Page:The Biographical Dictionary of America, vol. 02.djvu/351

 COLTON

COLTON

and legal adviser of the United States rubber company.

COLTON, Calvin, author, was born in Long- meadow, Mass., Sept. 14, 1789; son cf Maj. Luther and Thankful (Woolworth) Colton; grandson of Capt. Simon and Abigail (Burt) Colton; great-grandson of John and Johanna (Wolcot) Colton; and great - grandson of George Colton, who came from England and was one of the first settlers of Longmeadow, Mass. He was graduated at Yale in 1812, and at Andover theo- logical seminary in 1815. He was ordained, Jul}' 1, 1817; was a home missionary in New York, 1817-20; pastor of the Presbyterian church at Leroy, N.Y., 1820-24; and of the church at Batavia, N.Y., 1825-26, and then, owing to a failure of his voice, he gave up preaching and devoted himself to literature. He travelled ex- tensivelj' in the United States, and in Europe 1831-35, as correspondent of the New York Observer. He received holy orders in the Prot- estant Episcopal church July 2, 1837, held the rectorship of the Church of the Messiah, 1837-38, and was editor of the True Whig, Washington, D.C., 1842—44. He was professor of political econ- omy in Trinity college, Hartford, Conn., 1852-57. He received the degree of A.M. from Yale in 1813 and that of LL.D. from Hobart in 1832. Be- sides several books published in London, Eng., 1832-33, he published in America: Four Years in Chreat Britain (2 vols., 1835); Protestant Jesuitism (1836); A Voice from America to England (1839); The Crisis of Our Counti'y (1840); Junius Tracts (1843-1844); The Bights of Labor (1844); Life and Times of Henry Clay (2 vols., 1846); The Genius and JIissio7i of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States (1853); The Last Seven Yearn of the Life of Henry Clay ^1856); and Public Economy for the United States (18b6) . He died at Savan- nah, Ga., March 13, 1857.

COLTON, Gardner Quincy, cliemist, was born in Georgia, Yt., Feb. 7, 1814; son of Walter and Thankful (Cobb) Colton; grandson of Deacon Aaron and ^lary (Ely) Colton; and a descendant of George Colton of Sussex, England, who settled in Springfield, Mass., about 1650. He attended the public schools until 1830, when he began a five years' apprenticeship to a chairmaker. In 1835 he obtained employment in New York city, and in 1842 he entered the College of physicians and surgeons, and later studied in the oflSce of Dr. Willard Parker, devoting his attention especially to experimental chemistry. He became inter- ested in noting the effect of nitrous-oxide or laughing-gas, upon the human system, and in 1844 began to deliver lectures with practical illustrations. By an accident which occurred to a man under the influence of the gas during one of Dr. Colton's lectures, its value as an anaesthetic

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was discovered. A dentist who was among the spectators suggested the use of the gas in his profession and had a tooth extracted while under its influence, Dr. Colton administering the gas. In 1849 he went to California where he practised medicine among the miners, worked in the gold fields, and became the first justice of the peace. Returning to New York the follow- ing year he continued his lectures until 1803 when he founded at the Cooper institute the Colton dental asso- ciation. He subse- quently established branches in various cities of the United

States, and in Paris and London. He compiled Shakespeare and the Bible (1888); and wrote What do Unitarians Believe? (3d ed., 1890.) He died in Geneva, Switzerland, Aug. 10, 1898.

COLTON, Walter, author, was born in Rut- land, Yt., May 9, 1797; son of Deacon Walter and Thankful (Cushman) Colton. He was graduated from Yale in 1822, and from Andover theological seminary in 1825. He was professor of moral philosophy and Biblical literature in the Military academy, Middletown, Conn., 182.5-30, also oflfici- ating as chaplain. He was ordained, June 5, 1827. In 1828 he went to Washington, D.C, to accept the editorship of the American Spectator, a Whig organ. In 1831 he was appointed by President Jackson chaplain in the navy, and visited the West Indies on board the Yincennes, 1832-35, and the Mediterranean on board the Constellation, 1835-37. He was then assigned to the Charles- town navy yard, and while in Boston edited the Colonization Herald, 1837. In 1838 he was trans- ferred to the naval station in Philadeliahia, where he edited the Xorth American, 1841-42. In 1845 he was ordered to California, and in 1846 was appointed by Commodore Stockton alcalde of Monterej', to which office he was afterward elected by the people. He established the Cali- fornian, the first jmper published on the Pacific slope, which he removed to San Francisco and called the Alta Calif ornian. He built the first schoolhouse in California, and in a letter to the North American, made the first public announce- ment of the discovery of gold. He resigned his chaplaincy during President Tyler's administra- tion and returned to Philadelphia in 1849, where he devoted himself to literary work. The U.S. senate after his decease, voted his heirs a hand-