The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1895-07-14

..- f-eu a resident OF Boston IOr over
years. not 80 men know him by
"a. rrbsn he appears on the streets. He
81 his present distinction neither
..b the political arena nor by stir
5ssds of patriotism. He was prac-
,.. unknown to public life until his
Zen induction into Office two years ago.
~, he was appointed Attorney General
,-.,i51s 10 that time he had held but
,4sce and that was twenty years ago.
v. he was a member of the state legis-
stare-
.-,-,on is a surprise TO the people OF
Zen and they are asking: How is it
= ue never heard of Olney, when he has
=, living among us all these years?" Yet
.,.,s is no mystery about il. He has
,.sn serving as corporation attorney for
. =. Roston and Maine railroad. and other
..-,anies. and this legal work did not
4 ,..,, him into contact with the people
=. INFO popular notice, as he rarely ap-
. s..-sd in court He acted chiefly as
4 ii-~nsel in his own office, which is in
~ same building as that of Charles
\ r-ancis Adams, formerly president of the
Taion Pacific.
From his legal practice Secretary Olney
tas accumulated wealth. He has sum-
M nome at Falmouth, near Buzzard's
pav and a winter residence on Common
wealth avenue, the finest boulevard in
Boston.
Mr.. Olney has, however, risen to af-
euance from an humble New England ORR
Gin. He comes of hardy Worcester county
stock and is a native of oxford, eleven
miles south of Worcester. 1t is a village
among rocky, wooded hills, with all the
charm Of those quaint New England towns
that forgotten by time, change not. 1t
has held It's uneventful course hardly dis
turbed by a ripple, since Richard Olney
was born there sixty years ago, on Sept.
l5 1885. Even now il scarcely awakens to
the thrill of pride in its most illustrious
son.
Old worn and gray. with the suns and
storms that for a century have beat upon
il, the house of his grandfather, Richard
Olney where he was born, and whose
name he bears, still stands sad remind
er Of the past. II has been moved from
It's commanding position at the intersec-
ton of two roads, and placed close to the
street, where il stands, scantily shaded
by two young chestnut trees. Its present
occupant was, until recently, quite uncon-
scious Of its dignified past.
1t was the irony of famel In response
to my vigorous knocking at the front door,
an elderly woman appeared with a dis
turbed look on her face. When l asked
about the memorable birth that occurred
in her house sixty years ago, she said: Il
don know anything about Il. have only
hled here three or four years. Richard
Ulney? Who is he, any way, and what is
sl this fuss about? I've seen lots of
people pointing out this house this week"
Upon being told that it was the birthplace
OF the Secretary Of State, she said: "Oh,
Yes well, I'll have to read up about him"
Shortly after Olneys birth, his parents
moved from the old homestead to Louis
vile. Ky. While there his father Wilson
olnoy engaged in trade unsuccessfully,
aud the family returned to oxford, when
the boy was seven years old Wilson OIL
ney then became bookkeeper for the wooden
mil IN which his father had an interest.
IN addition to keeping the company's
BOOKS, he was clerk in the company's store,
as Is usually the case in the mill towns.
The mill was at Howarth's, mile from the
town proper. So as to be near his work,
Mr.. Olney built a home on a neighbor-
ing hillside, little aside from the factory
tenements.
This old brown house stands, but it has
become tenement, in which live a mill
operative and his swarm of children. But
mere at least the memory of the original
oWeIers is known, and the motherly house,
we takes pride in saying that some of the
Younger members of the Olney family were
born there
Inc mill itself is run by its present own
ers' Andrew Howarth e. Son, in about
1Ae same old way as fifty years ago, when
young Richard played about it and listened
III childish wonder to the click, click of the
looms. The same number of hands are en-
Hoyed-between fifty and sixty-the same
Product is turned out-white fiannel-and
IAe same power is still supplied by the
french river, q small stream, damned
up INTO two beautiful ponds encircled by
TWO nils wooded with pine and maple.
IL was in Oxford that Richard Olney
passed the formative period of his life.
II was at the district school here, held
to' IN the kind of little red school-house
famous in history, but in a room of the
corporation clearinghouse, that he learn
el mis- first lessons. This building is now
o-Niaed into number of tenements. But
o;nlohg the shifting population of mill help
a. traditions of the old school and it's ia
nous pupil have vanished. Only one old
weaver, who has worked in the mill as
nan and boy for over forty years, is able
~ point out the building. 1t was to this
nome In the little mill ha inlet in a remote
- CAAOAN Nihdl EAiClidIu OinCy re-
tuIned on his vacations from Leicester
academy and Brown University, which he
ne Oldest resident of Oxford Miss Err
una smith, was a teacher at that time,
anu boarded in the Olney household. She
- N her @th year, and she throws some
bt,'ohs side lights on life in the old brown
always thought that Richard had
ttcOF nigh notions" said she Those
o,.nes When he came home from college
VI VISITS he held his head up well and
9venled to think a good deal of aristocra>
~, got that idea from remarks he would
+ l"Ne' he was a great reader and / re-
va 5iil9er that on one visit he brought Da>
W ~ Coppertteld' and read it aloud to the
n.y., 9. oI the family evenings. While we wo>
read aloud"
or ne resident who best remembers Rich
OIney as a boy is Jonathan Pratt
ia % years of age. He was school
ann missioner when Richard went TO the
district school.
Ven well, it's nigh onto fifty years
esi5 NJ II, Olney was one of our school boys
nv Mr' Dana, musingly, as he sat on
'front.' steps of his house on the out
SIS SIS Oh the town. The good old man
f1o"s age in the countless seams of his
ana ana ana in the ragged snow-white beard
Ia ,,- ms mind is as clear as ever. He be-