Here he remained for two years, attaining to great popularity and usefulness in his profession ; but as yet he was neither a graduate of a medical college nor authorized to practice medi- cine by any constituted authority. Feeling the anomaly of his position he sold out his interests in Greenville, removed to Gustavus, Ohio, where he opened an office, and during the winter of 1856-7 attended lectures at the Cincinnati Medical College, from which he graduated with the degree of M.D. on the 7th of February, 1857, being the first of a class of one hundred and thirty students. He con- tinued his practice in Gustavus and soon gained a leading rank in the profession throughout the coun- ty, being often called to consultations as far as fifty miles distant. He enjoyed the reputation of being the most skillful and active practitioner of the coun- try. His practice, however, became so extensive and laborious that his health became impaired, and after some efforts at recuperation he finally resolved
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to settle in Janesville, Wisconsin, where he had stopped on one occasion and became charmed with the salubrity and beauty of the climate and country. Accordingly on the Ist of September, 1864, he re- moved his family to the Badger State and located in the town which has since been his home. He had been quite successful in his previous ten years' prac- tice, and therefore did not come empty-handed to Janesville. He purchased for himself one of the most pleasant and commodious homes in the city, and in the spring of 1865 opened an office and at once entered upon a large and lucrative practice amongst the best families of the city and surround- ing country.
Dr. Judd is a man of medium size, open and frank countenance, of very refined manners and pre- possessing appearance. His social qualities are of the highest order, he has an easy and graceful bearing, and ready and entertaining conversational powers, and is always an agreeable and welcome guest. He possesses not only the faculty of making friends, but the still rarer one of retaining them. Although somewhat positive and fixed in his opin- ions, he is generous and tolerant of the views of others, and what is remarkable in a leading physi- cian, he is held in the highest esteem by the rest of the profession. Notwithstanding his flattering suc- cess and great popularity, he is yet modest and unassuming, acknowledging and appreciating the talents of others. He is a keen observer, a close analyzer, a logical and incisive reasoner; in short, a success in his profession.
Since his settlement in Janesville he has taken a deep interest in everything pertaining to the material prosperity of the place, and has sometimes been
honored by his fellow-citizens with positions of trust and responsibility. He is at present a member of the board of aldermen, having been nominated on the republican ticket and returned by the largest majority ever given by the party to any candidate in his ward. He was an original stockholder and a charter member of the Janesville Cotton-Mill Com- pany. He is a Master Mason, and has passed through the chairs of Odd-Fellowship.
In ecclesiastical relationship he conforms to the Protestant Episcopal church, of which he is a mem- ber.
He was elected and commissioned surgeon of the 2d Ohio Cavalry soon after the outbreak of the late war, but owing to ill-health was unable to follow his regiment to the field.
He has been twice married: On the 6th of August, 1850, to Miss Juliett C. Young, daughter of Warren Young, Esq., of Warren, Ohio, a gentleman who has held for many years a prominent position in the pension bureau at Washington, District of Columbia. By this lady he has had three children, two of whom survive, namely : William Henry, born November 29, 1853, and Clara Ann, born October I, 1858. The son is a jeweler and doing business in Clinton, Wisconsin, and is a young man of much promise, while the daughter is being carefully edu- cated for future usefulness and honor. He was again married on the Ist of February, 1870, to Miss Helen M. Doland, of Rushford, New York, a lady of very superior accomplishments, and es- pecially noted as an artist, her paintings having often been awarded first prizes at State fairs. She was for several years a professor of drawing and painting in an eastern academy.
LUCIEN S. HANKS,
MADISON.
UCIEN S. HANKS, cashier of the State Bank at TU Madison, was born at Hartford, Connecticut, May 8, 1838. His father is Lucien B. and his mother Mary D. Hanks. His great-grandfather, Colonel Benjamin Hanks, born at Mansfield, Con- necticut, September, 1755, established himself in the clock and watch business at Litchfield, Connecticut, in 1778, and while carrying on his business there contracted for and put up the first town-clock in the city of New York, on the old Dutch Church, Nassau
and Liberty street, now the New York city post- office. The clock was unique, having a wind-mill attachment for winding itself up. In 1785 he re- turned to Mansfield and established the bell and bronze cannon founding business, where he cast the first church bells and bronze cannon in this country. This business, so happily inaugurated by Colonel Benjamin Hanks, has been continued by his sons, grandsons and nephews, with continued success to the present time.
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Lucien S. Hanks receiving a common-school edu- cation entered the Mount Washington Institute in 1850, and graduated in 1854. His education was chiefly of a practical and business character. How well it was adapted to its ultimate end, is best illus- trated by the uniform success he has achieved. He came to Wisconsin in 1854 and accepted a clerkship in the Bank at Janesville, which he held until 1860, when he removed to Madison and became teller in the State Bank of Madison. In 1864 he was elected cashier, which position he now holds. His business
transactions, methodical habits, general intelligence, strict integrity and urbane manners prove him to be no degenerate son of his highly respectable and hon- orable forefathers.
He married on the 19th of June, 1867, Sybil Per- kins, niece of the late Mrs. Samuel Marshall. She was educated at the convent of the Sacred Heart, Montreal, Canada, and is a Roman Catholic in re- ligion.
He is an Episcopalian in religion, republican in politics, respectable in all things.
WADSWORTH G. WHEELOCK,
JANESVILLE.
T' subject of this biography, a native of Hinesburgh, Chittenden county, Vermont, was born February 12, 1835, and is the son of John and Lucrecia (Washburn) Wheelock, and traces his de- scent in a direct line from Ralph Wheelock, who immigrated from England to America in the year 1637, and settled in Watertown, Massachusetts. Peter Wheelock, one of the intermediate links of the chain of lineage, was one of the first settlers of Vermont, and drew his baggage thither on a hand- sled. Since then the family has become numerous and influential, and some of its members distin- guished. They have been noted as devout and exemplary members of the church of the Pilgrim Fathers, to which many of them still adhere, having carried branches of it from the granite hills of New England which have taken root and flourished in the more genial soil of the western prairies.
Our subject received a fair academic education at the literary institutions of Hinesburgh, Jericho and Morrisville, Vermont, but, like many another New England youth, was dependent upon his own efforts for support while pursuing his studies. This he did by working on a farm a few months in the summer and teaching a district school (boarding around) during the winter months. At the age of fifteen he taught his first school at Elmore, Vermont, and the year following taught in Walden in the same State, where he had a school of sixty pupils, some of them quite large, and many pursuing the study of the higher mathematics.
At the age of seventeen years he left his native State and settled in Boston, Massachusetts, where he obtained a situation in the establishment of Elisha
Preston and Co., No. 6 Longwharf, wholesale dealers in West Indian goods, where he remained some three years, becoming not only an apt and accomplished business man, but earning for himself an enviable reputation as an honest, upright and efficient em- ployé. During his residence in the New England metropolis he was witness to some stirring events which made a lasting impression on his mind. Among these were the ovation given to the dis- tinguished Hungarian exile Kossuth, on Boston Common; the lectures of the world-renowned Ital- ian reformer and patriot, Father Gavatzi, on his first visit to America; several speeches of Daniel Webster in Faneuil Hall; the ovation given to the latter by the city of Boston after his failure to receive the whig nomination for the Presidency by the Baltimore con- vention in 1852, to which Boston had sent a thou- sand men to urge his claims upon the convention ; also the funeral of Webster at Marshfield in 1852 ; the capture and return of the fugitive slave, Anthony Burns, which was accomplished by the aid of several regiments of Massachusetts militia and a company of marines. The injustice and cruelty of this act not only intensified the abolition sentiment in the mind of our subject, but hastened the crisis in the history of this institution, which came upon the na- tion in less than ten years subsequently. While the gorgeous but humiliating pageant was passing down State street to the vessel, with the unfortunate victim of the then arrogant slave power in the center of a hollow square formed by marines with drawn cut- lasses, preceded and followed by artillery, frequent attempts were made by the enraged populace to res- cue the fugitive, which, though unavailing, showed
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clearly enough the light in which the transaction was viewed by the people of Boston. So demon- strative did they become that an order was given to charge with fixed bayonets and clear the streets, which was executed in front of the store of Mr. Wheelock's employers, then No. 6 Longwharf, now a continuation of State street. In the melée that followed many of the windows of the houses were broken and much property destroyed.
In 1854 our subject followed the tide of immigra- tion to the West, and settled in Janesville, Wiscon- sin, where for a short time he clerked in the store of an elder brother, who had preceded him to the Badger State, and in 1855 he became the sole pro- prietor of the establishment, and has carried on the business with a faithfulness and skill which has found its reward in ample success. He has accumu- lated a liberal competence and possesses a comfort- able and happy home, and cherishes for himself and his family all the feelings and moral associations that belong to that blessed word.
On the 10th of July, 1853, he was married to Miss Martha A. Trott, a charming and accomplished young lady of Boston. The union proved happy and they have grown up leaning upon each other, like the olive and the vine, bearing each other's bur- dens, and thus fulfilling the law of love. They have a family of four boys, named in the order of their birth : Charles Edward, George Henry, Arthur Washburn and Frank Wadsworth. The eldest is a
graduate of the Janesville high school, and intends pursuing the business of merchandising; the others are now attending school.
In religious faith and connection Mr. Wheelock adheres to the church of his fathers, and is an active member of the Congregational Church of Janesville, contributing liberally of his means toward the sup- port of the gospel ministry and all the charitable and benevolent institutions of Christianity. He is a deacon of the church, and has been trustee and superintendent of the Sunday-school, a zealous member of the Young Men's Christian Association, and an office-bearer in that most worthy order, the Sons of Temperance. In every relation of life his bearing and conversation are blameless and exem- plary. While he is unswerving in his loyalty to the church of his choice, he is, nevertheless, charitable to all denominations of Christians.
While his character is marked by a manly frank- ness and honesty on the one hand, it is not less dis- tinguished on the other by modesty and delicacy. In his gifts for religion or charity he lets not his left hand know his right hand's doings; but his deeds are seen in the fruit which they bring to per- fection. His manners are quiet, dignified and courteous; his heart is always warm, though he is rarely demonstrative. He is noted as a peace- maker, his word being generally an end of all con- troversy, and he is esteemed as one of the best and most useful citizens of Janesville.
HON. AUGUSTUS L. SMITH,
APPLETON.
A UGUSTUS LEDYARD SMITH, son of Au- gustus W. Smith, LL.D., and Catharine R. née Childs, is a native of Middletown, Connecticut, and was born April 5, 1833. His father was at one time president of the Wesleyan University of Mid- dletown, from which Augustus graduated in July, 1854. In the autumn of that year he removed to Madison, Wisconsin, and became a tutor of mathe- matics and the ancient languages in the State Uni- versity. He entered heartily into the work of teaching, for which he was admirably qualified, but at the end of two years, upon urgent solicitations, accepted the office of secretary and land commis- sioner of the Fox and Wisconsin River Improve- ment Company, and moved to Fond du Lac, and
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