Obituary. Abram Stevens Hewitt
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340 HENRY JAMES CABTLE. [Obituary. Mr. Castle was elected a Fellow of the Surveyors' Institution in 1881, and an Arbitrator to the London Chamber of Arbitration in 1893. He died on the 8th February, 1903, at Hampstead, in his fifty-seventh year. Mr. Castle was elected an Associate of the Institution on the 4th February, 1873. ABRAM STEVENS HEWITT' wasborn in a log cabin. His father was sent to the States in 1790 by Boulton and Watt, and the mechanic, for such he was, helped to set up the first engine used in America. Abram Hewittfirst saw the light of day in 1822, in the then remote little town of Haverstraw, in New York State, where his father had settled and become a cabinet-maker. It wasthe intention of the elder Hewittto make his son the master of some trade-and master he became, beyond his father's fondest hopes-but the parent gave way to the boy's desire for book-knowledge. Abram Hewitt made the most of every advantage offered by the schools nearhis home. He determined to go to college; but while he was preparing, partly with the help of the master of the district school, and partly with that of the Haverstraw parson, his father lost every cent of his hard-earnedsavings. Then Abram found out that some good man had endowed a prize for the student who passed the best entrance examination at Columbia. The prizewas enough money to paythe tuition-fees throughthe college. He won the prize, andduring his stay at Cohmhia earned his living by tutoring dull students in classes below him. Stillfurther he increased his income by competing for, and winning,every prize offered for mathematics while hewas at the Kew York College, as well as three prizes for Greek. All throughhis life he continued to read Latinand Greek. He graduatedin 1843. He was endowed with nervous American energy, and worked so hard at school that when he came out his sight was affected and his health impaired. As soon as his con- dition would permit,he took upthe study of law, meanwhile tutoring. In 1843 he was the acting-professor of uathematics at Columbia, and in 1845 he was admitted to the Bar. In that year the son of Peter Cooper, the great philanthropist, was in the graduatingclass at Columbia, but because of his delicate physical condition he did not keep up with hisclass. Peter Cooper This notice has been reprinted, with certain modifications, from Engineering, 6 February, 1903, by permission of the Editors. Downloaded by [] on [12/09/16]. Copyright © ICE Publishing, all rights reserved. Obituary.] ABBAMHEWITT. STEVENS 341 engaged Hewitt to take hisson on a tour abroad, and to act thereon as his tutor. Afterwards each of those young men became Mayor of New York. On the returnvoyage the two youngmen were shipwrecked,and spent a day in an open boat on the high seas. This experience, in which Hewitt showed his devotion to his charge and to duty, seta seal on the intimacy of the men ; and on their return, when Peter Cooper was about to embarkhis son in business, Hewitt was asked if he would accept a partnership in the concern. Peter Cooper was then, as he was for yearsafter, in the glue business. He had, however, a small rolling mill near an iron mine he owned in what is now the town of Trenton, New Jersey. The new firm of Cooper, Hewitt and Company was formed of Edward Cooper, Abram S. H-ewithand PeterCooper. The youngmen took charge of the works at Trenton, andMr. Hewitt gave special attention t.0 ths makingof steel, in which industry he became one of the first experts of the United States. The firm was the first to manufacture iron girders and supports to be used in fireproof buildings and bridges, and wag tho first to installa Bessemer converter. Its great financial success was based on Ahram Hewitt’s close study and prescience of the iron market. From 1873 to 1879 the business was conducted at a loss of $100,000 per annum. Then came a grwt increase in the value of iron, an increase which >fr. Hewitthad foreseen, and which cleared for the firm more than $1,000,000 alono bythe increase inthe value of the product in hand. More from a philanthropicinstinct than from a foresight of the advance in manufactured iron at that time, Mr. Hewitt had kept his mills running a.t the loss mentioned, storing away the products he could not dispose of. It is a notable fact that although the firm is a large employer of labour, there has never been a strike, even when everyother ironworks closed down, at Cooper, IIewittand Company. ‘‘ I hope when the time comes it will be said of me that I was a statesman,” said Mr. Hewittnot long before he died. “I care little for political strife except as the good of the community may be effected, or for business successes except as the general welfare is in that way influenced. But on my public papers and endea- vours, and on my work and speeches in Congress, 1 hope to be judged, and that it may be said that as a statesman 1 laboured. Do not bemisguided bygiving too much attentionto small personalities. You will find, when you reach my age, that if you have lived up to your best judgment, that isabout all that a man can hope to do.” Downloaded by [] on [12/09/16]. Copyright © ICE Publishing, all rights reserved. 342 ABRAMHEWITT. STEVENS [Obituary. Of higher importance to the worldto-day than all else that Mr. Hewitt gave, perhaps, are his views uniformly expressed in regard to the necessity for the association in great enterprises of capital on the one part, and of labour in the form of unions on the other. Mr. Hewitt, himself, believed that his discussions of this important matter were already bearing fruit in America, and that events would show that he was right in diagnosing the trend of modern progress. This, he declared, would result in the diffusion of ownership accompanied by theconcentration of management. Though Nr. Hewitt had studied law, he never practised it. His first step in public service was in 1867, when he was one of the ParisExhibition Commissioners. There he wrote awonderful report on iron and steel, which was printed by the Congress of the UnitedStatcs, and translated into many languages. He was elected to Congress in 1874, and served continuously, except for oEe term(two years) unti€ 1896, when hc defeated Theodore Roosevelt intho campaignfor Mayor of New York. Inthe notable campaign of 187G, when each party claimed tohave elected its candidate for President, to Rbram S. Hewitt, probably more than any other man, is due the averting of another civil warin the States. Mr. I-Iewitt served but one termas Mayor of New York, because by his honesty, and the fact that he could notbe influenced, heincurred tho animosity of theregular democratic party, so-called-the autocratic institutionof Tammany Hall.He rather expected the nomination bythe Republican party, but he had been too staunch a democrat in national affairs. Space does not admit of enumeration of all the good and great works of Abram Hewitt. As the acknowiedged father of the underground transit system of New York, the first links of which are just nearingcompletion, he is entitled to the deepest gratit.uds of his fellow-citizens. In his own estimation the most successful feature of his career was the organization of the Cooper Institute. In youth he had realized thehardships the boy without meansexperiences in attempting to geta technical education. There was not a place in New York-or in all America for that matter-where this could be had free, and every boy who desired knowledge could not win a scholarship that would pay his way through college. Mr. Hewitt brought the plan of a free technical college before Peter Cooper, who gave a vast building and 100,000 dollars as a nucleus for the institute, and made him president of the six trustees. The Hewitt family andthe Coopers havegiven hundreds of thousands of dollars for many years to the fund ; Mr. AndrewCarnegie has Downloaded by [] on [12/09/16]. Copyright © ICE Publishing, all rights reserved. Obituary.] ABRbM BTEVENP HEWITT. 343 given, all told, 600,000 dollars, and donations of large amounts have been received from other philanthropists, so that now the establishment is ableto educate in higher sciences over 3,000 pupils, who otherwise would probablygo no fartherthan the public high schools. Mr. Hewitt was elected President of the American Institute of Mining Engineers in 1876, and again in 1890. In the latter year the Bessemer,*gold medal was awarded him by the Iron and Steel Institute. On his eightieth birthday, last summer, Mr. Andrew Carnegie cabled to him from Scotland, ‘‘ Cordial greetings on ten octaves, every note trulystruck and grandly sung.” President Roosevelt wired : ‘I Heartycongratulations on youreightieth birthday, and congratulations to New York for having in you ono of the best possible object-lessons in good citizenship.” The business offiws of Cooper, Hewitt & Co. have long been at 17 Burlington Slip, where Peter Cooper’s glue offices werc. Here, in an old-fashioned room, with furnishings of forty years ago, Mr. Hewitt directed his large business interests. He was a diractor of the following concerns :-The Alabama Consolidated Coal and Iron Company ; the American Bridge Company; the Chrysolite Silver Mining Company; the Erie Railroad Company; the Lehigh Coal and Navigation Company; the New Jersey and New York Rail- road Company ; the New York,Sueyuehanna and Western Railroad Company;the Northern Railroad of New Jersey;the Shelby Iron Company ; the United States Steel Corporation ; and several banking institutions.