Extractions from
JOURNALISM IN CALIFORNIA
by John P. Young
Pacific Coast and Exposition
Biographies
CHRONICLE PUBLISHING COMPANY
San Francisco, California, 1915
Thank you to Beth Humphrey for transcribing and submitting
this material.
Herbert Fleishacker (page 266)
Many things make up those attributes that aid a
man toward success. Not the least of these is inherent ambition,
coupled with strict honesty of purpose and performance. All these
are recognized characteristics of Herbert Fleishhacker, president of the
Anglo & London Paris National Bank, financier, capitalist and officer
or director of a number of sound corporations.
The career of Herbert Fleishhacker has been a succession
of hard-won achievements. He did not acquire, at the outset, the
“higher education.” But the lack of it at no time seemed a handicap;
he did things just the same.
A native of San Francisco, born here November 2,
1872, Mr. Fleishhacker was sent to school for eight years by his parents,
Aaron and Delia (Stern) Fleishhacker, and attend Heald’s Business College
one year more. Then fifteen years old he became a bookkeeper in his
father’s paper business, but after about a year and a half entered the
manufacturing end. Here was his start and he made the most of it.
After four years as a paper manufacturer he went
into the sales department and became a traveling salesman for the concern.
As he traveled he kept his eyes open for opportunities. In Oregon
he saw the need of paper mils.. This led to his establishment of
the first mills of the kind in the State, at Oregon City. The project
was a success and later he organizes a large lumber company near Eugene,
Oregon. Again success attended him.
Returning to California, Mr. Fleishhacker organized
and promoted the Electric Power Company at Floriston. Gradually he
acquired or built other properties in various parts of the State, among
them the Truckee River Electric Company, which was sold in 1909 for nearly
$2,000,000, and the Sacramento Valley Power Company, which brought something
like $1,000,000 in 1912. At one time he had more than a dozen power
plants and factories in operation and still retains his interest in a number
of them.
From promoter Mr. Fleishhacker easily became a banker.
In 1907 he accepted the manager ship of the London, Paris & American
Bank of San Francisco. Then, on March 1, 1909, this institution absorbed
the Angle-California Bank, Ltd., and became the Anglo & London Paris
National Bank of today; he went up a step higher and became vice-president
and manger. He was chosen president of the bank in March 1911, upon
the resignation from that position of S. Greenbaum. When Mr. Fleishhacker
became a part of the London Paris & American Bank in 1907, the deposits
were $4,500,00 and is the largest institution of its kind west of the Rocky
Mountains. It is progressive, conservative, and makes a specialty
of exchange business.
In addition to his presidency of the Anglo &
London Paris Bank, Mr. Fleishhacker is president of the Northwestern Electric
Company, the Floristion Land & Power Company and the Reno (Nevada)
Traction Company; is vice-president of the Anglo-California Trust Company,
the Central California Traction Company, the City Electric Company and
the Great Western Power Company, and a director of the Crown-Columbia Paper
Pulp Company, the Swiss-American Bank, the Floriston Pulp & Paper Company
and a number of others.
Not in the least interesting of Mr. Fleishhacker’s
characteristics is his love of home, and within the family circle he is
usually to be found in his leisure moments. He was married August
9, 1905, to Miss May Belle Greenbaum and the couple has three children,
Marjorie, Herbert Jr. and Alan Howard.
Not to mention Mr. Fleishhacker’s connection with
the Panama-Pacific International Exposition would be to omit an important
work he has done on behalf of San Francisco and California. He has
given of his co-operation to the great world show from its very start;
he has backed it with money and with brains. It is significant that
the financial side of the Exposition is handled through the Anglo &
Long Paris National Bank, that the vast daily receipts are hauled to the
bank’s doors in a steel vault on wheels every evening.
Herbert Fleishhacker is a type of man whom it would
be well to pattern after. To men such as he San Francisco owes much—how
much one can readily conceive in a comparison of the city as it exists
today, with its skyscrapers and modern business concerns and as it existed
nine years ago in its ashes, with business almost annihilated by the great
conflagration.
Henry Engels (page 264)
Some four decades ago Henry Engels, then a young
man, was associated with his father and brothers, the former the late Henry
Engels, in the foundry and metal business in San Francisco. In those
days the firm paid from 35 to 40 cents a pound for pig copper and the chief
source of supply was the Lake Superior copper region. The demand
for copper was increasing, thanks to the great improvements then being
made in electrical appliances and machinery, and attention began to be
directed more and more to the value of the red metal.
These conditions form the impetus for the years
of effort that followed on the part of the Engels family—years that have
resulted in the organization of a the Engels Copper Mining Company and
the operation by it of one of the most valuable holdings of its kind on
the Pacific Coast. Thus does supply follow demand and development
projects materialized when once a field has been opened for them.
To go back a bit, the younger Henry Engels, now
president of the Engels Copper Mining Company, is a native of San Francisco,
born February 2, 1854. He attended the private and public schools
of this city, and to round out his education attended and was graduated
from Heald’s Business College, which at that time was in the old Platt’s
Hall where the Mills building now stands and where the mining company’s
offices are located. From business college Mr. Engel’s went into
his father’s foundry.
The rapid approach of a crisis in the copper situation,
studied long and earnestly by the elder Engels and his sons, finally determined
them to prospect and, if possible, to develop a copper mine. They
had valuable experiences in mining and metallurgy, and were well equipped
for that which they set out to do.
After several years of prospecting the Engels located,
in the late ‘70s, in Lights Canyon, Plumas County, where the present mines
are situated. Realizing that to develop a district they must live
in it and give their entire time to it, and that if there is to be any
progress it must follow as the result of hard work, they proceeded to do
both. This hard work and close study of geologic conditions later
made it possible for them to promote their enterprise with success.
Before this time, in the sixties in fact and even
as early as the fifties, prospectors had made their way into the Plumas
County district. Both alluvial and lode mining for gold was done
and in 1865 rich copper ore being discovered, a small smelter was built
and run intermittently for four years. The amount of copper that
alloyed the god was not attractive to the pioneer prospectors, however,
and they soon joined the rush to Virginia City, where the god and silver
excitement was intense. For years hardly any further attention was
given to the Lights Canyon district until the Engels family located there.
To quote from the Mining and Scientific Press, of
a recent issue:
“At that time there
was no railroad nearer than Reno, 150 miles away, and mining in such a
remote locality was difficult, though a fair tonnage of rich ore was mined
and shipped to Swansea. The discoverer and his sons, Henry and William
Engels, who have been largely responsible for the later development of
the mine, were courageous and persistent, however, and the assessment work
necessary to hold the property was so directed as to block our constantly
increasing amounts of ore.”
The Engels were determined to prove a good mine
before seeking outside capital. At first there was no boom in copper,
and few seemed to realize the great future for the metal, so it was difficult
to interest investors. The railroad that Kennedy surveyed and planned
to build through Plumas County failed, and it was only after twenty years
that the Western Pacific began to build the line. But during this
time actual work by the Engles proved the existence of rich ore in great
quantities, and in 1906 their company was organized. Then followed
more persistence in opening up the mine with small capital; but the stockholders
were kept together by their faith in the promoters, and in the manager,
Mr. E. E. Paxton, and by providing more funds placed the property on a
profitable basis. Today the mine is paying well and is being enlarged
so as to double the present capacity.
The mill of the Engles mine is unique in that it
is the only one yet built in which no other process than flotation is used
for the recovery of copper.
William A. Nunlist (page 309)
One can find almost any number of lawyers "who might
be said to have a "business mind," who see everything- from a business
stand-point only and weigh its feasibility on such scales alone. There
also is any number of lawyers who view every proposition solely from the
lawyer's Standpoint, that of an action at law. But those men are few indeed—in
San Francisco they might be counted on the fingers of one hand—s o constituted
and so trained as to be act-ually efficient in the dual capacity of lawyer
and business man.
One of these latter is William A. Nunlist. He, by
a combina-tion of faculties, wide and varied experience and peculiar train-ing,
is the businessman’s lawyer in the sense in which present conditions in
the United States have defined "business man." Not the lawyer who does
all his work in court or in an office, but one equally at ease in either
place; not he who liti-gates every con-troversy, but the one who helps
his clients primarily to avoid lawsuits and then to win them if they cannot
be avoided.
To settle everything, regardless of the result,
is no more good business than to litigate every question that arises. The
sole end of a lawsuit is to accomplish substantial justice. If this end
can be attained by avoiding controversy or as a matter of negotiation after
a difficulty has arisen, it is so much the more advantageous to all concerned;
if it cannot, litigation is the last resort. This balancing of the considerations
of practical business expediency against the probable outcome of litigation
is the province of the business lawyer.
Born January 26, 1876, at Springfield, Ohio, Mr.
Nunlist was educated in the public schools of Ohio, at Wittenberg College,
Ohio Northern University, University of Chicago, the law school of the
same institution and the John Marshall law school at Chicago. He was not
sent to school—he went. Consequently he had to finance his going.
He did this first as a stenographer, then successively
as a teacher of mathematics, as an expert stenographer and secretary to
managing officials of business corporations, and finally by filling various
corporation positions, the direct result of former employments. Thus was
gained a practical experience with twenty-one or twenty-two different kinds
of businesses, among them retail dry goods, stationery and furniture; manufacturing
agricultural im-plements, radiators, carriages, railway cars, iron foundries
and steel mills, structural iron work, meat packing, railroads, oil, insurance,
contracting, bank and trust companies, newspapers and hotels. He came to
California to adjust the losses and wind up the affairs of two Insolvent
insurance companies and has since made San Francisco his home.
Americans are essentially a business people.
They have been such since the first colonies were planted here and will
remain so for an indefinite time to come. Taking into consideration our
peculiar institutions it can be satisfactorily shown that we are likewise
a law abiding people, much agitation to the contrary not-withstanding.
The great difficulty always is to know what the law is. As our development
becomes more complex, legislation piles up.
Generally speaking, our laws are made by men who
have had little or no actual experience with modern business conditions.
They are interpreted by lawyers in their counsel
to clients, then by judges who must decide controversies. In both cases
this inter-pretation and application must be made by men almost invariably
trained for something altogether different from practical bus-iness. As
a result business affairs are hampered by ill-considered legislation, retarded
by advice and counsel, which lacks compre-hensiveness, and positively repressed
by ensuing needless and costly litigation. A final decision, when rendered,
often reflects the fundamental question in such a curious way as to make
the whole matter even more uncertain than it was at the beginning.
The need for the businessman's lawyer is thus obvious.
He is the businessman and sees the questions involved from that standpoint;
and he is the lawyer, who must find the way to solve business difficulties
by recognized legal principles. Considera-tions such as these, in the opinion
of the businessmen themselves, explain why there is a growing tendency
on their part to seek and make use of sound legal-business advice. It also
accounts, to a large extent, for the success of Mr. Nunlist, a man who
has the needed dual capacity.
Mr. Nunlist has had a great deal of litigation before
the Interstate Commerce Commission and also in the Federal courts. He represents
a number of corporations as general counsel, and his practice takes him
all over the State. Always, however, he is the businessman's lawyer.
J. R. MOLONY (page 300)
Organization undoubtedly has more to do with the
success of a venture in which several hands and minds are needed to carry
on the work, than any other one factor. This is coming to be recognized
more and more as the years of the Twentieth century slip by. Young men,
active and intelligent with their new ideas system and efficiency, are
everywhere superseding the older ones who have allowed themselves to run
along in the proverbial rut.
When J. R. Molony became Western branch manager
for the Aetna Life Insurance Company at San Francisco, this was practically
in its infancy, although the office had been established eight years ago.
The company stood in seventh place in volume of business in this territory.
By reason of his organization methods Mr. Molony put his company into first
place in 3 years later, in 1913, and the Aetna has since been doing the
largest casualty business in this territory. Since 1910 Mr. Molony has
increased the business just an even thousand percent.
Mr. Molony is a native of Humboldt, Nebraska. He
was born September 25, 1881, son of R. S. Molony, an attorney at law, and
Katherine (Ungles) Molony. His paternal ancestors were of the Knickerbockers
of New York and his mother's people were prominent in Virginia.
Following his graduation in 1899 from the Humboldt,
Nebraska, High School, Mr. Molony entered the University of Nebraska.
He spent six years in the law and academic departments but did not take
either degree, as circumstances made it necessary for him to leave school.
He became connected with the Lincoln Star, and for several months filled
a position in its circulation department.
Mr. Molony's introduction to the insurance business
came in 1905, when he went to St. Paul and became a solicitor for the Employers'
Liability Assurance Corporation of London. After about a year he was placed
in the claims department as an adjuster, but after a few months was made
superintendent of agencies. Nine months more saw him in charge of the Minneapolis
office as district manager, where he remained two years.
In the spring of 1909 Mr. Molony accepted a better
place with the Aetna Life Insurance Company at Hartford, Connecticut. He
was executive special agent and his work was largely of a general agency
organization nature in the accident and liability department. Coming to
San Francisco April 1, 1910, to fill the vacancy caused by the resignation
of the Western branch manager, he has remained here ever since. His territory
embraces California, Nevada, Arizona and the Hawaiian Islands.
The reason of Mr. Molony’s gratifying success in
his new field is that he has applied Eastern intensive cultivation methods
through a young aggressive organization built up from raw and green material.
He is a strong champion of the college-trained man and his present organization
has a college man at the head of every department. Nearly all of
these men are under thirty years of age. In his office he has, in
addition to the Aetna Life Insurance Company’s accident and liability Company
and the Automobile Insurance Company of Hartford, both subsidiaries of
the Aetna Life.
Ever since he came to San Francisco Mr. Molony has
been actively engaged in organizing all the casualty underwriting companies
doing business here into the Casualty Underwriters' Association, which
was formed in 1911. He has been chairman of all its committees on
organization and legislation, and as such has helped bring about a general
co-operation to meet new problems growing out of the employers' liability
and workman's compensation laws.
In 1913 Mr. Molony initiated the opposition to the
Boynton Act before the California Legislature by the employers and property
owners of the State and Chambers of Commerce. The fight was admittedly
the hardest ever made on a bill at Sacramento; some 300 amendments were
added, and this was the only thing that gave California fair liability
rates.
Although his forbears for seven generations back
were in politics, Mr. Molony finds no time for such activities except in
a way that affects his business. His social activities also are limited
to membership in the Bohemian Club and in the Alpha Tau Omega and Theta
Nu Epsilon fraternities. He is unmarried.
Mr. Molony believes that a man, to succeed, must
choose his field and then devote himself wholly to advancing himself in
this sphere. And the fact that he has followed his own belief explains
his rapid progress.
Louis Christian Mullgardt (page 227)
Louis Christian Mullgardt is emphatically an original
designer. The freshness of his vision and the novelty of many of his technical
expedients will be manifest to the most superficial observer, while at
the same time it is equally obvious that his innovations have not been
conceived in any perversity of spirit. He is a man who goes his own way,
because he has to go his own way."
This, in part, is what Herbert D. Croly, author
and editor, wrote of Mr. Mullgardt after he had made a critical study of
his work several years ago. Mr. Croly's analysis accounts for the originality
and beauty of Mr. Mullgardt's "Court of the Ages" and other structures
designed by him at the Panama-Pacific Inter-national Exposition. The Court
of Ages has commanded such universal expressions of approval by architectural
critics and public alike in respect to distinctive composition, style and
infinite detail, as to insure its permanency in the annals of architecture.
The general theme of the Court of the Ages is based
on the world's geological and progressional development depicted in architecture,
sculpture and mural paintings. It is an epitome of the world's progress.
The architectural style of the court is characteristically
Gothic without bearing any traceable evidence of having been directly influenced
by any other similar preceding style. It is a
distinctive evolution in architectural design, self-evidently based
on a colossal historical theme and in style traditionally ecclesiastic.
The preliminary studies, working drawings and every
individual detail of ornament and moldings were produced by the architect
himself, including final life-size clay models for each architectural detail.
He was responsible for the selection of Frank Brangwyn,
the famous London artist who painted the eight notable murals symbolizing
Earth, Air, Fire and Water, which are placed in the four corners of the
cloister.
The work of Mr. Mullgardt consistently divulges
its creator's wide versatility. It cannot be classified as
belonging to any previous architectural style, but there is something about
it, perhaps its very quality, that betrays its authorship.
This is proven by Mr. Mullgardt's work in the various
exhibit palaces. For the W. P. Fuller Company he designed a Moorish temple
of most original composition and exquisite detail. For the Union Oil Company
of California exhibit he used as a theme four huge dinosaurian symbolizing
the origin of the oil industry, geologically speaking. His design for the
Transvaal gold display consisted of an immense gold obelisk showing cubically
the world's annual output of gold. Two balls on adjoining pedestals terminating
an exedra represented the Transvaal output as com-pared to that of the
rest of the world. The design was strikingly Egyptian. In contrast to all
this was his "Home of Redwood" in the South Gardens, designed for the redwood
industries of Sonoma, Mendocino and Humboldt Counties.
Mr. Mullgardt came from London to San Francisco
in 1905. He is a native of Missouri. His earlier years were spent in St.
Louis, where he began the study of architecture. Subsequently he continued
his studies in Boston and at Harvard. Following this he went to Chicago,
where he first became engaged as designer of important work
In 1893 Mr. Mullgardt entered private practice in
St. Louis. In 1895 he made an extended trip to Europe for further study.
In 1902 he was commissioned to go to Manchester, England, and in 1903 to
London, to execute important work there and in Scotland. The results of
his labors for the next two years before coming to San Francisco, could
they be noted here in detail, would be most complimentary testimonials
of his genius.
To his accomplishments as an architect and sculptor
should be added those of artist and writer, he having contributed liberally
to magazines, particularly those relating to architecture.
Mr. Mullgardt is president of the Califorrnia Society of Etchers, vice-president
of the San Francisco Society of Artists, director of the San Francisco
Art Association, ex-president of the
San Francisco Society of Architects and member of the International
Fine Arts Jury of Award of the Panama-Pacific International Exposition.
C. P. Murdock (page 305)
This is indeed the young- man's age. Now, perhaps
more than ever before, is there opportunity for the aspiring young man
to advance himself to a position of trust and responsibility and compel
recognitions assets. Time was when the youthful were frowned
upon by their elders; a man was supposed to live several decades before
he became really "settled." But the world moves and to youth is left the
task of supplying most of the energy—because youth is prone to accept the
element of risk.
C. P. Murdock, vice-president and general manager
of the Realty Syndicate of Oakland and officer or director in a number
of California corporations, is still a young man. But for a dozen years
or more he has been identified with big projects in positions calling for
executive ability and prompt action. He is typical of the percussive young
man of the day.
Mr. Murdock is a native of San Francisco. He was
born August 29, 1881, the son of George H. Murdock, head of the real estate
and insurance firm of George H. Murdock & Son, and Susan L. (Fuller)
Murdock. After attending the public schools of Alameda, in 1895 he entered
the California School of Mechanical Arts in San Francisco. The institution
was founded by James Lick and Mr. Murdock's class was the second to attend
there.
In 1898 Mr. Murdock entered his father's real estate
and insurance business. He remained a partner in the firm until 1907. The
San Francisco fire of 1906 caused the concern to remove to Oakland, but
it moved back to the city as soon as possible and for a time maintained
offices on both sides of the bay. Mr. Murdock is still interested in a
financial way with his father in the firm. An opportunity to advance
came in 1907 when Mr. Murdock associated himself with the Great Western
Power Company as assistant to the superintendent in the construction of
the monster power plant on the north fork of the Feather River. He
was closely associated with the executive side of the project until its
completion in 1909.
Still larger things loomed ahead. In May 1909, he
became assistant secretary to F. M. Smith, the "borax king," inn connection
with all the vas Smith holdings. This gave him valuable experience in the
realm of capital and he made the most of it. The direct result was that
in January 1913, when Nat M. Crossley resigned from the managership of
the Realty Syndicate, a Smith property, Mr. Murdock was chosen for the
vacant position. Ever since he has assumed the details of the concern's
business. Just what this means may be understood from the fact that
the Realty Syndicate is the largest owner of land in Ala- County. It controls
the San Francisco-Oakland Terminal Railways; owns the Syndicate building
in Oakland, valued at $1,500,000, and also owns several million dollars
worth of subdivided property, including 5,000 acres contiguous to the present
developed portions of Berkeley and Oakland. Some of the most fashionable
and popular of the trans b a y residential sections it has put on the market.
Mr. Murdock is vice-president and general manager
of the Realty Syndicate and also of the Realty Syndicate Company, the latter
a concern growing out of the reorganization of the original corporation
several months ago. In several other Smith holdings he has positions also.
He is president of the Idora Park Company, owned by the Realty Syndicate
Company; vice-president of the Twelfth Street Realty Company of Oakland;
and director of the West End Consolidated Mining Company with properties
at Tonopah, Nevada, and of the Sorosis Fruit Company.
Mr. Murdock has long been prominent in tennis circles and is well known
up and down the Pacific Coast for his playing. He has won several championships
and still plays tennis as a recreation from business.
Although he is deeply interested in the civic advancement
of Oakland and the East Bay community Mr. Murdock is not one of those that
spend their time talking, leaving very little time for really doing things.
Rather, he remains in the background, no less a "booster" but accomplishing
his public work quietly and without ostentation. He is a member of the
Oakland Commercial Club as well as the Athenian Club and the Sequoia Country
Club. He is affiliated with no fraternal organizations.
Mr. Murdock was married in March 1912, in Alameda to Catherine War-
field Wells. The couple have one son, C. P. Murdock, Jr.
Thomas R. Murphy (page 306)
It is not always—not even often—that a man lives
to see his greatest ambition realized. That Thomas R. Murphy has done so
makes him a man in whose career there is a general interest.
The ambition of Thomas R; Murphy, Chief Engineer
of the San Francisco Fire Department, has been to make that department
rank -with the very best in the world. He has done so, in point of organization,
equipment and general efficiency, and in some particulars he has made it
the peer of them all.
San Francisco has the only central fire alarm station
of its kind in the world. It is absolutely isolated—therefore, absolutely
safe. Never again can a fire like that great con-flagration of April 1906,
cripple the department by destroying the very center of its system. Let
everything else go up in flames and Chief Murphy will still have his station
in Jefferson Square from where he can marshal his force of blue-clad fighters.
Chief Murphy only recently won this new and isolated
central station, after a struggle before the Supervisors lasting three
years. But the result -will be worthy of the effort, for when his other
plans for strengthening the system have been carried out he will have caused
the lowering of fire insurance rates, it is promised, at least two per
cent.
Born in San Francisco August 31, 1870, Murphy entered
the Fire Department as a relief driver in 1892. The late lamented Chief
Dennis Sullivan appointed him captain of Chemical Engine 6 in 1897, and
in 1905 he was again promoted by Chief Sullivan, this time to battalion
chief.
The disastrous fire of 1906, which caused the death
of Chief Sullivan, gave Murphy his opportunity to distinguish himself.
It was he who directed the work that saved the only block left standing
within the burned area of the city. The direct result of this coup was
the recommendation of Murphy for promotion by Acting Secretary of the Navy
Newberry, and Murphy was appointed second assistant chief engineer under
Chief Shaughnessey. In 1910, upon the retirement of Shaughnessey, the Board
of Fire Commissioners made Murphy chief.
When an entire city endorses a public official's
administration, it means that that official knows his business. Chief Murphy
has been endorsed, unmistakably, by every fire insurance interest of San
Francisco, by every newspaper, by the Civic League of Improvement Clubs,
the Downtown Association an by dozens of other commercial, political and
civic bodies. And the reason is not difficult to find.
Chief Murphy has injected efficiency into the Fire
Department of San Francisco. When he became chief engineer the only motor
apparatus the department was provided with was the chief's automobile.
Today nine engine companies are completely motorized, as are five truck
companies and three chemical engine companies; and each of eleven battalion
chiefs and two assistant chiefs have automobiles. In order to have men
competent to handle this motor apparatus the Chief started a school of
automobile instruction at the Corporation Yard, where the firemen take
turns attending. Where drills once were desultory, they are now given everyday
in the year except Sundays. In addition to the regular weekly company drills
at headquarters, where the men familiarize themselves with tools and apparatus,
there is a drill school at Seventeenth and Harrison streets, where new
and old members of the department alike are given instruction in their
turn, each one attending about four days a month. Here they work with pompier
ladders, extension ladders, hose, high-pressure valves, and in actual rescue
work with life guns, lifelines and nets. There is also a department of
first-aid instruction, and eventually the "flying squad" wagon will be
equipped to respond to any first aid emergency. In addition, each fireboat
has six two-hour oxygen helmets, with two each for the truck companies
in the congested district.
During Chief Murphy's regime the city's fire alarm
system has been increased more than twenty-five percent. There are now
672 boxes, and the Chief says eventually there will be 1,050. New firehouses
have been built and more are contemplated for the near future. The high-power
system has been extended until now there are 889 high-power water hydrants
capable of developing 335 pounds pressure to the square inch. In all these
improvements economy has been the keynote quite as much as has efficiency.
And as for his "human" side, Chief Murphy has collected
a fund of $17,000 with which he will perpetuate, by a monument in the Civic
Center, the memory of his stanch friend, the late Chief Sullivan.
Major General Arthur Murray, U. S. A. (page
307)
Nearly any normal man can make something of himself
in this world with the proper encouragement. It is the worthwhile man who
ac-complishes it in the face of disheartening- opposition.
When Major General Arthur Murray, Commander of the
Western De-partment and Third Division of the United States Army, started
on his career, he met anything but assurance. His ambition was to
gain entrance to West Point in a competitive examination. But when he announced
himself as a competitor to the Congressman of his home district, Bowling
Green, Missouri, he-was told the expense would be useless, that his lack
of education made it impossible for him to win.
"I'll stand the expense,” replied the 19-year-old
youth in a way characteristic of him. "I want to take the chance, for I'll
at least find out how much the other contestants know." He took the chance.
Also, he won the appointment.
Major General Murray was born in Bowling Green,
April 29, 1851. He was graduated from West Point in 1874 with second honors
and made a second lieutenant of artillery. In 1880 he captured first honors
in graduation from the Artillery School at Fort Monroe, Virginia. There
followed his marriage at Fort Monroe to Sara Wetmore De Russy, and a year
later he returned to West Point, this time as instructor—later becoming
assistant professor—in the department of philosophy. He remained until
1886.
Promoted to first lieutenant of artillery, Murray
was then made captain and acting judge advocate of the Department of Missouri.
He also studied law, which in 1895 gained for him admittance to the bar
before the United States Circuit Court at St. Louis. Also, he wrote "A
Manual for Courts Martial," published privately in 1887 but in 1895 revised
and issued by the War Department. It remains today the sole Army guide
in minor courts martial.
There followed transferences and more promotions.
In 1891 he was acting adjutant general of the Department of Dakota. In
1893 he wrote "Mathematics for Artillery Gunners," still used as a textbook.
He also designed the artillery post at Fort Hancock, N. J., and, after
declining a commission as captain and quartermaster, went to Yale as professor
of military science.
In December, 1908, following the out-break of the
Spanish-American war, Murray became acting judge advocate for the First
Army Corps at Matanzas, Cuba, and was in charge of civil govern-ment affairs
of the provinces of Matanzas and Santa Clara. The latter part of 1899 he
spent in Washington, in charge of all legal matters relating to the military
branch of the Army.
As Colonel o f the 43rd Volunteer Infantry, in 1900
and 1901, Murray was active in the Philippines. He was governor of the
islands of Samar and Leyte, and then commander of the First District, Department
of the Visayas. His regiment participated in 451 fights.
Declining, in 1901, another advancement, Murray
was given charge of the School of Submarine Defense at Fort Totten, N.
Y. His development of submarine defense brought him appointment as
lieutenant colonel, October 1,1906, and on the same day as brigadier general
and chief of artillery. Meanwhile he had helped design and constructs the
land fortifications of the United States, and his reward came in March
1911, when President Taft made him major general, which brought about his
present command.
After all, a man's success is measured by what those
closest in touch with him say of his work. Former President Roosevelt,
speaking of General Murray to George Griswold Hill, then chief of
the New York Tribune's Washington bureau, said: "Major General Murray
is, in my opinion, not only one of the ablest soldiers in the Army but
he has to my knowledge done more for the Army than any other man in the
War Department or anywhere else. He is essentially a man who does things,
who gets results."
In a similar vein was former President Taft's characterization.
"I don't know but I ought to make Murray a major general in order that
his great ability may be exerted for the benefit of the entire military
establishment," said Taft. "I am a little disposed to believe he has too
much force and enterprise to be confined to one branch of the service."
As a still more visible testimonial Major General
Murray, who reached the retiring age in April 1915, was kept on the active
list, by a special order unique in Army history, until the close of the
Panama-Pacific Exposition, December 4, 1915.
Joseph Rothschild (page 318)
Personal popularity, the direct result of a magnetism
that evidences itself in him at all times, has been the keynote of the
success of Joseph Rothschild, San Francisco, attorney at law, not only
in his profession but in the business field and in public life. He has
the gift of compelling attention. In the law he is noted for his clear
analysis of the problems involved, and for the simple but logical manner
in which he presents his cause at bar.
From his earliest years Mr. Rothschild has enjoyed
that popularity which distinguishes him. He was born in San Francisco October
5, 1857, son of Henry Rothschild and Hannah (Mossheimi) Rothschild, and
after attending the public schools entered Yale
College from which he was graduated in 1879. At the conclusion of his
course he was presented with the Seales of Justice, a distinctive Yale
honor, as the most popular member of his class.
After leaving Yale Mr. Rothschild took the examination
for admittance to the bar in Connecticut and was granted his credentials.
He did not practice there, however, but returned to San Francisco and was
admitted before the Supreme Court of Calif-ornia. In 1895 he was admitted
to practice also before the Supreme Court of the United States.
The professional career of Mr. Rothschild has been
in all branches of the civil law. He has specialized in commercial litigation,
and today is considered one of the leading authorities in this branch.
He has a large and strong clientele, largely composed of important mercantile
firms, some of which he has represented as general counsel for nearly a
quarter of a century. Since March 1911, he has been senior partner in the
law firm of Rothschild, Rosenheim, Schooler & Miller.
As already intimated, Mr. Rothschild does not believe
that flowery language, meaningless phraseology, strengthens a cause at
bar. His arguments are made up of facts rather than of surmises. And how
forcefully he presents these facts may be gleaned from the number of notable
victories he has won in the courts of California and the United States.
For many years Mr. Rothschild has been in the front
rank of public-spirited citizens of San Francisco. Following the disastrous
fire of April 1906, he was one of those who determined the future of the
Western metropolis by beginning the work of rebuilding almost before the
ashes were cold. Not a moment did he waver in his determination to help
rehabilitate the city of his birth. Soon after the fire he helped organize
the South of Market Improvement Association, and continuously since has
served as its president. He is also a member of the executive committee
of the San Francisco League of Improvement Clubs and of the Greater San
Francisco Committee. Furthermore, he succeeded A. W. Scott, Jr.,as president
of the Exposition Committee of Improvement Organizations, composed of 100
improvement clubs of San Francisco, which so materially aided the Board
of Directors of the Panama-Pacific International Imposition to make the
1915 world exposition a success. In other posts, civic and political, he
has distinguished himself. He was a member of the San Francisco Board of
Education from 1889 to 1890; and was president of the Democratic County
Committee, and vice-president and acting chairman of the Democratic State
Central Committee, from 1902 to 1906. On March 6, 1913, he was elected
president of the San Francisco Tunnel League, a property owners' association
affected by the assessment for the Fillmore Street Tunnel, which was expected
to cost $4,000,000 to $7,000,000. The organization defeated the construction
of the tunnel and caused to be abandoned all proceedings in reference thereto.
Fraternally, Mr. Rothschild has been highly honored,
especially by Jewish organizations. He is past-grand president of the Independent
Order B'nai B'rith; past-president of Unity Lodge, B'nal B'rith; past-president
of the Independent Order of Free Sons of Israel and a member of the National
Grand Lodge of the U. S-; past-president of the Board of Relief, B'nai
B'rith, and former vice-president of the Young Men's Hebrew Association.
He was delegate in 1890 to the Constitution Grand Lodge, B'nai B'rith,
at Richmond, Virginia, and there was elected judge of the Court of Appeals
of the Grand Lodge and re-elected in 1895 at Cincinnati, Ohio, serving
as judge of that court for ten years. He also served ten years as president
of the B'nai B'rith Hall Association. He is a member of San Francisco chapter.
Royal Arch Masons; Doric Lodge No. 216, P. & A. M.; past-president
of the Native Sons of the Golden "West; past-president of Golden Shore
Council No. 5, United Friends of the Pacific, and belongs to the Yale and
Concordia clubs.
Francis V. Keesling (page 285)
One thinking of an exponent of the law naturally
associates with the profession the idea of a man whose interest lies wholly
in the interpretation of Blackstone. The impression of versatility is not
present, and it is somewhat surprising to find a lawyer taking part in
anything so "frivolous" as, for instance, baseball, or in something so
practical as military affairs.
Francis V. Keesling, in his career as a lawyer,
has found pleasure in both these side pursuits. In his student days at
Stanford University he was baseball manager. During the San Francisco fire
of 1906 he was major of a National Guard battalion that won great praise
for its work in preserving order and in saving life and property. The law,
however, is his forte and in this and in semi-public life he has rendered
such service that his friends, at the State primary election in 1914, ran
him for the Republican nomination for Governor and gave him a flattering
vote of 65,028.
Born in San Jose February 17, 1877, Mr. Keesling
was educated in the public schools of the Garden City, being graduated
from the San Jose High School in 1894. He was a member of the Gamma Eta
Kappa fraternity and represented the High School in a debate against the
State Normal School. Entering Stanford University he secured the degree
of A. B. in 1898. As he went along his personal popularity increased. He
was first president of his class; was editor-in-chief of the Stanford Quad
in 1898, the year he was baseball manager; and held membership in the Sigma
Nu fraternity, the Phi Delta Phi, Skull and Snakes Honor Society and the
Press Club.
Following his graduation Mr. Keesling conttinued
his study of the law in the office of William M. Pierson and Crothers &
Crothers. On December 31,1898, he formally was admitted to the bar.
Prior to this, in 1898, he spent three months organizing
a campaign to secure for Stanford University a constitutional amendment
correcting vital defects in the foundation trusts and grants and making
provision for exemption from taxation by the Legislature. In 1899 he obtained
from the Legislature a submission to the people of the desired amendment.
He kept at work in the educational campaign until late in the summer of
1900, when he toured the State. The final result was the adoption of the
amendment by the voters and the giving of untold benefits to the University.
Mr. Keesling enlisted as a private in the National
Guard of California, Battery D, First Artillery, in July 1901. He was elected
a lieutenant in March 1902, and in December of the same year was made a
captain in command of the battery. He was specially detailed as a representative
of the State to the joint maneuvers of the United States Army and the National
Guard at West Point in 1903, and subsequently was elected associate member
of the Military Service Institution.
The fire of 1906 brought a test of his efficiency.
He was elected major of the First Battalion, Coast Artillery, whose work
was unequalled by any Army or National Guard force on similar duty. In
the California archives and elsewhere are official reports setting forth
this fact. The late E. H. Harriman, the railroad king, paid a well-deserved
tribute -when he said:
"These men left their private affairs and their
homes at a critical time, many laboring under the distress of personal
loss, and gave their service to their State in her hour of need. Praise,
and only praise, is due the National Guard of California for its service
in this crisis."
Similar commendation was set forth by Governor Pardee
in his message to the extra session of the Legislature June 2, 1906.
Mr. Keesling has always been a stanch Republican
and at present is chairman of the Republican State Central Committee. In
1907 he was elected regent of the Sigma Nu fraternity at Chicago. Socially
he is an active club member; fraternally, he is a thirty- third degree
Mason and at present is senior grand warden of the Grand Lodge, F. &
A. M., of California.
Limiting his professional practice to civil law,
Mr. Keesling has taken part in many important legal matters. Pol- lowing
the passage of the Dick Bill he practically rewrote the State law to conform
to it. He heads the Stanford Law Association as its president.
Mr. Keesling was married in 1903 to Haidee Grau
of Sacramento and is the father of four children. The family home is in
Presidio Terrace, San Francisco.
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