Page:The Biographical Dictionary of America, vol. 09.djvu/148

 ROBINSON

ROBINSON

sioned colonel of militiii in 1777, and coinniatuleJ his regiment at the defeat of Fort Ticonderoga, July 5, 1777; was a member of the council of Siifety, and as such sent by Vermont to represent the claims of the people before the Continental congress; a member of the governor's council, 1777-55. and chief justice of Vermont, 1778-84 and nSS-SO. He was governor of Vermont, 1789- 90; was elected by the legislature of Vermont with Stephen R. Bradley, the first U.S. .senators, and drew the long term. 1791-97. but resigned in OctoVx^r, 1790. Isaac Tichenor completing his term. While in the senate he opposed the Jay treaty. In 1802 he was a member of the general assembly. He was married, first, July 25, 17G2, to Mary, daughter of Stephen Fay, who died in 1801; and secondly, to Susannah, widow of Maj. Artemas Howe of New Brunswit-k. and daugliter of Gen. Jonathan Warner of Hardwick, Mass. Tlie lionorary degree of A.M. was conferred upon him by Yale in 1789, and by Dartmoutli in 1790. He died in Bennington, Vt.. May 20, 1813.

ROBINSON, Sara Tappan Doolittle, historian, was born in Belchertown, Mass., July 12, 1827; daughter of Mj'ron and Clarissa (Dwight) Law- rence; granddaughter of Benjamin and Sarah (Warner) Lawrence and of Col. Henry and Ruth (Rich) Dwight, and a descendant of John Dwiglit of Hatfield and of John Dwight of Dedham, Mass. Her father was repre- sentative, senator, and president of the senate in the general Court of Massachu- setts, 1838-40. She was educated at the Belchertown Classi- cal academy and at the New Salem acad- emy; .studied a year with Miss Sophronia Smith, and was married in Belchertown, Oct. 30, 1851. to Dr. Charles Robinson (q.v.), with whom she shared the hardships and dangers incident to the conflict in Kansas territory between the p«jlitical parties seeking to gain control of the government in order to shape the policy of the future state. She made the journey to New England alonf, to report the state of affairs to Amos A. Lawrence and Dr. Edward Everett Hale of the Emigrant Aid society, tiie rival govern- ment having pl.iced her hnsliand under arrest at the outset of the journey. She carried the evi- dence of fraudulent voting r.n March 30, 1855, taken before the congressional committee and gave it to Gov. Salmon P. Cliaseof Ohio, who sent

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it to Wasliington by Representative Cooper K. Watson. Slie gave to the history of that period valuable information as to the true condition of affairs in the territory and controverted many of the statements made in the heat of political ex- citement by interested actors in the conflict. Pei'haps with the exception of her husband's '"Tlie Kansas Conflict" Mrs. Robinson's ATansas, Its Interior and Exterior Life (IS.'iO), gives the most trustworthy data of tiie early history of Kansas extant, as it is manifestly conservative and temperate in its statements. In 1903 Mrs. Robinson was residing at " Oakridge," Lawrence, Kansas.

ROBINSON, Solon, author, was born near Tolland, Conn., Oct. 21, 1803. He worked on his fatlier's farm until 1817, his education being limited to the winter months. He was then ap- prenticed to a carpenter, but was soon released and became a peddler. His literary talents were early manifested, and he became a contributor to the Albany Cultivator and to other publica- tions, chiefly on agricultural subjects. He was for several years the agricultural editor of the New York Tribune. His publications include: Hot Corn, or Life Scenes in AVw York (]8.')3); How to Live, or Domestic Economy Illustrated (1800); Facts for Farmers (1804), and Mewonitoc (1807). In 1870 he purchased a farm in the vicinity of Jacksonville, Fla., where lie died, Nov. 3, 1880.

ROBINSON, Stillman Williams, mechanical and civil engineer, was born in South Reading, Vt., March 0, 1838; son of Ebenezer, Jr., and Adeline Williams (Childs) Robinson; grandson of Ebenezer and Hannah (Ackley) Robinson, and a great-grandson of James Robinson; the latter being a descendant of Jonathan and of William Robinson (born in Cambridge, Mass., April 20, 1082). He was graduated from the University of Michigan, C.E., 1803, having pre- viously served an apprenticeship in a machine shop, 1855-59. He was assistant engineer on the U.S. lake survey, 1803-00; instructor in civil engineering at the University of Micliigan, 1800- 07; assistant professor of mining engineering and geodesy, 1807-70; professor of mechanical engineering and physics at the University of Illinois, 1870-78, and at the Ohio State univer- sity, 1878-95, becoming professor emeritus in the latter institution in 1899. He was inspector of railroads for Oiiio, 1880-84; served as consulting civil and mechanical engineer in various works, including bridges of the Santa Fe Railroad in Kansas and Wyoming, in the mountings of the Lick telescope; and three awards were granted on inventions of his at the Centennial of 1870. and one at the Columbian exhibition of 1893. He was elected a member of the American So- ciety of Mechanical Engineers; the American