Dr. Swartwout is a member of the Orange County, the State and the American Medical Associations, and the Erie Railway Surgeons' Association. He is also a member of the Deer Park Club and at the present time is mayor of Port Jervis.
To Doctor and Mrs. Swartwout have been born four children. Henry Lewis died at the age of one year. Those living are Florence, Charlotte and Herbert B.
CLAYTON E. SWEET, of the firm of Sweet, Orr & Co., was born at Wappingers Falls, N. Y., June 16, 1834, and after a large business experience in that town he moved to Newburgh in 1887, to which city the business offices of the company were changed that year. His father was for many years a merchant and manufacturer in Wappingers Falls, and for a period postmaster of the village. Mr. Sweet was educated at the public schools of his native place and at the Dutchess County Academy at Poughkeepsie. Then for three years he was in the employ of Levi Cook & Co., merchants on Broadway, New York. He returned to Wappingers Falls to enter his father's store, and ere long was made a partner.
For many years Mr. Sweet was one of the leading business men of the place and of great usefulness to the community. He was one of the first trustees of the Wappingers Savings Bank, and acted as its secretary and treasurer until it obtained a substantial footing; he was afterwards elected vice-president of the institution. For seven years he was postmaster of the village under President Grant. He was also a director of the Fallkill National Bank of Poughkeepsie, and a vestryman of the Zion Episcopal Church of Wappingers Falls. Since 1876 Mr. Sweet, as head of the firm of Sweet, Orr & Co., has given his whole attention to the manufacture of overalls. This firm are the pioneers in this business and their product the largest in the country. Mr. Sweet has served as a trustee of the Newburgh Savings Bank and vestryman of St. George's Episcopal Church. He is president of the Newburgh City Club and a director of the Newburgh National Bank. He married in 1860, Chattie Louise, daughter of Hon. James Manning, of Bethany, Pa., and a lineal descendant of Captain Bazaliel Tyler, a soldier of the Revolution, who was killed when leading the advance guard at the battle of Minisink.
[LYMAN H. TAFT,] editor and proprietor of the Montgomery Standard and Reporter, has resided in Orange County since 1888. Previously he made his home in Warren, Pa.
October 23, 1888, Mr. Taft bought the Montgomery Reporter, a four-page sheet, founded May 30, 1887, by George H. Young. January 1, 1899, Mr. Taft purchased the Montgomery Standard from the Winfield family, who had owned the paper since 1868. He consolidated it with the Reporter under the above title. It is a four-page blanket paper, republican in politics. Mr. Taft, the popular editor, is a member of the Knights of Pythias, the Maccabees and the Foresters.
CAPTAIN THOMAS TAFT, senior member of the Taft-Howell Company, successor to the firm of Mead & Taft, contractors, builders and manufacturers, at Cornwall Landing, N. Y., is a lineal descendant of the colonist, Robert Taft, who came from England to Massachusetts in 1677. He is the oldest son of Daniel Taft, the sixth in line of descent from the colonist Robert and his wife Emeline Smith, descendant of a family of Pennsylvania Quakers who, escaping the massacre at Wyoming, settled near Woodbury Falls in Orange County.
Captain Taft was born in the town of Cornwall, September 28, 1840; was educated in the A. C. Roe Collegiate School at Cornwall, and at the outbreak of the Civil War was engaged in the building business with his father and brother-in-law, C. H. Mead. In response to Lincoln's appeal for three hundred thousand additional volunteers, he enlisted as a private in Company C, 124th Regiment, New York Volunteers, and in recognition of ability, fortitude and bravery displayed in camp, on the march and in battle, was promoted from grade to grade to the captaincy of his company.
In the desperate charge of the 124th at Devil's Den on the field of Gettysburg, in which Colonel Ellis, Major Cromwell and so many of his brave comrades were killed, he was disabled by wounds received at the most advanced point readied, and was captured by the enemy. Four months later he had been exchanged and was again on duty with his regiment. With the exception of these and the battle of Boydton Road, he was never absent from the 124th when it was under fire.
In 1866, the year after the close of the war, Captain Taft engaged in the building business with his brother-in-law, Charles H. Mead, under the firm name of Mead & Taft, employing from eighteen to twenty hands. In 1906 the company had in its employ over five hundred men, a majority of whom were skilled mechanics. Its plant at Cornwall Landing, on the west bank of the Hudson, is one of the most complete and extensive of its kind in the State. The building operations of the firm have extended from Northern New Hampshire to San Antonio, Texas. Since 1866 it has erected some eight hundred or nine hundred buildings, nearly all of which have been expensive structures. In the building up and successful management of this extensive business Captain Taft has been the leading factor.