Grover Cleveland.
Grover Cleveland was born at Caldwell, New Jersey, March 18, 1837. His ancestors came from England. His father was a Presbyterian minister and he was named after the Rev. Steven Grover. In 1841 the family moved to Fayetteville, New York, where the future president was educated in the public schools. Between lessons he acted as clerk in a country store. He received further education at a local academy, and was later appointed assistant teacher in the New York Institution for the Blind. In 1855, while helping his uncle, Lewis F. Allen, at Buffalo, compiling “The American Word Book,” he began to read law, and, in 1859, was admitted to the bar. He was appointed assistant district attorney of Erie county in 1863, but in 1865 he was defeated for the district attorneyship of the same county. Thereupon he became a member of a Buffalo law firm. In 1871 he was elected sheriff of Erie county. At the close of this term he helped to form the firm of Bass, Cleveland & Bissel. In 1881 he was elected mayor of Buffalo by the largest majority to a mayoralty candidate ever given in that city. In 1882 he was made governor of the state of New York. He was nominated as Democratic candidate for the presidency in 1884, was elected, and inaugurated on March 4, 1885. His term of office was notable on account of his exercising the veto power beyond all precedent. He vetoed one hundred and fifteen out of nine hundred and eighty-seven bills, which had passed both houses, one hundred and two of these being private pension bills. On June 2, 1886, he was married, in the White House, to Frances Folsom, the daughter of one of his former law partners. In 1888 Mr. Cleveland was candidate for a second term as president, but was defeated by Benjamin Harrison. In 1892 he was again a candidate, and this time he was elected. Mr. Cleveland was without doubt the most popular Democrat of his time when running for the presidency. He is an enthusiastic devotee of gun and rod, an ideal host, and even those who differ with him politically admit his statesmanship.
William Pierce Frye.
William Pierce Frye, who, since 1861, has been United States senator from Maine, was born at Lewiston, Maine, September 2, 1831. His father was Colonel John N. Frye and his mother Alice N. (Davis) Frye. Graduating from Bowdoin college in 1850, he subsequently carried out the wishes of his family and the trend of his own inclinations by following a legal career, in which he was eminently successful. Becoming a member of the Maine legislature in 1861, he was mayor of Lewiston from 1866 to 1867, and afterward held a variety of political offices, including the attorney-generalship of Maine from 1867 to 1869, presidential elector 1864, was made a member of congress in 1871, which office he held for ten years, was chairman of the commerce committee of the senate and member of the peace commission in Paris, 1898; was president pro tem, of the senate from 1896 to 1901, and after the death of Vice-President Hobart discharged the duties of that office during the Fifty-sixth congress. He is now acting chairman of the committee on foreign relations. Mr. Frye married Caroline Spears, who died in 1900. His life history is one that has for its moral the power of integrity when welded to unceasing effort.
John Hay.
John Hay, who, since 1890, has been secretary of state of the United States, first saw the light at Salem, Indiana, on October 8, 1838. His father was Dr. Charles Hay, and John was educated in the common schools at Warsaw, Illinois, and in the academy at Springfield, Illinois. He graduated from Brown university in 1858, and after a preparatory period in a local law school was admitted to the Illinois bar. Mr. Hay was one of the private secretaries of President Lincoln. He was breveted colonel of United States Volunteers and was also assistant adjutant-general during the Civil war. He has also been secretary of legation at Paris, Madrid and Vienna and was charge d’affaires at Vienna. From 1879 to 1881 he acted as first assistant secretary of state. During the international sanitary conference of 1881 he was made its president. His services as ambassador to England from 1897 to 1898 will be long remembered in connection with his tactful and dignified diplomacy. Mr. Hay, notwithstanding his many and onerous official duties has found time to write books of both prose and poetry. His Castilian Days and Pike County Ballads are among the most popular of these. In 1874 he married Clara Stone, of Cleveland, Ohio.
George Frisbie Hoar.
A commanding figure among the Republican forces in the United States senate, not alone from his personality and ability, but also because of his attitude on trust legislation and on the Philippine question, is George Frisbie Hoar, Massachusetts. Mr. Hoar was born in Concord, Massachusetts, August 29, 1826. A graduate of Harvard in 1846, aged twenty, and later of Harvard law school, he has retained his interest in higher education, and in scholarly matters. He has been an overseer of Harvard college from 1874 to 1880, at various times regent of the Smithsonian Institute, a trustee of the Leicester academy and the Peabody Museum of Archæology, and officer of various national and state societies. He settled in Worcester, Massachusetts, after graduating and practiced law. He has been married twice, his first wife being Mary Louisa Spurr and his second Ruth A. Miller. His service in the senate, since 1877, is exceeded by but few fellow-members, and he represents that body’s best traditions. He was elected because, as legislator from 1852 to 1856, as state senator in 1856, and as member of congress from 1869 until he was sent to the senate, he had shown marked ability, an unfailing watchfulness for public welfare and an unswerving honesty as rare as it is desirable. Senator Hoar is a striking example of how irreproachable integrity can take active and prominent part in party politics. He has kept his influence in his party and in general legislation in spite of sometimes opposing leaders of his own party, when his conscience and judgment bade him do so.
Henry Cabot Lodge.
Henry Cabot Lodge was born in Boston, Massachusetts, May 12, 1850. He prepared for college in Dixwell Latin school, and, entering Harvard, was graduated in 1876. After his graduation he spent a year in traveling. Returning to America in 1872, he entered the Harvard law school. In January, 1874, he became assistant editor of the North American Review, which position he held until November, 1876. In 1875 he was a lecturer on The History of the American Colonies, in Harvard. From 1879 to 1882 he was associate editor of the International Review of Boston. During the same period he was elected member of the Massachusetts house of representatives. In 1881 he was the Republican candidate for the state senate, but was defeated. He was nominated for congress in 1884, but was again defeated. In 1886, however, being nominated again, he was successful and was re-elected for three successive congresses, but resigned after his last election on account of having been made a United States senator, January 17, 1893. In the senate he has made his mark. Mr. Lodge is an orator of much ability, a far-sighted political executive, and a writer of considerable merit. Among his books are: A Short History of the English Colonies, Life of Washington, Daniel Webster, History of Boston, and he has contributed to the Encyclopædia Britannica and other works. He is a fluent lecturer. He is a member of the Massachusetts Historical Society, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, trustee of the Boston Athenaeum, a member of the American Antiquarian Society, and a member of the New England Historic Genealogical Society. In 1874 he was elected an overseer of Harvard university, and was offered the degree of LL.D. in 1875. He married, on June 29, 1871, Anna, daughter of Rear Admiral Charles S. Davis, and has three children by her.