Page:Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography (1900, volume 1).djvu/369

Rh the house, and he became chairman of the com- mittee on territories, and on 31 Dec, 1851, was chosen speaker, which oflRce he held until 1855. He was lieuten- ant-governor of Kentucky for a year before with- drawing from po- litical life, and when he finally retired it was with a high rep- utation for faith- fulness in every public trust.

BOYD, Sempronius Hamilton, lawyer, b. in Williamson co., Tenn., 28 May, 1828. He received an academic education at Springfield. Mo., after which he studied law. In 1855 he was admitted to the bar and practised in Springfield, where he be- came clerk, attorney, and twice mayor. During the civil war he was colonel of the 24th Missouri volunteers, a regiment which he raised, and which was known as the " Lyon Legion." In 1863 he was elected as representative in congress from Missouri. Afterward, I'esuming his profession, he was appointed judge of the 14th judicial circuit of Missouri. He was a delegate to the Baltimore con- vention in 1864, and in 1868 elected to congress, serving until 3 March, 1871. Since then he has spent a quiet life in Missouri, devoting his time partly to the practice of his profession and partly to stock-raising. The Springfield wagon factory and the first national bank of Springfield were founded by him.

 BOYDEN, Seth, inventor, b. in Foxborough, Mass., 17 Nov., 1788; d. in Middleville, N. J.,^31 March, 1870. His boyhood was spent in aiding his father in farm work, or in attending the com- mort school. Such leisure as he could obtain was devoted to the blacksmith's shop, and at the age of twenty-one years he engaged in manufacturing nails and cutting files with improved machines of his own construction. He then improved the ma- chine originally devised by his father for leather- splitting, which he adapted to the splitting of sheep-skins and thin leather for bookbinders' use. About 1813, with his brother, he established a leather-splitting business in Newark, and in 1816 he still further improved his nail machine. He then experimented on the manufacture of patent leather, and in 1819 produced a superior article, which he manufactured and sold until 1831. Meanwhile he had experimented in the production of malleable iron castings, and, succeeding in that, he engaged in their manufacture from 1831 till 1835. During the latter year he became interested in the manufacture of steam-engines. Fitting up a shop for himself, he introduced the cast-iron prome or bed used in stationary steam-engines, and substituted the straight axle in place of the crank in locomotives. His most important inven- tion was the cut-off in place of the throttle-valve, and he connected the same with the governor. In 1849 he closed out his business and sailed for Cali- fornia, but after two years, unsuccessful in gaining a fortune, he returned east, and began experiment- ing in agriculture. He succeeded in raising new varieties of strawberries of a size and qualitv hith- erto unequalled. The principal invention of his later years was a "hat-body doming machine," which is now extensively used. Other inventions have been attributed to him, but they failed of commer- cial success. As with many inventors, the just compensation of his labors was secured by others, and his life was laborious to the end. — His brother, Uriah Atherton, inventor, was b. in Foxborough, Mass., 17 Feb.. 1804; d. in Boston, 17 Oct., 1879. In early life he worked at a blacksmith's forge, and acquired considerable mechanical skill and a thorough knowledge of materials. Later he be- came an engineer, and was employed in the con- struction of a railroad from Boston to Nashua. He then turned his attention to hydraulic engineer- ing, and was employed in Lowell and in Manches- ter, where he found time to make a comprehensive study of the theory of the turbine water-wheel. Mr. Boyden succeeded in improving the construc- tion of turbines so that 95 per cent, of the total power of the water expended was utilized, thereby gaining fully 20 per cent. In 1850 he settled in Boston and devoted himself thenceforward to the study of physics and chemistry. He gave $1,000 to the Boyden library of Foxborough, where he also established the soldiers' memorial building. In 1874 he placed |1,000 with the Franklin Insti- tute, to be awarded to any resident of North America who should determine by experiment whether all rays of light and other physical rays were or were not transmitted with the same ve- locity. The " Foxborough Official Centennial Record " (1878) contains a full account of his life.

 BOYER, Jean Pierre, president of Havti, b. in Port au Prince, 28 Feb., 1776; d. in Paris', 9 July, 1850. Pie was a mulatto, and first became known in the revolution of 1792. He fled to France, but returned to Hayti with Gen. Leclerc to fight for the restoration of the colony to France. Afterward he took an active part in other civil contests, including one caused by Cristophe when he proclaimed him- self emperor. In 1818 Boyer succeeded Petion as president of the republic, which office he held for twenty-four years, until his tyranny and malad- ministration produced his fall. In 1820, after Des- saline's death, he added the latter's empire to the Ilaytian republic, and in 1822, after his successful expedition to Santo Domingo, united the whole island under one government.

 BOYESEN, Hjalmar Hjorth, author, b. in Fredericksvoern, Norway, 23 Sept., 1848 ; d. in New York city. 4 Oct., 1895. He attended the gymna- sium in Christiania, and, after a course of study at Leipsic, Germany, was graduated in 1868 at the uni- versity of Norway. He came at once to the United States, and in 1869 became editor of the " Fremad," a Scandinavian paper published in Chicago. He was appointed professor of German at Cornell in 1874, remaining until 1880, when he accepted the corresponding chair at Columbia. Soon after reaching this country Prof. Boyesen evinced a re- markable facility in writing English. His contri- butions to the periodicals of the day soon attracted attention, and he became popular as a story-teller in prose and verse. He was one of the founders of the authors' club in New York. The titles of his published books are as follows : " Gunnar : A Norse Romance " (New York, 1874) ; " A Norseman's Pilgrimage" (1875); "Tales from Two Hemispheres" (Boston, 1876 ; 4th ed., 1884) ; " Falconberg" (1878) ; " Goethe and Schiller : Their Lives and Works" (1878) ; " Ilka on the Hill-Top and other Stories" (1881) ; " Queen Titania " (1882) ; " A Daughter of the Philistines" (Boston, 1883); "The Story of 