Honorable Oakes Ames, eldest son of Oliver and Susannah (Angier) Ames, was born in Easton, January 10, 1804; married November 29, 1827, Eveline Orville Gilmore; and entered heartily into the enterprises inaugurated by his father. Under his supervision the manufacture of shovels grew into giant proportions. A railroad, constructed to the very doors of the factories, furnished facilities for transporting to them yearly fifteen hundred tons of iron, two thousand tons of steel and five thousand tons of coal, and for carrying away from them more than one hundred and thirty thousand dozen shovels, in the manufacture of which employment had been given to five hundred workmen. The fame of the goods kept pace with the advance of civilization; and on every frontier, in all quarters of the globe, were found as instruments of progress the Ames shovels.
It is not so much as the successful manufacturer, however, that Oakes Ames will be remembered, as the master mind through whose perseverance and indomitable energy, and in the face of seemingly insurmountable obstacles, was forced to completion the pioneer railway across the Western Continent. He gained a deserved and enduring fame as the builder of the Union Pacific Railroad, and that magnificent work will ever stand as his proudest monument. During the former part of the war of the Rebellion he rendered important service to the Union cause by his shrewd and sagacious counsels in State affairs, and a little later for ten years represented the Second Massachusetts District in the National House of Representatives. He died May 8, 1873.
Honorable Oliver Ames, second son of Oakes and Eveline O. (Gilmore) Ames, was born in North Easton, February 4, 1831. [See genealogical foot note]. He received his early education in the public schools of his native town and at the North Attleboro, Leicester, and Easton Academies. Having thus laid the foundation of a liberal education, he entered the shovel works of his father, where he served an apprenticeship of five years, thus mastering the business in all the minuteness of its details. At the age of twenty, appreciating the value of a more thorough scholastic training, he took a special course at Brown University, placing himself under the special tutelage of President Francis Wayland. The bent of his mind in this, his early manhood, is perhaps best seen from his favorite branches of study, which were history, geology, and political economy. Having finished his collegiate studies, he returned to North Easton where he soon demonstrated that he was possessed of the same splendid business qualities by which his father and grandfather had fought their way to success. His natural love of mechanical employments, which is a marked family trait, soon displayed itself in several inventions; and his inventive genius, coupled with his perfect knowledge of the business, has brought about important changes and improvements in the business of the firm. During this time he served honorably in the State militia, rising from the rank of Lieutenant to Lieutenant Colonel. In 1863 he was admitted a member of the firm of Oliver Ames and Sons, and for several years personally superintended the various departments of the firms immense establishment at North Easton. At his fathers death in 1873 the numerous financial trusts held by the latter devolved on him, and he has been, and is, President, Director, or Trustee of a large number of institutions and corporations, including railroads, national banks, savings banks, and manufacturing corporations. In 1880 Mr. Ames was elected to the State Senate, and was re-elected in 1881. With the exception of having served on the School Committee of Easton this was the first office to which he had been called by the suffrages of his fellow-citizens. He had, however, taken a deep and active interest in political matters, and had rendered efficient political service by his connection with the Republican Town Committee of Easton, as Chairman and Treasurer, since the formation of the Republican party. As a member of the State Senate he was diligent and painstaking in attendance upon his Legislative duties, and was known as one of the working members of the body. He served during each year of his membership on the Committees on Railroads, and Education. In 1882 he received the Republican nomination for Lieutenant-Governor upon the ticket headed by the name of Honorable Robert R. Bishop as the candidate for Governor. In that tidal-wave year Mr. Bishop was defeated by General Butler, but Mr. Ames was elected by a handsome plurality; and it is not too much to say that by his courteous official demeanor towards his Excellency, Governor Butler, during the somewhat phenomenal political year of 1883, coupled with his firmness and good judgment in opposing the more objectionable schemes of that official, he contributed much to the restoration of the Republican party to power at the ensuing State election. He was re-elected in 1883, and again in 1884, and has now entered upon his third term of service. His political, like his business life, has been characterized by a straightforward honesty of purpose, by the strictest integrity, and by an energetic, able, and faithful performance of trusts accepted. Mr. Ames is the possesor of large wealth, but he has most conclusively proven that such possession is in no sense a bar to a faithful and efficient service of his fellow citizens in positions of trust and honor. His rare executive ability has been of good service to the Commonwealth, in whose affairs he has exercised the same good judgment and marked executive ability, as in his own.
It is, perhaps, as a financier that Oliver Ames has won his widest reputation. Upon the death of his father the management of the vast enterprises which the later had controlled, suddenly devolved upon him. The greatness of the man showed itself in that he found himself equal to the emergency. The Oakes Ames estate was, at the time he took upon his shoulders its settlement, not only one in which immense and diversified interests were involved, scattered throughout different states of the Union, but it was also burdened with obligations to the extent of eight millions of dollars. The times were most unpropitious, the country being just on the eve of a great financial panic when immense properties were crumbling to pittances. He undertook the Herculean task of rescuing at this time this estate from threatened ruin, and of vindicating the good name of his father from undeserved censure. He had in this gigantic work to meet and thwart the plots of rapacious railroad wreckers, and schemers; but his thorough mental discipline united with his intensely practical business training, and coupled with his native energy, tact, good sense, and fertility of resources, stood him in good stead. He inspired capitalists with confidence, money was forthcoming to further his carefully matured plans, and the ship freighted with the fortunes of his family, was, by his steady hand, piloted securely amidst the shoals and quicksands of disaster, and by rocks strewn with the wrecks of princely fortunes, to a safe anchorage. He rescued the property from peril, met and paid the enormous indebtedness resting upon it, paid a million of dollars or more of legacies, and had still a large surplus to divide among the heirs.
As a business man his sagacity seems almost intuitive. As an illustration of this, his work in developing the Central Branch of the Union Pacific Railroad may be instanced, a work which at the same time gave him high rank as a railroad manager. At the time he connected himself with the undertaking, only the first hundred miles of the road were in running order. He first made a thorough personal investigation of the proposed line, and satisfying himself as to its capabilities for business, he pushed the enterprise through to completion, building two hundred and sixty miles of road, and fully equipping it for operation. His judgment, which at the time was somewhat questioned by other experienced railroad managers and financiers, was fully justified by the result, which was a complete financial success.
As a business man his sagacity seems almost intuitive. As an illustration of this, his work in developing the Central Branch of the Union Pacific Railroad may be instanced, a work which at the same time gave him high rank as a railroad manager. At the time he connected himself with the undertaking, only the first hundred miles of the road were in running order. He first made a thorough personal investigation of the proposed line, and satisfying himself as to its capabilities for business, he pushed the enterprise through to completion, building two hundred and sixty miles of road, and fully equipping it for operation. His judgment, which at the time was somewhat questioned by other experienced railroad managers and financiers, was fully justified by the result, which was a complete financial success.
One of the most impressive traits in the character of Oliver Ames is his veneration for the memory of his distinguished father. He fully believes that the hastily and unjustly formed verdict of censure pronounced upon Oakes Ames, both by public opinion and by the United States House of Representatives, will ere long be reversed, and that his memory will be honored by the country, as it so justly deserves. Indeed he has already had the gratification of seeing this verdict reversed, so far as public opinion is concerned; and it only remains for Congress to remove its undeserved vote of censure, for Oakes Ames to take his appropriate and honored place in American history. There is little doubt that Mr. Ames will yet see this ambition of his life realized. As to this censure, Massachusetts, where Oakes Ames was best known and appreciated, has spoken through her Legislature by the following resolution, which unanimously passed both House and Senate in the spring of 1883:
"Resolved, in view of the great services of Oakes Ames, representative from the Massachusetts Second Congressional District, for ten years ending March 4, 1873, in achieving the construction of the Union Pacific Railroad, the most vital contribution to the integrity and growth of the National Union since the war:
"In view of his unflinching truthfulness and honesty, which refused to suppress, in his own or any other interest, any fact, and so made him the victim of an intense and misdirected public excitement and subjected him to a vote of censure by the Forty-second Congress at the close of its session;
"And in view of the later deliberate public sentiment, which, upon a review of all the facts, holds him in an esteem irreconciliable with his condemnation, and which, throughout the whole country recognizes the value and patriotism of his achievement and his innocence of corrupt motive or conduct;
"Therefore, the Legislature of Massachusetts hereby expresses its gratitude for his work and its faith in his integrity of purpose and character, and asks for like recognition thereof on the part of the National Congress."
The beautiful Oakes Ames Memorial Hall at North Easton, erected by his sons, is an impressive monument of filial devotion and respect. This village of North Easton, the home of Mr. Ames and other members of the Ames family, as well as the seat of the extensive shovel works, deserves more than a passing notice, enriched and beautified as it has been by this family, until it has become one of the most charming of New England villages, and presents a model which deserves to be widely copied. The old and substantial factories, built of granite, present the neat appearance which characterizes the buildings in some of our oldest navy yards. The employes have many of them grown old in the service of the firm; and well paid, intelligent, and satisfied, are themselves the owners of their attractive cottage homes and take a just pride in the welfare of the community. The concrete walks, macadamized roadways, and well kept yards and lawns evince thrift. The elegant railway station, a gift to the village from one member of the family, is a model of architectural beauty and convenience. The Gothic church and parsonage of the same style of architecture, are befitting adjuncts of the park-like cemetery, where rests the dust of the blacksmith ancestor who bravely struggled amid adverse surroundings to found the fortunes of his family, and build up a business which has extended wherever civilization has made its way. The Memorial hall, before-mentioned, is on a commanding cliff, overlooking the town; close by is the elegant structure known and endowed as the Ames Free Library; and in another direction is the temple, dedicated to the cause of popular education, that emblem of New Englands power, the school-house, all monuments of the munificence of the Ames family, and of the deep interest its members take in the welfare of their native town. In the triangle near the centre of the village, formed by the converging of the principal streets, is a declivity, where art has so arranged the rough and irregular forms of New England boulders as to re-produce a unique scene from some Scotch or Swiss village. This "rockery," as it is called, is clothed in summer with verdure and flowers, and from its summit one finds an extended and charming view of the village, with its cottages, its workshops, and the villas of the proprietors of the latter. These villas, each set in extensive grounds, are models of architectural elegance, and are surrounded by most artistic landscape gardening. Conspicuous among these is the residence of the subject of this sketch, facing, as it does, a spacious well-kept lawn, and overlooking a lake, an exquisite gem in its emerald setting.
The public spirit of the Amess finds one of its most marked illustrations in this model and typical New England village; and no small share of what has been achieved for it is due to the warm heart and open hand of Oliver Ames. He has ever shown himself an ardent friend of popular education, and justly holds that the New England common school lies at its foundation. For a period of twenty years he found time, amid a multiplicity of weighty business cares, to serve upon the School Committee of his town and to give the benefit of his experience, judgment, and personal supervision to the promotion of the efficiency of this one of the very fundamental of American institutions, the common school. Oakes Ames left a fund of $50,000, the income to be used for the benefit of the school children of North Easton village. Through the wise thoughtfulness of Oliver Ames many of the privileges arising from this fund have been extended to the other sections of the town; and it hardly need be said that the schools of Easton are among the objects of the fondest pride of its citizens.
Mr. Ames, though absorbed in the cares pertaining to the management of gigantic business interests, yet finds time for the appreciative enjoyment of the amenities and refinements of life. He posesses a cultivated appreciation of music, literature and the drama, and his artistic taste is evinced by his valuable and choice collections of paintings and statuary. Architecture has been with him a special study, and his magnificent winter residence, recently completed on Commonwealth Avenue, in our city of Boston, is a monument of his own architectural taste. In Europe this residence would be called a palace, here it is simply the home of a representative American citizen. Peculiarly happy in his domestic relations his home is beautified and ennobled by the virtues of domestic life. A generous hospitality is dispensed within its portals, where on every hand are found the evidences of the cultured refinement of its occupants. A tour of a few months in the Old World not only gave Mr. Ames needed rest and relaxation from business cares, but also furnished him with opportunities for observation which were most judiciously improved. In his religious belief he is a Unitarian, and has for many years been an active member of the Unitarian Society of North Easton.