Page:The Biographical Dictionary of America, vol. 07.djvu/128

 Mccormick

Mccormick

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in 1847 and 1858. He employed a firm to manu- facture the reapers in Cincinnati, Ohio; and in 1847 his brother Leander superintended their con- struction. They established a manufactory in Chicago, 111., in 1848, and in 1851 he took his per- fected reaper to the World's Fair in Lon- don, where the Lon- don Times acknowl- edged it to be worth more than the entire cost of the exposition to the farmers of England. He exhi- bited it in Paris in 1855 and at Hamburg in 1863. The U.S. patent office refused to extend the patent in 1859, and during an argument be- fore the commission of patents, Reverdy Johnson declared that the McCorraick reaper was worth $55,000,000 a year to the United States, a statement never disputed. Secretary Seward also declared that its introduc- tion in the harvest fields of the United States moved the line of civilization westward thirty miles every year, and in 1897 it was estimated that it saved in labor alone to the farmers of the United States more than $100,000,000 yearly. Mr. McCormick received numerous prizes, di- plomas and medals at home, and in 1878 re- ceived for the third time one of the grand prizes from the Paris exposition, and' the rank of officer of the Legion of Honor. He was also elected a member of the French Academy of Science in that year, •' as having done more for agriculture

than any other living man." He gave $100,- 000 to found . the Presbyte- rian seminary of the North- west in Chica- go, 111., in 1850, which became the McCormick Theological seminary, and his gifts to the institution during his lifetime aggre- gated $300,000. He gave to Washington and Lee university, Lexington, Va., $10,000 soon after the close of the war, to which he added $10,000 more during his lifetime, and his trustees under the provisions of his will added $20,000, making his gift, known as the Cyrus H. McCormick fund, amount to $40,000 in real-estate mortgages. Upon this foundation the trustees of the univer- sity established the McCormick professorship of

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natural philosophy. He aided Union Theological seminary in Virginia to the amount of $30,000, and was also a generous benefactor of Hastings college, Neb. He gave his support to the In- terior, a religious paper in 1872, which became^ the organ of the Presbyterian church in the north- western states. After the great fire of 1871 he rebuilt his business on a much larger scale and also built several business blocks in the city. He was married in 1858 to Nettie, daughter of Melzar Fowler, of Jefferson county, N.Y., and their son, Cyrus Hall McCormick, Jr., succeeded as presi- dent of the McCormick Harvesting Machine com- pany on the death of his father. In the selection of names for a place in the Hall of Fame for Great Americans, New York university, in Oc- tober, 1900, his name in Class D, inventors, re- ceived twenty-six votes, Fulton, Howe, Morse and Whitney only exceeding. He died in Chicago, 111., May 13, 1884.

McCormick, Henry Clay, representative, was born in Washington township, Lycoming county, Pa., June 30, 1844 ; son of Seth T. and Ellen (Miller) McCormick ; grandson of Seth McCormick, and of William and Sarah (Moore) Miller, and a descend- ant of Hugh McCormick who immigrated ta America about 1754 and resided in Cumberland county, and of James McCormick of Londonderry, Ireland, prominent in the famous siege in that city. He attended the common schools and Dick- inson seminary, studied law, was admitted to the bar in 1866, and practised his profession in Wil- liamsport. Pa. He was a Republican represent- ative in the 50th and 51st congresses, 1887-91, and attorney-general of Pennsylvania, 1895-99. In 1899 he resumed the practice of law at Wil- liamsport.

McCORMICK, James Robinson, representa- tive, was born in Washington county, Mo.^ Aug. 1, 1824 ; third son of Joseph and Jane (Robinson) McCormick, and grandson of Andrew and Cath- erine (Adams) McCormick. Andrew McCormick came from the north of Ireland about 1776, served in the Revolutionary war, and married the daughter of Jolm Adams, who with his sister Catherine, fled from Germany to escape persecu- tion from the Papists. He was graduated at the Memphis Medical college in 1849, and settled in practice in Ironton, Mo. He married in 1852 Berchette C. Nance, who died in 1866, and sec- ondly Susan E. Garner. Emmet Curran McCor- mick, M.D., his son by his first marriage, and. James Edward McCormick, M.D., by his second marriage, survived him. He was a delegate to- the state constitutional convention of 1861 ; a mem- ber of the state senate, 1862, but resigned to serve in the Federal army, where he attained the rank of brigadier-general, and served to the close of the. war. In 1866 he was again elected a state sena