Page:The Granite Monthly Volume 9.djvu/23

Rh the navigation works upon the river above Middlesex canal: merchant, politician, trial justice, surveyor, and among the foremost in all the business activities of the time and place. A short sketch of his life may appropriately be given in this connection.

Frederick Gilman Stark was born in the house of his grandfather, General John Stark, at Derryfield, now Manchester, August 6, 1792. The place of his birth was upon land in the northerly part of Manchester, now owned by the state of New Hampshire, and occupied for the Reform School. The house was destroyed by accidental fire in 1866.

Of the five sons of General John Stark, the third one, John, Jr., known in his day as the "justice," inherited the family mansion and home farm, where he had lived with and assisted his distinguished father during the last forty years of the life of the old patriot, and where he spent the remainder of his own long life engaged mostly in agricultural pursuits. His third son, Frederick, the subject of this memoir, was one of a family of twelve children, all of whom lived to advanced age and raised families of their own. Starting in life with the advantage of a good physical constitution, as indicated by the remarkable longevity of the family, and what may perhaps be considered a further advantage of comparative poverty,—the family property being inadequate to the support of so many children without exertions of their own,—Frederick seems to have developed at an early age a rugged spirit of self-reliance, and a determination to make his way in the world by his own efforts.

The years of childhood were passed at home. The daily duties of the establishment required such aid from the children as they were able to give. In the winter there was some schooling, and in this direction he seems to have shown great aptitude, especially for figures. There is now in existence a manuscript book of complete arithmetic of the higher grade wholly in his handwriting, with all the rules and examples worked out in detail, embracing simple rule of three, inverse proportion, compound proportion, practice, tare and tret, single fellowship, simple interest, compound interest, commission brokerage, insurance, discount, bank discount, equation of payments, barter, loss and gain, alligation medial, alligation alternate, position, double position, vulgar fractions, and decimals. This manuscript book is dated in 1809, and has the appearance of being his own composition. There is no positive evidence of its originaltyoriginality [sic], but it is at least evident that he thoroughly mastered the subjects of which it treats. He was then seventeen years of age and in attendance upon school in Londonderry.