Page:The Granite Monthly Volume 8.djvu/149

 Sylvester Marsh.

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��New Englanders were selecting their homes in the Western Reserve. At Ash- tabula the young man from Quincy market began the business of supplying Boston and New York with beef and pork, making his shipments via the Erie Canal.

But there was a farther West, and in the Winter of 1833-4 he proceeded to Chicago, then a village of three hun- dred inhabitants, and began to supply them, and the company of soldiers gar- risoning Fort Dearborn, with fresh beef; hanging up his slaughtered cattle upon a tree standing on the site now occupied by the Court House.

This glance at the condition of soci- ety and the mechanic arts during the boyhood of Sylvester Marsh, and this look at the struggling village of Chicago when he was in manhood's prime, en- ables us to comprehend in some slight degree the mighty trend of events dur- ing the life time of a single individual ; an advancement vmparalleled through all the ages.

For eighteen years, the business be- gun under the spreading oak upon what is now Court House square, in Chicago, was successfully conducted, — each year assuming larger proportions. He was one of the founders of Chicago, doing his full share in the promotion of every public enterprise. The prominent busi- ness men with whom he associated were John H. Kuisie, Baptiste Bounier, Deacon John Wright, Gurdon S. Hub- bard, William H. Brown, Dr. Kimberly, Henry Graves, the proprietor of the first Hotel, the Mansion house, the first framed two-story building erected, Francis Sherman, who arrived in Chi- cago the same year and became subse- quent builder of the Sherman House.

Mr. Marsh was the originator of meat packing in Chicago, and invented many of the appliances used in the

��process — especially the employment of steam.

In common with most of the busi- ness men of the country, he suffered loss from the re- action of the specula- tive fever which swept over the coun- try during the third decade of the cen- tury ; but the man whose boyhood had been passed on the Campton hills was never cast down by commercial disas- ter. His entire accumulations were swept away, leaving a legacy of Hability ; but with undaunted bravery he began once more, and by untiring energy not only paid the last dollar of liability, but accumulated a substantial fortune — engaging in the grain business.

His active mind was ever alert to in- vent some method for the saving of hu- man muscle by the employment of the forces of nature. He invented the dried-meal process, and " Marsh's Cal- oric Dried Meal " is still an article of commerce.

While on a visit to his native state in 1852, he ascended Mount Washington, accompanied by Rev. A. C. Thompson, pastor of the Eliot Church, Roxbury, and while struggling up the steep ascent, the idea came to him that a railroad to the summit was feasable and that it could be made a profitable enterprise. He obtained a charter for such a road in 1858, but the breaking out of the war postponed action till 1866, when a company was formed and the enterprise successfully maugurated and completed.

Leaving Chicago he returned to New England, settling in Littleton, New Hampshire, in 1864 ; removing to Con- cord, New Hampshire, in 1879, where the closing years of his life were passed.

Mr. Marsh was married, first, April 4, 1844, to Charlotte D. Bates, daughter of James Bates of Munson, Massachu- setts. The union was blessed with three children, of whom but one, Mary E.

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