E. EASTMAN, It would be hard to find a fairer illustration of the
possibilities of the Birmingham district, abetted by intelligent and active
enterprise, than the career this modest gentleman affords. He is the possessor
of a handsome fortune, and he could hardly be less indebted to any of the
fictitious causes that thrust wealth upon men. A scientific education, giving
him a faith in this wonderful country, such as is hardly to be matched among
its largest operators; a quick eye for commercial quantities, and dauntless
energy in the organization of developing forces, are the factors that have
made Mr. Eastman one of the conspicuously successful men of Birmingham. He was
born near New Orleans in 1840, being the eldest son of Moses Eastman, M.
D.
Puritan and cavalier
sources, both of high quality, contributed to make his family, various of his
ancestors having been numbered among the prominent Americans of their day.
Moses Eastman, reared in Massachusetts, and educated at Dartmouth College and
the far-famed Philadelphia Medical College, began the practice of his
profession and the accumulation of wealth on the Tchfuncta River, in
Louisiana, but soon after moved to New Orleans, where he filled many important
positions. He was, for many years, president of the New Orleans Swamp Land
Draining Board. This office had control and direction of very large funds in
the interest of New Orleans. He was repeatedly an alderman and legislator. The
mother of E. Eastman was the daughter of General D. B. Morgan. General Morgan
married Miss Middleton, of the Charleston district, South Carolina, moved to
the Mississippi River, and located in Concordia Parish, Louisiana, before the
acquisition of that State by the United States, where the mother of Captain
Eastman was born. General Morgan was a man of mark in both a civil and
military capacity. He commanded the right wing of General Jackson's army at
the battle of New Orleans of 1815, and afterward served in the senate of the
State of his adoption for more than twenty years, and was also a member of the
convention that framed the first constitution. General Jackson, in token of
his appreciation of General Morgan, named the fort at the entrance of Mobile
Bay after him.
The wife of General
Morgan was a Middleton, of the famous South Carolina family, which embraced,
in the preceding generation, a signer of the Declaration of Independence, and
also a minister plenipotentiary to the court of Russia.
E. Eastman was educated
at the Kentucky Military Institute, and, at the breaking out of the late war,
entered the army of the Confederacy as second lieutenant of the Louisiana
Regulars, and served throughout the entire war. He was on the staff of General
Pillow at the battle of Fort Donelson. Before the end of the war Lieutenant
Eastman was made a captain of artillery. The war over, Captain Eastman, like
many other Southerners, left the United States for South America. After many
years of adventure there, he returned to his country and began the occupation
of inspecting and locating iron-ore lands, in which important work he soon
became an expert. Coming to Birmingham he entered the service of the Sloss
Furnace Company, and for several years inspected and located lands for
purchase by that great corporation. He made his fortune by judicious purchases
of mineral lands on his own account. In 1880 he formed a copartnership with
Mr. R. D. Smith. Messrs. Smith & Eastman bought about three hundred acres
of land at Irondale, on the Alabama Great Southern Railroad, about six miles
north of Birmingham. All the trunk lines tributary to Birmingham, coming
through a neighboring gap in the mountains, find there the first point of
contact on this land. It is otherwise phenomenally situated, as the different
constituents of pig iron are within a mile or two. Messrs. Smith & Eastman
also purchased two thousand acres of the famous twenty-feet vein of Red
Mountain ore. With the above property, and in conjunction with some of the
wealthiest gentlemen in Pennsylvania, a company has been organized, with a
capital of $1,500,000, for the purpose of manufacturing iron and steel. The
company will commence immediately the erection of two one-hundred-ton blast
furnaces. Smith & Eastman also purchased large bodies of land in the
suburbs of Birmingham, viz: the "Village Creek" lands, and the "Forest City"
lands. These two bodies of land are not more than two miles from the center of
Birmingham, and embrace about three hundred and fifty acres. They have been
laid off in streets and avenues, and are now regarded as part of the city.
Messrs. Smith & Eastman are respectively presidents of the companies
having control of these lands.
Captain Eastman is also
one of the incorporators of the Birmingham Tannery and Land Company, with a
capital of $250,000, and one of the leaders in establishing enterprises that
will benefit this section.
E. N.
EDMONDS, editor and
proprietor of the Labor Union, was born inCayuga County, N. Y., in 1842. He
was reared upon a farm, and received a good preliminary education. Upon the
outbreak of the civil war he was among the first to enlist, joining the
Nineteenth Regiment N. Y. V. Infantry, and served with that regiment, and the
Third N. Y. Artillery, until the close of the war. Since that period, and
until he started his publication, in the spring of 1886, he devoted his time
to railroading, and has long been known as one of the most efficient
yardmasters in the country. During this time he devoted his attention to the
organization of labor, and has made it a thorough study. Possessing native
ability, and quick of perception, it is not remarkable that he should adapt
himself so readily to journalism, in which he has achieved a notable success.
Captain Edmonds is a ready and forcible writer, and is deeply interested in
the work he has espoused.
CHRISTIAN F.
ENSLEN
, is a native of
Germany, and was born in Wurtemburg, in 1830. He obtained his education in the
common schools of that country, and at the age of fifteen, or in the year
1845, emigated to America, and landed on American shores at New Orleans. Being
well grown for his age he joined the Alabama Rifles, a volunteer regiment, and
went as private to the Mexican war in 1846.
In the fall of 1871 he
came to Birmingham. After following his trade for awhile he went into the
mercantile business, which he successfully followed until January, 1886, and
then organized the Jefferson County Savings Bank, of which he was made
president. This institution was incorporated by himself and two sons—Eugene,
who is cashier, and Charles. These three incorporated the bank with a capital
of $50,000. The charter was granted on the 2d of November, 1885, and the
building put up in that year, and actual business operations commenced
November, 1885. The first year's experience was so satisfactory that, at its
close, the capital stock was increased to $150,000.
Mr. Enslen is a Master
Mason and a member of the I. O. O. F., and belongs to the Baptist
Church.
EUGENE F.
ENSLEN, was born in Wetumpka,
Alabama, in 1858. He was educated there and came with his father to Birmingham
in 1871, and was bookkeeper in his father's store, as well as a member of the
firm as long as they continued in the mercantile business.
In 1877 he attended a
session of the Poughkeepsie Business College, in New York State. Upon the
organization of the Jefferson County Savings Bank he became the cashier, and
continues to hold the position with great satisfaction to all who are
interested in it.
No young man in
Birmingham has served a more honorable career than he, and few have a more
successful future lying before them.
He was married in 1878
to Miss Delia W. Evans, of LaGrange, Ga. He is the father of three
children—Julia, Eugene F., Jr., and Minnie Gip.
Mr. and Mrs. Enslen are
members of the Baptist Church.
FRANK VALLATLON
EVANS
was born onCape Fear in
Cumberland County,
North Carolina November 25, 1850.
He is the youngest child of John and Frances Evans, both descended from families
which, in the early history of the "Old North
State," contributed largely to her
glory.
When young
Evans had scarce passed his fifth year, misfortune overtook him in the death of
his father. He was thus left at a tender age to struggle with life as best he
may, but the struggle developed a character whose predominant elements are
industry, discreetness, and independence. A few years later his widowed mother,
with the younger children, moved to Fernandina, Florida. No sooner was she comfortably settled
in her new home, and prepared to educate her children, than the opening of the
war between the States thwarted her designs, and compelled her and her
interesting family to seek safety with relatives in the interior of
Georgia. Here, of course, young
Evans' educational facilities were meager and subject to serious interruptions.
He was entered at the military academy, in Tallahassee, but the heated struggle along the
coast soon compelled him to return to his home, where he must satisfy his
swelling ambition as the head of the household.
At the close
of the war he determined to learn the printing business, and entered the office
of the Albany News, then edited by his brother-in-law, Colonel Carey W. Styles.
Having mastered the mysteries of typesetting in a short time, he was sent to a
school in Carroll County,
Georgia. Here he
made rapid progress, and at the completion of his course he entered a business
college at Macon. Upon his return to Albany he accepted a partnership in the Albany News, and
soon became widely known as the "Boy Editor of Georgia." After
the consolidation of the Albany News and Advertiser, in 1876, Mr. Evans still
remained the controlling spirit of the new organ, and developed it into one of
the strongest and most influential papers in the State. He had now an
established reputation as a journalist, and hosts of warm and admiring friends,
through whose aid he could command positions of honor and trust in the
State.
But Mr. Evans
was not the man to rest upon the laurels he had already won; he looked abroad
for newer and more promising fields for the exercise of his talents, and in
July, 1881, he came to Birmingham, where he
bought a one-half interest in the Weekly Iron Age. In the following December he
and his partner, Mr. W. C. Garrett, established the Daily Age, and in September,
1882, the Iron Age Publishing Company was organized, with Mr. Evans as its
president and general manager. He resigned this. position in May, 1883, on
account of ill health, but soon after established the Sunday Chronicle, and the
following January, with Messrs. Grace and Cruikshank as partners, he established
the Evening Chronicle, now one of the leading evening papers in the
South.
From the
foregoing it will be seen that Mr. Evans, though still a young man, enjoys the
enviable distinction of being the father of Birmingham journalism. To his remarkable
foresight and sagacity, Birmingham is largely
indebted for her present vigorous and progressive dailies, whose columns still
bear the impress of their founder.
But Mr.
Evans' varied qualifications have not been confined to his journalistic
achievements. His rare tact and business ability received recognition at the
hands of the people of his adopted city by his election, in 1882, as alderman
from the Fourth Ward. In this capacity he served the city for two years, when he
was elected city clerk, and in April, 1886, he was promoted to the position of
city treasurer. It is but justice to Mr. Evans to state, in this connection,
that all, or nearly all, the city ordinances passed since 1882 are the products
of his pen, and the admirably arranged city code, recently prepared by him, is
but a fair illustration of his painstaking precision in all he
undertakes.
Mr. Evans was married in
January, 1875, to Miss Callie L. Hill, of Burton County, Georgia, who,
together with three interesting children, constitute his household. In the
lady of his choice are combined many of the most charming traits of woman; her
excellent judgment, quiet domestic habits, energy, and intelligence, make her
a most worthy helpmate to her husband.
But few men
in any progressive city become potent factors in its history. Mr. Evans has
always evinced a deep interest in every movement pertaining to the prosperity of
Birmingham, and more, he has been one of the
most active agents in its upbuilding since his advent to the city. Modest and
even diffident in his demeanor, he is. sought as a cautious and prudent adviser
in all matters pertaining to the welfare of the city. Such men are rare, and, if
wanting in aggressiveness and self-assertion, are more frequently overlooked
than overpraised.
In his social as well as
in his business relations, Mr. Evans' character may be described as the
embodiment, to a remarkable degree, of the advice given by Polonius ta
Laertes:
"Give thy thoughts no
tongue,
Nor any improportioned
thought his act.
Be thou familiar, but by
no means vulgar,
Those friends thou hast
and their adoption tried,
Grapple them to thy soul
with hoops of steel;
But do not dull thy palm
with entertainment,
Of each new-hatched,
unfledged comrade.
Beware Of entrance to a
quarrel, but being in,
Bear 't that the opposer
may beware of thee.
Give every man thy ear,
but few thy voice;
Take every man's
censure, but reserve thy judgment."
