Historic Michigan, land of the Great Lakes; its life, resources, industries, people, politics, government, wars, institutions, achievements, the press, schools and churches, legendary and prehistoric lore. [Vol. 2]

BENCH AND BAR IN MICHIGAN

911

was also admitted to practice. He was afterwards elected prosecuting
attorney, and state senator, each of which offices he held for two
terms, the duties of which he discharged with marked ability. He
was a man of some means and preferred the peaceful avocation of
growing fruits, and the work of an apiarist, to the contentions of
the courtroom, and for some years has not been in the active practice
of his profession.
The practicing lawyers at that time in Lapeer county were Mr.
Andrus, Egbert W. Cook, Hon. William Hemingway, who had been
a member of the Michigan legislature, Hon. Silas B. Gaskill, who
was later circuit judge, Hon. William W. Stickney, who succeeded
Tudge Gaskill upon the circuit bench, Phineas White, Hon. Jonathan
R. White, Harrison Geer, who was the junior member of the firm of
Gaskill & Geer and whom you all know as the very successful and
able trial lawyer now living in Detroit, Calvin Thomas, Stephen
Thomas, the father of Calvin, now an honored professor in Columbia
University, and John M. Wattles, who later established the bank still
doing business as John M. Wattles & Company. These men have all
gone into the life beyond except Mr. Geer and Judge Stickney. Most
of them were men of ability and character, and did much to so shape
events in that county as to make it one of the most intelligent and
law-abiding in the state.
It is a singular and to me a gratifying circumstance that the chairman of the examining committee before whom Senator Taylor and
myself appeared, the genial and learned Judge Mitchell of Port Huron,
though now upward of eighty years of age, is yet in the active
practice of his profession, and within the present year argued a case
before the court over which I have the honor to preside, with a
degree of learning and energy that would have done credit to a much
younger man. It is also a source of pleasure to know that the presiding judge, Josiah Turner, is still living and within a comparatively
short time read a very interesting paper before the annual meeting
of the State Association of Judges.
The judges who have presided over the circuit court for the county
of Lapeer within my recollection are Josiah Turner, James S. Dewey,
Levi B. Taft, Augustus C. Baldwin, Silas B. Gaskill, William W.
Stickney, Joseph B. Moore and George W. Smith. The list for the
Oakland county circuit is the same as the above except that the name
of Sanford M. Green should be substituted for Josiah Turner. All
these gentlemen are dead except Josiah Turner, William W. Stickney,
Joseph B. Moore and George W. Smith.
On Friday, May 20, the last session of the court was held in the
Oakland county courthouse, previous to tearing it down to make way
for a one hundred thousand dollar building which should be more in
keeping with the growth and prosperity of that great county. As I
had been presiding judge of that circuit for eight years, I was honored with an invitation to be present. The local paper reproduced
the address which had been made by Hon. Michael E. Crofoot at
the dedication of the building in March, I858. In that address it