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Trails to the Past Washington County Rhode Island Biographies Men of Progress of Rhode Island and Providence Part 4 BENTLEY, Benjamin Courtland, contractor and builder, Westerly, was born in Westerly, May 2, 1841, son of Benjamin Wilbur and Mary Potter (Maxon) Bentley. His paternal grandparents were Benjamin Peckham and Hannah (Wilbur) Bentley, and his mother was a daughter of Jonathan and Nancy (Potter) Maxon. He was educated in the common schools of Westerly, and for many years has been a member of the firm of Randolph Bentley & Company of that place, contractors and builders, and dealers in builders' materials of all kinds. Mr. Bentley has been for fourteen years a member of the Town Council of Westerly and Chairman of the Board for six years, and a member of the Board of Trustees of School District Number One for two years. He is a member and Past Master of Franklin Masonic Lodge, member of Palmer Chapter of Royal Arch Masons, member and Past Commander of Narragansett Commandery Knights Templar, and member of Palestine Temple, Ancient Arabic Order of Nobles of the Mystic Shrine. He is also a member and President of the Westerly Business Men's Association. He was elected a member of the Rhode Island House of Representatives in April 1894, and Senator in April 1895. Politically he is a Republican. Mr. Bentley was married, February 14, 1867, to Miss Henrietta Clark ; they have had five children : Bertha. Benjamin Courtland, Jr., Maryetta, Anna Hancox (died August 18, 1877) and John Clark Bentley. PERRY, John Edward, M. D., was born in Wakefield, South Kingstown, R. I., May 28, 1847, son of John G. and Harriet T. (Hazard) Perry, and continues to make his home there. His father has twice been General Treasurer of the State of Rhode Island, and thirty years Town Clerk of South Kingstown. Both parents are living. Dr. Perry claims close relationship to Commodore O. H. Perry, the hero of Lake Erie, and to Commodore Matthew C. Perry, famed for the treaty that he negotiated with Japan, by which the ports of that country were opened to the world, being cousin to them, as is shown by the Perry genealogy as follows: Edward Perry, who came from England, had two sons, Samuel and Benjamin. From Samuel was descended his son James : his son John; his son John R.; his son John G.; and his son John E., the subject of this sketch. From Benjamin came his son Freeman, and his son Raymond, the father of the Commodores. Dr. Perry's early education was obtained in the public schools, and later in the Connecticut Literary Institute at Suffield, where he bore the honor of the Presidency of the Calliope Oval, the oldest society of the Institute. Determining to enter the professional ranks, young Perry attended the Yale Medical College, and later the College of Physicians and Surgeons in New York, a department of Columbia College, from which he graduated February 27, 1873. He commenced practice immediately in Wakefield, where he has since resided. His specialty is obstetrics, in which he has been eminently successful. A similar success, however, has attended his efforts in other departments of medicine, and has won for him a substantial practice and the character of an able, painstaking physician. A course of popular health lectures having been projected in South Kingstown in 1886, Dr. Perry delivered a lecture on hygiene and accompanied it with illustrations on the blackboard. Among other contributions to medical literature. Dr. Perry is the author of an article on the Pediculophobia," which he read before the Rhode Island Medical Society, and also an essay on " La Grippe," published in the Narragansett Times in 1890, in which he called attention to the disease that prevailed in 1842, and which was called "Tyler's Grip," after the then President of the United States. He also showed that it was closely related to the Southern "dengue" or break-bone fever, in which opinion he was sustained by Louise Fiske Bryson, M. D., of New York, and by the French Academy. Dr. Perry was elected a member of the Rhode Island Medical Society in 1874, and of the Providence Franklin Society (scientific) in 1875. He has been twice elected Master of Hope Lodge, A. F. & A. M., No. 25, is a member of the Grand Lodge, and of Franklin Chapter No. 7, A. F. & A. M. In June 1891 he was appointed by the Grand Master to represent Hope Lodge at the Centennial of the Grand Lodge held in Providence. Among the civil offices he has held is that of Deputy Town Clerk in 1869, Town Physician, and in 1891 the Governor appointed him Medical Examiner for the Second District of Washington county, for the term of six years. Dr. Perry was married. May 1, 1878, to Miss Elnora E. Crawford; they have one daughter: Harriet E. Perry.
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