Trails to the Past

Providence County RI Biographies

Men of Progress of Rhode Island and Providence Part 3
Source:  Boston New England Magazine 1896
Page 3

 

 

HALL, William Henry, real estate broker, Providence, was born in that city June 12, 1837, son of James S. and Eleanor Ryder (Snow) Hall. His early education was obtained in the public schools, until at the age of fourteen, being desirous of learning a trade, he entered a large cigar factory, and in six months became an expert workman.   But the occupation and confinement impaired his health, so much so that for two years his life was despaired of, although he retained his courage and ambition, and upon partial recovery cast about for some other active employment.   When seventeen years old he borrowed from a friend a small capital of less than fifty dollars, and securing credit for the necessary materials, erected a small building and opened a store for the sale of fruits, confectionery and periodicals.   His venture proved successful, and by careful methods and strict attention to business, he was soon accumulating money in a small way, while at the same time contributing to the support of his parents.  With improved health came increasing ambition, and deciding upon a mercantile career, he attended a course of instruction in Scholfield's Commercial College, from which he received a diploma in 1859.  At once securing a position as book-keeper with a large concern in Providence, he sold out his business in the store and rented the building to the purchaser.   He retained his book-keeping situation in Providence four years, and then took a similar position with a large wholesale lumber house in Albany, New York. Early in 1865, being offered the position of Secretary and Treasurer of the Marietta and Vinton County Coal and Oil Company, of Providence, he accepted the situation and returned to his native city, and continued in this relation until the business of the company was closed up. Mr.  Hall began his operations in real estate in 1866.  At that time the real estate business of Providence was practically monopolized by one or two firms, long established and influential, and his success in this line, established in the face of competition with the older and more powerful operators, is but little short of phenomenal, and can only be attributed to his personal qualities of unbounded energy, strict integrity, unflagging persistency and rare business judgment. His experience in the lumber trade was invaluable to him, and this, combined with his intuition and natural business abilities of a high order, enabled him in due time to establish for himself an enviable position and reputation as one of the leading real estate brokers and dealers of Providence.  In 1873 Mr. Hall purchased the Joseph Sweet estate in Cranston, now Edgewood, and at great expense of time, labor and money transformed the once unpretentious homestead with its spacious grounds into an imposing and elegant residence. In 1876 he erected the large business block in Weybosset Street known as the Hall Building. In 1890 he organized the Central Real Estate Company, with an authorized capital of two millions, for the purpose of bringing within the reach of people of moderate means a class of investments hitherto monopolized by the wealthy. Nothing perhaps more favorably illustrates Mr. Hall's business energy and sagacity than the remarkable success of this company ; having been its President and Manager since its organization, he has been the chief factor in bringing this large business and investment enterprise to the substantial position and high standing which it today occupies. Mr. Hall has been active and influential in public life, and has filled many elective offices, never having been defeated. He served six years as a member of the Town Council of Cranston, and was Town Treasurer one year, declining a re-election.  He was a Representative to the General Assembly four terms, 1880-84, and for the two years succeeding was a member of the Senate, being the first Republican Senator elected from the town of Cranston ; he was again nominated, but declined a longer service.   While in the Assembly he served as Chairman of the Joint Committee on Accounts and Claims, and second on the Senate Committee on Corporations, and established a reputation as an excellent debater of governmental and economic questions. Mr. Hall finds his favorite relaxation from the cares of business in driving fine horses, and nothing gives him greater pleasure than handling the reins over his high-spirited four-in-hand team, while taking out a party of friends on his handsome drag. He was married, December 24, 1866, to Miss Cleora N., daughter of William L. Hopkins of Providence. Mr. Hopkins, who was one of the chief promoters and organizers of the Sons of Temperance society in Providence, is a descendant of Thomas Hopkins, from whom was descended Stephen Hopkins, one of the early governors of Rhode Island, and a signer of the Declaration of Independence. Biographie Index


 

HARKNESS, Professor Albert, Ph. D., LL.D., Professor of the Greek Language and Literature in Brown University, and author of the well known series of Greek and Latin text-books which are in almost universal use, was born October 6, 1822, in that part of Mendon, Mass., which is now the town of Blackstone.    He is the son of Southwick and Phebe (Thayer) Harkness.   In his boyhood he attended the district school for ten or twelve weeks in the year, and when thirteen years of age he attended the Uxbridge High School for a single term, and the following year the Worcester Academy for a similar length of time.    In 1838, after a year's study at home, mostly without a teacher, with occasional help from the Rev. Mr. Atkinson of Millville, he entered Brown University, where he at once attained high rank in his class, and was graduated as valedictorian in 1842.   After graduation he engaged in the work of private instruction, but at the opening of the Providence High School in 1843 he became one of its teachers.   He was Senior Master from September 1846 until August 1853, when he resigned and went to Europe for study and travel.  After a year's study at the universities of Bonn and Berlin, he received the degree of Doctor of Philosophy at Bonn, being the first American to receive the degree at that university.   He then spent one semester at the University of Goettingen, and during the summer of 1855 traveled in Germany, France, Switzerland, Italy, Greece and England.   On his way to Greece he received notice of his appointment to the Greek chair in Brown University, and began his work in the following September. Twice he has had leave of absence for a year to revisit Europe. Professor Harkness' labors have not been confined to the class-room. He has lectured on education in different parts of Rhode Island and elsewhere, and has held many positions of responsibility and trust. He was president of the Franklin Lyceum in 1849, and of the Rhode Island Alpha of the Phi Beta Kappa from 1871 to 1873. He was one of the founders of the American Philological Association, one of its Vice-Presidents in 1869, and President in 1875-1876. He is a member of the Archaeological Institute of America, and in 1881 was a member of the first committee appointed to consider the expediency of establishing an American School of Classical Studies at Athens, of which school he has been a member of the managing committee from its establishment in 1882 to the present time. Professor Harkness has given special attention to the methods of classical instruction. In his five visits to Europe he has made a careful study of educational questions, and at the great English and German schools and universities he has enjoyed peculiar privileges of inspecting academic work and of making valuable friendships among the leading professors and masters. He began his successful career as an author in 1851, with the publication of the First Latin Book. His later works are the Second Latin Book, the First Greek Book and Reader, the famous Latin Grammar, two Latin Readers, an Introductory  Latin Book, Practical Introduction to Latin Composition, Elements of Latin Grammar, editions of Caesar's Gallic War, of Cicero's Select Orations and of Sallust's Catiline, a Preparatory Course in Latin Prose Authors, a Latin Course for the First Year, and An Easy Method for Beginners in Latin. The publication of this series of text-books marked an era in the classical education of the country. A wonderful success followed the first appearance of the Grammar, in 1864; after thirty years it still deservedly leads its competitors, and its merits have been recognized by the highest educational authorities of England and Germany. Professor Harkness is also the author of various scientific papers embodying some of the original results of his philological investigations, chief among which are two on the Formation of the Perfect Tense in Latin .and one on the Development of the Subjunctive in Principal Clauses; these were published in the Transactions of the American Philological Association, and have been noticed with great respect by leading American and European philologists. The degree of Doctor of Laws was conferred upon him by Brown University in 1869. Professor Harkness is possessed of peculiar skill as a teacher, and is of a kind and genial disposition and of a high character as a Christian scholar and gentleman. The esteem which his associates accord to him increases as the years go by, and he is honored and beloved, not only among his neighbors and fellow citizens, but wherever he is known on both sides of the sea. He was married, May 28, 1849, to Miss Maria Aldrich Smith; they have two children : Clara Frances, born May 10, 1851, wife of Professor Poland of Brown University, and Albert Granger Harkness, born November 19, 1856, formerly a professor in Madison University, now Professor of Roman Literature and History in Brown University. Biographie Index


HARSON, M. Joseph, merchant, Providence, was born in New York city, July 1, 1855, son of John and Alice (O'Connell) Harson. His ancestry is Irish. He received his early education in the public schools of New York and entered upon his practical training for active life as an office-boy in his native city, in 1867-68. He re-entered school at Beltefont, Pa., in 1869 and 1870, and for the three years 1870-72 worked as a machinist in ironworks at Danville, Pa.   Following this experience he returned to New York and entered the employ of a prominent Broadway hatter, was a book agent in 1876, and a partner in the book business in 1877.  In the latter year he came to Providence, and in 1878 began the business career in which he has since been successfully engaged.   He first opened a small store on Dorrance street, devoted exclusively to hats.   This was an innovation in Providence, and many were the predictions of failure for the young merchant.   But his enterprise and push won from the start, and within a year larger quarters were needed for his growing business, and he leased a more capacious store   on Westminster street.  The prophets were now certain that failure was inevitable as a result of Mr. Harson's bold move. But as before, these predictions only served to stimulate his determination.  With unshaken faith in the wisdom of his policy and the efficiency of his methods, which especially in advertising were strikingly original, and even revolutionary in the hat trade, he carried out his plans with such success that the Westminster street store, twice too large at the beginning, continued to grow smaller and smaller each year, until it was scarcely half large enough to accommodate the business owing to him.  Increased room became a necessity, and after long waiting for a suitable location, he secured the stores embracing the numbers 196-202 Westminster street, to which he removed September 5, 1891, and where he now has one of the largest and finest emporiums of its kind in the United States.   Besides his large retail business, he has carried on a considerable wholesale trade, and has conducted at various times branch stores in the principal cities of New England.  He has also been instrumental in starting a number of young men in business, in nearly every instance with good success    Mr. Harson has always taken a deep interest in all movements for the advancement of young men.   He has been active and prominent in the National Union of Catholic Young Men's Societies, was invited to deliver addresses before it in 1882-84-85-87, and has been accorded the highest honors it could bestow.   In recognition of his society services, he has been complimentarily referred to as "The Ozanam of America "   He was one of the originators of the Catholic Congress held in Baltimore in 1889, and was elected Secretary of the committee appointed to arrange for future congresses.   He   is a frequent   contributor  to the Catholic and secular press and  his articles are distinguished for their vigorous style, fearlessness of expression and sprightliness of treatment. A series of thoughtful articles on the negro question, written by him in 1890, were the subject of much favorable comment and commanded widespread attention, and the Colored Congress held at Cincinnati in June 1890 passed resolutions of thanks and elected him an honorary member of its executive committee.  In September 1880 Mr. Harson entered Brown University and took a special two-years course, attending meanwhile to all the details of his business.  In June 1892 the Board of Fellows of the University conferred upon him the degree of Bachelor of Arts in connection with his class, the class of 1884.  His address at the first dinner of the Providence alumni, held in the month of March 1894, will be remembered as one of the successes of the evening, though following such notable speakers as President Angell of the University of Michigan, Rev. Dr.  Greer of New York, Professor Wheeler of Cornell University, Doctor Keen of University of Pennsylvania and President Andrews of Brown.   He is a member of the Rhode Island Historical Society, the United States Catholic Historical Society of Philadelphia, and the Catholic Club of New York.  He is also a member and founder of the Phi Kappa Sigma college fraternity.   In politics he is Independent-Democratic, but has steadfastly declined to accept nominations to public office.   Mr. Harson was married, October 11,1881, to Miss Marianna F.  Kelly; they have two children: Raymond Joseph, aged thirteen, and Henry Newman Harson. aged eleven years; another son, Edwin Brownson Harson, died in infancy. Biographie Index


HASBROUCK, Sayer, M. D., Providence, was born in Middletown, N. Y., June 3, 1860, son of John W. and Lydia (Sayer) Hasbrouck. Dr. Hasbrouck comes of one of the oldest Knickerbocker families of New York state, of Flemish and Huguenot ancestry. His mother, Lydia Sayer, M. D., is a descendant in the seventh generation of Thomas Sayre, whose homestead at Southampton, Long Island, built in 1648, is said to be the oldest house now standing in the state of New York. His father, John W. Hasbrouck, editor and founder of the Orange County Press, and one of the old line Whigs that came into the Republican ranks upon the formation of that party, is lineally descended from Abraham Hasbrouck, a native of Calais, France, who lived for a time in England, and came to this country about 1675, landed at Boston, and went to Kingston on the Hudson, where he became the head of the Paltz patentees, who controlled a large tract of land on the west side of the Hudson, where the town of New Paltz is at present located, and including Lake Mohonk, now a famous resort. Dr. Hasbrouck's great-grandfather, Captain Elias Hasbrouck, commanded a company of rangers in the Revolutionary army, was with Montgomery in the attack on Quebec in which the latter lost his life, and was also at the burning of Kingston by the British, on which occasion his store was destroyed. His grandfather, Richard Montgomery Hasbrouck, was named for General Montgomery, and was the recipient of a ring and a tract of land from the General's widow.  Dr. Hasbrouck's early education was acquired in the public schools of Middletown, and a four years' course in Cook Academy, Havana, N. Y., during 1875-79. in 1879-82 he studied in the Boston University School of Medicine, holding the position of House Surgeon in the College Dispensary during part of the course, and graduating with the degree of Doctor of Medicine. He then spent two years abroad, principally in London and Dublin, but passing some time in the hospitals of Glasgow, Edinburgh and Paris. He was six months in the Rotunda Hospital, Dublin, where he received the degree of Licentiate of Midwifery, and was also House Surgeon in St. Mark's Ophthalmic Hospital, Dublin.   In London he was Clinical Assistant to Sir George Lawson, F. R. C. S., at the Royal London (Moorfields) Ophthalmic Hospital, and to Mr.  Hamilton at the Gray's Inn Throat and Ear Hospital. Dr. Hasbrouck returned to the United States in June 1884, and opened practice in Providence, R. L, for the special treatment of diseases of the eye and ear. He has written papers on his travels, and has contributed many articles to the ophthalmic literature of the day, while numerous other interesting and important papers which he has read have appeared in the Transactions of the American Institute of Homoeopathy and the Reports of the New York State Homoeopathic Society. He holds the position of Ophthalmic and Aural Surgeon to the Rhode Island Homoeopathic Hospital and Providence Dispensary, is a member of the American Institute of Homoeopathy and the New York State Homoeopathic Society, and is Vice-President of the Rhode Island State Homoeopathic Society. He is active in various social and charitable organizations, and is also a member of the Sons of the American Revolution, and of the Holland Society of New York, an association of Knickerbockers whose ancestors came over prior to 1675. Dr. Hasbrouck is a lover of athletics and outdoor sports, and both the Rhode Island Yacht Club and Providence Athletic Association were organized in his office; he was four or five years President of the Yacht Club and one year its Commodore, and served as President of the temporary organization of the Athletic Association.   His residence is at Pawtuxet Neck, four miles out of the city. He was married, September 25, 1889, to Miss Mary Owen Fiske, daughter of John T. Fiske, of Pascoag, R. I. they have one child : Fanny Fiske, born December 16, 1890. Biographie Index


HAWES, Edward Coffin, merchant and mechanic, Providence, and inventor of the widely-known Hawes Steam Trap, was born in Coventry, R. I., December 29, 1833, son of George and Maria (Greene) Hawes. His ancestry is English on both sides. He was educated in the public schools, and attended the Friends' Boarding School in Providence in 1850, and later received a commercial training to fit him for a business career. He was brought up on a farm until the age of sixteen, when he came to Providence and engaged in the fruit and produce business with his father and three brothers, under the firm name of George Hawes & Sons. Later the wholesale grocery business was connected with this.   About 1880 Mr. Hawes conceived an idea to construct a device that would be advantageous to steam users, for the purpose of discharging the water of condensation from steam pipes and other appliances where live steam is used.  This invention, known as the Hawes Steam Trap, has proved a great success, and is widely known and used throughout the United States and foreign countries. At present Mr. Hawes is engaged solely in the manufacture and sale of steam traps, and in looking after his extensive interests in that connection, having retired from the fruit, produce and grocery business. He is a member of What Cheer Masonic Lodge and of Calvary Commandery Knights Templar, also of Canonicus Lodge of Odd Fellows and the Athletic Club of Providence. In politics he is a Republican. He was married in 1874 to Miss Sarah J. Haynes; they have one child : Alice May Hawes. Biographie Index


HOWARD, Henry, manufacturer, and Governor of Rhode Island 1873-75, Was born in Cranston, R. I., April 2, 1826, son of Jesse and Mary (King) Howard. His paternal ancestry are of the English Howards. On the mother's side he is descended from Gabriel Bernon, the eminent Huguenot refugee, who settled in Rhode Island, and through him from the Bernon family of Rochelle, France. Through the Bernons and  their descendants  he   has a genealogical record from the year A. D. 1300. He received his early education in the common schools and academies.   He first adopted the law as a profession and was admitted to the Providence County bar in 1851.   He practiced successfully for six years and then abandoned the profession for the large meld of manufacturing and business enterprises in which he has since been engaged in connection with very important and extended operations.   He early took an active part in politics and public life. He was Secretary of the Whig State Committee, and on the dissolution of the party took an effective part in the formation of the Republican party.   He was a Delegate to the National Convention which nominated Fremont for the Presidency in 1856, and also to the one which nominated Hayes in 1876. He was elected a member of the Rhode Island General Assembly in 1856-57, was a Presidential Elector in 1872, and in 1873 was elected Governor of Rhode Island and re-elected in 1874.   He was Expert Commissioner to the Paris Exposition in 1878, appointed by President Hayes.   He has repeatedly declined nomination for political office on account of the pressure of his business occupations. In military affairs he has been a Captain in the corps of the Providence Marine Artillery, and was a Colonel on the personal staff of Gov. William H.  Hoppin.   He is President of the Harris Manufacturing Company, and late President of the Aimington & Sims Engine Company, the Providence Telephone Company and the Pintsch Gas Company.  Governor Howard is a lucid and forceful writer upon public questions and topics of the time, and contributions from his ready pen have graced and enlivened the pages of various newspapers and periodicals, where they have invariably commanded thoughtful and widespread attention.   He was for some years a member of the Franklin Lyceum and at one time its President.   In 1873 he received the honorary degree of A. M. from Brown University.  He was married, September 30, 1851, to Miss Catharine Greene Harris, daughter of Elisha Harris, a former Governor of Rhode Island; they have three children: Jessie H., wife of Edward C. Bucklin, Elisha H. and Charles T. Howard. Biographie Index


JORDAN, Jules, musical director and composer, was born in Willimantic, Conn., November 10, 1850, son of Lyman and Susan (Beckwith) Jordan.  He is of early colonial ancestry, his progenitors on the maternal side having been the first settlers of New London, Conn.; his father's people were all Rhode Islanders, and their old homestead is located at Greene, R. I. The subject of this sketch attended the public school in Willimantic until sixteen years old. Always interested in music, and naturally possessed of musical talents of a high order, he had but small opportunity for cultivation until he re-moved to Providence in 1870, where his fine tenor voice secured him a position in the choir of Grace Church and made him known in musical circles.  He was thus enabled to commence study in earnest, and has since devoted himself exclusively to the practice of the art which his tastes and special abilities led him to adopt as a life profession. He studied thoroughly the cultivation of the voice, in this country with George L. Osgood of Boston, and in Europe under William Shakespeare in London and Signor Sbriglia in Paris. While abroad he had an exceptionally attractive offer to go upon the operatic stage, but he declined, much against the advice and wishes of Signor Sbriglia, preferring to pursue his own plan of work already well begun in Providence, to which city. he returned at once upon the completion of his studies. As a teacher, conductor and composer, Mr. Jordan has become recognized throughout the country as at the head of his profession. He was choirmaster of Grace Church, Providence, for thirteen years, and from its organization in 1880 has been the conductor of the Arion Club, a musical society that has won fame through-out New England and beyond. He has given instruction to many hundreds of pupils, and has written a great number of songs, choruses and other musical compositions, many of which are widely known and have acquired a well-merited popularity.  Early in his career Mr. Jordan came into prominence as an oratorio and concert singer, and he has appeared with success in most of the larger cities of the country. He was chosen by the late Dr.  Damrosch to create the role of Faust in Berlioz's great " L.e Damnation de Faust" at its first performance in New York, February 14, 1880; in this he made a remarkable success, and he has sung the part often since with great acceptance. Among the better known of his musical compositions are " Nydia's Love Song;" " Drink to Me Only with Thine Eyes: " " If on the Meads ; " " Bedouin's Prayer;" " love's Reward ; " " Sleep, Beloved ; " " Daffodils ; " " Down by the Brook in Maytime; " " Ring Out, Wild Bells; " " Forging the Plow; " " A Life Lesson;" "Invocation;" " Love's Philosophy;" "love's Sunshine; " " Love's Confidence;" " Stay-by and Sing;" "My Laddie" and "A Dutch Lullaby, " also " Wind Swept Wheat," for mixed chorus and orchestra, with tenor solo, and " A Night Service," a cantata, for mixed chorus and orchestra, with soprano and bass solos. His sacred compositions include    The Lost Sheep," tenor solo and chorus; "The Sower," alto solo and chorus; " Tantum Ergo," bass solo and chorus: " Panis Angelicus," "I Am the Vine," and numerous others which have found much favor with church choirs and choral societies. Among his later works are a fine setting of Whitrier's patriotic ballad, " Barbara Frietchie," for soprano, chorus and orchestra, and a national hymn, "Great Western Land." His last work, just completed (April 1896), is a romantic opera in three acts, " Rip Van Winkle," the libretto as well as the music being written by Dr. Jordan.  In June 1895 Brown University conferred upon Mr. Jordan the honorary degree of Doctor of Music, the first time the degree was ever conferred by this institution. In 1892 he was strongly urged to remove to New York, where a position was offered him in the National Conservatory of Music, but he declined for the sake of his interests in Providence.  Although fully occupied for years in the various branches of his profession, Dr. Jordan's field of labor is continually extending, particularly in the line of musical conducting, for which he is especially equipped and peculiarly adapted, and in which he has had the greatest success. Biographie Index


KINNERNEY, Rev. Henry Francis, Pastor of St. Joseph's Church, Pawtucket, was born near Mountrath, Queen's County, Ireland, January 26, 1846, son of John and Betty (Whalen) Kinnerney.  He came to America in September 1852, and in 1861, at the age of fifteen, entered St. Charles College, Maryland, the nursery of so many learned and zealous priests. In 1863 he entered Niagara University, finishing his classical course at that institution, and obtaining first honors in his class. He then made his course in philosophy at Montreal College, where in 1866 he was crowned by the Governor-General of Canada, having taken the highest honors. Upon the completion of his studies, December 18, 1870, he was ordained to the priest-hood by Bishop Bourget, and at once entered upon his missionary life. He had charge of the Fountain-street Academy, or preparatory school for the diocese of Hartford, until July 1872, when he was appointed pastor of Sandwich, and of all Cape Cod and adjacent islands, embracing Nantucket and Martha's Vineyard.   After two years' service in this field he was transferred to the pastorate of the new parish of St. Joseph's at Pawtucket, where he has since labored with great success.   St. Joseph's parish, set off from the old parish of St. Mary's, in 1873, and embracing the territory on the east side of the river from Cottage Street to the East Providence line, was struggling under a heavy debt, $52,000, incurred in purchasing a site and laying the foundations and corner stone for the new church, and with no means in sight for completing the edifice or even for carrying forward the work another stage.   The burdensome indebtedness, the especial money stringency of the times, and a laity composed mainly of people in humble circumstances practically without ready means in the hard times then prevailing, combined to make the outlook for the young parish anything but promising.   But Father Kinnerney's energy, skill and persistency proved equal to the emergency.   He was appointed to the pastorate January 26, 1874, and held his first service on the first Sunday in February, in the Old Town Hall on School Street.   Under his ministrations a new interest was awakened, the courage of the parishioners revived, money began to flow in, and on April the basement was completed and mass was celebrated in the new church for the first time.   The pastor's labors met with continued success, and the church debt was rapidly reduced, 527,000 being raised the first year, while the construction of the edifice went on.    A church fair held in the first year of his pastorate, attended by all the civic and military societies of the state, was instrumental in raising $10,000, of which amount $3,000 was contributed by Hon. George H. Wilson of Providence.   By 1878 the pastor had brought the financial problem of the parish within sight of solution   On the first Sunday in October of that year the church was dedicated with great ceremony, the collection upon that occasion amounting to $1,500, and in 1891 the belfry and tower were finished. In 1887 Father   Kinnerney  purchased   the French estate for educational purposes, and in 1892 was commenced the erection of a convent and school buildings on the grounds, completed in February 1895 at a cost of $50,000.   The old French house was also transformed into a home for the Sisters of Mercy.   The school now has an attendance of four hundred and fifty pupils.   So greatly has St.  Joseph's flourished under Father Kinnerney's pastorate, that notwithstanding the detachment from his parish of the mission districts of Dodgeville, Hebronville and Romford, he still numbers upwards of three thousand people among his parishioners, and in this time the church has raised, exclusive of the pastor's support, a sum amounting to about half a million dollars.   Not merely in religious affairs has Father Kinnerney been the adviser and guide of his flock; as a public spirited citizen he is noted among Protestants and Catholics alike for his deep interest in matters of public moment, and has taken an active part in many local and national movements.   He is known as one of the ablest of public speakers, and as President of the Rhode Island Temperance Union, has spoken in that capacity to full houses from nearly every pulpit and platform in the state.   In 1878 he was elected a member of the Public School Board of Pawtucket, and served three years.   He was one of the speakers at the great mass meeting to welcome Parnell and Dillon in 1879.   In 1885 the Grand Army of the Republic of the state held memorial services in St. Joseph's Church, the first time in the history of the society that such services were ever held in a Catholic church, upon which occasion the pastor delivered the oration.   He also delivered memorial orations upon General Grant and General Garfield, at the instance of the G. A. R. of the state, the Grant oration being published by the society in pamphlet form.   Father Kinnerney visited England, Ireland and France in the summer of 1882, and attended the unveiling  of the   O'Connell  monument by Charles S. Parnell. In November 1884 he attended the Third Plenary Council of Baltimore, as Theologian for the diocese of Providence. In June 1895 he again visited Europe, making a tour of the continent, including Rome, Naples, Switzerland and other parts. On December 18, 1895, occurred his silver anniversary, commemorating his twenty-fifth year of priesthood; it was characteristic of him that he should refuse upon that occasion to sanction any public celebration of his sacerdotal jubilee.  Father Kinnerney was in 1893 elected President of the Board of Directors of the Providence Visitor, which office he still holds. Biographie Index


KNAPP, ALBERT Mason, M. D., Providence, was born in Lyman, N. H., October 14, 1842, son of Dr. Horace and Lucretia (Dickenson) Knapp.  His father was a native of Maine, born in Kingfield, and was a school teacher in early life, afterward a Universalist minister, and subsequently a physician and lecturer upon medical and other subjects. His mother was a daughter of a New Hampshire farmer.  His boyhood was passed to quite an extent in Maine, mostly at Kendall's Mills, but the greater part of his early education was acquired in the public schools of Racine, Wis. He attended the Normal School of that state, and taught school two years, after which he entered the Medical Department of the University of Michigan, from which he graduated with the degree of Doctor of Medicine in 1865. Following graduation he practiced in Racine, Wis., for a time, and then in Chicago, until the great fire in 1871, when having suffered the loss of his office and much other property by the conflagration, he came  and accepted an offer to associate himself with another physician in Lowell, Mass. Remaining there but a short time, he practiced two years in Manchester, N. H., and about 1875 located in Providence, where he has since been established in successful and remunerative practice. Dr. Knapp has served as Medical Examiner for several benevolent and fraternal organizations, and is a member of the Rhode Island Medical Society, and the Providence Medical Association.  He was married, in Dubuque, lA., May 31, 1865, to Miss Kittie A., daughter of Thomas W. Crane, an old resident of Chicago; they have two children: K. Mabel and George H. Knapp. Biographie Index


KNIGHT, Benjamin Brayton, manufacturer, and head of the firm of B. B. & R Knight, Providence, was born in Cranston, R. I., October 3, 1813, son of Stephen and Welthan (Brayton) Knight.  His early life was spent in assisting his father on the farm, and his educational advantages were limited to occasional terms in the district schools, until he was sixteen years old. At the age of eighteen, in 1831, he entered the Sprague Print Works at Cranston and served as an operative until 1833, then he resumed farming for two years. In 1835 he started the initiative movement of his remarkable business career, by purchasing a small building near the Sprague Print Works and opening a general grocery.  Five years later he removed to Providence, and with Olney Winsor and L. E. Bowen, under the firm name of Winsor, Knight & Company, engaged in the wholesale and retail grocery business. In 1842 he purchased Mr. Bowen's interest, and in 1847 his brother Jeremiah became associated with him, under the style of B. B. Knight & Company.  Soon afterwards Mr. Knight extended his operations by engaging in the flour and grain trade with D. T.  Penniman, under the name of Penniman, Knight & Company, and a year later bought out Mr. Penniman and continued alone for about four years, doing a large and successful business. In 1849 he sold his grocery interest to his partner and brother, Jeremiah, and in 1852 sold a half interest in his flour and grain business to his brother Robert, at the same time purchasing of the latter a half interest in the Pontiac Mill and Bleachery, and establishing the firm of B. B. & R. Knight, under which name the constantly and now marvelously extended manufacturing and mercantile interests of the brothers have ever since been carried on. They soon retired from the flour and grain trade to devote their entire time to the manufacture and sale of cotton goods, and the immense business which they have built up from small beginnings is now the largest of its kind in the world. They own and operate under various corporate names no less than twenty-one cotton mills - excepting only a limited interest owned by outsiders in two of the mills- in nearly as many different and widely scattered villages of Rhode Island and Massachusetts, with an aggregate capacity of eleven thousand looms and over four hundred thousand spindles, and employing nearly seven thousand operatives. The principal of these mills are: In Rhode Island, the Natick Mills at Natick, Royal and Valley Queen Mills at River Point, Arctic Mill at Arctic, Pontiac Mill and Bleachery at Pontiac, White Rock Mill at Westerly, Clinton Mill at Woonsocket, Grant Mill at Providence, Lippitt Mill at Lippitt, Fiskeville Mill at Fiskeville, and Jackson Mill at Jackson ; and in Massachusetts the Hebron Mill at Hebronville, the Manchaug Mills at Manchaug,  the Readville  Mill at Readville, and the Dodgeville Mill at Dodgeville. The vast manufacturing property of the Messrs. Knight comprises fifteen entire villages, absolutely separate and independent from each other as regards their community interests, and includes some seventeen hundred or more tenements occupied by employees, besides large tracts of farming lands upon which they conduct extensive operations. Stores are maintained by the corporations in the respective communities, which are conducted upon the same careful system as in the case of the mills, and whose aggregate sales constitute alone a business of extensive proportions Independent of all other operations and interests, the Messrs. Knight carry on a mammoth mercantile business, in the sale of the goods of their own manufacture. They have no accounts with commission houses upon which they can draw, but sell their goods direct to the trade and carry the accounts of all their customers.  Their principal store is in Worth Street, New York, and they have branches or agencies in Boston, Philadelphia, Baltimore and other cities, the operations of all being directed from their central office in Providence. The firm also owns a controlling interest in the Cranston Printing Company at Cranston, formerly the property of the A. & W. Sprague Manufacturing Company, known as among the most extensive works of the kind in the country, and have other large and diversified interests, both as a firm and individually. Mr. B. B. Knight has rendered efficient public service as a state legislator and as a member of the city government of Providence.  He served as Alderman from the sixth ward in 1865-66-67, was chairman of the Finance Committee of the Aldermanic Board, and has been twice elected to the General Assembly. He has been President of the Butchers' and Drovers Bank almost ever since its organization in 1853, and is a Director in several insurance companies and other business organizations and institutions. Mr. Knight was married, in 1842, to Miss Alice W., daughter of Elizur W.  Collins of Johnston, R. I., who died February 8, 1850, leaving three children, all now deceased. He married, second, in December 1851, Phebe A., daughter of Abel Slocum of Pawtuxet, R. I.: they have had three children: Alice Spring, Henry Eugene (deceased) and Adelaide Maria Knight. Biographie Index


KNIGHT, Robert, manufacturer, and member of the firm of B. B. & K. Knight, Providence, was born in Old Warwick, R. I., January 8,. 1826, son of Stephen and Welthan (Brayton) Knight. In his childhood his father moved his family to Cranston, and the lad was put to work in the Cranston Print Works when but eight years of age. At ten years he became an employee in the cotton mill at Coventry, owned and operated by Elisha Harris, where he remained until he was seventeen, part of the time working fourteen hours a day for $1.25 a week. Early in 1843 he went to Providence and entered the store of his brother Benjamin as clerk.  Being desirous of securing an education, he followed this occupation but two years, and then, through the aid of a friend, spent the eighteen months following in the Pawcatuck Academy at Westerly. He next taught a district school in the town of Exeter four months, and in 1846 took a position as clerk in the factory store of John H.  Clark at Arnold's Bridge, now Pontiac. Mr. Clark was subsequently elected .United States Senator, at which time he leased his cotton mill and bleachery to Zachariah Parker and Mr. Knight for $5,000 a year, and in October 1850, the firm of Parker & Knight purchased the whole property from Mr. Clark for $40,000. The next year Mr. Knight bought his partner's interest and gave the village its present name of Pontiac. The main facts relating to his subsequent business career are narrated in the sketch of Benjamin Brayton Knight, wherein mention more or less detailed is made of the origin, development and present extent of the immense business con-trolled and operated by the brothers Benjamin B.  and Robert under the firm name of B. B. & R.  Knight. Robert Knight has been distinctively a business man, never having held any public office, but devoting his time and energies exclusively to business affairs.   He was a Director in the National Bank of Commerce, Providence, from 1867 to 1884, when he was elected President, which office he now holds. He was an incorporator of the People's Savings Bank, was elected Vice-President in 1874, and in 1884 became its President. He has also been connected officially with other banking institutions and several insurance companies, and was for several years a Director in the New York, Providence & Boston Railroad Company. Mr. Knight was married, March 5, 1849, to Miss Josephine Louisa, daughter of Royal A. and Hannah C. (Parker) Webster, of Providence : they have had nine children, of whom five are now living: Josephine E., Webster, Clinton Prescott, Sophie and Edith Knight. Biographie Index

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