The daily morning journal and courier., 1897-12-14
TWO VENERABLE YALE MEN
THE TWO OLDEST GRADUATES OF
 THE UNIVERSITY.

Men--BO(h ATe Noteu ANosh~
 dents and Lawyers of New York City.
 The oldest two graduates of Yale col lege now living are still practicing law in New York city, although each is in the tenth decade of his life. The senior is William K. Wightman, who was born in Scituate, R. T., January 8, 1903, and is therefore in his ninety-fifth year. He was in the class of '25. The other is Benjamin D. Silliman, who was born in Newport, R. l., and Is in his ninety-third year. He was in the class of '24. The New York Times says of them, as follows: These two venerable and distinguished lawyers are in ex- cellent health, and they may be found at their respective offices almost every day In fact, they are more regular in their business habits than is the aver age man of seventynve years of age
 Although MT. Wightman is the elder, he was one year behind Mir. Slliman in entering and graduating from college. He was the only son and child of the Rev. Frederick Wightman, a prominent Baptist clergyman. At an early age he became resident of Middletown, Mid dlesex county, Conn.,, and while there entered Yale college, in New Haven, in the autumn of 1S21 He was graduated with due honors of scholarship in the autumn of 1925, with his class, then numbering seyenty-one members, of whom he is now the only survivor. He was admitted to the bar in Middletown in October, 1927, where he spent the next ensuing fifteen years in the trac- tice of the law, during which time he was attorney and counsel for a bank, and for five years he was judge of pro- abte of the large probate district of Middletown. For another period of five years he was attorney and counsel for the state in and for the county of Mid- dlesex. involving the trial in court of all criminal actions in the county.
 MT. Wightnan served as a member of the Connecticut legislature for six years, two years as senator and four years as representative in the house. For two years, including an extra ses- sion, he was speaker of the house of representatives. While a member of the house he introduced and was chiefly instrumental in carrying through two very important bills, one abolishing im- prisonment for debt, and the other ex- pressly ordering and requiring two or more millions of surplus funds received by the state from the United States, to be put and kept at interest thereaf- ter and the income to be distributed for the use of the common schools of Con- necticut. Those enactments never have been repealed.
 In the fall of 1S43 MT. Wightman re- moved with his family to this city, where he forthwith commenced and still continues the practice of law. In May 1852, he took his eldest son into part nership, and theirs is probably the old est law firm in the city.
 When MT. Silliman left college he pur- sued the study of law in this city in the office of Chancellor Kent and his son William (afterward Judge) Kent, was admitted to the bar in 1929, and has ever since been engaged in active practice He has had a valuable clientage, in- cluding important corporations. His practice has been alike at common law in admiralty, and in equity-in the state and federal courts, including the supreme court of the United States
 At pleasant dinner in Delmonico's. given him by leading members of the bar on the 24th of May. 1889-the sixti- eth anniversary of his admission to practicable gave a sketch of the courts, the judges, the bar and its bus mess, and of the changes and progress in the law, the courts and the profess sion, during that long period He was one of the founders and vice presi- dent of the Bar association of New York city.
 Tn 1873 the honorary degree of LII. D. was conferred on Mr. Silliman by Co., lumbfa college, and in 1874 the like de- gree was conferred on him by Yale col lege. He was for more than twenty years the president Of the Brooklyn club, was president of the Yale Alumni association of Long Island, Is a direc- tor of the Long Island Historical soci- ety and trustee of Greenwood ceme- tery The charter of the cemetery he introduced in the legislature in 183S and has watched the steady growth of that great city of the dead whose silent inhabitants already number more than 295, 900. He was president of the New England society in Brooklyn from it's organization in 1880 until 1886, when he declined a reelection. For many years he was one of the board of managers of the House of Refuge for Juvenile Delinquents in New York
 Mir. Silliman has always taken an &C., tive but limited interest in politics; has been a delegate to national and state conventions, and as far back as 1888 was a member of the convention in Harrisburg which nominated the first General Harrison for the presidency and John Tyler for the vice presidency In 1S42 he was selected by the whigs of the Second district (then consisting of Kings, Richmond and Rockland coun- ties) as their candidate for the Twenty eighth congress. and led the ticket at the polls, but the democrats carried the election by small majority. He rep resented Kings county in the legisla- ture as far back as 1898, and was ap- pointed by President Lincoln to the of. fee of United States attorney for the eastern district in 1885.
 Tn 1872 he was appointed by the gov ernor and senate as Q member of the commission for proposing amendments to the constitution of the state. Tn 1873 he was nominated by the republi- can party as it's candidate for the of flee of attorney general of the state and received a flattering support at the polls though the democrats carried