collection is the sheep in a storm, No. 118, "Lost," souvenir of
Auvergne, by Auguste Frederic Albrecht Schenck, a member of the Legion
of Honor, born in the Duchy of Holstein, 1828. Those who love animals
can scarcely stand before it without tears.
Others besides Miss Wolfe have made notable gifts to the Museum of Art.
Mr. Cornelius Vanderbilt gave, in 1887, Rosa Bonheur's world-renowned
"Horse Fair," for which he paid $53,500. It was purchased at the auction
sale of Mr. A. T. Stewart's collection, March 25, 1887.
Meissonnier's "Friedland, 1807" was purchased at the Stewart sale by Mr.
Henry Hilton for $66,000, and presented to the museum. Mr. Stephen
Whitney Phoenix, who gave so generously to Columbia College, was also,
like Mr. George I. Seney, a great giver to the museum.
MISS MARY ELIZABETH GARRETT
Of Baltimore gave to the Medical School of Johns Hopkins University over
$400,000, that women might have equal medical opportunities with men.
President Daniel C. Gilman, in an article on Johns Hopkins University,
says, "Much attention had been directed to the importance of medical
education for women; and efforts had been made by committees of ladies
in Baltimore and other cities to secure for this purpose an adequate
endowment, to be connected with the foundations of Johns Hopkins. As a
result of this movement, the trustees accepted a gift from the committee
of ladies, a sum which, with its accrued interest, amounted to $119,000,
toward the endowment of a medical school to which 'women should be
admitted upon the same terms which may be prescribed for men.'
"This gift was made in October, 1891; but as it was inadequate for the
purposes proposed, Miss Mary E. Garrett, in addition to her previous
subscriptions, offered to the trustees the sum of $306,977, which, with
other available resources, made up the amount of $500,000, which had
been agreed upon as the minimum endowment of the Johns Hopkins Medical
School. These contributions enabled the trustees to proceed to the
organization of a school of medicine which was opened to candidates for
the degree of doctor of medicine in October, 1893."
Several women have aided Johns Hopkins, as indeed they have most
institutions of learning in America. Mrs. Caroline Donovan gave to the
university $100,000 for the foundation of a chair of English literature.
In 1887 Mrs. Adam T. Bruce of New York gave the sum of $10,000 to found
the Bruce fellowship in memory of her son, the late Adam T. Bruce, who
had been a fellow and an instructor at the university. Mrs. William E.
Woodyear gave the sum of $10,000 to found five scholarships as a
memorial of her deceased husband. Mr. and Mrs. Lawrence Turnbull endowed
the Percy Turnbull memorial lectureship of poetry with an income of
$1,000 per annum.
MRS. ANNA OTTENDORFER.
"Whenever our people gratefully point out their benefactors, whenever
the Germans in America speak of those who are objects of their
veneration and their pride, the name of Anna Ottendorfer will assuredly
be among the first. For all time to come her memory and her work will be
blessed." Thus spoke the Hon. Carl Schurz at the bier of Mrs.
Ottendorfer in the spring of 1884.
Anna Behr was born in Würzburg, Bavaria, in a simple home, Feb. 13,
1815. In 1837, when twenty-two years old, she came to America, remained
a year with her brother in Niagara County, N.Y., and then married Jacob
Uhl, a printer.
In 1844 Mr. Uhl started a job-office in Frankfort Street, New York, and
bought a small weekly paper called the _New-Yorker Staats-Zeitung_. His
young wife helped him constantly, and finally the weekly paper became a
daily.
Her husband died in 1852, leaving her with six children and a daily
paper on her hands. She was equal to the task. She declined to sell the
paper, and managed it well for seven years. Then she married Mr. Oswald
Ottendorfer, who was on the staff of the paper.
Both worked indefatigably, and made the paper more successful than ever.
She was always at her desk. "Her callers," says _Harper's Bazar_, May
3, 1884, "had been many. Her visitors represented all classes of
society,--the opulent and the poor, the high and the lowly. There was
advice for the one, assistance for the other; an open heart and an open
purse for the deserving; a large charity wisely used."
In 1875 Mrs. Ottendorfer built the Isabella Home for Aged Women in
Astoria, Long Island, giving to it $150,000. It was erected in memory of
her deceased daughter, Isabella.
In 1881 she contributed about $40,000 to a memorial fund in support of
several educational institutions, and the next year built and furnished
the Woman's Pavilion of the German Hospital of New York City, giving
$75,000. For the German Dispensary in Second Avenue she gave $100,000,
also a library.
At her death she provided liberally for many institutions, and left
$25,000 to be divided among the employees of the _Staats-Zeitung_. In
1879 the property of the paper was turned into a stock-company; and, at
the suggestion of Mrs. Ottendorfer, the employees were provided for by a
ten-per-cent dividend on their annual salary. Later this was raised to
fifteen per cent, which greatly pleased the men.
The New York _Sun_, in regard to her care for her employees, especially
in her will, says, "She had always the reputation of a very clever,
business-like, and charitable lady. Her will shows, however, that she
was much more than that--she must have been a wonderful woman." A year
before her death the Empress Augusta of Germany sent her a medal in
recognition of her many charities.
Mrs. Ottendorfer died April 1, 1884, and was buried in Greenwood. Her
estate was estimated at $3,000,000, made by her own skill and energy.
Having made it, she enjoyed giving it to others.
Her husband, Mr. Oswald Ottendorfer, has given most generously to his
native place Zwittau,--an orphan asylum and home for the poor, a
hospital, and a fine library with a beautiful monumental fountain before
it, crowned by a statue representing mother-love; a woman carrying a
child in her arms and leading another. His statue was erected in the
city in 1886, and the town was illuminated in his honor at the
dedication of the library.
DANIEL P. STONE AND VALERIA G. STONE.
When Mr. Stone, who was a dry-goods merchant of Boston, died in Malden,
Mass., in 1878, it was agreed between him and his wife, Mrs. Valeria G.
Stone, that the property earned and saved by them should be given to
charity.
While Mrs. Stone lived she gave generously; and at her death, Jan. 15,
1884, over eighty years old, she gave away more than $2,000,000. To
Andover Theological Seminary, to the American Missionary Association for
schools among the colored people, $150,000 each, and much to aid
struggling students and churches, and to save mortgaged homes. To
Wellesley College to build Stone Hall, $110,000; to Bowdoin College,
Amherst, Dartmouth, Drury, Carleton, Chicago Seminary, Hamilton, Iowa,
Oberlin, Hampton Institute, Woman's Board for Armenia College, Turkey,
Olivet College, Ripon, Illinois, Marietta, Beloit, Robert College,
Constantinople, Berea, Doane, Colorado, Washburne, Howard University,
each from five to seventy-five thousand dollars. She gave also to
hospitals, city mission work, rescue homes, and Christian associations.
For evangelical work in France she gave $15,000.
SAMUEL WILLISTON,
The giver of over one million and a half dollars was born at
Easthampton, Mass., July 17, 1795.
He was the son of the Rev. Payson Williston, first pastor of the First
Church in Easthampton in 1789, and the grandson of the Rev. Noah
Williston of West Haven, Conn., on his father's side, and of the Rev.
Nathan Birdseye of Stratford, Conn., on his mother's.
As the salary of the father probably never exceeded $350 yearly, the
family were brought up in the strictest economy. At ten years of age the
boy Samuel worked on a farm, earning for the next six years about seven
dollars a month, and saving all that was possible. In the winters he
attended the district school, and studied Latin with his father, as he
hoped to fit himself for the ministry.
He began his preparation at Phillips Academy, Andover, carrying thither
his worldly possessions in a bag under his arm. "We were both of us
about as poor in money as we could be," said his roommate years
afterward, the Rev. Enoch Sanford, D.D., "but our capital in hope and
fervor was boundless." Samuel's eyes soon failed him, and he was obliged
to give up the project of ever becoming a minister. He entered the store
of Arthur Tappan, in New York, as clerk; but ill health compelled him to
return to the farm with its out-door life.
When he was twenty-seven he married Emily Graves of Williamsburg, Mass.
She brought to the marriage partnership a noble heart, and every
willingness to help. The story is told that she cut off a button from
the coat of a visitor, with his consent, learned how it was covered, and
soon furnished work for her neighbors as well as herself.
After some years Mr. Williston began in a small way to manufacture
buttons, and the business grew under his capable management till a
thousand families found employment. He formed a partnership with Joel
and Josiah Hayden at Haydenville, for the manufacture of machine-made
buttons in 1835, then first introduced into this country from England.
Four years later the business was transferred to Easthampton.
Mr. Williston did not wait till he was very rich before he began to
give. In 1837 he helped largely towards the erection of the First Church
in Easthampton. In 1841 he established Williston Seminary, which became
a most excellent fitting-school for college. During his lifetime he gave
to this school about $270,000, and left it at his death an endowment of
$600,000.
He was also deeply interested in Amherst College, establishing the
Williston professorship of rhetoric and oratory, the Graves, now
Williston, professorship of Greek, and some others. "He began giving to
Amherst College," writes Professor Joseph H. Sawyer, "when the
institution was in the depths of poverty and well-nigh given over as a
failure. He saved the college to mankind, and by example and personal
solicitation stimulated others to give." He built and equipped Williston
Hall, and assisted in the erection of other buildings.
He aided Mary Lyon, in establishing Mount Holyoke Seminary, gave to
Iowa College, the Protestant College in Beirut, Syria, and to churches,
libraries, and various other institutions.
He was active in all business enterprises, as well as works of
benevolence. He was president of the Williston Cotton Mills, the First
National Bank, Gas Company, and Nashawannuck (suspender) Company, all at
Easthampton. He was the first president of the Hampshire and Hampden
Railway, president of the First National Bank of Northampton, also of
the Greenville Manufacturing Company (cotton cloths), member of both
branches of the Legislature until he declined a re-election, one of the
trustees of Amherst College, of the Westborough, Mass., Reform School,
on the board of an asylum for idiots in Boston, a corporate member of
the American Board, a trustee of Mount Holyoke Seminary, etc.
Mr. Williston overcame the obstacles of poor eyesight, ill health, and
poverty, and became a blessing to tens of thousands. His wife was
equally a giver with him. The Rev. William Seymour Tyler, D.D., of
Amherst College, said at the semi-centennial celebration of Williston
Seminary, June 14-17, 1891, "I knew its founders. I say 'founders,' for
Mrs. Williston had scarcely less to do than Mr. Williston in planning
and founding the building and endowing the seminary, as in all the
successful measures and achievements of his remarkable and useful life;
and the few enterprises in which he did not succeed were those in which
he did not follow her advice. I knew the founders from the time when, at
the beginning of their prosperity, their home and their factory were
both in a modest wing of Father Williston's parsonage, until they had
created Williston Seminary, made Easthampton, following out their great
and good work, and entered into their rest."
Five children were born to Mr. and Mrs. Williston, but all died in
childhood. They adopted five children, two boys and three girls, reared
them, and educated them for honored positions in life.
Mr. Williston died at Easthampton, July 17, 1874; and his wife, two
years younger than he, died April 12, 1885. Both are buried in the
cemetery at Easthampton, to which burying-ground Mr. Williston gave, at
his death, $10,000. He lived simply, and saved that he might give it in
charities.
JOHN F. SLATER AND DANIEL HAND,
AND THEIR GIFTS TO THE COLORED PEOPLE.
One of the best charities our country has ever had bestowed upon it is
the million-dollar gift of Mr. Slater, and the million and a half gift
of Mr. Hand, for the education of the colored people in the Southern
States. Other millions of dollars are yet needed to train these millions
of the colored race to self-help and good citizenship.
Mr. John Fox Slater was born in Slatersville, R.I., March 4, 1815. He
was the son of John Slater, who helped his brother Samuel to found the
first cotton manufacturing industry in the United States.
Samuel Slater came from England; and setting up some machinery from
memory, after arriving in this country, as nobody was permitted to carry
plans out of England, he started the first cotton-mill in December,
1790. A few years later his brother John came from England, and together
they started a mill at Slatersville, R.I.
They built mills also at Oxford, now Webster, Mass., and in time became
men of wealth. Mr. Samuel Slater opened a Sunday-school for his workmen,
one of the first institutions of that kind in this country.
His son John early developed rare business qualities, and at the age of
seventeen was placed in charge of one of his father's mills at Jewett
City, near Norwich, Conn. He had received a good academical education,
had excellent judgment, would not speculate, and was noted for integrity
and honor. He became not only the head of his own extensive business,
but prominent in many outside enterprises.
His manners were refined, he was self-poised and somewhat reserved, and
very unostentatious, thereby showing his true manhood. He read on many
subjects,--finance, politics, and religion, and was a good
conversationalist.
As he grew richer he felt the responsibility of his wealth. He gave
generously to the country during the Civil War; he contributed largely
to the establishment of the Norwich Free Academy and to the
Congregational Church in Norwich with which he was connected, and to
other worthy objects.
He determined to do good with his money while he lived. After the war,
having given largely for the relief of the freedmen, he decided to give
to a board of trustees $1,000,000, for the purpose of "uplifting the
lately emancipated population of the Southern States and their posterity
by conferring on them the blessings of Christian education."
When asked the precise meaning of the phrase "Christian education," he
replied, "that in the sense which he intended, the common school
teaching of Massachusetts and Connecticut was Christian education. That
it is leavened with a predominant and salutary Christian influence."
He said in his letter to the trustees, "It has pleased God to grant me
prosperity in my business, and to put it into my power to apply to
charitable uses a sum of money so considerable as to require the counsel
of wise men for the administration of it." In committing the money to
their hands he "humbly hoped that the administration of it might be so
guided by divine wisdom as to be, in its turn, an encouragement to
philanthropic enterprise on the part of others, and an enduring means of
good to our beloved country and to our fellow-men."
Mr. Slater's gift awakened widespread interest and appreciation. The
Congress of the United States voted him thanks, and caused a gold medal
to be struck in his honor.
Mr. Slater lived to see his work well begun, intrusted to such men as
ex-President Hayes at the head of the trust, Phillips Brooks, Governor
Colquitt of Georgia, his son William A. Slater, and others. He died May
7, 1884, at Norwich, at the age of sixty-nine.
The general agent of the trust for several years was the late Dr. A. G.
Haygood of Georgia, who resigned when he was made a bishop in the
Methodist Church. Since 1891 Dr. J. L. M. Curry of Washington, D.C.,
chairman of the Educational Committee, and author of "The Southern
States of the American Union" and other works, has been the able agent
of the Slater as well as Peabody Funds. Dr. Curry, member of both
National and Confederate Congresses, and minister to Spain for three
years, has been devoted to education all his life, and gives untiring
industry and deep interest to his work.
The Slater Fund is used in normal schools to fit students for teaching
and for industrial education, and much of it is paid in salaries to
teachers.
Dr. Curry, in his Report for 1892-1893, gives a list of the schools
aided in that year, all of which he visited during the year. To Bishop
College, Marshall, Tex., with 248 colored students, $1,000 was given for
normal work and manual training; to Central Tennessee College,
Nashville, with 493 students, $2,000, to pay the teachers in the
mechanical shop, carpentry, sewing, cooking, etc.; to Clark University,
Atlanta, Ga., 415 students, $2,500, mostly to the mechanical department,
etc.; to Spelman Female Institute, Atlanta, with 744 pupils, $5,000; the
institute has nine buildings, with property valued at $200,000.
To Claflin University, Orangeburg, S.C., with 635 students, both men and
women, $3,096, chiefly to the industrial department,--iron-working,
harness-making, masonry, painting, etc.; to Hampton Normal Institute,
Hampton, Va., the noble institution to which General S. C. Armstrong
gave his life, $5,000, for training girls in housework, to the
machine-shop, for teachers in natural history, mathematics, etc. There
are nearly 800 pupils in the school.
To the Leonard Medical School, Shaw University, Raleigh, N.C., $1,000.
The medical faculty are all white men. To the university itself, with
462 pupils, $2,500; to the Meharry Medical College, Nashville, 117 men
and four women, $1,500; to the State Normal School, Montgomery, Ala.,
with 900 students, $2,500; to the Normal and Industrial Institute,
Tuskegee, Ala., with 400 men and 320 women, $2,100, given largely to the
departments of agriculture, leather and tin, brick-making, saw-mill
work, plastering, dressmaking, etc. "This institution is an achievement
of Mr. Booker T. Washington, a graduate of Hampton Normal Institute,"
says the Report of the Commissioner of Education, 1891-1892. "Opened in
1881 with one teacher and thirty pupils, it attained such success that
in 1892 there were 44 officers and teachers and over 600 students. It
also owns property estimated at $150,000, upon which there is no
encumbrance. General S. C. Armstrong said of it, 'I think it is the
noblest and grandest work of any colored man in the land.'"
To Straight University, New Orleans, La., with 600 pupils, the Slater
Fund gave $2,000. The late Thomas Lafon, a colored man, left at death
$5,800 to this excellent institution; to Talladega College, Talladega,
Ala., with 519 students, $2,500; to Tougaloo University, Tougaloo,
Miss., with 392 students, $3,000. This institute, under the charge of
the American Missionary Association, began twenty-five years ago with
one small building surrounded by negro cabins. Now there are ten
buildings in the midst of five hundred acres. Most of these institutions
for colored people have small libraries, which would be greatly helped
by the gift of good books.
In nine years, from 1883 to 1892, nearly $400,000 was given from the
Slater Fund to push forward the education of the colored people. Most of
them were poor and left in ignorance through slavery; but they have made
rapid progress, and have shown themselves worthy of aid. The _American
Missionary_, June, 1883, tells of a law-student at Shaw University who
helped to support his widowed mother, taught a school of 80 scholars
four miles in the country, walking both ways, studying law and reciting
at night nearly a mile away from his home. When admitted to the bar, he
sustained the best examination in a class of 30, all the others white.
The _Howard Quarterly_, January, 1893, cites the case of a young woman
who prepared for college at Howard University. She led the entire
entrance class at the Chicago University, and received a very
substantial reward in a scholarship that will pay all expenses of the
four years' course.
Mr. La Port, the superintendent of construction of the George R. Smith
College, Sedalia, Mo., was born a slave; he ran away at twelve, worked
fourteen years to obtain money enough to secure his freedom, is now
worth $75,000, and supports his aged mother and the widow of the man
from whom he purchased his freedom.
The highest honor at Boston University in 1892 was awarded to a colored
man, Thomas Nelson Baker, born a slave in Virginia in 1860. The class
orator at Harvard College in 1890 was a colored man, Clement Garnett
Morgan.
DANIEL HAND
Was born in Madison, Conn., July 16, 1801. He was descended from good
Puritan ancestors, who came to this country in 1635 from Maidstone,
Kent, England. His grandfather on his father's side served in the War of
the Revolution, and his ancestors on his mother's side both in the old
French War and the Revolutionary War.
Daniel, one of seven boys, lived on a farm till he was about sixteen
years of age, when he went to Augusta, Ga., in 1818, with an uncle,
Daniel Meigs, a merchant of that place and of Savannah. Young Hand
proved most useful in his uncle's business; in time succeeded him, and
became one of the leading merchants of the South. Some fifteen years
before the war Mr. Hand took into business partnership in Augusta Mr.
George W. Williams, a native of Georgia, who later established a
business in Charleston, S.C., Mr. Hand furnishing the larger part of the
capital. The business in Augusta was given in charge to a nephew, and
Mr. Hand temporarily removed to New York City.
When the Civil War became imminent, Mr. Hand went South, was arrested as
a "Lincoln spy" in New Orleans; but no basis being found for the charge,
was released on parole that he would report to the Confederate authority
at Richmond. On his way thither, passing the night in Augusta, he would
have been mobbed by a lawless crowd who gathered about his hotel, had
not a few of the leading men of Atlanta hurried him off to jail in a
carriage with the mayor and a few friends as a guard.
Reporting at Richmond, Mr. Hand was allowed to go where he chose, if
within the limits of the Confederacy, and chose Asheville, N.C., for his
home until the war ended, spending his time in reading, of which he was
very fond, and then came North.
The Confederate Courts at Charleston tried to confiscate his property,
but this was prevented largely through the influence of Mr. Williams.
Some years later, when the latter became involved, and creditors were
pressing for payment, Mr. Hand, the largest creditor, refused to secure
his claim, saying, "If Mr. Williams lives, he will pay his debts. I am
not at all concerned about it." The money was paid by Mr. Williams at
his own convenience after several years.
Mr. Hand had married early in life his cousin, Elizabeth Ward, daughter
of Dr. Levi Ward of Rochester, N.Y., who died early, as well as their
young children. Mr. Hand remained a widower for more than fifty years.