CALVIN DE WOLF. FIFTY-TWO years ago there came to Chicago a young man upon whom the weight of years now rests lightly, who, incredible as it might seem to one unfamiliar with the history of the city and its marvelous growth, has seen more than a million of people gather round him in the metropolis of the west. Fifty-two years ago he helped swell the population of the city to four thousand people, and today he counts one among the million and more of its inhabitants. In 1837 he found here a struggling town, covering a limited area of territory; to-day, even if he could be "taken up into a high mountain" and have restored to him the accuity of vision of his young manhood, he would be unable to trace the boundary lines of the great city. A four-story brick. building the old "Lake House"was then not only the most pretensious building in the city, but the "pride of the west;" to-day, a building of the same character is hardly thought to be fairly begun until it is past the eighth story, and would be considered incomplete if it stopped short of twelve or fourteen stories. Then nearly all the buildings in the city were constructed of wood; of wood; looking from his office window to-day the young man above alluded to, still vigorous and actively engaged in business, can point out a dozen buildings which represent a greater value in the aggregate than all the buildings in Chicago would have represented fifty-two years ago. No man who has witnessed this wonderful transformation, and who has been, during all these years, an active observer of the trend of events, can fail to attract a considerable measure of public attention, and when he has been not merely "a looker on in Venice," but a citizen who has, through his enterprise, his integrity, and his public service, contributed his full share to the magnificent achievements of a half century, he becomes a conspicuous object of interest to the historian and to the reader of history as well. Such a man is Calvin DeWolf, who came to Chicago with a few shillings in his pocket, studied law, was admitted to the bar, has practiced his profession here for more than forty years, amassed a fortune, and is now growing old as gracefully as an old time philosopher. He was born at Braintrim, in Luzerne county, Pennsylvania, on the 18th of February, 1815, and was one of the thirteen children of Giles M. DeWolf, a farmer in comfortable circumstances. His father and grandfather were born at Pomfret, Connecticut, and his more remote ancestors were among the early settlers in Lyme, Connecticut, being colonists who came over from Holland, to which country they had probably been driven from France, where the family originated, by religious persecution. His mother, Anna (Spaulding) DeWolf, a descendant of Edward Spaulding, who located in Chelmsford, Massachusetts, in 1633, was born at Cavendish, Vermont, which was the early home of Calvin DeWolf, his parents having removed to that place soon after his birth. When he was five years of age his parents returned to Braintrim, Pennsylvania, and four years later removed to the adjoining county of Bradford, where his father purchased a farm in the "beech woods" of that county. This farm had to be "cleared" of the heavy timber which covered it in its primitive state, prepared for the plow, and cultivated carefully and assiduously to make it sufficiently productive to support the large family of its owner. Calvin DeWolf was the eldest of his father's sons who lived beyond the infantile period, and upon him devolved the arduous task of aiding to the full extent of his youthful ability in converting the "beech forest" into a tillable and productive farm In this labor all his time was employed, with the exception of three winter months, which he spent each year in school until he was twentyone years of age. When his twenty-first birthday dawned upon him, in accordance with the time-honored rule of the pioneers' he acted upon the theory that his time was his own. As this was literally the only possession he could boast of, he determined to make the best possible use of it, and first of all he resolved to improve his education as far as it lay within his power to do So. He was without means, and it was therefore out of the question for him to enter upon a course of study at any of the institutions where the expense of board and tuition were to be met in the ordinary way. Under the instruction of his father, who was a man of more than ordinary ability, had a good common school education, and was well versed in mathematics, he had obtained a good knowledge of arithmetic, algebra and surveying, and with the assistance of a gentleman of liberal education, who lived in the neighborhood, he had made fair progress in the study of Latin. With these attainments, and his common school education as a basis for a more liberal education, he decided to enter the Grand River Institute in Ashtabula county, Ohio, and left home for that purpose in 1836. Grand River Institute had become famous throughout Eastern Ohio and Western Pennsylvania as a school, where young men who were industrious as well as ambitious, could partially support themselves by manual labor, and pursue a course of study at the same time. Calvin DeWolf maintained himself at this institution for a year and a half, devoting as much time as possible to his books, when an opportunity to reach "the west," looked upon then as the land of promise, was presented to him by a trader, who was making a shipment of fruit from Ashtabula to Chicago. Accepting the proposition made to him by the fruit shipper, young DeWolf paid his passage between the two cities by assisting to load and unload the fruit, and taking charge of it in transit. When he arrived in Chicago he was, of course, compelled to look about at once for employment, and, as he had before this successfully taught school one or two terms, he applied for a school in the city, after having passed the requisite examination. There were other applicants, however, whose claims had to be first considered, and he failed to secure the desired position as a Chicago school teacher. Disappointed in this, he set out on foot across the prairie, determined to find employment in the same capacity in some other locality. At Hadley, a. new settlement, thirty-five or forty miles from Chicago, when his resources had become so nearly exhausted that he had only an old-fashioned "York shilling" in his pocket, he obtained a situation and taught school there during the winter of 1837-38. The following spring he returned to Chicago, where his application for a position as teacher was favorably considered. While teaching school and engaging in various other occupations which were calculated to improve his financial condition, he began the study of law, and entered upon a systematic course of reading in 1839 with Messrs. Spring & Goodrich. This firm was composed of Giles Spring, afterwards a judge of the Superior court of Chicago, and Grant Goodrich for many years one of the prominent lawyers of the city. In 1843 he was examined and admitted to the bar by Judge Richard M. Young and Theophilus W. Smith, then sitting on the Supreme bench. Two years before this he had been married to Miss Francis Kimball, and as they had decided to make Chicago their home, immediately after his admission to the bar, Mr. DeWolf began the practice of law in this city. At this time there were probably not more than twenty or thirty lawyers in Chicago,the most prominent among them being Norman B. Judd, who was President Lincoln's minister to Prussia; Edward G. Ryan, afterwards a judge of the Supreme Court of Wisconsin; Justin Butterfield, Commissioner of the General Land Office during President Fillmore's administration; John D. Caton, afterwards Judge of the Supreme Court of Illinois; Mark Skinner, Buckner S. Morris, and George Manierre, all of whom afterwards sat upon the bench in Chicago; Patrick Ballingall, who was for many years the States Attorney for Cook county, and James M. Strode, James H. Collins, J. Y. Scammon, and Thomas Hoyne, who won exceptional renown as practitioner in Up to 1854 Mr. DeWolf was engaged in the active practice of law. At that time he was elected justice of the peace, a position which, in a rapidly-growing western city, is not only a highly important and responsible one, but generally a very remunerative one. This office he held six successive terms, four by popular election and two by appointment, covering in all a period of more than twenty-five years. Within that time he heard and disposed of over 90,000 cases, which is undoubtedly a far greater number of cases than any other judicial officer of Illinois has ever passed upon. In the early years of his magistracy "Judge " DeWolf, as he was known. to the profession and the public of Chicago generally, held preliminary examinations in many an important case which afterwards became a cause celebre in the higher courts. The preliminary hearing of murder cases, for instance, used to be very grave proceedings in Illinois, when two justices always had to sit together to pass upon the questions coming before the court, and some of these cases were almost as long drawn out as similar cases coming before the higher courts nowadays. It was while acting as magistrate that "Judge" DeWolf became connected with a case which attracted attention from one end of the United States to the other, or rather through both the length and breadth of the land, and raised questions which the United States Courts were called upon to decide, but which the war finally determined. From his earliest boyhood he had been taught to abhor the institution of slavery, and as early as 1839 he was actively engaged in the founding of an anti-slavery society in Chicago, which was designed to build up in the west, by every proper means, a sentiment which would ultimately bring about the abolition of slavery in the United States. Of this early anti-slavery association, Rev. Flavel Bascom, a Presbyterian minister, was the first president, Judge George Manierre treasurer, and Mr. DeWolf secretary, while other ministers and many of the prominent business men of the city were active members. In 1842, the Illinois State AntiSlavery Society held a meeting in Chicago, at which an organization was effected to raise funds for establishing an anti-slavery newspaper in Chicago. Henry L. Fulton, Charles V. Dyer, Shubal D. Childs and Calvin De Wolf were appointed a committee to collect funds and set the enterprise on foot, Mr. DeWolf being made treasurer of the committee. As a result of their efforts the "Western Citizen" came into existence, with Z. Eastman as editor and publisher, and for several years it was recognized as one of the leading "abolition " newspapers of the country. It was in 1858 that Mr. DeWolf, in connection with other abolitionists of Chicago, brought down upon himself the wrath of a disappointed slavehunter and his sympathizers, who sought to inflict upon him condign punishment for facilitating the escape of a liberty-seeking black woman. Stephen F. Nuckolls was a Southern man who had carried his slaves with him into Nebraska. One of these slaves, a young negro woman, Eliza, made her escape, and by some means or other found her way to Chicago, to which place she was followed by her master, Nuckolls, who came near effecting her capture. His scheme was frustrated by the parties who appeared before "Judge❞ DeWolf, charging him with riotous conduct. Under the warrant issued from the magistrate's court, the slaveowner was arrested and locked up for a few hours, and in the meantime the colored woman made her escape from the city. Nuckolls carried the matter to the United States Courts, and succeeded in having the magistrate, Mr. DeWolf, George Anderson, A. D. Hayward and C. L. Jenks indicted for "aiding a negro slave called Eliza to escape from her master," she having been “held as a slave in Nebraska and escaped to Illinois." This involved the constitutional question as to whether or not slaves could be held in "free territory." The defendants held that the negro woman was not lawfully held as a slave in Nebraska, and moved to quash the indictment on that ground. This motion was never passed upon by the court, but in 1861 the case was dismissed by advice of the Hon. E. C. Larned, United States. District Attorney. Holding, as he did, radical antislavery views, he naturally became identified with the Republican party when it was organized, and he has ever since affiliated with it, although he has never been an active politician. Twice he served as a member of the board of aldermen of Chicago, and from 1856 to 1858, while serving as a member of that body, as chairman of the committee on revision and publication of ordinances, he rendered to the city an important service in codifying the local laws and putting them into shape to be generally understood, and easily and systematically enforced. He has held no office since he retired from the position of magistrate in 1879, but has devoted himself to the practice of law in company with his son, Wallace L. DeWolf. Since his early manhood he has been an active participant in church work, and for some years he has been one of the elders of the Sixth Presbyterian Church of Chicago. Conscientious in the discharge of his duties as a public official, upright in his dealings. with clients, and honorable alike in his methods of practice as an attorney and his general business dealings, this pioneer lawyer enjoys to-day the respect and esteem to which his years of good citizenship and a life well spent entitle him, H. L. C.. |