Baer, George Frederick (26 September 1842–26 April 1914), lawyer and railroad president, was born in Somerset County, Pennsylvania, the son of Major Solomon Baer and Anna Baker, farmers. George spent his early years on the family farm until the Baers moved to the village of Somerset in 1848. Family resources enabled him to acquire his early education at the Somerset Institute. At age thirteen he served as an apprentice at the ...
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Baer, George Frederick (1842-1914), lawyer and railroad president
Edward J. Davies
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Billings, Frederick (1823-1890), lawyer and railroad president
Robin W. Winks
Billings, Frederick (27 September 1823–30 September 1890), lawyer and railroad president, was born in Royalton, Vermont, the son of Oel Billings, a farmer and later register of probate, and Sophia Wetherbee. In 1835 Billings’s father, a debtor, was instructed by the court to move to Woodstock, Vermont, as the law required that he live within a mile of a jail. Frederick Billings found schooling in Woodstock inadequate and persuaded his parents to send him to Kimball Union Academy. In 1840 he entered the University of Vermont, graduating in 1844. He studied law as an apprentice to Oliver Phelps Chandler in Woodstock and in 1846 became secretary of civil and military affairs to Horace Eaton, the Whig governor of the state. Eaton and Billings pressed in particular for school reform....
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Calhoun, Patrick (1856-1943), railroad attorney and streetcar syndicator
William C. Barrow
Calhoun, Patrick (21 March 1856–16 June 1943), railroad attorney and streetcar syndicator, was born on the family plantation, “Fort Hill,” near Pendleton, South Carolina, the son of Andrew Pickens Calhoun, a prosperous antebellum plantation owner who was later ruined by the war, and Margaret Maria Green. He was a grandson of U.S. vice president ...
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Evans, George (1797-1867), lawyer, politician, and businessman
Sylvia B. Larson
Evans, George (12 January 1797–06 April 1867), lawyer, politician, and businessman, was born in Hallowell, Maine, the son of Daniel Evans and Joanna Hains. After attending Hallowell and Monmouth academies, Evans went to Bowdoin College in Brunswick, Maine, graduating in 1815. He remained so interested in Bowdoin that for the rest of his life he attended each subsequent commencement except for one. Evans read law in the office of Frederick Allen, was admitted to the bar in 1818, and began his law practice in Gardiner, Maine, before returning briefly to Hallowell. He won distinction as a criminal lawyer who could discern immediately the point on which his case would be decided and who appealed to the jury through reason rather than passion. In 1820 he married Ann Dearborn; they had three children....
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Gibbons, Thomas (1757-1826), planter, lawyer, and steamship owner
Carol S. Ebel
Gibbons, Thomas (15 December 1757–16 May 1826), planter, lawyer, and steamship owner, was born near Savannah, Georgia, the son of Joseph Gibbons and Hannah Martin, planters. Gibbons was schooled at home and in Charleston, South Carolina, where he also read law. He married Ann Heyword, but the date of the marriage is unknown. They had three children. Throughout his life Gibbons demonstrated a determined spirit. Contemporaries described him as a “high liver,” possessing a “strong mind, strong passions, strong prejudices, and strong self-will” (Halsted, pp. 16–17)....
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Gowen, Franklin Benjamin (1836-1889), lawyer and railroad executive
John H. Hepp
Gowen, Franklin Benjamin (09 February 1836–14 December 1889), lawyer and railroad executive, was born in Mount Airy, Philadelphia County, Pennsylvania, the son of James Gowen, a wealthy merchant and farmer, and Mary Miller. Despite his father’s wealth, Gowen never completed his formal education. He attended a Roman Catholic school in Maryland and a Moravian school in Pennsylvania, before his father apprenticed him to a storekeeper in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, at age thirteen....
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Jewett, Hugh Judge (1817-1898), lawyer, railroad president, and Democratic politician
Philip Pappas
Jewett, Hugh Judge (01 July 1817–06 March 1898), lawyer, railroad president, and Democratic politician, was born at his family’s homestead, “Landsdowne,” in Deer Creek, Harford County, Maryland, the son of John Jewett and Susannah Judge, farmers. A graduate of Hopewell Academy in Chester County, Pennsylvania, Jewett attended Hiram (Ohio) College and studied law in the office of Colonel John C. Groome in Elkton, Maryland. In 1838 he was admitted to the Maryland bar and moved to St. Clairsville, Ohio. Jewett was married in 1841 to Sarah Jane Ellis of St. Clairsville, with whom he had four children. After briefly practicing law with Judge William Kennon, he removed to Zanesville, Muskingum County, in 1848. In Zanesville Jewett gained a reputation as an honest but astute lawyer with an ability to handle cases involving complex financial questions. Jewett’s talent for financial problem solving impressed local banking interests and led to his election as president of the Muskingum County branch of the State Bank of Ohio in 1852. After the death of his first wife, Sarah Jane, Jewett married Sarah Elizabeth (Guthrie) Kelly in 1853, with whom he had three children....
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Joy, James Frederick (1810-1896), lawyer and railroad builder
John F. Stover
Joy, James Frederick (02 December 1810–24 September 1896), lawyer and railroad builder, was born in Durham, New Hampshire, the son of James Joy, a manufacturer of farm implements, and Sarah Pickering. Joy attended the local schools before clerking in a store for several years. He graduated from Dartmouth College at the head of his class in 1833. Joy then entered Harvard Law School but left after a year to become the principal of an academy in Pittsfield, New Hampshire, and a tutor of Latin at Dartmouth College. He returned to Harvard, where he completed his law course in 1836, and was admitted to the bar. In the same year Joy moved west to Detroit and gained admission to the Michigan bar. In 1837 he entered into a law partnership with George F. Porter that lasted for nearly twenty-five years....
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McKennan, Thomas McKean Thompson (1794-1852), lawyer, congressman, and railroad president
Sylvia Larson
McKennan, Thomas McKean Thompson (31 March 1794–09 July 1852), lawyer, congressman, and railroad president, was born in Dragon Neck, New Castle County, Delaware, the son of Colonel William McKennan, a revolutionary war officer, and Elizabeth Thompson, a niece of Thomas McKean, a Pennsylvania chief justice and governor. His grandfather, the Reverend William McKennan, who emigrated from Scotland via northern Ireland and Barbados, ministered to the Presbyterians in Wilmington for over fifty years. When Thomas was just a boy, his family left Delaware, migrating to western Virginia and then western Pennsylvania. They settled in the town of Washington in 1803, and Colonel McKennan served in the administration of Pennsylvania’s governor McKean until the end of the governor’s term in 1808. Colonel McKennan died in 1810 from the effects of wounds suffered in the revolutionary war....
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Saunders, Stuart Thomas (1909-1987), lawyer and railroad executive
James A. Ward
Saunders, Stuart Thomas (16 July 1909–08 February 1987), lawyer and railroad executive, was born in McDowall, West Virginia, the son of William Hamett Saunders and Lucy Smith, farmers. His childhood was spent on a dairy farm outside Roanoke, Virginia. After graduating from Roanoke College in Salem, Virginia, in 1930 and from Harvard Law School in 1934, he spent five years practicing law outside Washington, D.C. Then, in 1939, he married Dorothy Davidson, with whom he had four children, and took a job as assistant general solicitor with the Norfolk & Western Railroad. He became its executive vice president in 1956, and two years later he succeeded Robert H. Smith as its president....
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Stickney, Alpheus Beede (1840-1916), lawyer and railroad executive
Edward L. Lach, Jr.
Stickney, Alpheus Beede (27 June 1840–09 August 1916), lawyer and railroad executive, was born in Wilton, Franklin County, Maine, the son of Daniel Stickney, a farmer and occasional Universalist preacher, and Ursula Maria Beede. Stickney’s childhood was marred by poverty. His father relocated the family twice before 1850, only to abandon them. Stickney was forced to assist his mother in factory piecework in order to make ends meet. At the instigation of an uncle, his mother relocated with her children to Carroll County, New Hampshire, in 1850, and for the following six years “A.B.,” as he insisted on being called, alternated factory work with intermittent sessions at local public schools. In 1856 he began attending a Freewill Baptist academy in New Hampshire, occasionally interrupting his education with teaching stints in local schools to support himself. After returning to Maine in 1858, he attended another academy, taught some more, and eventually began legal studies in the office of Josiah Crosby in Dexter, Maine....
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Tod, David (1805-1868), businessman, lawyer, and Civil War governor of Ohio
Phyllis F. Field
Tod, David (21 February 1805–13 November 1868), businessman, lawyer, and Civil War governor of Ohio, was born on a farm near Youngstown, Ohio, the son of George Tod, a lawyer and judge, and Sarah Isaacs. Although his father and maternal grandfather were Yale graduates, Tod’s hard-pressed father could only partially subsidize his schooling at Burton Academy and expenses while reading law in the office of Powell Stone of Warren, Ohio. In 1827, more than $1,000 in debt, Tod was admitted to the bar. He was not the ablest of the many lawyers in Warren, but his handsome appearance, musical voice, ready wit, and sociable manner made him effective with juries, and his practice flourished. The same attributes made him an excellent political campaigner. Attracted to ...
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Van Winkle, Peter Godwin (1808-1872), lawyer, businessman, and politician
Leonard Schlup
Van Winkle, Peter Godwin (07 September 1808–15 April 1872), lawyer, businessman, and politician, was born in New York City, the son of Peter Van Winkle, a merchant, and Phoebe Godwin. Van Winkle attended local elementary and secondary schools. One of his interests was writing poems, which were published in several literary journals. In 1831 he married Juliette Rathbun of Paramus, New Jersey; they had six children, three of whom died in infancy. Van Winkle remained a widower after his wife’s death in 1844....
