250 and Counting

Tag: 1775 births

  • July 8, 1775: Judge William Davies

    Cover art for July 8, 1775: Picture of Judge William Davies. Creator unknown, via findagrave.com

    N.B. While it’s Mike recording today, I write this part and I’m still a little under the weather, so I’ll be brief again.

    It’s Cake and Candles today for William Davies, born in Savannah on this day in 1775. Davies enjoyed careers in both the legal and political fields, and appeared to do well in both of them.

    Also, my brain might be addled by the drugs the doctor gave me, but my calculation has him dying at the age of 54, so Mike was a little off, there. That’s probably why he teaches History and not Math.

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  • July 1, 1775: Cephas Thompson

    Cover art for July 1, 1775: Self-portrait of Cephus Thompson, 1830.

    Fun Fact: I say “Cephas Thompson” several times during this podcast, mostly because it’s fun to say.

    He wasn’t a formally-trained painter, but he had a good eye and some natural talent, and during his career he painted over 600 portraits, with roughly a fourth of those made entirely in Bristol, Rhode Island.

    Even after retiring from the itinerant artist life, he continued to work in Middleborough, Massachusetts until his death.

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  • June 29, 1775: Thomas Boyle, Privateer

    Cover art for June 29, 1775: Picture of Thomas Boyle, source unknown

    Thomas Boyle wasn’t born in Baltimore, Maryland, but when he was a young man he made it his home and became quite successful there, as a merchant marine and an overall businessman.

    And, of course, given Baltimore’s penchant for naming streets after historic people and events, there is a Boyle Street. It’s not very long; in fact you see the entire road in the photo below.

    In this picture the viewer is standing on Fort Avenue looking down toward Key Highway. The green structure in the background is the Baltimore Museum of Industry, and the Inner Harbor is just beyond that. Based on my research, Boyle didn’t live near this location; he’d settled in a part of town called Fell’s Point, which is on the other side of the harbor and about a mile to the east. If a person standing where the camera was for this photo turned to the right, they could probably see the entrance to Fort McHenry.

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  • June 19, 1775: The Father of Greenville

    Cover art for June 19, 1775: painting of Vardry McBee by William Garl Browne, Jr., 1854.

    Sometimes when you’re watching a movie or listening to music, you find yourself in the awkward position of separating the artist from the work, because it turns out that the artist has some shady stuff going on in the past, or even in the present. But the song/movie/book is just so good that you need to temporarily overlook that.

    Such is the case, we think, with Vardry Echols McBee, an entrepreneur and philanthropist who basically invented the town of Greenville, South Carolina. He was also a slave owner who sided with the Union but provided material assistance to the Confederacy.

    Mixed messages! Conflict of loyalty!

    But it’s also clear that he was instrumental in making the town of Greenville what it is today, even more than 150 years later. What’s more, by all contemporary accounts he did it “without pride, pretense or ostentation.”

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  • June 18, 1775: Orsamus Cook Merrill

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    Cover art for JUne 18, 1775: Daguerrotype of Orsamus Cook Merrill, ca. 1850-1860. Cropped from the original image in the Bennington Museum.

    It’s Cake and Candles today for a future State Representative of a future state.

    Orsamus Cook Merrill was born in Connecticut but moved to Vermont coincidentally the same year that the Vermont Republic was admitted to the Union as our fourteenth state. He spent the rest of his life in the Bennington area, working in jobs as diverse as newspaper editor or publisher, postmaster, attorney and Engrossing Clerk for the Vermont House of Representatives before becoming a Representative himself.

    (For those not in the know: an Engrossing Clerk is responsible for preparing prints of intermediate drafts of bills that a governing body is considering before they vote at the next stage.)

    By most accounts, he represented his constituents well, and he was largely done in by shifts in the political winds. He died in 1865 and is buried in Bennington Centre Cemetery.

  • May 29, 1775: Nathan Cutler

    Cover art for May 29, 1775: Photo of Nathan Cutler, ca. 1850, photographer unknown.

    By all accounts, Nathan Cutler was an effective lawyer and legislator, as his frequent returns to the Massachusetts Legislature, and later the Maine House of Representatives, will attest.

    And when a governor of the State of Maine died, he was able to step into the role until the term of office expired.

    Cutler could have probably remained Governor, but he’d turned down positions before, so it’s entirely possible that he simply chose not to run again.

    Listen in, it’s an interesting story.

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  • May 21, 1775: David Woods

    Cover art for May 21, 1775: Map of Washington County, NY (detail), circa 1814.

    Like so many people who lived in upstate New York in the Revolutionary era, David Woods was an immigrant from Ireland when he came over with his family in 1775.

    New York was unusual compared to the other colonies in that the overwhelming percentage of the population was immigrants; as a result it became a bit of an enclave for people from the UK and the Netherlands, so Woods blended in well.

    As a result, we believe that although he wasn’t a politician for very long, he did a solid job, which doesn’t always stand out from the bigger picture.

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  • May 17, 1775: Daniel LeRoy

    Cover art for May 17, 1775: Portrait of Daniel LeRoy, slightly doctored by Claude. Original creator unknown.
    Actor Richard Kind

    Is it just me or does Daniel LeRoy look a lot like actor Richard Kind?

    Daniel LeRoy was born in upstate New York and started to put together a pretty good settlement, but an unfortunate choice on his part caused him to lose it all.

    So he moved west and rebuilt his life and, by most accounts, it’s reasonable to say that he did rather well in the Michigan Territory, and in the State after that area became our nation’s 26th.

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  • May 9, 1775: Jacob J. Brown

    Art for May 9, 1775: portrait of Jacob Jennings Brown by James Herring, ca. 1835.

    When it comes to the War of 1812, Baltimore and the Fort McHenry get to eat for free for a long time, because they get most of the good stories: the star-spangled banner and Francis Scott Key, the battle at North Point, the Shot Tower being briefly the highest structure in America, and so on.

    But there was a lot of fighting going on elsewhere, particularly in upstate New York, around the Great Lakes area, and General Jacob Brown was in the thick of it. He was a nationally-recognized war hero back in the day, but nowadays he’s largely forgotten. And more’s the pity.

    Listen in on a brief review of General Brown’s life.

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  • May 6, 1775: Mary Sherwood

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    Cover art for May 6, 1775: Mrs. Mary Sherwood, artist unknown.

    First, I think we need to address the elephant in the room that Mike brought up during this episode: Winona Ryder comes third out of four; Katharine Hepburn and Saoirse Ronan are way ahead.

    And let’s just pretend June Allyson didn’t happen.

    Mary Sherwood is one of those authors who, it appears, was fated to fade into obscurity after dying despite the huge popularity they enjoyed in life. It still happens today; ask anyone under 40 about Erma Bombeck or Kurt Vonnegut.

    Fortunately you have us to learn a little bit about her and her work.

    [powerpress}