Republican farmer., 1918-08-30
Pioneer on Early Life of Bridgeport Dies at Ad-
 vanced Age of 82.
LIFE INTERWOVEN
 WITH CITY PROGRESS
Had Much to Do With Build ing Up of Industry and
 Growth of Bridgeport.
Wednesday, Aug. 2S

NO. 0V6 NODle AVe., LIllS LlOIulnS III his 82nd year.
 MT. Morris life had been so closely interwoven with the progress and de- velopment of Bridgeport for so many years that his death removes one of the few remaining members of the old CT generation of New England people who contributed in such measure to- ward making the city what it is today.
 MT. Morris was born in Salem, Conn.,, May 10, 1887. He was the son of Sheldon and Betsy Morris and was of old Connecticut stock from his parents on both sides. In his boyhood his father removed to Litchfield, where he was engaged in the manu- facture of clocks. MT. Morris spent his boyhood days in Litchfield, be- ing educated in the public schools there and gaining a knowledge in his fathers factory of wood working and wood working machinery which later on occupied so large a part of his bus mess life. At that time his father was making the Jerome clock for P. T. Barnum. It will be remembered by the older generation of Bridgeporters that after MT. Barnum had made a great place and fortune for himself in the conduct of his New York Mu- scum, he suffered great financial dis asters and lost practically all of his fortune through his ownership and control of the Jerome Clock Co.
 Just when MT. Morris was growing into young manhood, the late Nathan iel Wheeler was establishing and de- | veloping the Wheeler and Wilson Sew | ing Machine Go. business in Bridgeport | and when that company determined to make it's own cabinets for sewing machines, MT. Morris father was sought out by Nathaniel Wheeler and prevailed upon to move to Bridgeport 1 to take up the manufacture of sewing i machine cabinets here on a large scale for the then young, but rapidly growing, Wheeler & Wilson Co.
 About the time that his father nov. l ed his business to Bridgeport, Mar | shall Morris, actuated by the spirit o1 adventure and travel of young man. hood, went to DuQuoin, H., where he engaged in the conduct of a genera store, being associated with the late | Daniel Hatch under the firm name o1 Hatch & Morris. MT. Hatch later be. came nationally known figure as 2 1 member of the stock brokerage firm | of Hatch & Foote of New York, which l figured so largely in the Black Fri
 day panic caused by the going out ot J. Gould's operation in the Erie Rail
 road.
 While in DuQuoin MT. Morris mar rfed Margaret Elizabeth Winters ir 1862. Soon after the Civil war ht returned to Bridgeport and entered into partnership with his father in tho manufacture of sewing machine cab
 inets and later this partnership wa!
 incorporated under the name of Int
 Sewing Machine Cabinet Co.,. of whicF company Mir. Morris became secrtary and remained so until he retired iron
 business in the early nineties Tn,
 Sewing Machine Cabinet Go. develop
 ed into and remained a large facto,
 in the Wheeler & Wilson business
 Only within the last year was tn,
 company dissolved and it's bushes
 taken over by the Singer Sewing Ma
 chine Co.,, which purchased the busi
 ness of the Wheeler & Wilson Co. sev
 eral years ago.
 In the early nineties Mir Morris ac
 quired a large interest in oyster lands
 Prior to that time the whole oyste
 industry in this section had been car
 ried on by the so called natural grow
 thers who had harvested oysters a
 they were found on the natural beds
 The business of scientifically planting developing and selling oysters on
 large modern business scale was nev . at that time and it was largely due t
 MT. Morris interest in the industr.
 that it developed to its present larg
 size. Mr Morris was one of the frs to build steamers for dredging pur poses and his connection with tn business did much toward revolution
 izing it and bringing 1t to its presen , highly developed state. His larg oyster interests, which ran to man . thousand acres, were later merged in
 to the Radel Oyster Co.,, which wa . put together by the late Andrew Ra del. MT. Morris retired from the Cab
 inet company in the early nineties an from all participation in active busi 5 ness about 1900. He retained, how ever, his active connection with man
 Bridgeport institutions. He was on of the founders and directors an l member of the executive committee ( the Bridgeport Hospital from the tim l of it's organization. He had been very active director of the Connecticr
 National bank for a great many year He was vice president of the Me | chanics and Farmers Savings banl
 He was senior deacon of the Fir!
 Baptist church, a director of the Boy U club and of many other institution U Although never active in politics U had been a member of the Board ( U Education and was Republican non D inee for the Connecticut Legislature 1903.
 MT. Morris occupied for over
 years the family homestead original D built by his father at the corner (
 Noble and East Washington avenue L. At the time this house was built tf e whole Wheeler & Wilson colony ha ,- grouped around Washington Par d Practically all of the old houses no 1T standing there were originally bui n by the officers of the Wheeler & Wi e son Sewing Machine Go. In tho! r- days East Bridgeport was very smal ,t In locating where it did the Wheel, m & Wilson Go. had gone far out of u IS beaten tracks of manufa cturers. IT i late P. T. Barnum and William ] D. Noble were developers of Fla l. Bridgeport and the two great tho
 oughgares of Barnum and Noble av
 nues were named after them. Int os had caused the establishment of Washington Park and the entire la, s. out of the East Side of the city. M ,h Morris was intimately associated wi
 \ all of these old pioneers and develol