|
GRAVES, son of Nelson A. Graves and his wife, Maria Beach, was born November
11, 1843, in Albion, New York. His grandfather, Selden S. Graves, was the pioneer of
the family in Western New York, moving from Vermont, the latter part of the eighteenth
century, into the wilderness near the present city of Rochester, New York. Graves
received his preparatory education in Albion Academy, and entered our Class at the
opening of Junior year in 1861. He became a member of Delta Kappa Epsilon fraternity; also of the
'Technian Literary Society; was one of the disputants in the
Adelphic Union Debate, October, 1862; he received the award for presenting the best
prize poem of the year this was our Senior year the prize, sought for in open competition, being offered by the editors of Williams Quarterly. The title of the poem
was "Reverie." He also received an appointment of an oration on the Commencement
program.
After graduation, Graves spent some time in travel through this country, and then
began the study of the law at Albion, in the office of his father. But very soon this
course was interrupted by the excitement of the Civil War, and Graves joined the army
in the winter of 1864. On the 11th of April, 1865, he was mustered captain in command
of Company K, Eighth New York Volunteer Cavalry, at Alexandria, Virginia. He remained in active service until the close of the war and was discharged with brevet rank.
The war over, Graves immediately returned to his law studies with Hon. Sanford E.
Church, late chief justice of the New York Court of Appeals, and was admitted to the
bar in May, 1866. A little later, on a tract of land belonging to the Graves family, in
Pendleton, a few miles south of Lockport, New York, our classmate started a sheep
ranch and stock farm. While living in Pendleton, he was elected justice of the peace of
Niagara County for three successive terms of three years each, but before the conclusion
of his last term he moved to Lockport and resumed his law practice, and is still
continuing it.
While in Pendleton, Graves married, February 1, 1872, Miss Jennie E. Canfield,
daughter of William Canfield, of Hamburg, Erie County, New York.
They have four children.
1. Eina Lillian, born June 25, 1873. She is now a teacher in the Lockport Union
School.
2. Edith Claire, born April 14, 1875. She was married November 14, 1893, to
Peter Eggenweiler, of Lockport, and has two daughters, Clara Lillian, born March 4,
1895, and Ora Leone, born July 20, 1896.
3. Claribel, born August 11, 1877. She was married, April 21, 1996, to George L.
Pasimer. She has one son, Selden Graves Pasimer, born June 11, 1901, and Graves
confesses that this youth has become his grandfather's "tyrant."
4. Frank Canfield Graves, born February 25, 1882. He was graduated with high
rank from Lockport Union School, which stands among the best high schools in New
York State, has chosen a business career, and is now connected with the Holly Manufacturing Company, Lockport, New York.
Graves belongs to the Masonic fraternity, and has taken the Scottish rite. He is
also a member of the First Congregational Church in Lockport. A Democrat in politics,
but has held no office except the non-political office of justice of the peace.
Our classmate's sketch is closed with the following greeting, which I am sure we
all reciprocate, and in which we recognize Graves of old as large as life, and, as always,
kindly, serene:
Classmates of '63: If we regard our life as a book in which each day has
stamped its little page, it makes a compendious volume. When we summon memory to
turn its leaves, we find titles and chapters upon which we would that oblivion should sit
and hold her form, as of no importance to ourselves and of no interest to our classmates,
even to those the best loved and the most intimate. Over other pages a mellow luster
shines, for to us alone they are very dear and sacred. How far we may infringe them
upon the contributors to this Class history we know not, although to me such pages of
each life would meet the tenderest appreciation. I can but hope that, when each book is
closed, upon its clasp may be impressed the divine seal, "Thou art not altogether
unworthy." Or if we regard our life as an unfinished edifice, along whose long and
winding corridors are placed the silent chambers of the rolling years, each its own
"treasure house," and call up memory from her classic urn to blaze her torch and convoy
us, many a rusty door would be passed unopened and unchallenged. And though, through some half-opened entrance should be borne to us the enchanting fragrance of
life's best love, and the low, whispered confidences of true affection, and through others
the happy voices of children, thrilling the heart with parental pride and hope; or mayhap
the lone wail of sorrow from hearts grief-stricken, or the frenzied cry of remorse and
atonement who of us can safely presume that among our classmates, the "best loved
and the best," that their own joys, or their own burdens, have not overwhelmed the
felicity or sadness of the rest? And so I hope again that when life's building is
completed and the door is closed, there shall glow a steady, radiant light across the
unknown sea, focused upon this our building and giving us a telescopic realization of that
"House not made with hands." I have preserved our last Class catalogue, and often
repeat its names from memory until each familiar face arises and some circumstance
connected with it is recalled. I have kept our Class album intact, and it will be a keen
source of pleasure to note changes that forty years have wrought in appearances and
expressions. Our college years have been to me the brightest in all the past, and so I
think they will remain. This may be our last record and we may never meet again on
earth, but if goodness never dies they will continue to be a light to us, and a blessing.
And I shall be glad that I was a classmate of Williams '63. S. E. GRAVES.
Source:
Class of Sixty-Three Williams College Fortieth Year Report, by
the Class Historian, Thomas Todd Printer, Boston, 1903
|
