1876 it was proposed to make her a member of the National Medical Association, being the first woman proposed for this honor, and she was elected.

She has been prominently identified with the progress of the great city in many ways pertaining to her profession, such as the Woman's College, Home for Incurables, Training School for Nurses, and various hospitals. At present she occupies the chair of obstetrics in the Woman's Medical College, is attending physician of the Woman's Hospital, attending physician of the Hospital for Women and Children, gynæcologist and obstetrician of Cook county Hospital, chairman of the hospital committee of the Illinois Training School for Nurses, member of the American Medical Association, member of the Illinois State Medical Society, member of Chicago Medical Society, member of the Mississippi Valley Medical Society, and Chicago Medico Legal Society.

Meanwhile Dr. Stevenson has accomplished much in a literary way, her work being largely in the form of essays and papers in connection with the Fortnightly and Woman's Clubs of Chicago, of which she is an active member.

Industrious, enthusiastic, and direct as a student, and hence of necessity well informed as to what the books tell her of her profession, still, no one will ever think of her as a "bookish woman" because in adopting the

ideas of others they become her own, and in restating them her words, manner and application indicate that she is not quoting authority, but that she is presenting the living thoughts of her own intellect.

Dr. Stevenson's dynamic vitality, clear perceptions and indomitable industry, are directed by an unusually persistent and concentrated will, which would render her arbitrary, if it were not for her kindliness of disposition and abundant sympathy. All these qualities of intellect and affection are the elements of her success, socially and professionally.

While she is naturally succesful in her professional practice in a general way, she is especially fortunate in her treatment of all those ailments in which keen insight, ready tact, delicate operation, and ministry to mind. and morals are effective elements of cure. Her sense of justice and her warm sympathy with the needy and the suffering, frequently war with each other-each by turns gaining the temporary mastery, but her reverence of all she deems sacred will not allow either one or the other to get far from the true line of sweet mercy with stern justice.

Dr. Stevenson is a true worker. Her abilities and industry must render her successful. She is of necessity useful in her profession, but in the larger field of arousing others to work, directing their operations, and thus multiplying herself, she will have still grander success.

The work upon various institutions for the amelioration of the condition of mankind, is in the beginning slow and difficult to carry; later when the work begins to reflect great credit upon those interested, it is carried forward by its own impetus and gains supporters even from its earlier detractors.

In many of those institutions which are to-day the crown of Chicago's benevolence and philanthropy, the first organization shows a small number of well known names, and among these stands frequently that of Dr. Stevenson. The influence of a physician knows no limit-not only is it

often the breath of life to the individual, but in the community, it stands for right living, for the righteousness that means health mentally, physically, and morally. For this, women welcome representatives of their sex who, trained scientifically, can lend to the public weal the weight of that conservative element in the social world, the vast number of women who otherwise have no voice.

With a name known already beyond her own country, American women can well be proud of one who is in many ways the representative of all they hold dear and who has never failed to honor her high calling.

PROBABLY for the same reason that those persons who were adult residents of Chicago prior to 1840 have, by common consent, been styled the "old settlers" of the city, the men who were engaged here in the practice of law prior to that date have always been accounted the "pioneers" of the Chicago bar. Just why the line should have been drawn at 1840 is not clearly apparent in either instance, but there can be no question as to the right of those who established themselves here during the

V.

first decade of the city's existence to claim all the rights and privileges of pioneer citizens.

Limiting the membership of the pioneer bar to this period renders it comparatively easy to deal, to some extent, with the personality of the men who looked after the interests of litigants in the early Chicago courts. So much is necessary in this connection, to give some idea of the character and ability of the pioneers individually and of the bar of that period as a whole.

It may be of interest first to note the fact that with three or four exceptions all the lawyers who became identified with the Chicago bar prior to 1840 were from the eastern States, and New York, Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont were the States making the most generous contributions of legal talent. Only a small number of the pioneers were men who, even at that period, would have been termed liberally educated men, and the great majority of them were men who, in one way or another, educated themselves.

Russell Heacock, the first lawyer to locate here, had learned the carpenter's trade before he began the study of law. He was born in Connecticut, and when he first came west located in St. Louis. From there he came to Chicago, where he practiced law until 1849, when he fell a victim to the cholera epidemic of that year.

Richard J. Hamilton, the second lawyer to locate in Chicago, was a Kentuckian by birth, whose career in Chicago has been previously noticed in this series of articles. An extended biographical sketch of Hon. John D. Caton, who came a few years later, has also been published in this connection. Judge Caton's most active competitor, in fact, his only active competitor when he began practicing in Chicago-Messrs. Heacock and Hamilton being at that time busied with non-professional affairswas Giles Spring, one of the most noted of the pioneer lawyers. He

was born in Massachusetts, and read law in Ohio with Benjamin F. Wade and Joshua R. Giddings, when those two distinguished men were practicing together in the Western Reserve of the Buckeye State.

Spring's education was faulty, but a fair estimate of his ability as a lawyer has been left on record by a contemporary, who declares that "he was a phenomenon," and then goes on to say: "He was a natural born lawyer. His education was quite limited, and he paid little attention to the rules of grammar; yet he could present a point of law to the court and argue the facts of a case to the jury with a clearness and force seldom equalled. He seemed sometimes to have an intuitive knowledge of the law and mastery of its profoundest and most subtle principles. His brain worked with the rapidity of lightning and with the force of an engine. In argument he possessed a keenness of analysis, a force of compact, crushing logic which bore down all opposition. His language, though sometimes homely, was always forcible, and strongly expressive of thought. He was firm in attack, but not often offensive. His most astounding powers were exhibited when some new question arose in the progress of a trial. However suddenly it might be sprung and however grave or abstruse in character, he would instantly, and seemingly by a flash of intuition, grasp it with a skill and mastery of legal learning, which seemed possible

only to the most careful preparation. His resources appeared exhaustless." Spring died, while still a young man, in 1851. He was at that time a judge of the Cook County Common Pleas Court, had been prominent in politics as a member of the Whig party, and sat as a delegate in the "Free Soil" Convention of 1848 at Buffalo.

Edward W. Casey, a native of New Hampshire, practiced in Chicago four or five years prior to 1838, when he returned to New England. He is said to have been a scholarly man and a thorough lawyer, but given to conviviality to such an extent that on one occasion, when he was serving in an official capacity, an objection was raised to his prosecution of a vagrancy case, on the ground that one vagrant could not legally prosecute another.

James Grant, a North Carolinian by birth, began practicing in Chicago in 1839. At a later date he removed to Iowa-where judicial honors were conferred upon him-and still lives at Davenport, in that State.

A. N. Fullerton, born in Vermont, who was known as one of the pioneer lawyers, after practicing three or four years, abandoned his profession, engaged in commercial business, and at his death in Chicago, in 1880, left a large fortune.

James H. Collins came from New York State, and located in Chicago at the solicitation of his former pupil, John D. Caton. He was chiefly noted for industry and perseverance as a

lawyer, and for his uncompromising hostility to slavery as a politician. He continued to practice law in Chicago until 1854, when he died of cholera.

Henry Moore, a scholarly and brilliant young lawyer from Massachusetts, opened a law office in Chicago. very early in the history of the town, but left in 1839 on account of failing health, and died some years later at his home in New England.

Buckner S. Morris, of Kentucky, came to Chicago in 1834, having previously served as a member of the legislature of his native State, and acquired considerable distinction as a lawyer. He was a successful pioneer practitioner, and served with credit as a judge of the circuit court of Cook county, and also as mayor of the city.

Grant Goodrich, who came from New York to Chicago in 1834, lived in the city and practiced law up to the time of his death, some years since. He was a public-spirited citizen, an accomplished lawyer, and for several years an honored member of the Cook county judiciary.

Royal Stewart, of the same State, came early to the city, and was enrolled for a time among the pioneer lawyers. He returned to New York State, however, and not much is known in the west of his later life.

Wm. H. Brown, a native of Connecticut, was first known in Illinois as the editor of the Illinois Intelligencer, published at Vandalia. He

came to Chicago in 1835, as cashier of a branch of the State bank, established here at that time.

Although a lawyer by profession, he was known. here as financier rather than lawyer. He served as a member of the State legislature during the war, and died. while traveling abroad in 1867.

James Curtiss, a member of the pioneer bar, was never an active practitioner. He held numerous local offices, and was twice mayor of the city.

Wm. Stuart was registered as a lawyer during the same period. He was better known, however, as editor of the Chicago American and postmaster of the city during the administrations of Presidents Harrison and Tyler. He returned to New York, his native State, in 1846, and turned his attention to editing a newspaper at Binghampton.

Ebenezer Peck, born in Portland, Maine, came to Chicago in 1835, and for many years was one of the most distinguished members of the bar, and also a prominent business man of the city. He was an intimate personal friend of President Lincoln; was appointed by him judge of the Court of Claims at Washington, and served in this capacity until he reached the age of retirement, after which he returned to Chicago, and died here in 1881.

Alonzo Huntington, of Vermont, came to Chicago at the same time that Judge Peck located here, and died in the same year that the latter

passed away, after a long and honorable career at the bar.

Jonathan Young Scammon, whose useful life ended but a short time since, was another of the pioneers whose career has previously been sketched in this connection.

Joseph Hubbard, of Vermont, Thomas Hubbard and G. A. O. Beaumont, of Connecticut, were numbered among the pioneers for a short time, but all returned to the east without having filled any important place at

the bar.

Foster Ames Harding, of Rhode Island, and Fletcher Webster, of Massachusetts, a son of Daniel Webster, were two out of a very few of the early members of the Chicago bar, who were college graduates and classical scholars. Harding graduated at Brown University and Webster at Dartmouth College. They practiced in Chicago a short time in partnership, and then removed to Detroit, Michigan. Harding abandoned the law, and gained renown as a journalist, while Webster's ambition seems to have been satisfied later by an appointment as United States Minister to China.

Henry Brown, born in Connecticut, and a graduate of Yale College, was identified with the bar from 1836 to 1849, when he fell a victim to the cholera scourge. In addition to practicing law he had a fondness for writing history, and was the author of one of the early histories of Illinois.