Cleveland Past and Present by Maurice Joblin

hundred tons of coal per day.

In February, 1867, Mr. Cross retired from the business, and the present firm of Payne, Newton & Co., composed of N. P. Payne, Isaac Newton and Charles J. Sheffield, now carry on the extensive business of the entire concern. They have ample facilities for mining and handling five or six hundred tons of coal per day.

After the completion of the Cleveland & Mahoning Railroad the Pennsylvania and Ohio canal was abandoned, the Railroad Company having obtained control of the stock, and fixed so high a tariff as to cut off all competition with themselves. This effectually killed the canal, except that portion between Akron and Kent. The active trade on this part of the Pennsylvania and Ohio canal will insure its preservation, and as it is an important feeder (supplying water and trade) to the Ohio canal, the State will undoubtedly take possession of it. The capital invested by this concern in the coal trade is about $250,000.

Since his retirement from the coal trade, Mr. Cross has been actively interested in the Winslow Car Roofing Company and the Cleveland Steam Gauge Company, both carrying on their manufactories in Cleveland.

Religious

Although originally settled by people from Connecticut, Cleveland was not in its early days distinguished for its religious characteristics. Old inhabitants narrate how in the infancy of the settlement the whisky shop was more frequented than the preaching meeting, whenever that was held, and how, on one occasion, a party of scoffing unbelievers bore in mock triumph an effigy of the Saviour through the streets. A regular meeting of infidels was held, and burlesque celebrations of the Lord’s Supper performed. Still later, when the business of slaughtering hogs became an important branch of industry, it was carried on regularly, on Sundays as well as on week-days, and as this was a leading feature in the year’s doings the religious observance of the day was seriously interfered with during slaughtering season. Trade on the river, in the busy season, went on with but little regard for the Sundays, except that Mr. John Walworth invariably refused, although not a church member, to conform to the usage of his neighbors in doing business on that day. Unlike the modern emigrants from New England, the Cleveland pioneers did not carry the church with them.

The first regularly organized religious society in Cleveland was the Episcopal, which gathered together for religious worship in 1817, under the ministration of the Rev. Roger Searles. The meetings were held wherever a room could be obtained, the court-house, old academy building, and other public rooms being frequently used for the purpose. In 1828, Trinity Church was regularly incorporated, and the frame building which stood on the corner of Seneca and St. Clair streets until its destruction by fire in 1853, is remembered with affection by many Clevelanders as “Old Trinity.”

The next religions organization was Presbyterian. In 1820, a few residents of Cleveland engaged, the Rev. Randolph Stone, pastor of a church at Morgan, Ashtabula county, to devote a third of his ministrations to Cleveland. In June of that year the first Sunday school was established with Elisha Taylor as superintendent, but it was only by the most persistent effort that it was enabled to combat the prejudices and overcome the indifference of the people. In September, 1820, the First Presbyterian church was formally organized, with fourteen members, in the old log court-house. In 1827, the society was regularly incorporated, and in 1834, the old stone church on the Public Square was opened for worship. During the whole of this time the congregation had no settled pastor, but was dependent on occasional visits of ministers from other places.

The first attempt at Methodist organization was somewhere between 1824 and 1827. Methodism was not in favor among the early settlers in Cleveland. The historian of the Erie Conference relates that a Methodist friend in New England, who owned land in Cleveland, sent on a deed for the lot on the northeast corner of Ontario and Rockwell street, where Mr. Crittenden afterwards built a large stone house, which lot would have been most suitable for a church, and that no person could be found willing to pay the trifling expense of recording, or take charge of the deed, and it was returned to the donor. In 1830, Cleveland became a station, with Rev. Mr. Plimpton, pastor.

The first Baptist meeting was held in the old academy, in 1832, the Rev. Richmond Taggart preaching to a handful of believers. In 1833, the First Baptist society was formally organized with twenty-seven members, Moses White and Benjamin Rouse, who still live in the city, being of the original deacons. In 1836, their first church, on the corner of Seneca and Champlain streets, was dedicated with a sermon by the Rev. Elisha Tucker, of Buffalo, who was afterwards called to the pastorate.

About the year 1835, the first Roman Catholic church was built on Columbus street on the flats, and was intended to supply the religious needs of the Roman Catholics of Cleveland and Ohio City, being situated almost midway between the settled portions of the two places. The first pastor was the Rev. Mr. Dillon.

In 1835, the first Bethel church, for the use of sailors, was built at the back of the site of Gorton, McMillan & Co.’s warehouse. It was a plain wooden structure, which remained there until the erection of the brick church on Water Street, when the wooden building was removed to make way for the Cleveland, Columbus and Cincinnati Railroad.

In 1839, the first Hebrew synagogue was organized and a brick church was afterwards built on Eagle street.

From these feeble beginnings have grown up the present religious organizations of Cleveland, numbering about seventy churches, many of them of great beauty and costliness, with flourishing Sunday schools and wealthy congregations. The leading denominations have each several churches graded, from stately buildings for the older and wealthier congregations to the modest mission chapels. Nearly all the religious beliefs of the day are represented by organizations in the city, and all are in a flourishing, or at least a growing condition.

Samuel C. Aiken.

The ancestors of Mr. Aiken were from the North of Ireland, particularly from Londonderry, Antrim and Belfast. At an early day one or two colonies came over to this country and settled on a tract of land on the Merrimac River, in New Hampshire, calling it Londonderry, after the name of the city from which most of them had emigrated. Fragments of these colonies were soon scattered over New England, and a few families moved to Vermont and purchased a tract of land midway between the Green Mountains and Connecticut River. The township was at first called Derry, and afterwards divided, one portion retaining the original name, and the other taking the name of Windham. In the latter town Dr. Aiken was born, September 21, 1791. His parents were both natives of Londonderry, New Hampshire. Before their marriage, his mother, whose maiden name was Clark, resided a considerable portion of her time in Boston, with a brother and three sisters, and was there when the Revolutionary war broke out. When the city fell into the hands of the British, they refused to let any one leave. By some means however Miss Clark escaped and crossed over to Cambridge, where the American army was stationed under General Washington. After questioning her as to her escape and the situation of affairs in the city, Washington told her, that, in the present condition of the country it was unsafe for her to travel unprotected, and accordingly gave her an escort, proving that the great General was also mindful of the courtesies of a gentleman.

When about twelve or thirteen years of age, Dr. Aiken, after a preparatory course, entered Middlebury college, in 1813. In his junior year a long fit of sickness placed him under the care of a physician from Georgia, who bled him forty times and gave him calomel and julep, (such was the way of curing fever,) sufficient to destroy the best constitution. The consequence was, his health was so impaired that he was obliged to leave college for a year. Afterwards returning he entered the class of 1814. In both classes were quite a number of young men who became distinguished in Church and State. Among them was Sylvester Larned, the eloquent preacher of New Orleans, Levi Parsons and Pliney Fisk, first missionaries to Palestine, Carlos Wilcox, the poet, Silas Wright, afterwards Governor of New York State, and Samuel Nelson, now on the Bench of the Supreme Court of the United States.

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Dr. Aiken’s first religious impressions were occasioned by reading Doddridge’s Rise and Progress of Religion in the Soul. Faithful parental instruction in the Bible and Shorter Catechism had laid the foundation for belief in the truth of religion. A revival of religion soon after entering college awakened a new and solemn purpose to devote his life to the work of the Gospel ministry. The usual course of three years at Andover Theological Seminary was passed without any special occurrence. He was then called by the “Young Men’s Missionary Society” in New York, to labor in their service in that city. He had but just entered the field when an urgent request from the First Presbyterian society in Utica, New York, took him to that place, then only a small village, where he was ordained and installed, the third of February, 1818. Some events of deep interest occurred while he was in Utica. The building and completion of the Erie canal was one. The cholera in 1832, was another. It was there and then this fatal epidemic first appeared in the United States. In Utica also during his ministry were several revivals of religion of great power and interest. Moreover, about that time the subject of anti-slavery began to be agitated; opposition and mobs began to gather, which, under the control of the Almighty, have resulted in the emancipation of millions of slaves.

Impaired health, after about nineteen years of labor, with very little relaxation or relief by traveling, such as is common now, determined him to accept a call from the First Presbyterian church and society in Cleveland, over which he was installed pastor in November, 1835. Although the church had been organized fifteen years, Rev. Mr. Aiken was the first regular pastor. The ministerial duties were performed by supplies.

Soon after Mr. Aiken was installed pastor, a great financial revulsion took place; and for a period of about ten years he voluntarily relinquished three hundred dollars out of his salary of fifteen hundred, lest it should prove burthensome to the church. This low tide in financial matters was characterized by remarkable religious developments; slavery, temperance and Millerism became church questions; and it was regarded as the peculiar mission of Mr. Aiken to distinguish between truth and error. His moderation, judicious advice, and devoted character were just calculated to conduct his charge safely through the distractions of that period. The society increased at such a rate that the building became crowded, and another church was organized for the West Side. On the East Side a Congregational church was formed about the year 1840, to which some of the more radical members of the First Presbyterian church went over. In process of time the nucleus of the Second Presbyterian church on Superior street, and the Third, on Euclid street, were formed out of the First church, not because of any dissatisfaction, however, but for want of room. But, notwithstanding these offshoots, a new and larger edifice became necessary, and in 1853, the present enlarged, elegant and substantial building was put up on the site of that of 1834. In March, 1857, the wood work of this spacious stone structure was destroyed by fire.

In his physical constitution, with which the mental is closely allied, Mr. Aiken is deliberate, to a degree which some have greatly mistaken for indolence. But with a commanding person, and strong will this habitual absence of excitement was never tame, but rather impressive. He seldom rose above the even tenor of his discourse, but never fell to commonplace, was generally interesting and occasionally eloquent. His sermons were not hasty compositions, without a purpose, but well studied, rich with original and important thought, artistically arranged and glowing with genuine piety and embellished with scholastic treasures. Dr. Aiken possessed the accomplishment, and understood the value of good reading, so rare in the pulpit, and which is scarcely inferior to eloquence. We remember but few occasions when he became thoroughly aroused. The destruction of so fine a church edifice so soon after it was completed seemed to him a personal calamity. On the following Sunday the congregation met in Chapin’s Hall. His heart was evidently full of grief; but also of submission. His fine enunciation, correct emphasis, and strong yet suppressed feelings, secured the earnest attention of every hearer. He touched graphically upon the power of fire; how it fractures the rock, softens obdurate metals, envelopes the prairies in flame, and how it seized upon the seats, ceiling and roof in his darling house of worship, thence fiercely ascending the spire to strive to rise still higher, and invade the clouds. From this he turned to the doctrine of submission, in a manner so earnest and pathetic that a perceptible agitation pervaded the audience, in which many could not suppress their tears. There was no laboring after effect. It was the natural result of a lofty sentiment, expressed with unction, beauty and vigor.

During the same year the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church was held at Cleveland. The slavery question was there presented for the last time. The Southern members, represented by Rev. Mr. Ross, of Alabama, had counted upon what they called a conservative course, on the part of Mr. Aiken. They wished, simply, to be let alone. From the Middle States there were many clergyman of moderate views, who expected him to take their ground, or, at least, to be silent. He had advised non-resistence to the execution of the fugitive slave law, even on the part of the blacks, in cases where governmental officials were implicated. As usual, the negro question came up, and a large portion of a day was given to it.

Until near the close of the debate the representatives of the Middle and Southern States were quite hopeful of a moderate policy, or of no policy. Mr. Aiken sat near the marble pulpit in the Second church without any apparent interest in the discussion. He rose and spoke with difficulty and in a weak voice, and few words. In a temperate but firm and patriarchal manner he recounted the various phases of the question, during his public ministry. He then touched upon the moral and religions aspect of the case, but with no asseveration, and concluded by denouncing slavery as an evil, so monstrous that the church could neither sustain nor ignore it. The silence was so complete that no word was lost. When he sat down, the Southern members remarked that their fate within the church was settled.

On a previous public occasion in 1851, when the Columbus Railway was just completed, and an excursion of State dignitaries made a trial trip to Cleveland, Mr. Aiken was requested to preach in their presence. As this discourse is one of a very few that have been printed, we can give a few literal extracts:

It was my privilege on the Lord’s day to address De Witt Clinton and the Canal Commissioners of New York in recognition of the beneficient hand of Providence, who had carried them on to the completion of the Erie Canal. In a moral and religions, as well as in a social and commercial point of view, there is something both solemn and sublime in the completion of a great thoroughfare. It indicates not only the march of mind and a higher type of society, but the evolution of a divine purpose.

In his quarter century sermon, June 3d, 1850, he says of revivals:

They are as their Divine Author says, like the breath of wind through fragrant trees and flowers, scattering grateful odors, pervading the universal church with the treasured sweetness of divine grace. If my success has not been as great as I would wish, it is as great as I had reason to expect. I confess I have much to deplore, and much for which to be thankful. There have been adverse influences here to counteract those usually falling to the lot of other ministers. So far as the subject of slavery is concerned I have endeavored without the fear or favor of man to preserve a course best calculated to promote freedom and save the church from dismemberment.

With such a style, perspicuous, easy and impressive, it is easy to see how he might thoroughly absorb the attention of an audience, without affecting the orator. If he had been more ambitions and more enterprising, he might have risen higher as a popular preacher, but would have held a lower place in the affections of his people. The position of a pastor in an active and growing city is beset with difficulty on all sides. To retain place and influence in one congregation during a period of thirty-five years is an evidence of prudence, character and stability of purpose more to be desired than outside fame in the church.

Though not yet arrived at extreme old age, he is too feeble to perform much service. It is ten years since he has retired from active duty, but his congregation continue his annual salary by an unanimous vote. Few clergyman are permitted to witness, like him, the fruits of their early labors. He has contributed largely to shape the religions institutions of a city, while it was increasing in population from three thousand to ninety thousand. We remember but one instance where he was drawn into a newspaper discussion. This was in the year 1815, in which he reviewed the decrees of the Council of Trent in relation to the prohibition of the Scriptures to the common people. The letters of “Clericus” and “Veritas” on that subject covered the whole ground on both sides, and are worthy of publication in a more permanent form.

The Rev. Doctor sustained the relation of pastor to the First Presbyterian church until 1858, when he resigned, leaving the Rev. Dr. Goodrich sole pastor. The whole extent of his ministry from the time of his license by the Londonderry Presbytery, 1817, to the present time, March, 1869, has been about fifty-three years. During forty-three years of this period he has been a pastor in only two congregations. The other portion of this time he has preached and labored in vacant churches and where there was no church, as health and opportunity permitted.

The Doctor still resides in Cleveland, beloved by the church over which for so many years he watched and prayed, and honored in a community in which he has so long been recognized as an unswerving advocate of right.

Retired from active duty, and nearing, as he is, the sunset of life, his quiet hours may bring to him remembrances of vigorous effort and unmeasured usefulness, while his gentle nature may be cheered by the consciousness that he still holds the love of this people.

Seymour W. Adams.

The subject of this sketch, Rev. Seymour Webster Adams, D. D., was born at Vernon, Oneida county, New York, August 1, 1815. His father’s name was Isaac Adams and his mother’s maiden name was Eunice Webster–she was a niece of Noah Webster, the great American lexicographer. His mother is still living. His father died in 1861. Dr. Adams was possessed of remarkable equanimity of temperament, a healthful constitution and great powers of application and endurance. These traits, the home influences under which he was nurtured, developed in a high degree. His early years were passed upon his father’s farm at Vernon and in the home circle. Having before him constantly not only the example of right living, as generally esteemed, but of holy living, he could not do otherwise than profit greatly by the example set before him. But he did not only profit by this example–he went much further. It is said of him, “As a son he was docile, loving, tenderly attached to his kindred, profoundly obedient and reverent towards his parents, whose wish was the law of his heart, and whom he loved to call blessed.”

At the age of seventeen he became a member of the Baptist church at Vernon, and soon after this entered upon a course of preparation for a liberal education and in due time he entered Hamilton College, Clinton, New York, from which he graduated after a full course, taking a very high position in his class.

That the leading traits of his character while young may be appreciated, some of his early writings are here referred to.

Soon after entering upon his collegiate course he wrote upon “Integrity of Character,” and among other things remarked that the man who suffers his principles to be violated “sacrifices his honor, barters all that is noble and admirable, and abandons those principles to which he should cling with an unyielding grasp.”

On another occasion a little further on he is found maintaining the necessity of the exercise of the physical and intellectual powers of man “as a wise provision of the Sovereign Ruler of the world” for man’s happiness, and he maintains that not only in this should there be activity but _energy_.

Afterwards, in 1841, when he had become a senior and was about to bid adieu to college life, he chose as the subject of his oration, “Development of Character,” maintaining that no one can become “deservedly great” who does not encounter and overcome the impediments and difficulties constantly presenting themselves. He says: “Difficulties may long have met the aspirant at every step and been for years his constant companions, yet so far from proving detrimental, they have been among the most efficient means for preparing him for vigorous effort to surmount still greater barriers.”

These references are deemed sufficient to indicate the principles and leading traits of the youthful Seymour W. Adams, and as we shall see, were his unvarying guides through life. To him it was the same to resolve as to perform, for whether in earlier or later life he never put his hand to the plow and looked back. Therefore, having resolved to become a Christian minister, he never swerved from that resolution for a single moment, but went forward with his mind fixed upon his purpose and object as the mariner’s upon his guiding star. In pursuance of his previous determination, in the Fall of 1841 he entered the Hamilton Theological Seminary at Hamilton, Madison county, New York, from which in regular course he graduated, and after acting as ministerial supply in one or two places, he was called to and accepted the pastorate of the Baptist church at Vernon, his native place, having previously received ordination. Here he was greatly beloved by his people and continued there quietly pursuing his duties, until sought out at his village home and invited to accept the vacant pastorate of the First Baptist church of Cleveland, Ohio.

When first invited to the Cleveland pastorate he refused to listen, and declined to entertain the call; but upon the matter being further pressed upon him, upon the second call he consented to visit Cleveland for the purpose of becoming acquainted with the people and learning their situation, but was careful to give them no encouragement that he would accept their invitation.

Mr. Adams came to Cleveland in pursuance of this call October 19th, 1846, and after remaining three weeks returned home to Vernon, leaving it in great doubt whether he would return here. In about a month afterwards, the church at Cleveland calling him was relieved of suspense by his acceptance of the pastorate. He entered upon it November 22d, 1846. The subject of his discourse on this occasion was:

“For they watch for your souls as they that must give account.”–Heb. xiii, 17.

A few words as to this discourse is deemed not out of place here, as it has become historic in the church to which it was delivered. The doctrine of the discourse was the reciprocal duty of pastor and people. Reference will only be made to what appertains to the pastor. He laid down most rigid rules for him–“that he should be a holy man,”–that he should be one that “hath clean hands and a pure heart; who hath not lifted up his soul unto vanity.” That the injunction was laid upon him, “Keep thyself pure;” that as the conduct of the minister is observed by many it should be fitting as an example to others “in word, in conversation, in charity, in spirit, in faith, in purity.” That in preparation for preaching the Word “time, thought and prayer must be given–that the burden of all his preaching should be ‘Christ and him crucified.'”

How well he observed these will appear hereafter in the language of those who made addresses at his funeral, or soon afterwards. The reader is also referred to the Memoir of Dr. Adams, edited by Judge Bishop.

In this pastorate Dr. Adams continued till his decease. No extended reference can be made to his labors in so brief a sketch as this. A mere summary only can be given of his life work. The number of sermons preached by him, including addresses at funerals, is three thousand four hundred and ninety-three; number of marriages solemnized, three hundred and fifty-two; number of funerals attended, five hundred and four; number received into the church, including those received both by letter and baptism, about seven hundred. In addition to his other labors, in 1858-9, he wrote the life of Rev. Dr. Nathaniel Kendrick, so long and honorably known as the founder of the Hamilton Theological School, and which has since grown to be Madison University and Hamilton Theological Seminary. While in this work all display and all mere ornament is avoided, it is a work of decided merit, requiring severe application and patient industry to accomplish it. His surviving wife has said that “his pastoral labors were prosecuted regardless of self.”

He was three times married. First to Miss Caroline E. Griggs, who died April, 1847. Second, January, 1849, to Mrs. Cordelia C. Peck, widow of Rev. Linus M. Peck, and daughter of Rev. Dr. Nathaniel Kendrick; she died October, 1852. Third, to Miss Augusta Hoyt, August, 1855, who is the mother of his four surviving children.

He was not only a Christian minister, but he was a true Christian patriot, and never, during all the terrible struggle for the life of the nation, when he offered prayer, did he fail to remember his country. Nearly the last work of his life was to accept an appointment in the Christian Commission to render service in Washington and at the front, relieving and comforting the sick and wounded of our army.

On the sixth of July, 1864, he returned home from this service, quite unwell, but he thought he could find no space for repose, and labored on more intensely than ever, all which time a crisis was approaching which he did not anticipate. He at last began to perceive symptoms of severe illness, and Sabbath, September 11th, he preached his last sermon to his people from Heb. iii: 7, 8. “To-day if ye will hear his voice harden not your hearts,” &c. All that can be said here of this discourse is, that if he had known it was his last he could not have spoken more appropriately or warned more earnestly. From the preaching of this discourse he went to the sick-room, and on the 27th of September, 1864, Dr. Adams bade adieu to earth and passed away.

His funeral was attended September 30th, by a great multitude of mourners and friends, at the First Baptist church, and a large number of the clergymen of Cleveland participated in the solemnities.

This sketch can not be better concluded than by referring briefly to some of the remarks made on that occasion, as a fitting testimonial to the character and worth of Dr. Adams.

Remarks, 1st, by Rev. Dr. Aiken:

I have known him intimately, and I have thought, as I have seen him on the street, of that passage of Scripture, “Behold an Israelite indeed in whom there is no guile,” for there was no guile in him. You might read his profession in his daily life. He commended daily the Gospel that he preached, and gave living witness of its power and showed that he loved the truth. He was eminently successful as a pastor and useful in the cause of the Redeemer.

2d, by Rev. Dr. Goodrich:

There was manifest a diligence in his study and a thoroughness of thought which commanded increased respect the longer we listened to him. His life and character made him felt in this community even more than his words. He preached one day in the week to his own flock, but he lived forth the Gospel of Christ every day before the world. There was in him a sincerity and consistency which could not be hid. He was transparent as crystal and honest as a little child. No man ever doubted him. He was always himself, true, manly, faithful. Men, as they passed him in the street, said to themselves, “There is a man who believes all the Gospel he preaches.” He is gone, but his works follow him. “Being dead he yet speaketh.”

3d, by Rev. Dr. Hawks:

Possessed naturally of a strong intellect, he disciplined it by the severe process of thought and study. His scholarship was accurate and thorough, his reading extensive and profitable, by means of these he intended to serve, as he did, Christ and the church. Dr. Adams was a pastor as well as preacher. He taught not only publicly but from house to house.

J. A. Thome.

James Armstrong Thome was born in Augusta, Kentucky, January 20, 1813. He is of Scotch descent on his father’s side, and of North Irish by his mother, a native Armstrong of the border land. His father was a Presbyterian of the Scotch type, and a ruling elder in the church. His mother was a Methodist of the original Wesleyan order and period, having been converted under the labors of the Wesleys at the age of nine. This difference of the parents in religious beliefs and church affinities remained unchanged till the death of the mother, each attending their respective meetings; yet, wide as the distinction then was, and warm as the prevalent feeling was, between Presbyterians and Methodists, particularly in Kentucky, there was neither sectarian width nor warmth between the godly pair, the twain were one flesh and one spirit in Christ Jesus.

The son usually followed his father to church, though he sometimes accompanied his mother; and during week-day evenings he had the double advantage of going to prayer-meeting with the one, and to class-meeting with the other. To this two-fold, yet harmonious, religious training in childhood the son is indebted for a breath of religious sentiment and sympathy which made him early a Presbyteria-Methodist in heart, and led him subsequently to the mid-way ground of Congregationalism, where many a Presbyterian and many a Methodist have met in Christian unity,

He owes his early conversion to the faithful teachings and pious example of his parents, to their religious instruction, to family worship, to Sabbath observance, to sanctuary means, in prosecution of the covenant his parents entered into with God when they consecrated him in infancy.

The son’s first great sorrow came when he was in his ninth year, in the death of his mother. The loss was irreparable, but it led him to Christ, From the sad moment when the dying mother laid her hand upon his head and spoke in words never to be forgotten, her last benediction, sorrow for the sainted dead was blended with penepenitentialrow towards God, and prayers and tears cried to heaven for mercy. It was not, however, until the age of seventeen that the blind seeker found the Saviour, and conscious peace in Him. This happy event was immediately followed by union with the Presbyterian church, and this by personal consecration to the ministry. Just before his conversion, his college course, early begun, had been completed. Three years were spent in farther study, and in travel, and general observation bearing on the chosen calling of life.

At the opening of Lane Seminary, under the Theological headship of Dr. Lyman Beecher, the young divinity student chose that school of the prophets, and joined its first class in 1833. It was a class destined to be made famous by a discussion, in its first year, of the slavery question, then beginning to be agitated by the formation of an anti-slavery society on the basis of immediate emancipation, and by the active agitation of the subject in the neighboring city, Cincinnati, whereby the mobocratic spirit was aroused, whence threats of sacking the seminary buildings, and thereupon alarm and hasty action of the trustees, disallowing further agitation, and enjoining the disbanding of the society. The students, too much in earnest to yield, after unavailing attempts at reconciliation with the authorities, the professors mediating, and Doctor Beecher conjuring his beloved pupils to stay with him, seceded in a body, in December, 1834. The young Kentuckian, son of a slave-holder, became a thorough convert to the doctrine of emancipation, joined the anti-slavery society, agitated with his brethren, delivered an address at the first anniversary of the American Anti-Slavery Society, in New York, May, 1834, and seceded with the class. “A Statement of the Reasons which induced the Students of Lane Seminary to Dissolve their Connection with that Institution”–a pamphlet of twenty-eight pages, signed by fifty-one names, and bearing date December 15, 1834, was published and went over the land, and the city, intensifying the agitation at home, and raising it throughout the country. Among the signatures to this document are those of Theodore D. Weld, H. B. Stanton, George Whipple, J. W. Alvord, George Clark, John J. Miter, Amos Dresser, (afterwards scourged in the Public Square of Nashville,) William T. Allen, son of a slaveholding Presbyterian minister in Alabama, and James A. Thome.

Exiled from the Seminary halls, these rebel reformers took refuge in a building hard by the city, and extemporized a Theological school, themselves being both lecturers and students. The following Spring, negotiations being matured for adding a Theological department to the Oberlin Institute by the accession of Professors Finney and Morgan the seceders went in a body to Oberlin, where they prosecuted their preparations for the ministry, which were completed in 1836. Among these first graduates of Oberlin Theological Seminary was J. A. Thome. The Winter of 1835-6, he had spent in lecturing on anti-slavery in Ohio, under commission of the American Anti-Slavery Society. The Winter of 1836-7, he, with Jos. Horace Kimball, of New Hampshire, visited the British West India Islands to investigate the results of the abolition of slavery, two years prior, by act of Parliament. A volume entitled “Emancipation in the West Indies,” prepared by Mr. Thome, and published, in 1837, by the American Anti-Slavery Society at New York, embodied these observations. The book was timely and told efficiently on the reform in this country. The Winter of 1837, was passed in Kentucky, the abolitionist living among slaveholders, and officiating as the minister in the church of his father. The next Spring he accepted a call to the chair of Rhetoric and Belles Lettres in Oberlin college, and in September following was married to Miss Ann T. Allen, daughter of John Gould Allen, Esq., of Fairfield, Connecticut. After ten years of professorial labors, in association with men of great worth, most of whom still retain their connection with the college, Mr. Thome entered upon the pastoral work, December, 1848, in connection with the church of which he is still the pastor.

He has enjoyed a pastorate of twenty years, uninterrupted by serious ill-health, and cheered by successive revivals and consequent accessions to the church, which, having a membership at the beginning of his pastorate of little over one hundred, now numbers over three hundred, after many losses by dismission and death.

Mr. Thome, early converted to anti-slavery, and consistently devoted to that cause, has lived to see slavery abolished in America. In addition to the volume on West India Emancipation, he wrote, in 1850, a book on Slavery in America, which was published by the British Anti-Slavery Society. Since, a Prize Tract on Prayer for the Oppressed, also a tract during the war on “What are we Fighting for?” and a treatise on “The Future of the Freed People.”

At the earnest solicitation of the Secretaries of the American Missionary Association, and with the generous consent of his church, Mr. Thome, accompanied by his wife and daughter, went abroad early in 1867, to secure pecuniary assistance from the friends of the freedmen in England and Scotland for their education and evangelization. He was absent on this mission one year. The result of his efforts have not yet ceased to be realized.

After thirty years of unbroken domestic felicity, three beloved daughters having been reared to womanhood in the enjoyment of the Christian’s hope, and two of them happily wedded, Mr. Thome and his wife were overwhelmed with sorrow by the sudden death, on the last day of April, 1869, of their second daughter, Mrs. Maria E. Murphy, wife of Mr. Thos. Murphy, of Detroit. A lady of singular amiability, purity, and Christian excellence, she was endeared by her sweet graces to rich and poor, to young and old, throughout the circle of her acquaintances.

William H. Goodrich.

Rev. William H. Goodrich, D. D., pastor of the First Presbyterian Church of Cleveland, is a native of New Haven, Conn. His ancestry is among the most honorable known in American society. His father was the late Rev. Chauncey A. Goodrich, D. D., a greatly distinguished professor in Yale College; and his grandfather, Hon. Elizur Goodrich, for some years a representative in Congress, and for twenty years Mayor of New Haven; and his great-grandfather, Rev. Elizur Goodrich, D. D., distinguished both as a clergyman and an astronomer. His mother was the daughter of Noah Webster, LL.D., the lexicographer.

He graduated at Yale college, and was subsequently a tutor in that institution. He studied theology at the New Haven Theological Seminary. While tutor, it was his duty to preserve order about the college grounds, and he received, (though not from a student,) during a night disturbance, a severe injury upon the head, which put his life in peril and interrupted mental labor for a long period. A part of this time was spent abroad in 1848; and it was not till 1850 that he entered steadily upon the duties of his profession. He was first settled as pastor of the Congregational Church of Bristol, Connecticut, where he remained four years. He was then called to the pastorate of the Presbyterian Church in Binghamton, N. Y., where he remained till 1858, when he removed to this city, where, for eleven years, his ministry has been marked by very great success. The prosperous condition of the church under his care, together with almost unparalleled attachment between pastor and people, afford evidence of the ability and faithfulness with which he has discharged his ministerial duties. To remarkable mental vigor, he adds great delicacy of character and the warmest sympathies; and those who know most of him, regard it as no partial judgment which awards him a front rank among preachers and pastors.

[Illustration: Yours truly, W. H. Goodrich]

Mr. Goodrich has enjoyed the best of opportunities, and is a writer of rare taste and rhetorical force, and an eloquent and impressive speaker. As a preacher he is never speculative and theoretical, never dogmatic nor sectarian, but eminently spiritual and practical. But the strongest point in his character is his downright, never-failing _common sense_. He never blunders, and never has to apologize for important mistakes committed. He is remarkable for insight to the character of all with whom he has to do. This trait gives him influence with many who care little for the gospel which he preaches. Though not conspicuously demonstrative in his outward life, and though free from all approach to obtrusiveness, so earnest and direct are his ways, that he becomes known to thousands with whom he has no personal acquaintance.

In this country it is generally regarded as a misfortune to have had a grandfather. Most Americans who have reached distinction for abilities and usefulness, have been the sons of parents unknown to fame. As a general rule, self-made men are the only well made men. By the force of their own energies they have surmounted the difficulties that stood in their pathway, and achieved distinction by their own efforts. There are very few prominent men in our country whose fathers and grandfathers have left names which will live for a score of years in the memory of society. But to this general truth the history of our country affords honorable exceptions. The sons of certain families distinguished for wealth, for talent and for the highest position in society, have been so wisely and prayerfully trained that they have escaped the dangers which have proved fatal to most of those who have inherited honored names, and to this class Mr. Goodrich belongs. Though not ignorant of the truth that his ancestry is held in the highest honor by all good men, it seems never to have occurred to him that anything less than his own personal labors and merits would avail to give him a good name with those whose good opinion is desirable. “The poet is born, not made.” _Character is made, not born_.

In 1867, Mr. Goodrich was prostrated by severe illness, which for a season filled the hearts of his friends with most painful apprehension, but the prayers of a loving people were answered, and after an interim of six months he again resumed the duties of his pastorate. It soon became apparent, however, that while the “the spirit” was “willing,” “the flesh” was “weak,” and that a longer respite was necessary before he could again enter upon his work with his wonted zeal. Hoping to renew his impaired energies by a temporary release from care, and in the pleasures of travel, Mr. Goodrich, with his wife, sailed for Europe in 1868, where he remained for eight months, re-visiting the scenes with which he had become acquainted twenty years before. The ultimate object of his tour was secured, and at the close of the year he returned to his people in excellent health, and with an enriched experience from which he seemed to draw new inspiration for his work.

Soon after his return from abroad, the rapidly failing health of his mother, residing in New Haven, became to him a constant source of solicitude, more especially so from the fact of his being the sole surviving child of that once happy and affectionate household. His departure for Europe had been saddened by the sudden death of his only brother, Rev. Chauncey Goodrich. In the month of August, 1869, that mother passed from a life which seemed rounded to completeness, into the “day-break of heaven,” leaving this son, Rev. William H. Goodrich, to rear the tablet to her memory, and to go out from a vacant, voiceless home, the last of his household.

But a quarter of a century has laid grandparents, parents, brother and sisters in the grave.

At the present writing, Mr. Goodrich is once more united to his people, and we but give utterance to the general voice in the desire, that in the love and confidence of this church and community, he may find solace for his bereavements; and that henceforth Cleveland may be the home of his adoption, and the field of his labors.

Isaac Errett.

Among the preachers and writers of the nineteenth century who have pleaded for a return to primitive Christianity, the subject of this notice stands pre-eminently among the most distinguished. For more than thirty-five years he has been connected with the Disciples, and, during the greater portion of that time, has been an earnest, able and successful advocate for their plea for reformation.

Isaac Errett was born in the city of New York, January 2, 1820. His father was a native of Arklow, county of Wicklow, Ireland, and his mother was a native of Portsmouth, England. His paternal grandfather was shot down in sight of his own house during the Irish rebellion of 1798. His immediate parents were both of Protestant families, and became identified with the Disciples in New York city, as early as 1811–the father being an elder in the original church in that place. Hence, the son was trained from infancy in the principles which he now cherishes, and, in the Spring of 1832, at Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania–where his mother had moved soon after the death of his father, in 1825–when only a little over twelve years of age, at a time when the church was without preaching, under the instruction of his mother, he, in company with an elder brother, went forward and asked the privilege of baptism. He was baptized by Robert McLaren, one of the elders of the church.

He now became a diligent student of the Word of God, and, under many embarrassing circumstances, made constant and encouraging progress.

From the time he was ten years old he has been dependent upon his own personal exertions for a living; hence his respectable education has been gathered in the midst of toil and care, by dint of untiring, industrious application.

While laboring as farmer, miller, lumberman, bookseller, printer, schoolteacher, and editor, he never ceased to augment his stock of useful knowledge, and to use whatever opportunities he had for the discipline of his mental powers.

He commenced preaching in the city of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in the Spring of 1840, and soon gave promise of the distinguished position which he has since held as a preacher of the Gospel.

He enjoyed the advantages of frequent and intimate association with Walter Scott, Thomas Campbell, Alexander Campbell, and most of the early advocates of primitive Christianity in the West; and his association with these men was of incalculable advantage to him, for they not only gave him valuable instruction in the principles of the Reformation, but he was enabled, by coming in frequent contact with them, to draw inspiration from their lives and characters for the great work upon which he had entered.

His ministerial labors have been divided between the work of an evangelist and pastor. He was pastor of a church in Pittsburgh three years; New Lisbon, Ohio, five years; North Bloomfield, Ohio, two years; Warren, Ohio, five years; Muir and Ionia, Michigan, eight years; and Detroit, Michigan, two years. At all these points he was eminently successful, and, besides his regular pastoral labors, did considerable work in the general field.

He removed to Warren, Ohio, in 1851, and while there, was corresponding secretary of the Ohio Missionary Society three years; and it was he who first put that society into systematic and active operation.

In 1856, he removed his family to Ionia county, Michigan, and while laboring to build up a congregation at that point, he was prevailed upon to take the corresponding secretaryship of the American Christian Missionary Society, which position he held three years, and succeeded in bringing the society to a degree of prosperity which it had never before reached. When heresigned the Secretaryship he was appointed first vice-president, and afterwards presided at the annual meetings of the society until 1866, when he was elected president. This, however, he at once declined. In the Spring of 1856, he removed to Cleveland, Ohio.

In April, 1866, he established the Christian Standard in Cleveland, which has become a leading and influential religions journal. In August, 1868, having been elected first president of Alliance College, he removed to Alliance, Ohio, and at once gave to the new college a successful position among our literary institutions. In May, 1869, he was elected president of the Ohio Christian Missionary Society. In August, 1869, he was elected, by a unanimous vote of the Board of Curators of Kentucky University, to the presidency of the Agricultural and Mechanical College of that University. Also, about the same time, Bethany College tendered him the Biblical Department of that institution. We have not learned whether he has yet accepted either of these positions.

Mr. Errett’s personal appearance is striking and prepossessing. He is about six feet one inch high, has dark auburn hair, light grey eyes, and a well developed muscular organization. As a public speaker he has few, if any, superiors. His language is chaste and copious, containing an unusually large per cent, of Saxon words; his gesticulation is easy and natural, but his voice, though well under control, has not volume enough to give full force to his beautiful and stirring thoughts. His writings, like his sermons, are full of strong and rugged points, and are frequently interspersed with brilliant passages of exquisite beauty that will compare favorably with many of the finest word-paintings in the English language.

In the social circle he is companionable, but not a very good conversationalist. He needs the inspiration of an audience, or the quiet solitude of the study, to bring out his full strength; hence, while he is pleasant in company–full of wit and humor–he does not appear there to the best advantage.

Benjamin Rouse

Benjamin Rouse was born in Boston, March 23d, 1795, and was brought up as a builder, working at the trade at first in Massachusetts, and subsequently removing to New York, where he carried on his business extensively for about six years. From an early age he had taken great interest in religions matters, and especially in the establishment of Sunday schools. In 1830, he accepted the appointment of agent of the American Sunday School Union for the purpose of going to the West and establishing Sunday schools and book depositories. For this purpose he gave up his business and turned his face westward, prepared to endure hardships and encounter difficulties for the cause in which he was so deeply interested.

Coming directly to Cleveland, he opened his Sunday school book depository, near the corner of the Public Square and Superior street. The prospect was not a hopeful one, but Mr. Rouse had faith, and persevered. There was but one church building in the place, old Trinity, built by the Episcopalians with the aid of those of other denominations, and but little religious sentiment among the people. A Sunday school had for some time struggled hard to maintain its existence, and had but just become established on a tolerably firm basis. The depository, aided by the active labors of Mr. Rouse in the schools, gave a powerful impetus to the cause.

Three months after the opening of the depository Mr. Rouse purchased the lot on which it stood, for six hundred dollars. In making the purchase he had little thought of its speculative value, the sole object being a permanent home for his agency. Time has, however, so enhanced the value of property that the lot on which stood the little book-room, has now, with the pile of buildings standing on it, reached a value of eighty thousand dollars, thus amply repaying Mr. Rouse for his labors in the cause of religion and morality in the earlier days of the place.

For about three years the depository was continued, and then Mr. Rouse turned his attention for a while to general store-keeping, abandoning it finally for the purpose of removing to Richfield, where he went to benefit the health of his wife. In that place hie remained six years.

Mr. Rouse was a member of the Baptist denomination, and was largely instrumental in the organization of a Baptist society in Cleveland. When, in 1835, it was decided to erect a church building on the corner of Seneca and Champlain streets, the experience of Mr. Rouse, then a deacon of the church, was called into requisition. In due time the church was built and a steeple placed on it, which became the wonder and admiration of the country round about, and Trinity, built by the Episcopalians with the aid of those of other denominations, and but little religious sentiment among the people. A Sunday school had for some time struggled hard to maintain its existence, and had but just become established on a tolerably firm basis. The depository, aided by the active labors of Mr. Rouse in the schools, gave a powerful impetus to the cause.

On his return from Richfield, Mr. Rouse engaged in the coal business in connection with Mr. Freeman Butts. About the year 1862, he retired from active business and thenceforth devoted his time to the cause of patriotism, religion, and charity. From the breaking out of the war Mr. and Mrs. Rouse entered vigorously on the work of aiding the nation’s cause by caring for the nation’s defenders. Their zeal and activity were irrepressible, visiting the camps and hospitals, ascertaining the needs of the soldiers, and then with unresting assiduity collecting money and materials to supply those needs. Mrs. Rouse became president of the Soldiers’ Aid Society of northern Ohio, and was directly instrumental in the formation of hundreds of auxiliary societies that made every city, village, and nearly every home in northern Ohio busy in the work of preparing and sending forward comforts and luxuries for the soldiers of the Union. Mrs. Rouse visited camps and hospitals in the South, and her visits and reports were productive of great good. Her name was known and respected by thousands of soldiers, was repeated with grateful praise in a multitude of homes from which brave boys had gone forth to the war, and has passed into history. In all her labors she was cordially seconded and efficiently aided by her husband.

Three sons and one daughter have been born to this worthy couple.

Medical.

In the early records of Cleveland, as in those of most western towns, the story of sickness and death fills a large part. Fever and ague, brought on by exposure, privations, and by the miasma from swamp, river and uncleared lands, disabled a large number of the early settlers, and hurried some to untimely graves. There were no physicians, and save a few drugs and the simples gathered from the river banks and forest, there were no remedies.

In course of time appeared the pioneer doctor with his saddle-bags, and he was soon followed by a number of his brethren to practice their skill upon the settlers. When the first Cleveland Directory was issued, in 1837, there were already established a round two dozen of physicians and surgeons, and three “surgeon-dentists.” It may be interesting to quote the names of these brethren of the lancet and saddlebags who purged and bled the good people of thirty-two years ago. They were, J. L. Ackley, F. I. Bradley, C. D. Brayton, W. A. Clark, Horace Congar, E. Cushing, Jonathan Foote, S. B. Gay, Robert Hicks, M. L. Hewitt, Smith Inglehart, Robert Johnston, Burr Kellogg, David Long, P. Mathivet, George Mendenhall, Joshua Mills, T. M. Moore, W. F. Otis, A. D. Smith, J. Swain, Charles Terry, Samuel Underhill, Joseph Walrath. The surgeon-dentists were B. Strickland, and Coredon & Sargeant.

This list has now swollen to proportions that make the two dozen and three exceedingly insignificant by comparison, and every school of medicine is represented. There are two Allopathic medical colleges–the Cleveland and Charity Hospital colleges–and two Homeopathic–the Western Homeopathic college and the Homeopathic College for Women. There are also three hospitals, the Charity Hospital (Allopathic), the Homeopathic Hospital on University Heights, and the Woman’s Hospital on Wilson street.

David Long.

Dr. Long was born at Hebron, Washington county, New York, September 29, 1787. In early life he qualified himself for the practice of medicine and surgery, studying in Massachusetts and graduating in New York city. In June, 1810, he arrived at Cleveland and commenced his professional career. At this early day there was no physician nearer than Painesville on the east, Hudson on the south-east, Wooster on the south, River Raisin (now Monroe) on the west. The arrival of a physician was, therefore, a matter of no small gratification to the settlers here and the neighboring settlements.

In this wild region, without roads, streams without bridges, cabins in many places eight to ten miles apart, did the young and ardent Long hopefully commence the practice of medicine. Nor were the hopes of the early settlers disappointed. In rain and snow, in Winter’s cold and Summer’s heat, by darkest midnight or mid-day sun the doctor ever cheerfully responded to all the calls for his services with alacrity and zeal, forgetful of self, desirous only to administer timely relief to the suffering and afflicted. In this he was eminently successful, as many of those who knew him for more than a third of a century can testify.

In proof of the untiring perseverance of Dr. Long in the early part of his professional life, it has been stated that on one occasion, in the Fall of the year, about midnight, he rode nine miles in fifty-one minutes. In another instance of extreme urgency, he rode, in the day time, fourteen miles in fifty minutes by changing horses twice on the route. He was a surgeon in the army during the war of 1812, and brought the news of Hull’s surrender at Detroit to this city, from the mouth of Black River, a distance of twenty-eight miles, in two hours and fourteen minutes. Such was his character for promptitude to all the calls that were made upon him, and they were far from being few.

For kindness to his patients and friends he had no superior. In his zeal in their behalf, in a few years, he sacrificed in a measure one of the finest constitutions.

After following his profession thirty years or more, Dr. Long retired from general medical practice, and engaged in other pursuits more favorable to his health and congenial to his tastes.

In all public measures for the benefit of our city, in the way of improvements, schools, churches, every effort in behalf of humanity, religion or science, Dr. Long was ready to place his shoulder to the work with all the ardor and enthusiasm of youth.

Dr. Long never had any aspirations for political distinctions, but such was his popularity and so great the confidence of the people in his judgment and integrity that he could have obtained it had he so desired. At one time, however, he was elected to fill a vacancy which had occurred by the death of one of the three County Commissioners. Unimportant as this may seem now, it then occasioned intense excitement. The location of a new county court house, presumptively fixing the county seat for all time, devolved upon these Commissioners. Newburg and Cleveland were the contestants, both being villages of about an equal number of inhabitants–the claims of each supported by a single Commissioner, yet Newburg having the more central location. Though hotly contested, Dr. Long was elected, and the result was the erection of the Court house in the south-west corner of the square, which was demolished about ten years since.

In the year 1834, Dr. Long united with the Presbyterian church in this city, and by his daily walk and conduct in the community, by his deeds of love and charity to the poor, his kindness to the sick and afflicted gave the most striking evidence of a heart renewed by grace and made meet for the kingdom of heaven. During his last painful illness his calmness and resignation showed that he had placed his trust firmly upon the sure foundation.

He filled all the relations of life in a most exemplary manner and thus embalmed his memory in the hearts of all who knew and survive him. He died on the first day of September, 1851, at the age of sixty-four years, lacking a single month.

John Delamater.

Just before the massacre of St. Bartholomew, the ancestors of Dr. Delamater fled from France to Holland. The family name was then De La Maitre. Being whole-souled protestants, they migrated with other Dutch families to the Province of New York, and settled on the banks of the Hudson, near Kingston. Their names are still visible on the ancient grave stones of that neighborhood. Like the Huguenots, of South Carolina, they were Calvinist, or puritans of the French school. They became allied by marriage to the Rogardus family of New York, and others partook of the blood of Anneke Jans, whose name has become famous in the New York courts. The investigation of this connexion and heirship, occupied the last years of Prof. Delamater’s life. It was closed only about a month before his death. His coadjutor in this work, was the late Chancellor Walworth, of Saratoga, whose ancestors were also in the line of Anneke Jans.

Dr. Delamater was born in Columbia county, New York, near Chatham, on the State line of Massachusetts, April 18th, 1787. He died at East Cleveland, in March, 1867, having almost reached the extreme age of four score years.

The Huguenots like English Puritans, and the Scotch Irish, have made their mark in North America. John Delamater, while a boy, was destined to be a farmer, on the soil where he was born. He was transferred to the medical profession on account of an accident, which injured his ability for manual labor. His father removed to Schenectady, New York, where his son was put under the tuition of one of the self-denying clergymen of those times, whose salary did not meet the expenses of living. At the age of nineteen his medical education was finished and he commenced practice in his native town. From thence he moved to Florence, Montgomery county, N. Y. Then stopped a short time in Albany, N.Y., and in 1816, established himself at Sheffield, Massachusetts. There was a settlement of negroes in this ancient borough. Dr. Delamater was then, as ever since, an active philanthropist. He attended the negroes as physician, Sunday teacher, and preacher. They also drew money from his purse, which was never very well filled, and paid back very little, either of his fees or of their debts. After some years of assiduous labor on his colored charge, his views of the race underwent a radical change. Among the last utterances of his life he expressed the opinion, based upon his experience at Sheffield, that the negro is by nature unfit for citizenship. In the days of the Jeffersonian Republicans and Adams Federalists, Dr. Delamater was in full accord with the new and rising Democratic party. He left it during the administration of General Jackson, and since then was a thorough Whig and Republican. No one hated slavery more. He saw the remnants of it in his early practice over the line in Connecticut, but never recovered faith in the capacity of the colored man for self-government.

Returning to his medical career, in which for sixty years he led in the profession, it is briefly as follows: While practising in the valley of the Housatonic, he rode almost constantly on a racking horse, about sixteen hands high, and almost with the speed of the wind, and occasionally in a two wheeled vehicle, common in those days, called a chaise, or more often a “one horse shay.” At such times one of his medical students rode beside him, and drove the horse.

Between calls along the road the Doctor read his works, especially those relating to cases in hand. This custom of keeping up with the new works and periodicals of the profession he never relaxed, even after old age and the most distressing physical infirmities prevented his practice. Neither was the old shay ever abandoned; our citizens remember it well, moving carefully along these streets, with its huge calash top and faithful horse. No storm of rain or snow prevented him from keeping an appointment while he was able to get in and out of his vehicle.

In 1823, Dr. Delamater was made Professer in the Medical Institute of Pittsfield, Berkshire county, Mass.; in 1827, at the Fairfield Medical School, Herkimer county, New York. He was at the same time giving lessons at Bowdoin College, Mass. While at Fairfield, he was invited to lecture in the Medical College of Ohio, where Kirtland, Drake and Mussey have occupied chairs. This resulted in an appointment as Professor in the Willoughby University, Lake county, Ohio, at that time a flourishing institution. In 1842, he became one of the Faculty of the Western Reserve Medical College, at Cleveland.

Almost every man has some prominent talent, though with many it is never developed. With Professor Delamater it was the ability to give prolonged, profound and perspicuous lectures. This was his special gift and as usual in such cases he was not a facile writer. It is said he delivered seventy courses of medical lectures. His memory was perfect and his reading embraced everything relating to his profession. A good lecturer requires not only a clear perception of his subject, but a lucid and fluent presentation of it. Dr. Delamater never wrote lectures. His memoranda were of the most meagre kind. They were frequently nothing more than a few hieroglyphics made on the margin of a newspaper drawn from his vest pocket as he mounted the desk. Every case he had ever treated and all its details appeared to be thoroughly fixed in his recollection. He sometimes wrote medical essays for publication, but with evident reluctance. In cases of malpractice Dr. Delamater was the especial dread of the attorney whose side he did not favor. His full, clear and logical statements made a deep and generally an irresistible impression upon the court and jury.

After he became unable to visit patients he was consulted with never ceasing confidence by physicians and by patients, especially those afflicted with chronic complaints.

His moral and religious qualities were as conspicuous as his mental ones. He carried the faculty of conscientiousness to a length which the most conscientious would regard as extreme. Against the poor his charges for professional service were merely nominal and were never pressed, and with the rich he was so moderate and easy that with a large practice he was barely able to maintain his family, which, like himself, were afflicted with prolonged constitutional diseases. His rare Christian virtues are described with fidelity and beauty in the farewell discourse of Rev. W. H. Goodrich, of the First Presbyterian Church, which, being in print, may be read and preserved by the numerous friends of the good old man.

Jared Potter Kirtland.

Prof. Kirtland belongs to the class of self-made naturalists who attain to greater eminence than others of equal talents and better advantages. Success in this branch of science requires not only a native genius, but enthusiasm and never tiring perseverance; to the rich and the educated these last qualifications are frequently wanting, or, if they are not, instead of growing with the progress of life, they become more and more weak instead of more and more strong. Industry and ambition are more than a match for education in minds of the same order.

[Illustration: Your Fellow Citizen, J. P. Kirtland]

Dr. Kirtland originated at Wallingford, Connecticut. His father, Turhand Kirtland, in 1799, was appointed general agent of the Connecticut Land Company, on the Reserve. He removed to Poland, in Mahoning county, the next year, where he became a prominent citizen of the new county then known as New Connecticut. So long as the Company existed he was continued in the agency, and survived until 1833 to witness the developments of the region.

Jared appears to have been left in Connecticut, probably to secure the advantages of those common schools which were wanting in this western wilderness. The young man made his appearance in Ohio on horseback, July 4th, 1810, at the age of fifteen years. He was destined to be a physician, and in 1817 he was sent to the celebrated medical school of Dr. Rush, in Philadelphia. After leaving that institution he set forth on the way of life with horse and saddle bags, dispensing advice and prescriptions, according to the custom of the times, to the people of the townships around Poland. Every old settler knows what a time the pioneer doctors had. Their patients were scattered far and wide in log cabins which stood in small clearings in the forest surrounded by gigantic trees. A messenger rushed in at any hour of the day or night from a distressed, perhaps a distant family, requiring immediate attention. It was the duty of the frontier physician to saddle his horse at the moment and return with the messenger. The route more often lay along a narrow trail through the woods, over roots and logs, with mud and water on all sides. In dark nights, or in storms of rain and sleet, the overhanging boughs of the trees dripping with water, these visits were not of the most cheerful character. In those early days bridges were behind roads in regard to condition and repairs, and it was frequently necessary, in order to reach a suffering patient, to do as Cassius did–plunge in and trust to a faithful horse–in order to cross swollen creeks and rivers.

While engaged in this rude professional practice, acquiring a good reputation as a physician, he was closely observing the fishes, reptiles, shells and animals of a region teeming with animal and vegetable life. Scientific works were scarce in that new region, but living subjects were abundant. This exuberance of life was of more value to a scrutinizing mind than a surplus of books and a deficiency of specimens. An unusually rich field for the naturalist lay open to his daily observation for twenty years.

During his residence at Poland, Dr. Kirtland was twice elected to the House of Representatives for Ohio. In that body he directed his efforts especially to a change in the Penitentiary system. It was mainly through his zeal and activity that the old style of treating State prisoners was abandoned, and they have been made a source of revenue and not of expense. Convict labor has thus proven by experience to be valuable to the public and to the convict a relaxation of the rigor of his situation.

It was while studying the habits of the fresh water shells of the Mahoning and its branches that Dr. Kirtland made a discovery which attracted attention throughout the scientific world. The classification of species had been made upon mere difference of form. Dr. Kirtland perceived that in the same species a difference of form was due to sex in _testacea_ the same as in all other animals, and that too many species had been adopted. This bold announcement, coming from the back woods of Ohio, created quite a commotion among naturalists. It was, however, found, on investigation, to be true, though it rendered obsolete a large number of terrible Latin phrases.

In the publication of his views, and afterwards for his descriptions of the fishes of Ohio, he found a liberal patron in the Boston Society of Natural History. When the State of Ohio organized a geological survey, in 1838, the department of Natural History was of course given to him. There was barely time to make a catalogue of the fauna and flora of the State before the survey was suspended, but many of his figures and descriptions of the fishes have since been published in the transactions of the Boston Society. This appointment broke up his large medical practice in Trumbull and adjacent counties. He now accepted the appointment of Professer in the Ohio Medical College at Cincinnati. About 1838, Prof. Kirtland removed from Poland to Cleveland, to perform the same duties in the Cleveland Medical College. With a restless energy he went beyond natural history and medicine in his investigations, into the field of horticulture, floriculture and agriculture.

Purchasing a rugged farm on the ridge road five miles out of Cleveland, he entered with zeal into the business of scientific farming. Here he demonstrated that a stiff clay soil derived from the underlying Devonian Shales may be made highly productive in fruit. His success stimulated others along the ridge road, until the old pastures and meadows on that side of the city have been changed into the most profitable orchards and gardens in the vicinity. This required twenty years more of time and industry, during much of which he came daily to the college and delivered one or more lectures. In the lecture his style is entirely conversational, but rapid, fluent, and always intelligible. Here all the varieties of his studies come into play, as it were, spontaneously. He is equally at home among the birds, the insects and the reptiles, the fishes or the mammalia. Their habits are as familiar as those of his children and grandchildren. He writes but seldom, and thus the teachings of so many years on so many subjects are confided principally to the memory of the many hundreds of students to whom they have been delivered.

For several years Dr. Kirtland has declined to lecture on any subject. He is verging upon four score, a period which with most men, is necessarily one of rest if not of weariness, but he has never known what it is to rest. No farmer in Rockport is up earlier or attends more closely to his grounds. All the valuable varieties of peaches, pears, cherries and grapes, have been tested by their actual product, or are in the process of being tested. He is enthusiastically fond of the culture of bees and of every variety of flowers which will thrive in this climate. A number of new varieties of cherries have been originated on the Kirtland farm, and after trial those which are valuable have been scattered over the country. There are very few men who are enabled to make so many applications of science to practical subjects, and still fewer who are permitted to live long enough to witness the fruits of their labors.

Theodatus Garlick.

We are almost at a loss in what class to place Dr. Garlick. By natural taste and genius he belongs to the artists. His devotion to the healing art arose principally from the necessities of our race for something to eat and wear. He had the fortune, probably good fortune, to be born in Vermont, at Middlebury, March 30th, 1805, in view of the Green Mountains, among rocks and mountains. This region is principally famous for marble, slate, iron ore, and hardy young men, generally known as Green Mountain boys.

An older brother, Abel B. Garlick, having been apprenticed to a marble cutter, came out West, sometime after the war of 1812, and located at Cleveland. In 1816, Theodatus, at the age of eleven years, had drifted as far as Erie, Pennsylvania; in 1819, to Cleveland. The Winter of 1819-20, he spent at Black River, which was then the leading ship yard of the lakes.

Abel B. had artist’s ability also. In this region no marble was to be found, but a tolerable substitute existed in the fine grained blue sandstone at Newburg. A mill was erected at the quarry on Mill creek, below the falls, where these stones were sawed, as they are now, into handsome slabs.

Like other New Englanders, the Vermont boys are early impressed with the idea of self-support. Although Theodatus much preferred fun and frolic to hard labor, he entered cheerfully upon the business of a stone cutter at the age of sixteen. Their marble yard (without marble) was on Bank street, where Morgan & Root’s block now stands. Abel marked the outlines of the letters upon incipient grave stones in pencil, and Theodatus carved them with his chisel. Most of the renowned sculptors of Ohio, such as Powell, Clevenger and Jones, took their first lessons in the same way. All of them have left samples of their untutored skill in various angels and cherubs, now mouldering in old churchyards. The blue sandstone monuments, on which Dr. Garlick cut inscriptions fifty years since, are still to be seen in the early cemeteries of the Western Reserve; some are touching enough, but not a few are more ridiculous than mournful. When Nathan Perry became so prosperous that he proposed to remove the old wooden store on the corner of Water and Superior streets and replace it with a brick one, he concluded to expend something upon ornament. He ordered two oval stone signs to be made and to be built into the walls over the two doors, one on each street. These were among the earliest efforts of Dr. Garlick. Both of these stones were in existence until the ground was cleared for the present Bank building, when they were broken up and put into the cellar wall. In those days it was one of the duties of an apprentice to sharpen the tools at a blacksmith’s forge. The young man concluded to carve flying cherubims with their stone trumpets to ring in the ears of coming generations no longer.

Having a robust physical constitution, he became passionately fond of hunting and fishing. In 1822, he lived with a brother in Newbury, Geauga county, which was then a forest full of game. In a letter referring to the sporting days of his youth, he wrote as follows:

My brother and myself started out very early one morning for a deer that we knew had been feeding around the cabin that night; within a quarter of a mile from the cabin my brother shot him, and as he fired, up jumped eleven elk; one of our neighbors shot five of them within an acre of ground; they were near together, at bay, fighting with the dogs. I helped to get them in; they were a part of a larger herd, we counted their beds in the snow where they had lain at night, and there were over one hundred in the drove.

[Illustration: Yours Truly, T. Garlick]

Ten or fifteen years previous to that time, one of those tornadoes, which occasionally visit this region, had prostrated the timber along a tract a mile wide and several miles in length, through the township of Newbury. A thicket of bushes had sprung up among the fallen trees, which furnished excellent browsing ground and shelter for game, of which there was an abundance of bear, wolves, elk, deer, turkeys, &c., constituting quite a paradise for a young Nimrod.

He finally determined to become a physician, and after some years of the usual experience of medical students, practicing some, and assisting at operations, he entered the medical department of the University of Maryland, in the city of Baltimore, where he graduated in 1834.

No sooner was his diploma secured than the artist again broke forth. He suddenly produced bas-reliefs in wax of five favorite professors without sittings, which were pronounced perfect likenesses. General Jackson and Henry Clay gave him a short sitting, and the next day their statuetts were on exhibition. Mr. Clay expressed his satisfaction for his own in an autograph letter. Another miniature in relief, full length, of Chief Justice Marshall, from a portrait by Waugh, was pronounced by Mr. Bullock, an English virtuoso, as equal to anything produced by Thorwaldsen. But being surrounded by medical men, who, like men of all professions, regard their own as more important than any other, Dr. Garlick was induced to turn his artistic skill upon anatomical models.

He located at Youngstown, Ohio, the same year that he graduated, at which place, and at the Medical College of Cleveland, he devoted nearly two years in getting up models of all parts of the human body, taken from subjects in the dissecting room. They may yet be seen in the Medical Colleges at Cleveland, Buffalo, Toronto, Charleston, South Carolina, Cincinnati, and other places. These were such close imitations of nature that the late Professer Mussey, of Cincinnati, pronounced them superior to the French models at Paris by Auzoux. At Youngstown he made a life size bust of Judge George Tod, copies of which are now in the family. In 1853, after a successful practice at Youngstown, he came to Cleveland, and formed a partnership in surgery with the late Professer H. A. Ackley, and for a number of years was a member of the Board of Medical Censors of the Cleveland Medical College, and vice president of the Cleveland Academy of Natural Science. As he was a naturalist, he applied the principles of the anatomical models to animals and parts of animals, especially fishes. He entered with great zeal upon the artificial propagation of brook trout and other fish in connection with Dr. Ackley. In 1857, he published a small book, which is the standard work of the United States on this subject.

He was a skillful physician and surgeon, a diligent student of natural history, a keen sportsman, and a great lover of the fine arts. A good physical constitution is at least one-half of the capital of any man, however gifted in mind. In this respect he was like Christopher North, with few equals. In the rude contests of strength among the young men of a new country, the races, wrestling matches, and occasional fights, he never felt like backing down; but of late years this powerful frame has been partially stricken with paralysis.

The doctor still resides in this city, devoted to natural science, especially botany, but the days of his personal activity are past.

J. L. Cassels.

John Lang Cassels, M.D., LL.D., was born in Stirlingshire, Scotland, and in 1827, while quite a young man, came to this country. Soon after, he studied medicine with Prof. John Delamater, in Fairfield, New York, and graduated in 1834, in the College of Physicians and Surgeons located at Fairfield, N. Y. He was Demonstrator of Anatomy in that school three years, two years during his pupilage and one after his graduation. He opened an office for the practice of medicine in Earlville, New York, in the spring of 1835, and in the fall of the same year received and accepted the appointment of Professor of Chemistry in Willoughby University, Ohio, which connection he retained until the fall of 1843, when he and his associates opened and established the Cleveland Medical College, in which he still occupies the chair of Chemistry.

In 1837, he received the appointment of First Assistant Geologist of the New York State Geological Survey, which he occupied for several seasons, performing field labor in the summer and lecturing on chemistry in Willoughby Medical College during the winter. His connection with the New York survey gave him an excellent opportunity to become an expert practical geologist; his location being on the Hudson river district, offered him a fine field of action, as it is really the key to the geology and mineralogy of the State.

In the winter of 1839, he gave a course of demonstrated lectures on chemistry before the Young Men’s Library Association in Cleveland, the first public lectures on science ever given in the city. The following winter the citizens of Cleveland invited him to lecture again on the same subject, and he complied. The city at that time contained mostly young people–only two gray-headed men attended the Stone Church.

In 1815, he spent most of the season in visiting and collecting specimens of mineral in the lead region of Wisconsin, Illinois, Iowa and Missouri, thus becoming familiar with the geology of their rich mineral region.

In 1846, he spent the whole season in exploring the Lake Superior country, coasting the south shore in a bark canoe, having for his traveling companions two Indians and a half-breed voyager. At this date there were no steamers on Lake Superior, and but a very few small sailing craft. It was during this time that he took squatter possession of a mile square of the iron region of that country, for the benefit of the Cleveland Iron Company. He was the first white man that had visited this region, now so famous for its ferruginous wealth. Near the close of the season he spent a short time geologizing Isle Royale, and returned to Saut St. Marie on the steamer Julia Palmer, which had, during the summer, been hauled over the passage of Saut St. Marie. During the winter following, at the request of a number of Clevelanders, he gave a public lecture on the Lake Superior region; at the close of which he said he would venture a prophecy: “Such was the character of the climate, scenery, etc., of Lake Superior that the time was not far distant when it would become as great a resort for invalids and pleasure-seekers as Saratoga and Newport now are.” Also, that there is iron enough in the iron district sufficient to furnish a double track of the much talked of Whitney’s railroad. These statements were then received with a stormy manifestation of incredulity.

In 1859, the Jefferson College of Mississippi conferred the Degree of LL.D. on Dr. Cassels.

In 1861, he was elected a corresponding member of the Imperial Geological Institution of Berlin, Prussia.

For the last ten years, in addition to the duties of his chair in the Cleveland Medical College, he has regularly filled the chair of chemistry and natural history in the Western Reserve College at Hudson. During the past twenty years he has given several courses of popular experimental lectures in his favorite branches of chemistry and geology in a number of our neighboring towns, Akron, Canton, &c. He is also the regular lecturer in these branches in the Female Seminary in Painesville.

Perhaps few men have been as extensively engaged in texicological examinations during the past twenty years as Dr. Cassels. Many of these have been of great interest, both in a social and moral point of view. In all such cases he is regarded with great confidence, both on account of his scientific skill and his high sense of moral integrity.

As an analytical chemist he has few superiors, and is much of his spare time engaged in the analysis of waters, ores, coal, limestone, &c. In 1866, he analyzed the water of Cleveland which is brought from Lake Erie and distributed through the city. He analyzed this water taken from different parts of the city and from the point where it entered the pipes to be forced into the reservoir; also from a point in the lake three thousand four hundred and fifty feet from the shore, where he advised that the inlet pipe ought to be located. All these analyses are embraced in his report to the Trustees of the city water works; in which also are many valuable suggestions respecting supply pipes and the character of the water for steam purposes.

J. S. Newberry.

J. S. Newberry, M.D., LL.D., was born at Windsor, Connecticut, of old Puritan stock, his ancestry having formed part of the colony which in 1635, emigrated from Dorchester, colony of Massachusetts Bay, and founded the town of Windsor, the first settlement made in Connecticut.

[Illustration: Yours Very Truly, J. S. Newberry]

The family continued to reside at Windsor for two hundred years, during which time it held an honorable place in that community and contributed several representatives, who took an important part in the affairs of the State government, or in the defense of the colony against the Indians, and in the French and Indian and Revolutionary wars. Dr. Newberry’s grandfather, Hon. Roger Newberry, a distinguished lawyer, and for many years a member of the Governor’s council, was one of the directors of the Connecticut Land Company, which purchased a large part of the Connecticut Western Reserve. The town of Newberry received its name from him. His son, Henry Newberry, inherited his interest in the land of the company, by which he became possessed of large tracts in Summit, Ashtabula, Medina, Lorain and Cuyahoga counties, including one hundred acres now within the city of Cleveland. Looking after these interests he made three journeys on horseback (the first in 1814,) from Connecticut to Ohio, and, in 1824, removed his family to Summit county, where he founded the town of Cuyahoga Falls, remaining there till his death, in 1854.

Dr. Newberry graduated at Western Reserve College, in 1846, and from the Cleveland Medical College in 1848. The years 1849 and 1850, he spent in study and travel abroad. Returning at the close of the latter year he established himself, early in 1851, in the practice of medicine in Cleveland. Here he remained till 1855, when his professional business became so engrossing as to leave him no time for the scientific study to which he had been devoted from his boyhood. To escape from too great professional occupation, and impelled by an unconquerable passion for a scientific career, in May, 1855, he accepted an appointment from the War Department, and became connected with the army as acting assistant surgeon and geologist to the party which, under Lieutenant R. S. Williamson, U.S.A., made an exploration of the country lying between San Francisco and the Columbia river. The results of this expedition are embodied in Vol. 6 P. R. R. Reports. The reports of Dr. Newberry on the “Geology, Botany and Zoology of North California and Oregon,” are republished in a volume of 300 pp., 4to., with 48 plates. In 1857-8, he accompanied Lieutenant J. O. Ives, U.S.A., in the exploration and navigation of the Colorado river, one of the most interesting explorations made by any party in any country. The object of the expedition was to open a navigable route of communication with our army in Utah. To this end an iron steamer was constructed in Philadelphia, taken in sections to the head of the Gulf of California, where it was put together and launched. With this steamer the river, before almost entirely unknown, was navigated for five hundred miles, opening a route of travel which has since been extensively used. Beyond the point reached by the steamer the course of the river is for several hundreds of miles through the “Great Canon,” as it is called, a chasm worn by the stream in the table lands of the “Colorado Plateau.” This canon has nearly vertical banks, and is nowhere less than three thousand feet deep; in some places six thousand feet, or more than a mile in depth.

The party with which Dr. Newberry was connected, spent nearly a year in exploring the country bordering the Colorado, adding much to our knowledge of our western possessions, and giving, in their report, an interesting and graphic description of, perhaps, the most remarkable portion of the earth’s surface. Half of the report of the Colorado Expedition was prepared by Dr. Newberry, and so much importance was attached to his observations by his commanding officer, that in the preface he speaks of them as constituting “the most interesting material gathered by the expedition.”

In 1859, having finished his portion of the Colorado Report, Dr. Newberry took charge of another party sent out by the War Department, to report to Captain J. N. Macomb, topographical engineer, U.S.A., for the exploration of the San Juan and upper Colorado rivers. The Summer of 1859 was spent in the accomplishment of the object had in view by this expedition, during which time the party traveled over a large part of Southern Colorado and Utah and Northern Arizona and New Mexico, filling up a wide blank space in our maps and opening a great area before unknown, much of which proved rich and beautiful, abounding in mineral wealth, and full of natural objects of great interest. Among the results of this expedition were the determination of the point of junction of Grand and Green rivers, which unite to form the Colorado, and the exploration of the valley of the San Juan, the largest tributary of the Colorado; a stream as large as the Connecticut, before almost unknown, but which, though now without an inhabitant upon its banks, is for several hundred miles lined with ruined towns or detached edifices built of stone, and once occupied by many thousands of a semi-civilized people. The report of this expedition made by Dr. Newberry, containing much new and interesting scientific matter, was finished just before the war, but yet remains unpublished.

Immediately after the commencement of the war, the United States Sanitary Commission was organized. Dr. Newberry was one of the first elected members, and it is, perhaps, not too much to say that no other one individual contributed more to the great success that attended the labors of that organization. In September, 1861, he accepted the position of Secretary of the Western Department of the Sanitary Commission, and from that time had the general supervision of the affairs of the Commission in the valley of the Mississippi; his head-quarters being first at Cleveland, and subsequently, as the frontier was carried southward, at Louisville, Kentucky.

Through his efforts branches of the Sanitary Commission were established in the principal cities of the West, and agencies for the performance of its work at all important military points, and with each considerable sub-division of the army. Before the close of the war the entire West was embraced in one great System of agencies for the production and distribution of supplies, and the care of sick and wounded on the battle-field, in hospital or in transitu. The magnitude of the work of the Sanitary Commission at the West may be inferred from the fact that there were at one time over five thousand societies tributary to it in the loyal States of the Northwest–that hospital stores of the value of over $5,000,000 were distributed by it in the valley of the Mississippi–that over 850,000 names were on the records of its Hospital Directory at Louisville, and 1,000,000 soldiers, for whom no other adequate provision was made, were fed and sheltered in its “homes.”

Of this great work Dr. Newberry was the responsible head, and by the wisdom and energy displayed by himself very much of the harmony and efficiency which characterized this organization are to be ascribed.

As his labors in connection with the Sanitary Commission were drawing to a close, Dr. Newberry was appointed Professor of Geology in the School of Mines of Columbia College, New York city. He entered on the duties of the position in 1866. In 1869, he was appointed by Governor Hayes to the office of State Geologist, created by the Ohio General Assembly of that year.

The scientific acquirements of Professor Newberry have given him a world-wide fame. As a Geologist his reputation ranks among the foremost. He has been honored with the membership of the most of the learned societies of this country, and of many in Europe; was one of the original corporators of the National Academy of Sciences; was recently elected president of the American Association for the advancement of Science, and is now president of the New York Lyceum of Natural History.

D. H. Beckwith.

The first Homeopathist in Cleveland was W. K. Adams, who succeeded in converting Dr. Hoyt, with whom he formed a partnership. Very soon after, in 1845, Drs. Wheeler and Williams were added to the list. There were but six families in the city having firm faith in the principles of homeopathy, and these were silent followers of Dr. John Wheeler, not willing to be known as such, so strong was public opinion against them. Dr. Wheeler continued unshaken by the strong opposition he met with, and heeded neither sneers nor denunciations. His course was onward and his practice successful, every month adding to his list of converts, and the profits of each year doubling the preceding one. Dr. Wheeler was the first member of the profession to propose that a homeopathic medical college should be located in Cleveland, and he earnestly pressed his theory that Cleveland should be the centre of homeopathy in the West. His name was the first signature to procure a charter, and when the college was organized he was selected as the President, and held the office for the first eleven years of its existence, contributing materially to its success, and resigning only when increasing age rendered its duties too onerous, when added to a large practice.

From the little beginnings in the early days of Dr. Wheeler’s practice, homeopathy has grown in Cleveland, until it now reckons a flourishing college, a woman’s medical college, two hospitals, an insurance company, twenty-six practicing physicians, and a host of believers in homeopathic principles and modes of treatment.

Prominent among the number of practicing physicians is D. H. Beckwith, M.D., who was born in Huron county, Ohio, in 1826. His father was one of the pioneers of the northern part of the State; emigrating from the State of New York in 1815, and making the journey the most of the way on foot, occupying more than six weeks. He remained a few days in Cleveland, and not admiring the soil for agricultural purposes (little thinking it was the site for a city of its present beauty and magnitude), he journeyed on until he reached more fertile soil in Huron county, where, by economy and industry, in a short time he accumulated sufficient to purchase a small farm, on which he lived until his death, having seen his family of six sons and one daughter arrive at mature age.

[Illustration: Truly Yours, D. H. Beckwith]

The subject of this memoir remained at home during his boyhood, attending school during the winter and working on the farm in the summer season. At the age of sixteen he entered the Norwalk Seminary, pursuing his studies with vigor for a few years, when it became necessary for him to earn his own living. He taught several schools and was among the first in the State to inaugurate the normal school system to elevate the standard of teaching and improve public schools.

Early in life he decided that the medical profession would be his choice, and all his leisure hours were spent in studying medical books. After securing a sufficiency from teaching (as he supposed,) to meet the expenses of a medical education, he studiously applied himself, under the tuition of John Tiff, M.D., one of the most scientific practitioners of the State. During the third year of his studies his money was expended, and not wishing to call on friends for assistance he concluded to commence the practice of medicine. A partnership was offered him in an adjacent town, and arrangements were made for him to commence his professional career. He unfolded his plan to his preceptor, who listened attentively to his future plans, and then rising from his chair, exclaimed with much emphasis: “If there is anything, sir, that I despise, it is half a doctor,” and immediately left the office. The brilliant prospect was clouded. With but eight months more study the young student could commence the practice of medicine and be an honor to his preceptor and to himself, but the lack of money was a seemingly impassable barrier. It was a dark day to the student, but he had learned “never to let his energies stagnate.” One resource was left him. He determined to open a select school for advanced scholars. In four days from that time he entered the school room with one hundred scholars, many of them his former pupils. Morning and evening he clerked in a drug store, for which he received his board and washing. On Wednesday and Saturday evenings he was examined in his medical studies with two other students who devoted their entire time to their studies. Thus for thirteen weeks he was daily performing the duties of a teacher, so arduous that many would have complained, though they had no other occupation. In addition to this he was several hours each day compounding and dispensing medicine, and at the same time keeping pace with his class in the study of materia medica and botany.

Having already attended one course of lectures in an allopathic college, and not being satisfied with that mode of prescriptions for the sick, he attended the Eclectic College of Cincinnati, where he listened to the first course of lectures ever delivered in any chartered college in the country on homeopathic medicine, by the lamented Prof. Rosa who had no superior in his profession. After receiving his degree he commenced the practice of medicine with his preceptor. The prompt and curative effect produced by homeopathic remedies soon convinced him of its superiority over other systems of medicine and decided him to adopt it as his system of practice for life. The success that has attended his labors ever since has well proved the correctness of his choice.

The first few years of his practice were spent among the acquaintances of his childhood, in the beautiful village of Norwalk. In 1852, he left a large practice and many warm friends to seek a larger field for future work, and located in Zanesville, Ohio, where he continued his profession until the year 1863. The climate not being adapted to the health of his family he moved to Cleveland and soon obtained what he had left in Zanesville–a large and lucrative practice. By close attention to his patients, being always ready to give his services to the poor as cheerfully as to the rich, and his unusual kindness to all persons placed under his professional care, he has won the affection and esteem of his patients to a degree rarely equaled.

He has always taken a lively interest in the advancement of medical science, firmly believing in the immutable principles that govern the administration of homeopathic medicine as well as the curative effect. He has always been anxious to induce young men that proposed to study the science of medicine to follow the example of the illustrious Hahnemann. His lectures in the Cleveland Homeopathic College have always been characterized by practicability. He has not only published a medical journal, but has largely contributed to the pages of many others in this country. He has always been a leading member of county and State medical societies, as well as of the Northwestern and American Institute of Homeopathy, holding the office of Vice President of all the above named societies. In 1866, he was chosen by the American Institute as one of the committee to prepare an essay on Cholera, its nature and treatment.

He was among the first to establish the Hahnemann Life Insurance Company of Cleveland, being one of its incorporators and procuring a large amount of capital stock for its support, besides giving his time in organizing it. He was chosen their chief medical examiner, and the great success of the Company is largely due to his skill in selecting good and healthy risks for insurance.

[Illustration: T. T. Seelye]

Thomas T. Seelye.

Thomas T. Seelye, M.D., was born in Danbury, Connecticut, August 23, 1818. His parents were Seth and Abigail Seelye, of English descent. After preparing for a collegiate course, it became necessary for him to take charge of his father’s store. At twenty-one years of age he commenced the study of medicine as a private pupil of William Parker, professor of surgery in the College of Physicians and Surgeons, New York, from which college he graduated in the Spring of 1842. He was then appointed assistant physician in Bellevue Hospital, where he remained one year, when he commenced the practice of his profession in Woodbury, Connecticut. There he remained until the Spring of 1848, when he sold out his business and removed to Cleveland, having previously leased a tract of land just within the suburbs of the city, covered with native forest and such a profusion of real natural beauty in glen, woodland, and beautiful springs of soft water, that it seemed apparent that art only needed to blend with nature to make this one of the most desirable of localities for a great health institution.

His system of practice, though called water cure, in fact drew assistance from all the experience of the past in relieving physical suffering and curing disease. It was not _orthodox_, it belonged to no _pathy_, and in consequence had the opposition of all branches of the profession. His means were quite limited, as were also his accommodations–not so limited, however, but that the expense of construction and furnishing greatly exceeded the length of his purse. Business waited for _success_, to establish itself, but the sheriff _did not_. Debts became due, and nothing with which to pay, but hope in the future, which is rather unsatisfactory nutriment for hungry creditors.

But, by and by, patient labor and persistent effort in the right direction began to bring forth fruit. Business increased, the visits of the sheriff were less frequent, and after about five years he could lie down to rest at night without fear of a dun in the morning.

In ten years he purchased the Forest City Cure, which was started in opposition, the capacity of the old Cure having become altogether inadequate for his increased business. After ten years he sold it to the Hebrews for an orphan asylum, preferring to unite the two institutions under one roof. He then proceeded to complete the plan he had been perfecting for the past five years, for erecting buildings of an extent that would amply accommodate his ever increasing patronage, and supplied with those conveniences and appliances which an experience of twenty-one years had deemed most desirable for the invalid. The architect has furnished us a sketch of this institution, of which, when completed, every lover of our beautiful city will be proud.

In addition to his professional labors he is largely engaged, in connection with W. J. Gordon and others, in the manufacture of the non-explosive lamp, which bids fair to be one of the most successful and extensive manufacturing enterprises ever started in this city.

Within the past three years, Dr. Seelye has purchased the twenty-six acres he originally leased, and twenty-two acres adjoining, making a very valuable tract of real estate, taken in connection with the present and prospective growth of the city.

Although Dr. Seelye is not engaged conspicuously in public charities, few hands are so frequently open as his to the wants of the poor. Great comprehensiveness of intellect, an indomitable energy, a rare penetration and control over other minds, combined with an unblemished integrity of character, have given him a high reputation among physicians in the West.

[Illustration: Water Corm.]

Manufacturing

With neither water power nor steam power very little can be done in the way of manufacturing. Cleveland, until the construction of the Ohio canal, was without either of those two requisites for a manufacturing point. The Cuyahoga river, though giving abundant water power along a considerable portion of its course, enters Cleveland as a slow moving stream, winding its sluggish way in so tortuous a course that it seems reluctant to lose its identity in the waters of the lake. Water power, under such circumstances, is out of the question, and, as with no coal, and a rapidly decreasing supply of wood, steam cannot be economically used for manufacturing purposes, the people of Cleveland turned their attention wholly to buying and selling instead of producing.

The construction of the Ohio canal to the coal fields of Summit county opened the eyes of the more enterprising citizens to the possibilities of a great future for Cleveland as a manufacturing city. No sooner had the canal reached Akron, and an experimental shipment of coal been made to the future city–with but poor success, as already narrated–than attention was called to the importance of the new field thus opened to Cleveland enterprise. On the 7th of March, 1828; a letter appeared in the Cleveland Herald, from which the following is an extract:

“We possess, beyond a doubt, decided advantages over Buffalo, or any other town on Lake Erie, in our contiguity to inexhaustible beds of pit-coal and iron ore, very justly considered the basis of all manufacturing. On the one hand, at the distance of about thirty miles, we can obtain any quantity of crude iron of an excellent quality, while, on the other, at about the same distance, we have access by canal to exhaustless mines of coal of good quality. This last most invaluable, and all important article in manufacturing, can not be obtained anywhere else on the Lakes without the extra expense of shifting from canal-boats to other craft.

“When these mines shall have become extensively worked, coal will be delivered in this place very little, if any, above that paid in Pittsburgh, say from four to six cents; and good pig-iron can and is now delivered at a less price here than in Pittsburgh. Doctor Cooper further says: ‘The very basis of all profitable manufacturing is, plenty of fuel, easily, cheaply and permanently procurable;–the next desirable object is plenty of iron ore; iron being the article upon which every other manufacture depends. It is to the plentiful distribution of these two commodities that Great Britain is chiefly indebted for the pre-eminence of her manufactures and her commerce.’ Surely it need not be thought strange that Cleveland must one day become a great manufacturing place, if we consider,

“_First_, That the canal will give us access to one of the finest portions of country in the United States, sufficient for vending, to almost any extent, articles such as might be manufactured here;–and, _Secondly_, That power and materials in great abundance are ‘easily, cheaply and permanently procurable.’ There is probably not a town in the Western country, Pittsburgh only excepted, that unites these two objects so happily as this place does.

“Every steam-engine wanted for boats on the Lake, for mills and factories near the Lake, and on and near the canal should be made at this point.

“Not a pound of nails, a wagon-tire, an anchor, a cable, a cast-iron stove, pot, kettle, ploughshare, or any article made of cast-iron–a yard of coarse cotton, a gallon of beer, an ax, a shovel, nor a spade, should be sent east for. There ought to be in full operation before the completion of our canal, at least one steam engine manufactory, one establishment for puddling iron, one rolling and slitting mill, and nail factory, two or three iron foundries, in addition to the one now going into operation under very favorable auspices, a cotton factory, a woolen factory, a steam grist and saw mill, a brewery, &c.”

On the succeeding week appeared some editorial comments in support of the suggestions in the letter, and for some time frequent references, by correspondents and editorially, were made to the matter. On the 25th of April, 1828, appeared in the Herald a notice of a new iron foundry; the first that had been built, and reference to which had been made in the letter quoted. This was built by John Ballard & Co., and an editorial announcing its opening says it “supplies this place and the surrounding country on short notice and on reasonable terms, with the various articles of cast iron work, for which, before this foundry was established, our citizens were forced to send to a distance, and at the cost of much trouble and expense.”

But with all this urging of newspapers, and talking of far-sighted citizens, the cause of manufacturing progressed slowly. To establish manufactories was a costly experiment, requiring capital, patience, and a faith, which, though some might profess, few actually possessed. As is frequently the case in regard to public improvements, those who pressed them most had no funds to invest in them, and those who had the funds were little inclined to heed the suggestions of moneyless advisers.

MacCabe’s Directory of Cleveland and Ohio City for 1837-8, says that at that time there were on the east side of the river, in the corporation of Cleveland, “four very extensive iron foundries and steam engine manufactories; also, three soap and candle manufactories, two breweries, one sash factory, two rope walks, one stoneware pottery, two carriage manufactories, and two French run millstone manufactories, all of which are in full operation.” A flouring mill was in course of erection by Mr. Ford which, it was predicted, would be, when finished, “the largest and most complete establishment of the kind in the State of Ohio.” At the same time Ohio City was described as possessing “among the principal manufactories of the place, the Cuyahoga Steam Furnace, the Saleratus manufactory, and the Glue manufactory.” The Cuyahoga Steam Furnace had turned off in the previous year five hundred tons of castings, besides a great quantity of wrought iron work, and gave employment to seventy men. In noticing the description of the iron furnaces and steam engine manufactories on the East side of the river as “very extensive”, it must be borne in mind that the standard of size and importance for such establishments in Cleveland was much smaller then than now.

In spite of all the attempts made to stir up an interest in manufactories, slow progress was made until a comparatively late period. One great obstacle in the way was the opposition or indifference of the land-holders, who directly rebuffed the proposals of intending manufacturers, or placed a value on their land so high as to require an amount of capital sunk in the soil that rendered the chances of profit very hazardous. There was also a strong prejudice against factories on the part of very many persons because they were “so dirty,” and would tend to make the neat and trim residences and door-yards of Cleveland as smutty as those of Pittsburgh.

It was not until the breaking out of the war for the Union called into existence manufactories all over the land to supply the needs born of the war, that manufactories found a home and cordial welcome in Cleveland. The exigencies of the time, and the intense feeling excited, scattered to the wind all the prejudices against the dirt and smoke of iron manufactories, and establishments of this kind sprang up on all sides, calling into existence a host of other manufactories dependent on and contributing to the successful conduct of iron foundries and iron mills. The war found Cleveland a commercial city, whose trade, if not languishing, threatened to soon reach its turning point; it left Cleveland a busy, bustling manufacturing city, over a great part of which hung a perpetual cloud of dense smoke, and with a population nearly doubled in numbers and greatly changed in character owing to its change from a commercial to a manufacturing city. The petroleum discovery in North Western Pennsylvania and the coincident opening of direct railroad communication between Cleveland and the oil regions, contributed greatly to the rapid increase

Cleveland Past and Present by Maurice Joblin (page 8)