Part 9 (1/2)
Mr. Bradburn was in 1839 elected to the City Council from the Third ward.
As chairman of the Committee on Fire and Water he reorganized the Fire Department, which was then in a wretched condition, and, with the a.s.sistance of Mr. J. L. Weatherly, who was made Chief Engineer, and the aid of new laws, made it one of the most efficient of any at that time existing in the country. As chairman of the Committee on Streets, at that time an office of much responsibility and labor, he rendered the city valuable service.
In 1841, he was elected a member and made chairman of the Board of School Managers. This body was merged into the Board of Education, and for several years he filled the office of president. For thirteen consecutive years he served as member of the Board of School Managers and of the Board of Education, during much of which time he had almost unaided control of the educational affairs of the city. Mr. Bradburn succeeded in getting through the Legislature a bill authorizing the establishment of a High School, the first inst.i.tution of the kind, connected with the public schools, in the State of Ohio. A school of this character was started in June, 1846, and maintained in spite of fierce opposition. But there was no building to receive it, and its earlier years were spent in the bas.e.m.e.nt of a church on Prospect street, the room being fitted up by Mr. Bradburn and rented by the city for fifty dollars per annum.
Feeling strongly that he could render better service to the cause of popular education in the City Council than he could in the Board of Education, in 1853 he resigned his seat in the latter body and was elected to the City Council. When Ohio City was united with Cleveland, he was chosen president of the united Councils.
Having, on taking his seat in the Council, been appointed to a position on the Committee on Schools, his first and continuous efforts were directed to bringing the Council to provide suitable buildings, not only for the High School, but for all the schools of the city. In consequence of his earnest and persistent labors an ordinance was pa.s.sed authorizing a loan for school purposes of $30,000. The loan was negotiated at par without expense to the city. Mr. Bradburn, and the Building Committee, of which he was chairman, immediately made plans for the Central High School, and the Mayflower, Eagle and Alabama street Grammar schools, all of which were put under contract without delay, and finished under their supervision to the entire satisfaction of the Council and Board of Education. The teachers of the public schools in grat.i.tude for his services in the cause of education, induced Mr. Bradburn to sit to Allen Smith, Jr., for his picture, which was then hung in the hall of the Central High School. At a subsequent date the High School teachers presented him with a ma.s.sive gold-headed cane, engraved with a complimentary inscription, but this highly prized token was unfortunately lost, together with a number of other cherished mementoes and all the family pictures, in a fire which destroyed his residence in February, 1868. In the fire also perished a valuable library of over four hundred volumes, the result of a lifetime's collection, and Mr. Bradburn barely escaped with his own life from a third story window, being badly injured in the descent.
In public matters he has done but little during the past few years, devoting himself entirely to his business, but he may be seen on all occasions where the cause of popular education can be benefited by his presence. In 1848, he was the Whig candidate for Mayor, but, being ill at the time, gave the canva.s.s no personal attention, and was defeated by a few votes, the opponents of the High School, of whatever party, voting against him.
To Mr. Bradburn the credit belongs of procuring, after a hard battle against parsimony and prejudice, the establishment of the first free High School in the West.
Samuel Raymond.
Samuel Raymond was born in Bethlem, Connecticut, March 19, 1805. Like most of the sons of New England, his boyhood was pa.s.sed in plowing among the rocks on one of the stony farms of that rocky and hilly State. At the age of sixteen he commenced teaching the village school, and continued teaching for six years, a portion of that time being spent in New York State, in one of the many pretty towns that are scattered along on either side of the Hudson. Returning to Connecticut at the end of his six years'
trial of teaching, he was employed to keep the books of the old and wealthy firm of Messrs. A. & C. Day, dry goods commission merchants, at Hartford. The late Governor Morgan, of New York, was, at the same time, a salesman in the house.
In 1833, Mr. Raymond married Mary North, daughter of James North, of New Britain, Conn.
In the Spring of 1835, he determined to try his fortune in the Far West, away out in Ohio. With Kansas as the present geographical centre of the Union, it is difficult for us to conceive of the New Englanders' idea of the West at that time. It was something of an undertaking. It was a journey of weeks, not a ride of twenty-three hours in a sleeping coach or palace car. It meant long and tedious days of staging--a monotonous ride along the Erie ca.n.a.l from Schenectady to some point a little farther west, and finally, when the lake was not frozen over, the perils of lake navigation. In 1835, Cleveland, Erie and Sandusky were all struggling for supremacy. When Mr. Raymond got as far west as Erie, he thought that might be a good place for him ”to drive a stake,” but the number of newly made graves suggested to him, on second thought, the propriety of getting out of the place as speedily as possible. Cleveland at that time was beginning to put on city airs--Kellogg's great hotel (the American) was slowly going up. The only vacant store to be had by Mr. R. was a little wooden building on the site of the present Rouse block--a location at that time about as far out of town as it would be safe for a prudent merchant to venture.
Henry W. and Marvin Clark were a.s.sociated with him in business, under the firm name of Raymond & Clark.
Mr. Raymond was a merchant of more than ordinary business ability, a man of scrupulous exactness in his business dealings. His extreme conservatism in business management carried him safely through every commercial crisis.
Like most business men Mr. Raymond had but little time to devote to political discussions. He voted the Whig ticket as long as the old Whig party had an existence. In religions principles he was a Presbyterian, and united with the First Presbyterian Church in 1840, at that time under the pastoral charge of Rev. Dr. S. C. Aiken.
In the Winter of 1866, in compliance with his physician's advice, he took a journey south for the benefit of his health, which had been impaired by his unremitting devotion to business. In company with a party of friends from Cincinnati, he and his wife left Louisville for Havana, in January.
On the 2d of February a telegram was received by the remaining members of his family in Cleveland, informing them that Mr. Raymond was among the missing on the ill-fated steamer Carter, which was burned when within a few miles of Vicksburg.
When the alarm was given, Mr. Raymond and his wife were asleep. Hastily dressing themselves and providing themselves with life-preservers, they jumped through the cabin window, Mr. Raymond having a state-room door which he had wrenched from its hinges. Mrs. Raymond clung to a floating bale of hay and was saved after an hour of peril and suffering in the icy water. Nothing was seen of Mr. Raymond after he floated away from the wreck, clinging to the door. His death was mourned by a large circle of friends who appreciated his worth.
By diligence and economy he acc.u.mulated a valuable estate, leaving to his family property valued at two hundred and fifty thousand dollars.
Richard T. Lyon.
The first secretary of the Cleveland Board of Trade, and its president for the year 1869, Richard T. Lyon, is probably the oldest established merchant now doing business on the river. He arrived here in 1823, when there were but a few hundred people in the village, and for some time resided with his father-in-law, n.o.ble H. Merwin, on the lot now occupied by Bishop's Block, about where M. Heisel's confectionary store now stands.
In 1838, he entered as clerk in the forwarding house of Griffith, Standart & Co., at the foot of Superior street, continuing in that position until the Spring of 1841, when he formed a partners.h.i.+p with I. L. Hewitt, and carried on a forwarding and commission business on River street, under the firm name of Hewitt & Lyon. The partners.h.i.+p continued until 1847, when Mr.
Hewitt retired, and Mr. Lyon continued the business in his own name at 67 Merwin street, where he has remained until the present time. In the Spring of 1868, his son, R. S. Lyon, was taken into partners.h.i.+p, the firm name being changed to R. T. Lyon & Son. For a number of years Mr. Lyon has been the largest dealer of salt in the city, having had the agency of the salt works in western New York.