Page:One of a thousand.djvu/554

 540 SAWYER. SAWYER. SAWYER, JOSEPH, was born in Bos- ton, October 22, 1823. He is a lineal de- scendant of James Sawyer, who was born in England about 1630, and emigrated to this country between the years 1665 and '69. He settled first in Ipswich and sub- sequently removed to Gloucester. The father of the subject of this sketch was a mariner ; made a number of voyages to England, and before he was twenty-one years of age was master of a packet-ship. He married Ellen Whyte in Liverpool, England. Joseph, the eldest of eleven children, received his education in the Eliot school, Boston, but at fourteen years of age was desirous of entering into business, and ob- tained a situation in the retail dry-goods store of the late Joshua Stetson on Hanover Street, then the headquarters of this line of trade. He continued with his employer after he had established an extensive jobbing busi- ness. In 1844 the firm of Wilkinson, Stet- son & Co. was organized in the woolen im- porting and jobbing business. This house recognized the industry and application of Mr. Sawyer, and in 1S49 he was admitted as a partner. These relations continued until 1862, the house representing some of the largest mills in New England. At this time the commission house of E. R. Mudge, Sawyer & Co. was formed for the sale of textile fabrics. They purchased, in company with the old firm of Wilkinson, Stetson & Co., the Burlington Woolen Mills of VVinooski, Yt., the largest woolen mills in the state, and of which Mr. Sawyer's friend and partner, Joshua Stetson, was treasurer. On the death of Mr. Stetson in 1869, Mr. Sawyer succeeded to the treasurership of the corporation, from which he retired in 1882 to assume the presidency. Since the death of Hon. E. R. Mudge the firm has been dissolved, and Mr. Sawyer has retired from active business. He remains, however, a special partner in the firm which is the successor to the large anil prominent business which has been built up. Mr. Sawyer has been for many years a director in the National Revere Bank, trustee of a number of estates, and con- nected with various charitable and benevo- lent societies. Mr. Sawyer was married in Boston, in 1S47, to Anna Maria, daughter of William 1 nllaway. SAWYER, Thomas Jefferson, son of Benjamin and Sally (York) Sawyer, was born in Reading, Windsor county, N. V., January 9, 1804. His formal education began in the com- mon school of the neighborhood. At the age of eighteen he entered upon the work of teaching, and, at the same time, of fitting himself for college. He entered Middle- bury College, Middlebury, Vt., in 1825, and was graduated in 1S29. He entered the Christian ministry in connection with the Universalist church, receiving his fellowship and ordination in September, 1829. His first settlement as pastor, 1830, was in New York City. In 1 S3 1 he became editor of the " Christian Messenger," a paper devoted to the pro- motion of the cause of Universalism. In 1845, after fifteen years of prosperous service in the ministry, he accepted the principalship of the Clinton Liberal Insti- tute at Clinton, Oneida county, N. Y. Here, in addition to his supervision and teaching in the routine work of the school, he taught classes in theology, thereby pre- paring a large number of young men for the ministry of the church to which he was devoted. To him, also, belongs the honor of calling an "educational convention," the fruit of which was the founding of Tufts College, at College Hill, near Boston. In 1850 he received the honorary degree of doctor of sacred theology from Harvard College. In 1852 he returned to New York, re-assuming the work of his old pastorate, and completing a ministry of a quarter of a century in New York City. In 1863 he was made editor-in-chief of " The Christian Ambassador," a paper pub- lished in New York. In 1S69 he was elected Packard professor of systematic theology in the divinity school of Tufts College, which office he still holds. Dr. Sawyer was twice honored by an election to the presidency of Tufts Col- lege ; to the presidency of Canton theo- logical school, which he was active in founding, and of Lombard University, at Calesburg, 111. All of these offers he de- clined from distrust of his own executive ability. Though past eighty-five, he still preaches and is also a frequent contributor to the religious papers of his church. During his ministry of sixty years, he has been an earnest defender of the faith according to the Universalist interpretation, and most of his books and essays have the contro- versial cast. Always an advocate of good learning, his influence in the cause of edu- cation has been felt throughout the Uni- versalist church, in which he has witnessed the rise and progress of all its schools, col- leges and theological seminaries.