Friday, February 24, 2017

A00006 - Arthur Sherburne Hardy, A Novelist and Poet

Arthur Sherburne Hardy (usually: Arthur S. Hardy) (August 13, 1847 – March 14, 1930) was an American engineer, educator, editor, diplomat, novelist, and poet.

Early life and education[edit]

Hardy was born in 1847 in Andover, Massachusetts, the son of Alpheus and Susan W. (Holmes) Hardy. He received his elementary school education abroad and thus gained an exposure to languages. He attended Phillips Academy and completed one year at Amherst College before becoming a cadet at the United States Military Academy at West Point in 1865, where he excelled in languages. He graduated tenth in the class of 1869 and was commissioned a second lieutenant of artillery. His first duty was as assistant instructor of artillery tactics at West Point from July 6 to August 28 in the summer of 1869. He was then stationed in Fort Jefferson in the Dry Tortugas in Florida. In this period after the Civil War, there was little chance of advancement in the Army so, after consulting with General William T. Sherman, he resigned in 1870.[1]

Career[edit]

Hardy served as a short period as an engineer locating routes for railroads. Then he became a professor of mathematics at Grinnell College where he stayed until 1873. Then he became professor of civil engineering in the Chandler Scientific School at Dartmouth College, accepting the position on the condition that he be allowed to serve abroad for a year. He went to Paris where he followed the course of the Ecole des Ponts et Chausees as an eleve externe and simultaneously attended as many of the lectures as he could at the École des Beaux-Arts (School of Fine Arts), Sorbonne, and Conservatoire National des Arts et Métiers (National Conservatory of Crafts and Industries). In 1878 he obtained the chair of mathematics at Dartmouth and served until 1893.[1]
According to “The Early History of the [Dartmouth] Mathematics Department 1769–1961”:
The one example of mathematical competency was furnished by Arthur Sherburne Hardy who wrote a book on quaternions, an adequate, if not inspiring text. It was something for Dartmouth to offer a course in such an abstruse field, and the course was actually given a few times when a student and an instructor could be found simultaneously. In 1893 Professor Hardy failed in his ambition to be elected President of Dartmouth College. He resigned, entered the diplomatic service, and was successively Ambassador to Turkey, Greece, Switzerland, and Spain. He was also a novelist with a national reputation, and if a modern generation fails to find in his books the values which their great-grandfathers found, the fact remains that his books were best-sellers in their day.[2]
While teaching at Dartmouth, Hardy helped redesign the College Park behind his house. On his departure, he sold his house to the incoming President William Jewett Tucker (the house later became the official presidential residence, a medical laboratory, and the home of a chapter of the Delta Gamma Sorority before being demolished.)
In 1893 Hardy became the editor of Cosmopolitan magazine, in which capacity he worked until 1895.[3]
Subsequent to his academic career and publishing career, Hardy was appointed as the United States ambassador to several countries:[3]
Hardy died in 1930 in Woodstock, Connecticut. His burial location is unknown.

Partial bibliography[edit]

Novels[edit]

  • But Yet a Woman (1883): "By a hitherto unknown writer" was "regarded as the hit of season of 1883"[4]
  • The Wind of Destiny (1886)
  • Passe Rose (1889)
  • His Daughter First (1903)
  • Helen (1916)
  • No. 13 Rue du Bon Diable (1917)

Short stories[edit]

  • Diane and Her Friends (collection, 1914)

Children's fiction[edit]

  • Aurélie (1912)

Poetry[edit]

  • Francesca of Rimini (1878)
  • Dualty (1893)
  • Songs of Two (1900)

Nonfiction[edit]

Textbooks[edit]

  • Elements of Quaternions (1881)
  • Imaginary Quantities (1881), a translation of a French treatise by Jean-Robert Argand
  • New Methods in Topographical Surveying (1883)
  • Elements of Analytic Geometry (1889)
  • Elements of Calculus (1890)

Biography[edit]

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Thursday, November 3, 2016

A00005 - Edward Webster Bemis, Public Utility Expert

Edward Webster Bemis (7 April 1860 Springfield, Massachusetts – 25 September 1930) was a United States economist and a public utility expert. He was a proponent of municipal ownership.

Biography[edit]

He graduated from Amherst College in 1880, and received a degree of Ph.D. in 1885 at Johns Hopkins University after over three years' advanced work in economics and history. He was a pioneer lecturer in the university extension system, 1887–88; professor of economics and history, Vanderbilt University, 1889–92; and associate professor of economics, University of Chicago, 1892-95. At the latter institution, he was obligated to leave because of his “radical” viewpoint. He was assistant statistician to the Illinois bureau of labour statistics in 1896, and in 1897 he was professor of economics and history in the Kansas State Agricultural College.
He was superintendent of the city water department of Cleveland, Ohio, 1901–09; deputy commissioner of water supply, gas and electricity of New York City, 1910; consulting expert for cities and states on public utilities after 1910. He became a member of the advisory board, valuation division, Interstate Commerce Commission; city representative on board of supervising engineers, Chicago Traction; and director of valuations of public utilities for the District of Columbia, the city of Dallas, Texas, and other places.

Works[edit]

  • History of Co-operation in the United States (1888)
  • Municipal Ownership of Gas in the U.S. (1891)
  • Municipal Monopolies (1899)
He did many scientific studies of co-operation, trades unions, immigration, etc., but after 1900 chiefly confined his writing to technical reports for various public bodies.

Family[edit]

He married Annie L. Sargent on 28 October 1889, and they had three children.
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Wednesday, March 4, 2015

A00004 - Cass Ballenger, Controversial Congressperson

Cass Ballenger, Provocateur in Congress, Dies at 88

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Cass BallengerScott J. Ferrell/Congressional Quarterly, via Getty Images
Cass Ballenger, a nine-term congressman from North Carolina, died on Wednesday at a hospice in his hometown, Hickory. He was 88.
His death was confirmed by Tommy Luckadoo, a longtime aide.
Mr. Ballenger, a Republican, served in the North Carolina House from 1975 to 1977 and in the State Senate from 1977 to 1986 before being elected to Congress. He introduced the first substantive open-meetings law enacted in North Carolina.
In Congress, Mr. Ballenger made headlines in 2001 when the president of Venezuela, Hugo Chávez, showed up at his home in Hickory with most of his cabinet for a barbecue. The two often met while Mr. Ballenger was chairman of a House international subcommittee.
Near the end of his tenure in Washington, Mr. Ballenger became a magnet for controversy. He cast a key vote in December 2001 that helped pass hotly contested legislation giving President George W. Bush authority to negotiate global trade agreements and submit them to Congress for a yes-or-no vote. Waiting until time had expired on the roll call, Mr. Ballenger was one of the few Republicans who stepped forward to ensure a one-vote majority for the measure.
He also said that Cynthia McKinney, a black congresswoman from Georgia known for her abrasive style, had stirred in him “a little bit of a segregationist feeling.” He later apologized for what he called “pretty stupid remarks.”
Thomas Cass Ballenger was born on Dec. 6, 1926, in Hickory, and attended Amherst College. Survivors include his wife of 63 years, Donna Davis Ballenger; three daughters, Cindy Ballenger, Missy Jordan, and D. D. Weaver; and three grandchildren.

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Wednesday, October 8, 2014

A00003 - Sarah Goldberg, Actress on TV's "7th Heaven"

Sarah Goldberg, actress on TV series “7th Heaven” and in film roles, dies at 40

By Associated Press October 8 at 1:14 PM

Sarah Goldberg, who appeared in the television series “7th Heaven” and the film “Jurassic Park III,” died Sept. 27 at her family’s cabin in Wisconsin. She was 40.
Her mother, Judy Goldberg, confirmed the death to the Chicago Sun-Times. She said a heart ailment is suspected, although an autopsy failed to determine the exact cause of death.
Ms. Goldberg’s entertainment career started as a bumblebee in a Chicago City Ballet production of “Cinderella,” her mother said, and gained momentum when she was asked to be an extra on the Julia Roberts movie “My Best Friend’s Wedding” (1997).
She got the role because her mother co-owned a company providing table linens for a set. A film staffer saw her helping arrange tablecloths and asked her to be in a scene, her mother said.
Ms. Goldberg went on to appear in television series including “90210,” “Judging Amy,” “The Beast” and “CSI: Crime Scene Investigation.”

Actress Sarah Goldberg in an undated photo. (AP)
In “7th Heaven,” which aired mostly on the WB network between 1996 and 2007, she played Jewish medical student Sarah Glass Camden who fell in love with the son of a Christian pastor.
“She wanted to go to medical school, and instead for three years she played a doctor on ‘7th Heaven,’ ” Judy Goldberg said of her daughter, who graduated in 1996 from Amherst College in Massachusetts with a degree in microbiology, according to her IMDB biography.
Ms. Goldberg also played a college student looking for drugs in the Denzel Washington movie “Training Day” (2001).
The actress was sometimes was credited under the stage name Sarah Danielle Madison.
Ms. Goldberg was born Sept. 6, 1974 in Springfield, Ill., where her father worked as a lawyer. She attended the Latin School of Chicago before going to Amherst. She practiced yoga and was a trick skiier.
“She could get on [skis] backwards and blow kisses to people and pretend she was a water skier,” her mother said.

*****


Sarah Goldberg, 40, TV Actress on ‘7th Heaven,’ Dies

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS



    Sarah Goldberg Paul McCallum/The WB


    Sarah Goldberg, an actress in the popular television series “7th Heaven,” died on Sept. 27 at her family’s cabin in Wisconsin. She was 40.
    Her mother, Judy Goldberg, told The Chicago Sun-Times that an autopsy had failed to determine the exact cause of death but that a heart ailment is suspected.
    Ms. Goldberg was frequently identified as Sarah Danielle Madison in film and television credits, as she was in “7th Heaven,” an issue-oriented family drama broadcast from 1996 to 2007 on the WB and then the CW networks.
    Ms. Goldberg appeared in episodes from 2002 to 2006 playing Sarah Glass, a medical student and rabbi’s daughter who married the son of a Protestant pastor.
    Among her other credits, Ms. Goldberg appeared in the movie “Jurassic Park III” (2001).
    Her acting break came as an extra in the 1997 Julia Roberts movie “My Best Friend’s Wedding.” She got a role in that film after a crew member saw her arranging tablecloths on the set — her mother co-owned the company providing table linens for the film — and asked her to be in a scene.
    She went on to appear on television in “90210,” “Judging Amy,” “The Beast,” “CSI: Crime Scene Investigation” and other series.
    Sarah Danielle Goldberg was born on Sept. 10, 1974, in Springfield, Ill. She attended the Latin School of Chicago before going to Amherst College, where she received a bachelor’s degree in microbiology. She lived in Santa Monica, Calif.
    Besides her mother, she is survived by her father, Bill Goldberg, a lawyer; and a brother, Bradley.
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