Page:The Biographical Dictionary of America, vol. 08.djvu/297

 PERLEY

PERRY

Boston counting room in 1785, visited and en- gaged in business with his brother James in Santo Domingo, and returned soon after as the Boston agent of his brother's house. He was married in 1788, to Sarah, daughter of Simon Elliot. He formed a partnership with his brother James in Boston in 1793, which continued till the latter's death in 1822, and in the meantime established a house in Canton under the name Perkins & Co. He traveled in Europe, 1794-95, was made president of the Boston Branch of the Bank of the United States in 1796, but resigned the next year and was succeeded by George Cabot. He was elected to the Massachusetts senate in 1805 and for nearly twenty years thereafter, serving in one or the other branch of the state legislature. He was a projector of the Quincy railroad, the first in the United States, in 1837, and retired from business with a large fortune in 1838. He was prominent in establishing the Massachusetts general liospital with an asylum for the insane, and about 1813 donated his mansion house on Pearl Street, worth $50,000, for a blind asylum, which was the foundation of the Perkins Institu- tion for the Blind in 1853. The condition of the gift was that $50,000 should be raised as a fund for its support. With other members of his family he gave more than $60,000 to the Boston Athen- £euiu, and was the largest contributor to the Mercantile Library association. He also contrib- uted to the erection of Bunker Hill monument and toward the completion of the Washington monument. His diaries of travel and autobio- gi-apliical sketches were partly preserved in Thomas G. Cary's " Memoir of Thomas H. Per- kins" (1856) and he published a small book in- tended to teach tlie art of reading to the blind (1827) the Gospel of St. John, for the blind (1834), and afterward several otlier books for the blind. He died in Brookline, Mass., Jan. 11, 1854.

PERLEY, Ira, jurist, was born in Boxford, Mass., Nov. 9, 1799 ; son of Samuel and Phebe (Dresser) Perley ; grandson of Maj. Asa and Susanna (Low) Perley, and a descendant of Allen Perley, a native of Wales, who immigrated to New England, settled first at Charlesto\vn in 1630. and in Ipswich in 1635 and was married in 1635 to Mrs. Susanna Bokeson. Ira Perley was prepared for college in Bradford academy, graduated at Dartmouth college A.B., 1833, A.M., 1835, and was a tutor there, 1833-35. He studied law under Benjamin J. Gilbert of Hanover, N. H., and Daniel M, Christie of Dover, was ad- mitted to the bar in 1827, and settled in practice in Hanover, N. H. He was treasurer of Dart- mouth college, 1830-35 ; represented Hanover in the state legislature in 1834, removed to Concord in 1836, and served as a representative in the state legislature in 1839 and in 1870. He was an

associate judge of the superior court of New Hampshire, 1850-52; chief justice of the superior court, 1855-59 and 1864-69, and in 1869 resumed practice as a consulting lawyer. He received the honorary degree LL.D. from Dartmouth in 1852. He was married in June, 1840, to Mary S., daughter of John Nelson of Haverhill, Mass. He is the author of : A Charge to the Grand Jury ; A Eulogy on Daniel Webster, and An Address at the Dartmouth Centennial. He died at Concord, N.H.. Feb. 26, 1874.

PERRIN, Bernadotte, educator, was born in Goshen, Conn., Sept. 15, 1847 ; son of Lavelatte and Ann Eliza (Comstock) Perrin ; grandson of Aaron and Lois (Lee) Perrin, and of W^illiam and Ann (Keeler) Comstook, and a descendant of Thomas Perrin, who came from England to Lebanon, Conn., in 1709, and, on the same side, of John Porter, who came to Windsor, Conn., in 1639. He was graduated from Yale in 1869 ; taught in the high school at Hartford, Conn., and was tutor at Yale, 1869-76. He studied at the Universities of Tiibingen, Leipzig and Berlin, 1876-78 ; was again tutor at Yale in 1878, assistant principal of the Hartford liigh school, 1879-86, professor of Greek at Western Reserve university, 1881-93, and was appointed professor of Greek language and literature at Yale in 1893. He was married, Aug. 17, 1881, to Luella, daughter of James J. Perrin of Lafayette, Ind., who died in 1889 ; and secondly, Nov. 25, 1892, to Susan, daughter of Charles S. Lester of Saratoga, N.Y. He was president of the American Philological association in 1897. He edited : Ccesar's Civil War (1882) ; Homer's Odyssey (Books I.-IV., 1889 ; V.-VIII. 1894) ; School Odyssey, eight books and vocabulary (1897); Plutarch's Themistocles and Aristides (1901), and contributed articles on Greek and Roman history and literature to scientific journals.

PERRY, Alfred Tyler, educator, was born in Geneseo, 111., Aug. 19, 1858; son of George Bulkley and Maria Louise (Tyler) Perry ; grand- son of Dr. Alfred and Lucy (Benjamin) Perry and of Duty S. and Amy (Arnold) Tyler, and a descendant of Arthur Perry of Stratford, Conn, (supposed to be the son of Arthur Perry of Boston, 1638); of Job Tyler of Andover, Mass., (1650), and of William Pynchon, settler of Springfield, Charles Chauncey, Boston, 1635, the Rev. Gershom Bulkeley of Wethersfield, Conn. (1636), Capt. Richard Lord of Hartford. 1636, and other early settlers. He was graduated from AVilliams college, A.B., 1880, A.M., 1891, and from the Hartford Theological seminary in 1885. He was ordained to the Congregational ministry in 1886 and was appointed assistant pastor of the Memorial church at Springfield. Mass., in 1886. He was married, April 13, 1887,