Providence County Biographies
Providence County Biographies
S
SAWIN, Isaac Warren, homoeopathic physician, Providence, was born in Dover, Mass., December 30, 1823, son of Joel and Mary (Battelle) Sawin. He comes of old New England stock, his ancestor Thomas Sawin having emigrated from Boxford, county of Suffolk, England, and settled in New England between 1647 and 1653. He received his early education in the public schools of Massachusetts, supplemented by private teaching and self-culture. He studied medicine under Dr. P. T. Bowen of Providence, and Dr. C. \V. B. Kidder, then of Providence but now located in New York, who was lecturer on surgery and demonstrator of practical and surgical anatomy at the medical college in Worcester, Mass. He graduated from the Western Homoeopathic College of Cleveland, Ohio, March n, 1857 In 1875 and 1876 he took a post-graduate course of clinical study in Vienna, Austria. In 1857 he established himself in Centredale, R. I., and remained there until 1867, when he removed to Providence, where he has since continuously practiced, except for the season spent in study in Europe. He was an Assistant Surgeon in the Rhode Island Militia under the militia law enacted during the war of the Rebellion. He was appointed Visiting Physician of the Rhode Island Homopathic Hospital in 18S6 and has been a Consulting Physician at the same institution since 1892. He is also a Consulting Physician in the Providence Homoeopathic Dispensary. He is a member of the Rhode Island Homoeopathic Medical Society and a senior of the American Institute of Homoeopathy. He married, January 1, 1849, Miss Olive S. Budlong; they have had children: Adaline Frances (deceased), Olive Ervina and Ida Estelle Sawin.
Source: Rhode Island Men in Progress - Submitted by Cathy Schultz
SENIOR, Daniel Widmer, manufacturer, Woonsocket, was born in Troy, N. Y., July 17, 1849, son of Francis and Elizabeth (Widmer) Senior. He comes from English stock on his father's side, and on the maternal side from Swiss ancestors. He was educated in the public schools of Troy, and prepared for college under the tuition of Rev. F. Widmer, of Fultonville, N. Y., following which he entered the office of the Troy Woolen Company. After serving as clerk in the office a few years he went into the mill of the company, to learn the practical and mechanical end of the business. Afterwards he studied the art of fancy weaving and designing, and finally took up the manufacture of fancy woolen and worsted goods, rising from weaver to overseer and from overseer to superintendent. He was Superintendent of the Livingstone Mills, Bristol, Pa., from September 1884 to September 1887, and since the latter date has held the position of Superintendent of the Harris Woolen Company's mills at Woonsocket. He has just started in business for himself, as a member of the firm of Cole, Senior & Co., manufacturers of fine kerseys, meltons and fancy cassimeres. Mr. Senior is vice-president of the Woonsocket Business Men's Association, and is a member of all the Masonic bodies, was Eminent Commander of Woonsocket Commandery Knights Templar from October 1893 to October 1895, High Priest of Union Royal Arch Chapter, and has passed through the several offices of the Blue Lodge. He is a Republican, but has never held political office. He was married. May 12, 1870, to Miss Mary J. Button, of Schaghticoke, N. Y., who died July 8, 1884 ; two children were born to them, both of whom are living: Clare E. and Frank W. Senior, the latter now a student at the Philadelphia Dental College.
Source: Rhode Island Men in Progress - Submitted by Cathy Schultz
SMITH, Charles Sherman, M. D., Providence, was born in Douglas, Mass., October 16, 1863, son of Dr. John Derby and Susan (Anthony) Smith. He comes of good medical ancestry. His grandfather, Dr. Nathan Smith, founded the Medical School of Dartmouth College, filled for nearly twenty years the chair of surgery in the Medical School of Yale College, and gave large aid as a lecturer in establishing similar schools at Bowdoin College and at the University of Vermont. Nathan Smith was a farmer's son, and at sixteen shouldered a musket to protect Vermont homesteads from Indian attack during the Revolutionary war. At the close of that period he found a fitting mate in Sarah, daughter of General Jonathan Chase who fought with Stark at Bennington and drew up the terms of surrender for Burgoyne after the battle of Saratoga, and granddaughter of Samuel Chase who joined the Continental army when near seventy years of age. Dr. Nathan Smith's practice extended throughout New England and Canada. He was the second American surgeon to perform ovariotomy, and his method was the one that is best approved at the present time. He had four sons, all of whom followed the profession of their father. Dr. David S. C. H. Smith was formerly a practising physician in Providence, and was an accomplished botanist and entomologist. Dr. Nathan R. Smith, of Baltimore, Professor of Anatomy and Surgery in the University of Vermont at the youthful age of twenty-eight, was soon called to the chair of anatomy in Jefferson College, and later to the chair of surgery in the University of Maryland, where he remained until the ripe age of eighty. He counted among his early pupils, Drs. Gross and Atley. In lithotomy alone he performed successfully three hundred operations. His Baltimore students affectionately styled him the " Emperor of Surgeons," and his exhaustive treatise on the surgical anatomy of the arteries is of itself an enduring monument to his name. Dr. James M. Smith was a beloved and successful practitioner in Springfield, Mass., for nearly twenty years; he met his death in the Norwalk railway disaster, and was succeeded by his son, Dr. David P. Smith. Dr. John Derby Smith was a Yale graduate of 1832, and studied both theology and medicine; he never engaged in private practice, but during the Rebellion served as surgeon at Fairfax Seminary Hospital, and after the war, became surgeon in the navy. At the age of sixty-two he was placed upon the retired list, and spent the remainder of his days in private life at his country home in Bridgewater, Mass. Of Dr. Nathan Smith's fifteen grandsons, nine became physicians, of whom the older and more widely known are Dr. Nathan Smith Lincoln, of Washington, D. C.; Dr. Allan Smith of Baltimore, Md.; and the late Dr. David P. Smith, of Springfield, Mass., the latter occupying at his death the same chair of surgery that his grandfather had filled so many years before him. Of the third generation six have already been added to the medical profession. Dr. Charles Sherman Smith's mother came from a Rhode Island family even more numerously supplied with physicians than was his father's. The subject of this sketch is therefore, in three generations, one of twenty physicians on his father's side, some of whom were of national fame, and one of twenty-five on his mother's side. He acquired his early education in the district schools and at the Bridgewater High School. He graduated from the Medical College of the University of New York in the spring of 1S92, being among the twenty selected for an honor list from a class numbering one hundred and sixty-members. Following his graduation he stood first among nine in a competitive examination for the position of Interne at the Rhode Island Hospital, remained in that institution until May 1894, and three months later opened an office in Providence. An unusual amount and variety of surgical work has come to his hands during his three years' residence in that city, requiring and testing all the qualities of a true surgeon. As he has said, water will boil and bichloride will destroy germs anywhere, and some of his best use of the surgeon's knife has been in the treatment of hernia and appendicitis in the midst of surroundings that might well dismay the looker on. Dr. Smith was so fortunate while Interne as never to lose a typhoid patient, a result which he attributes largely to a discreet, and yet a more than usually persistent, treatment by the sponge. In devising ingenious appliances fur the relief and cure of spinal and hip diseases he has brought into play inherited mechanical skill. He is an ardent believer in the possibility of arrest of lung disease in its earlier stages, and the sufferings of motherhood have led him to study closely how to reduce them to the greatest extent possible. Lately he has made a successful debut as a laparotomist. He is intensely devoted to his profession, and waits patiently for the larger successes which come slowly but surely to those who set for themselves a high standard of professional and personal honor. Dr. Smith is a member of the Masonic fraternity, the Providence Medical Association and the Rhode Island Medical Society. He is unmarried.
Source: Rhode Island Men in Progress - Submitted by Cathy Schultz
SPRAGUE, Albert Gallatin, M. President of the State Board of Health, was born in Providence, November 22, 1836, son of Albert G. and Mary (Fiske) Sprague. His grandmother on the paternal side, Amy (Williams) Sprague, was descended in direct line from Roger Williams. He received his early education at Peirce Academy, Middleboro, Mass., and entered Jefferson Medical College at Philadelphia, graduating in 1859. He started the practice of medicine in Warwick, R. I., in 1866, and has since practised there to the present time. Dr. Sprague is President of the State Board of Health, of which he has been a member since its organization in 1878. He was a Representative to the General Assembly in 1886-87, and has been Health Officer of the town of Warwick since 1887. In the army he served as Assistant Surgeon in the Tenth and Seventh regiments Rhode Island Volunteers, from May 1862 to the close of the war in 1865. He is a member of McGregor Post G. A. R. of Phenix, R. I., also of the Warwick Club, the Providence Press Club and the Providence Athletic Association. In politics he is a Republican. Dr. Sprague was married, November 22, 1859, to Miss Ellen T. Duncan of North Brookfield, Mass.; they had two children: Albert D. and Mary E. D. Sprague, both deceased.
Source: Rhode Island Men in Progress - Submitted by Cathy Schultz
SPRAGUE, Nathan Brown, musician and composer, Providence, was born in Greenville, R. I., April 25, 1864, son of John S. and Lelotina (Phetteplace) Sprague. He received his early education in the public schools and in the English and Classical schools of Providence. He was early attracted to musical studies and pursued them in Providence, Boston and New York, and under leading masters in England and Germany, acquiring a thorough knowledge of the principles of both vocal and instrumental harmony. Since 1881 he has taught the pianoforte, organ, the cultivation of the voice and musical theory in Providence, having a large clientage. As a composer, Mr. Sprague has produced four complete operas, two of which have been performed, about fifty songs, some of which have been very popular, a large amount of church music, and many pieces for violin, piano and orchestra. He is the organist and director of music at Grace Episcopal Church, Providence, conductor of the Narragansett Choral Society of Peacedale, R. I., President of the Rhode Island Music Teachers' Association, also a member of the executive committee and organist and pianist of the Arion Club, the leading musical association of Providence. He is a member of the Athletic and Press clubs of Providence, the Boston Cadet Club, and of the Masonic order. He married, June 24, 1884, Miss Lydia A. Irons; they have one son, Stanley Sprague.
Source: Rhode Island Men in Progress - Submitted by Cathy Schultz
STAPLES, William Bead, of Providence, Rhode Island, died in that city, October 19, 1868. He was born in Providence, October 10, 1798. In the fifteenth year of his age, he entered Brown University and graduated in 1817. He studied law with the Hon. Nathaniel Searle, and was admitted to the bar in 1819. In November, 1821, he married Rebecca M. Power, eldest daughter of Nicholas and Anna (Marsh) Power, by whom he had two children, both of whom died young. His wife died September 14, 1825. In October, 1826, he married his second cousin, Eveline, the only daughter of Levi and Susan (Howe) Eaton, of Framingham, Massachusetts, by whom he had eleven children. His wife and six children survived him, namely Henry, Rebecca, who married the Rev. Edward L. Drown, of New Haven, Connecticut, William, Samuel, Levi, and Charles.
In June, 1835, Mr. Staples was elected Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of Rhode Island, and in November, 1854, he was appointed Chief Justice of that court. On account of ill health he resigned the office March 5, 1856. His objection to capital punishment was so strong that he would not allow
himself to be a candidate for the office of Chief Justice till the law, requiring such punishment, was repealed. In January, 1856, he was elected secretary and treasurer of the Rhode Island Society for the Encouragement of Domestic Industry, which position he held at the time of his death. In September, 1862, he received from Brown University the honorary degree of Doctor of Laws. Judge Staples was quite distinguished as a lawyer. In 1835 he wrote the second volume and in 1843 the fifth volume of the Collections of the Rhode Island Historical Society. He also prepared in 1845 "Documentary History of the Destruction of the Gaspee," compiled for the Providence Journal, and in 1847, "The Proceedings of the First General Assembly for the Incorporation of Providence Plantations, and the code of laws adopted by that Assembly in 1647." In 1859 he published "A Collection of Forms —every man bis own conveyancer." For several of the last years of his life, Judge Staples was engaged in writing a history of the State Convention of 1790, and left an unfinished manuscript of nearly four hundred pages. This work was undertaken in response to a resolution of the General Assembly.
As an antiquary, Judge Staples left behind him few if any equals in Rhode Island. His knowledge of the early history of that State was probably greater than that of any living man. He was one of the fotinders of the Rhode Island Historical Society, and for many years he was its Librarian and Secretary. He was a vice-president of that society at the time of his death. As a jurist, Judge Staples was not, perhaps, so eminent for his legal attainments as for his earnest desire to reach the actual truth of the case. He labored for a righteous result, rather than for a verdict gained by sharp though legal practice. In his religious views, he sympathized with those entertained by the Society of Friends. He professed a firm, unwavering faith in the Redeemer of the world. In lus domestic relations, Judge Staples was an example of conjugal tenderness, and of paternal
anxiety for the highest welfare of his children. Judge Staples was elected a corresponding member of this Society in 1846.Submitted by Christine Walters
STUDLEY, John Edward, manager of real estate corporations, Providence, was born in Worcester, Mass., November 13, 1S52, son of John Moore and Julia Ann (Gill) Studley. The Studleys are an old English family found in Kent and Yorkshire, the scat of the family in the latter county being Studley Park. There were two families of this name in New England at an early date, one in Boston and one in Sandwich, Mass. The Providence Studleys descended from the Boston branch, and among their ancestors was Benjamin Studley who was a lieutenant in the Massachusetts troops during the war of the Revolution, and was a Selectman in Hanover, Mass., in 1778. The subject of this sketch received his early education in the public schools of Worcester, Mass., Brooklyn, N. Y-, and Providence, R. I. He graduated from the high school in Providence, May 5, 1869. His early training was all of a business character. Much of his spare time out of school was employed in a grocery store in the vicinity of his home, and later in vacations and on Saturdays he was employed in the store of Eddy & Studley. In September 1869 he was engaged as clerk in one of the freight offices of the New York, Providence & Boston Railroad. A few years later his employer accepted an important office with the Providence and New York Steamship Company, and at his request he accompanied him as a cashier, and later was appointed head clerk of the company. In 1877 he took the position of book-keeper and confidential clerk of Amos D. Smith & Company, then a large cotton manufacturing firm operating the Franklin Manufacturing Company and the Providence Steam Mills. While in their employ he married the eldest daughter of William H. Low, a man who in his line of business of leasing and improving real estate had done much to build up the business centre of the city. In 1881 Mr. Low died suddenly and at the request of his heirs Mr Studley resigned his position with Amos D. Smith & Company, and assumed the management of the estate of William H. Low. This management has been very successful and the estate has grown largely in value, so much so that it was deemed advisable to incorporate it. Consequently in 1889 The William H. Low Estate Company was chartered, and since then the business has been carried on under that name. At the present time he holds the office of President and Treasurer of the company. In 1895 the Studley Land Company was incorporated and he was chosen President and Treasurer; a large business block was erected on Weybosset street known as the Studley Building. He is also President of the Weybosset Investment Company, and Director in the Providence Gas Company, the Manufacturers' National Bank, the Atlantic National Bank and the Atlantic Mutual Fire Insurance Company of Providence. He has always been so deeply engaged in business that he has uniformly declined to accept public office, although for years solicited to do so, until 1894, when he accepted the nomination for Representative in the General Assembly, to which he was elected, and re-elected the succeeding year, serving on the Judiciary Committee. On his nomination the Providence Daily Journal said : "J. Edward Studley of Ward 9 is the strongest man on the ticket, and could have had the party nominee for Mayor long ago had he desired." In politics he is a Republican. He is a member of Adelphoi Lodge A. F. & A. M., in which he has held all the offices, including that of Master, also a member of Providence Royal Arch Chapter, of Providence Council Royal and Select Masters, and of St. John's Commandery Knights Templar. He is a Scottish Rite Mason, thirty-second degree, and a member of the Ancient Arabic Order of Nobles of the Mystic Shrine, also a member of the Providence Press Club, the West Side Club, the Providence Athletic Association, the Pomham Club of which he was Treasurer for one year and President for two years, the Squantum Association and the Societv of the Sons of the American Revolution. He is a Companion of the second class of the Military Order of the Loyal Legion, Massachusetts Commandery. He married, November 21, 1878, Miss E. Lillie Low; they have had three children : Ethel, Earle Stowell (deceased) and William Low Studley.
Source: Rhode Island Men in Progress - Submitted by Cathy Schultz
STEVENS, Grenville Smith, homoeopathic physician, Providence, was born in Raynham, Mass., July 10, 1829. His father was a merchant, and he spent his early youth on the farm and in attendance at the public schools. In 1848 he entered Brown University from which he graduated with the degree of A. M. in 1852. He had early adopted medicine as his profession, and during the vacations of his college course he pursued his preliminary studies in the office of Drs. Barrows and Graves, eminent physicians of Taunton, Mass. Immediately after his graduation he entered the office of Dr. A. Howard O'Kie, Providence, as a student. In 1853 he attended a course of medical lectures in Pittsfield, Mass., and afterward entered the College of Physicians and Surgeons in New York, from which he graduated with the degree of M. D. in 1854. His first service as a physician was in Chicago during the cholera epidemic, when his health gave way and he returned East. In August 1854 he opened an office in Providence, where he soon gained a successful practice. After thirteen years of practice his health again failed under his exacting labors, and he retired to his farm, where he remained for two years. In 1869 he returned to Providence and resumed the practice which he has continued since. Dr. Stevens has been much interested in religious matters, and was the originator and one of the founders of Trinity Methodist Episcopal Church, Providence. He is a member of the Masonic Order, and of various medical associations. He was one of the founders of the Rhode Island Homoeopathic Society and its first Secretary. He married Miss Hannah Wheaton Smith, and subsequently Mrs. Lydia Browning White; he has no children.
Source: Rhode Island Men in Progress - Submitted by Cathy Schultz
STINESS, John Henry, Providence, Justice of the Supreme Court, is a native of Providence, where he was born August 9, 1840, son of Philip Bessom and Mary (Marsh) Stiness. Judge Stiness is descended from sturdy English stock; the name originally being Staines, pronounced in two syllables, and changed to Stiness in America. The family settled in Marblehead, Mass., and during the Revolutionary war Samuel Stiness, the great-grandfather of Judge Stiness, served in the famous regiment recruited mainly among the fishermen of Marblehead and vicinity, called " The Amphibious Regiment," commanded by Colonel — afterward Brigadier General — John Glover. The grandfather of Judge Stiness was a sea-captain and during the war of 1812 served as sailing master in the two-gun schooner Growler, attached to the squadron under command of Capt Isaac Chauncey in Lake Ontario. After the war Capt. Stiness removed to Smithfield, R. I., where he died in 1816. Philip Bessom Stiness, the father of Judge Stiness, was born in Marblehead, and in his early business life served as a clerk to the firm of which Samuel Slater, the famous founder of the cotton manufacturing industry in the United States, was a member at Slatersville, R. I. He afterward engaged in the business of calendering cotton goods at Woonsocket, and in a few years became interested in the manufacture of gimlet-pointed screws under a patent obtained by Cullen Whipple. He and Mr. Whipple founded the business in Providence in 1838, which resulted in the formation of the New England Screw Company. Mr. Stiness died in 187 8. Judge Stiness's mother was Mary Marsh, daughter of John and Lucy (Blake) Marsh of Sutton, Mass., and a sister of George W. Marsh, a former Grand Master of the Grand Lodge of Rhode Island. Judge Stiness received his early education in the Providence public schools and at the University Grammar School. He entered Brown University in the class of 1861. At the close of the Sophomore year he took charge of the Hopkins Grammar School, North Providence (now the Branch Avenue Grammar School of Providence), and remained two years. At the outbreak of the civil war he received a commission as Second Lieutenant in the Second Regiment New York Artillery and served a year and a quarter, acting as Adjutant and occasionally as Judge Advocate. He did not graduate from the University but received the honorary degree of A. M. in 1876 and that of LL, D. in 1893. After his service in the army he studied law in the office of Thurston, Ripley & Co., and was admitted to the Rhode Island bar March 31, 1865, and to the United States Supreme Court in January 1875. In 1874-75 he was a Representative in the General Assembly from Providence, and was elected a Justice of the Supreme Court on April 13, 1875. Among the important decisions rendered by Judge Stiness was the one sustaining the validity of the trust deed given in behalf of their creditors by the A. & \V. Sprague Company. The Court of Errors in Connecticut had decided that the deed was invalid and this decision had been followed by Judge Shipman in the United States Circuit Court. Judge Stiness's opinion, however, was sustained in the United States Supreme Court, where it was contested by General Butler in the case of Evan Randolph vs. the Quidnick Company, and the Court of Errors in Connecticut modified its opinion so as to hold the mortgage valid for the assenting creditors, which was the main point at issue. Judge Stiness was one of the commissioners for the erection of the Providence County Courthouse in 1876-77. In 1882 he was elected a trustee of the Providence Public Library and is a member of the library committee. In 1893 he was elected President of the Brown University Lecture Association. He is President of the Rhode Island Historical Society, and member of the Churchmen's Club, the Phi Beta Kappa Society, the Brotherhood of St. Andrew, and other social and fraternal organizations. In politics Judge Stiness is a Republican. He married, November 19, 1868, Miss Maria E. Williams; they have two children : Flora Brown, wife of Henry C. Tilden, and Henry Williams Stiness.
Source: Rhode Island Men in Progress - Submitted by Cathy Schultz
SWAIM, Joseph S.
Swaim, Joseph S., clergyman, editor, was born May 2,1851, in Worcester, Mass. He was educated at Harvard and at Newton Theological Institution. Since 1877 he has filled pastorates in Claremont, N.H.; in Providence, R.I.; in Binghamton, N.Y., and in New Bedford, Mass. He is president of the New England Baptist Library Association. Since 1904 he has been editor of The Watchman, of Boston, Mass.
[Source: "Herringshaw's American blue-book of Biography: Prominent Americans of 1912- An Accurate Biographical Record of Prominent Citizens of All Walks of Life" - TK - Sub by FoFG]
SWEET, Benjamin
Benjamin Sweet was the son of Minor Sweet and Waity (Manton) Sweet, and was born in the town of Johnston, R. I., July 25, 1833. In 1857 he married Olive W. Gardiner, daughter of Nelson and Jane F. (Taylor) Gardiner, and five sons and seven daughters were born to them. When a boy he attended the schools of his native town until he was sixteen years old, when he entered the employ of his father as an apprentice to learn the carpenter's trade; and having a natural aptitude for that branch of industry, he made rapid progress, and in 1855 started in business for himself as contractor and builder, and met with considerable success, completing many large contracts, including the Stillwater woolen mill and other large mills and public buildings. He retired from active business in 1898.In May, 1863, during the Civil War, he joined Company A, Fifth Regiment, Rhode Island Militia and was appointed first lieutenant, but the regiment was not called upon to do active duty in the field. He took up his residence in Centerdal in April, 1864, where he has since resided. His party affiliations were always with the Republican party, and he was honored many times with public office. He represented the town of North Providence in the General Assembly in the years 1874 and 1875, and was a member of the town council for twenty-two years, serving in that office longer than any other man in the town. He was also elected upon the school committee and board of tax assessors for several years, and for many years has served upon the board of directors of the Union Free Library of Centerdaie. He was always interested in public improvements and the good and general welfare of the home of his adoption, the village of Centerdaie, where he still resides.
[Source: Annals of Centerdale in the Town of North Providence, RI, by Frank C. Angell, 1909, Transcribed by C. Anthony ]