Page:The Biographical Dictionary of America, vol. 01.djvu/262

 BEARDSLEY

BEARDSLEY.

captain. Nov. 26, 1880; commodore, Jan. 23, 1894; rear-admiral. May 21, 1895. He commanded the Franklin, the Powhattan and the }'ermont respect- ively. In November, 1891, he was i)hiced in command of the naval stiition, Port Royal. S.C, and was transferred to San Diego. Cal. He was retired Feb. 1, 1898, on which occasion a water carnival was given in his lionor in the bay of San Diego, Cal., in which three British and six United States naval ves-sels took part, and a land parade whic-h included upwards of sixty th(ius;jnd soldiers and s;iilors.

BEARDSLEY, Arthur, educator, was born in Esop.is. Ulster county. N. Y., Nov. 1, 1843; son of Jonatlian and Laura (Coutant) Beardsley. His first American ancestor, ^Villiam Beardsley, sailed from London in the ship Planter, in April, 1635, and became one of the original proprietors and one of the first settlers of Stratford, Conn. His mother was descended from Jean Coutant, a Huguenot refugee, who settled at New Rochelle, N. Y., about 1690. He attended the Dutchess county academy, Poughkeepsie, N. \., entered Bt)wdoin college, Brvmswick, Me., in 1862, but through a change in his plans he left there in 1864 and went to the Rensselaer polytechnic institute. Troy, N. Y., where he was graduated in 1867 with the degree of C.E. He was appointed assistant civilengineer of the Hoosac tunnel, then one of the great practical schools of engineering. He resigned in June. 1868, and spent the following year in Poughkeepsie, N. Y"., as a civil engineer and architect. In Jime, 1869, he was appointed in.structor of civil enigneering, physics and in- dustrial mechanics in the Universitj^ of Minne- sota, and in June, 1870, was made professor of civil engineering and industrial mechanics in the same university. In June. 1872, he accepted the chair of applied mathematics and physics in Swarthmore college, Pennsylvania. In 1888 his professorship was endowed as the " I. V. William- son Professorship of Engineering. ' ' He organized and took entire charge of the manual training work and the department of mechanical arts in Swarthmore college, and designed and built sev- eral college and other buildings and residences at Swarthmore and elsewliere. He was made a meml>er of the American society of civil en- gineers, American society of mechanical en- gineers. Franklin institute (chairman for 1892 and 1894 of its committee on .science and the arts; meml»er of the Ixjard of managers, and of the committee on publications, editing the journal of the Franklin institute); Rensselaer society of en- gineers. S<x)iete des ingenieurs civils de France. Society of naval arcliitects and marine engineers, hi.storical society of Pennyslvania, American association for the advancement of science (fel- low), etc. He was librarian of Swarthmore col-

lege from 1877 until 1888, and vice-president of the same from 1881 until 1886. He visited Europe in 1886 to study foreign technical schools and systems; received, in 1889, the honorary degree of Ph.D. from Swarthmore; was special agent of the 11th U. S. census (building-stones, etc), in 1890): became postmaster at Swarthmore in 1895, and emeritus i)rofessor at the college in 1898.

BEARDSLEY, Eben Edwards, clergyman, was born at Stepney, Conn., in 1808: the son of a prosperous farmer and landholder. He was grad- uated from Trinity college, Hartford, in 1832, as honor man of his class. After serving for three years as master of a classical school in Hartford, and as tutor in Trinity college, he was ordained to the prie.sthood of the Epi.scopal church, his first incumbency being that of St. Peter's church, Cheshire, Conn. He continued in charge of this parish until he was elected principal of the Episcopal academy in that place, an office which he held for several years. In 1848 he accepted the rectorship of St. Thomas's church, New Haven, and continued there until the time of his death, a period of forty-three years. Trinity college conferred upon him the degree of D.D. in 1854, and Columbia college that of LL.D. in 1874, in recognition of his valuable contributions to the history of the college in his " Life and Cor- respondence of Samuel Johnson, D. D., Missionary of the Church of England in Connecticut and First President of King's College, New Y'ork " (1874), and " Life and Times of William Samuel Johnson, president of Columbia college, New York " (1876). In historical research of the church in Connecticut he became a recognized authority. He published the "History of the Episcopal Church in Connecticut, from the Settlement of the Colony to the Death of Bishop Brownell, in 1865" (2 vols., 1865), and the "Life and Cor- respondence of the Rt. Rev. Samuel Seabury, D.D., First Bishop of Connecticut, and of the Episcopal Church in the United States of America" (1881). Besides his parochial and literary labors, Dr. Beardsley took the deepest interest in diocesan and general ecclesiastical affairs. For thirty-four years he was a member of the standing committee, and for twenty-three years a delegate to the general convention of the church from Connecticut, and in 1880 to 1883 he was president of the House of deputies. He died Dec. 21, 1H91.

BEARDSLEY, Levi, lawyer, was born at Hoosic, Rensselaer county, N. Y.., Nov. 13, 1785; son of Obadiah and Eunice (Moore) Beardsley. When lie was about four years old he removed with his father to Otsego county, and after at- tending the district school and working for a tiii.e on his father's farm, he enli.sted at the age of eighteen in the militia. In 1810 he removed to