Page:Encyclopedia of Virginia Biography volume 5.djvu/731

 VIRGINIA BIOGRAPHY

1063

llamas brought freight from the mountains to be shipped by rail to the coast, and car- ried back freight arriving at Chimbo. The work undertaken by the party was to con- tinue this railroad, then only fifty-five miles long, on to Quito, a distance of two hun- dred and thirty-one miles. Many trouble- some engineering difficulties were overcome in reaching the plateau on which Quito is situated. Beside having charge of one of the three sections of this work, Mr. Buck- ner was manager of the fifty-five miles of railroad already in operation. This railroad is advantageously situated for electrification. as the adjacent waters will supply ample power for generating the current. The ad- ventures encountered by the engineers in pursuing their work read like a romance. After the completion of this work, Mr. Buck- ner abandoned engineering to take up com- mercial life.

In 1901 he became office manager of the New York Title Insurance Company. In 1904 he engaged in business on his own account, organizing the Prospect Park Bank of Brooklyn, New York, of which he be- came first vice-president and executive offi- cer. This venture has been attended by suc- cess, and has steadily grown and prospered, taking rank among the sound financial insti- tutions of Greater New York. In 1909 Mr. Buckner was elected president of the insti- tution, which position he still holds. The name of the bank was changed to the Bank of Flatbush in December, 191 1. He has been a leading factor in many New York real estate operations, which have proven successful, and he also finds time to conduct a large stock farm and shooting lodge at "Island \'iew," the family seat in Orange county, Virginia, of which he is the owner. He is treasurer of the New York Southern Society, and of the Society of Virginians of New York, and has been a member of the Hamilton. Midwood, Crescent and Civic clubs. Upon his estate in central Virginia still stands his old home, and it is one of the chief pleasures of Mr. Buckner to take house parties there for two or three weeks each year for shooting, as the surrounding coun- try is well stocked with wild turkey, quail and a variety of other game. He is interested in literary matters, and spent his leisure time during a period of many years in ac- cumulating material concerning the Buck- ner family of Virginia, which was ultimately

published through his liberality and interest in family history. As an author Mr. Buck- ner has also added to his reputation, as his articles on political and financial subjects are considered as authoritative.

He married, in 1910, Helen Edith Grif- fiths, daughter of the late Albert and Mary ( Farnsworth) Griffiths, of Lexington, Mas- sachusetts.

John Breckinbridge Goode. John Breck- inbridge Goode belongs to several of the very oldest Southern families and was born at Liberty, Bedford county, Virginia, Au- gust 8, 1864. The family whose name he bears is descended from John Goode, who removed from the Barbados to Virginia prior to 1660. He settled at a place on the colo- nial frontier, four miles from the present site of Richmond, which he named Whitby, or Whitley, and where he died in 1709, the pro- prietor of a considerable plantation. While in Barbados he married Martha MacKar- ness, who accompanied him to Virginia, where she shortly after died, leaving two suns. By a second marriage with Anne Bennet. John Goode had eleven other chil- dren, and the descendants of all these have constituted one of the most prominent fam- ilies of the South.

The father of John Breckinbridge Goode was John (loode, solicitor-general and pub- heist, who was born May 27, 1829, in I>ed- ford county, Virginia, and died July 8, 1910. His father in turn was also John Goode, a farmer, a man of remarkable intelligence and of high integrity, and a typical Virginian of the old school. John Goode, Sr., married .'\nn l\l. Leftwich, daughter of a son of Joel Leftwich, a gallant soldier of the War of Independence, and major-general in the W'ar of 1812.

John Goode, Jr., received his early train- ing at the New London Academy, Bedford county, Virginia : then entered Emory and Henry College, Virginia, from which he was graduated in 1848. .After that he attended the Lexington Law School, from which he was graduated in 1830. In April, 1831, Mr. Goode began to practice law at Liberty, Vir- ginia, and in the same year was elected to the legislature of \''irginia. In 1861 Mr. Goode was a member of the now famous secession convention which took Virginia out of the Union. He threw himself with all his enthusiasm and his great ability into