known as the Hocking Coal & Railway company, the entire stock of which is now held by the Columbus, Hocking Valley & Toledo Railway company. The affairs of this vast corporation have been very prosperous, with the exception of the period of the strike of 1884. That long and persistent contest interfered largely with the revenues of the railway company, but notwithstanding the severe strain put upon it, its resources proved adequate to the occasion. The entire purchase of railway and coal property was much the largest single transaction and purchase at that time in the west, and could only have been engineered to its full fruition of success by one who was a master-hand in financial matters, and who possessed a vision that could see the end of a policy at its beginning. But still another transaction of moment followed those outlined above. Early in 1885, after the organization of the Ohio Central railroad-a line running from Toledo to the centre of the great Hocking coal field, at Corning, Ohio, with a branch to Columbus-Judge Burke entered into negotiation with the owners of the new stock of that line, as reorganized under the name of the Toledo & Ohio Central railway company, and during the summer completed the exchange of a small percentage of the stock of the Columbus, Hocking Valley & Toledo railway company, for three-quarters of the stock of the new Toledo & Ohio Central railway company, by which his associates and himself, the owners of a controlling interest of the stock of the Columbus, Hocking

Valley & Toledo railway company, became the owners of a controlling interest in the other line, thus uniting in one compact combination the two greatest coal carrying roads in Ohio or in the west. Railroad men of experience, who have watched this brilliant and successful series of events with the greatest interest, say that this last movement of Judge Burke was in many respects the most important and successful of them all. The difficulty of the task he had set himself to do can be appreciated when it is known that there were nearly eight hundred stockholders in the Toledo & Ohio Central company, and that the contracts had to be made with all of them, or nearly all of them, before the arrangements could be completed or control secured.

There has been much of detail in

the newspapers touching one of Judge Burke's railroad transactions-the purchase for William H. Vanderbilt of the New York, Chicago & St. Louis road, more commonly known as the "Nickel Plate." The deal was a great one, and made with most consummate skill, but as the story has been fully told recently, only a passing reference thereto need be made here. Suffice it to say, that the purchase was negotiated entirely by Judge Burke, and only three men beside himself had a hint of it before it was completed-Mr. Vanderbilt, General J. H. Devereux and Augustus Schell. The purchase was consummated on the twenty-sixth of October, 1882. The negotiations commenced early in August of that year; the contracts were made in Judge Burke's

name, and so far as the vendors knew the property was purchased for his associates and himself. The entire amount of money entrusted to him and paid out in that transaction was something over seven million dollars. In speaking of this subject, a leading railroad man of Cleveland said:

There have been, up to this time, built in this country three parallel and competing lines of rail

road. The New York Central has been paralleled by the New York, West Shore & Buffalo; the Lake Shore was paralleled by the New York, Chicago & St. Louis; the Columbus, Hocking Valley & To

ledo was paralleled by the Ohio Central, and it has been Judge Burke's fortune to purchase and absorb two of these new lines-the "Nickel Plate" and the Ohio Central.

Judge Burke has been active in so many directions, and with tireless energy and undaunted courage has accomplished so much that only a passing reference can be made to several of his operations. For many years he represented, as attorney, the owners of threefourths of the stock of the Shenango & Alleghany Railroad company, and of the Mercer Mining & Manufacturing company, two quite large and important corporations in Pennsylvania. He was also a director in each, and was often offered the choice of all their offices. For ten years past or more he has been a director in the Cincinnati & Springfield Railroad company; for several years was a director of the Dayton & Michigan Railroad company, of the Cincinnati, Hamilton & Dayton, of the Cincinnati, Hamilton & Indianapolis company. He was for several years a director of the New York, Chicago & St. Louis Railroad company, which position he resigned in 1885. He has

been for some time, and at present is, a director of the Central Ontario Railway company. He holds the same position in numerous mining and manufacturing companies; and it is probably a fact that Judge Burke has more stock of railroads or of other corporations standing in his name to-day, upon the books of railroads and other corporations, than any other man in the

state.

While the foregoing gives some idea of Judge Burke's mental power and his equipment for the battle of life, it does not begin to picture him in full length nor to portray him before the public as he appears to those who know him well and have studied him at short range. One thing that most strongly impresses those who meet him is his wonderful vitality, and the elasticity of his nature. Burdens that would confuse or crush many men seem to lie lightly upon him, and he never confuses the many trains of thought that must in his busy mind. be hurrying onward to conclusion and thence into action. While there is not a touch of the bully about him, every line of his face and glance of his eye expresses a courage of the coolest and most daring character, and one need but look at him to see that he holds no half purposes, and is not wont to turn back when his hand is placed to the plow. Those who know him best and have met him in all the forms of practice for years say that his rare success. at the bar is due primarily to the fact that nature made him for a lawyer, that he was adapted to that profession, and that from the time he determined to be

a lawyer he made up his mind to succeed, and never indulged himself in anything that would in the least retard or impede his progress in that chosen path. He never used tobacco in any form, nor touched intoxicating liquors under any pretense whatever. He never allowed his clients' interests to be neglected, but sick or well he gave them attention to the full measure of his ability. He devoted himself not only to business but to books and study, and became exceedingly familiar not only with the text-books, but with the reports, and being blessed with a most excellent memory never forgot what he had once learned.

As a lawyer one of Judge Burke's strongest points consists in his power to elicit the truth upon cross-examination of a witness. No evasion will mislead him, and no weak point in the chain of assertion can escape his keen eye. He goes to the centre with each question, and compels the truth to come to the front. It is one of the features of his mind that what legal learing he has acquired from books, whatever he has once learned from any source, becomes a part of him—not merely remembering it, but knowing it. It is there, ready for use at any demand. He never loses what he has once gained. Usually a lawyer who goes into other operations to any extent becomes rusty in legal learning, and unfitted for practice at the bar. With Judge Burke this makes no difference. He is as ready to return fully equipped from one to the other ast though he had never left his books. This is a remarkable feature in his men

tal make-up; few men are able to do it. His mind is naturally of a logical turn. In addition to having mastered all the rules of law, he has that logical faculty strengthened by long practice, to apply those rules with wonderful power to the case he may have in hand. In this respect he has no superior at the Ohio bar, and perhaps none in the country.

This fact should also be considered in any discussion of Judge Burke's mental characteristics that ordinarily a man in whom the logical faculty predominates is not able to master details, while in his case that rule does not hold good. He holds all the details, even of the smallest character, at command. He never loses anything or forgets, and a point that many might overlook is not allowed to escape his glance and examination. examination. While engaged in other great enterprises, Judge Burke, as a lawyer, has kept up with the times, and in the adaptation of the old and standard legal principles to the new and broadened issues that have grown out of the great corporations, inventions and developments of modern days, he has shown most remarkable power. He knows how to hold to the old principles and make them apply to the new questions. He makes no claim to oratory of the imaginative sort, but is powerful with a jury. His clearness of statement, his logic, his forcible presentation of fact and readiness in meeting any point that may be sprung against him, unite in giving him a hold on the respect and judgment of a jury that makes him more effective with them than would any impassioned appeal to

their feelings or sympathies. In the trial of a case no man ever caught him unawares. He is never driven into a corner. Quick in repartee, cool, never flurried, never upset, never taken at a disadvantage, never led astray from the point-he is a power in the court room, and a lawyer with whom only the best can afford to cope.

It is needless to go into any discussion as to his business qualifications. The above account of his labors and of the things he has done casts a flood of light on that point. His railroad operations show the far-seeing vision, the cool courage, the executive ability and the comprehensive mind of a great railroad manager, while his operations in other commercial and business lines supplement his more prominent operations and prove that no element of luck or chance lies beneath them. He is sound, shrewd and cautious as a financier, never taking a step until he sees the way before him, asking no man to risk a dollar where he will not risk his own, and then when once committed to a line of operations his courage is equal to the greatest demand that may be made upon it. He has no trouble in finding support in any operation he may undertake, as he commands the most implicit confidence in those with whom. he has to deal.

This sketch would be incomplete in one important subject were nothing said about Judge Burke's career upon the bench. He has been heard to refer to that experience as one of the most gratifying and interesting periods of his life. He loved the bench and the ad

ministration of justice, and loved and respected the bar that practiced before him. him. Quick and sharp as he sometimes. is in the trial of a case-as Job would have been in the trial of some caseshe always kept his temper while on the bench, and disposed of every case that came before him without the least partiality or prejudice against counsel or parties, and he came as near satisfying the parties in court, probably, as any man could have done or can do. Proof of his great ability as a judge can be found in the fact that it was not an unusual thing for him to hold court term after term, in the counties of his district, without an exception being taken, and but two or three of all the judgments in which he concurred, during his term of seven years upon the bench, were ever reversed. It is indeed a pity that when a man of that character is placed upon the bench the rewards of the position are not enough to keep him there.

Judge Burke has been too busy to give his attention to office-seeking or officeholding, and has never been tempted to enter public life. But he has deep convictions and strong beliefs on all public questions, and when aroused to discuss. the measures of the day can do so with a clearness, logic, fairness and resource of information that cause one to regret that the political rostrum has no attractions for him. A scholar and a thinker, his range of knowledge is wide, and in history, literature and general information, as in law, what he learns is learned for good, and ever at his command. Socially he is one of the most approach

able men in America, and many have grateful cause to know that the young man or the poor man has as ready and welcome access to him as the honored or the rich. Still in the prime of life, strong, capable and ambitious to

make good use of his opportunities, we may expect to see him do even better and more fruitful work in the future than he has in the past.

J. H. KENNEDY.

AMONG the pioneers of Ohio yet living is Dr. William Bushnell of Mansfield. The family from which he descends dates back in America to early in the sixteenth century. Some time about that date, Francis Bushnell came to America and located in Guilford, Hartford county, Connecticut; he died in 1646, this record being the first authentic date in possession of the family. Francis left five sons, to-wit: Francis, William, John, Richard and Isaac. William, the second son, married and settled in Connecticut, and at his death left four children, the second of whom, Ephraim, also married and continued his residence in Connecticut, rearing a family of seven children. The third child of Ephraim, James, was born March 12, 1716, and about the year 1736 married a Miss Dudley. James was a seafaring man, and soon after his marriage departed on one of his voyages and was never afterward heard from. It is supposed his vessel was lost at sea with all on board. After his departure, his only son, Alexander, was born June 2, 1737. February 12, 1761, Alexander married Miss Chloe Waite, a member of the Waite family of Lyme, Connecticut,

from which descended the present chiefjustice of the United States supreme court, Morrison R. Waite of Ohio. Miss Waite was born June 20, 1738, and died October 28, 1832, at the age of ninetyfour years. She was the mother of eleven children, the sixth child being Sterling G. Bushnell, father of the subject of this sketch.

Sterling G. Bushnell was born in Hartford county, Connecticut, in 1781; the exact date is not known, as the record is lost. He was a gentleman of scholarly attainments and great force of character, having-in that nest of literary culture, Hartford county-enjoyed advantages of education which were impossible to his children in the wilds of Ohio. He came with his family to Vernon, Trumbull county, Ohio, in 1805, settling on land controlled by the Western Reserve company of Connecticut. Ohio was then a wilderness in the far west, and the farm was to be cleared of timber and a home hewn out of the wildest surroundings. As must be surmised, the school education of Dr. Bushnell was slight and irregular, there being in those early days few educational advantages, the text books being common