History of Michigan, / by Charles Moore. [Vol. 3]

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HISTORY OF MICHIGAN

Methodist church, is affiliated with the Masonic Order through the
Knights Templar degree, and in politics is Republican. During his
university career he belonged to the Sigma Chi fraternity.
JAMES BURRITT NETTLETON. By diversified gifts and various services men contribute to the development of a great city. The foundations
of law and municipal order attract some; others give themselves to the
founding of institutions of religion and learning, still others are instrumental in the opening up of the avenues of trade and commerce and in
furnishing the facilities for the transaction of business. In a thousand
different but diverging directions they bend their energies, according to
some mysterious law of organization to the common weal. Among all
the various occupations and professions, none is more promotive of the
reputation abroad of a growing city than that which has to do with its
architecture. Detroit for many years has been noted for the beauty of its
public buildings, its churches and schools, its business emporiums and its
private residences, and this is because of the work and superior gifts
of such men as James Burritt Nettleton, senior member of the wellknown firm of Nettleton & Weaver, architects.
Mr. Nettleton is a product of the farm, having been born on the
homestead of his parents in Medina county, Ohio, June 24, 1862, a son
of Noble and Mary Anna (Blakeslee) Nettleton. The father was born
in Connecticut in 1820, and was a son of Daniel Nettleton, also of that
state. The latter left New England in 1832 with his family and removed
to Medina county, Ohio, becoming a pioneer of that section of the Western Reserve, where he continued to pass the remainder of his life in tilling
the soil. Noble Nettleton was twelve years of age when he accompanied
his parents overland to Ohio. He was reared to agricultural pursuits,
early adopted farming as his life work, and continued in pastoral pursuits throughout his life, passing away in 1893. He was an energetic,
industrious and thrifty farmer, and through energy and well-directed
effort became a substantial man, so that in his declining years he was
able to retire and enjoy the fruits of his early labors. Mary Anna
(Blakeslee) Nettleton was born in Medina county, Ohio, in 1825, the
daughter of Burritt Blakeslee, who was a New Englander by birth and a
pioneer farmer of Medina county. She also passed her last years in
Ohio, and there died in I899.
James Burritt Nettleton was reared on the home farm in Ohio. He
received his early education in the country schools and graduated from
the Medina high school, following which he entered Cornell University,
where he took the architectural course, graduating with the degree of
Bachelor of Arts in architecture in the summer of I886.. Succeeding
this, he spent some time in the study of his chosen profession as a
draughtsman in different architects's offices at York, Pennsylvania, and
Zanesville and Cleveland, Ohio, and in the spring of 1887 came to Detroit
and became a draughtsman in the office of Donaldson & Meier, architects,
with whom he continued for ten years. In I897 Mr. Nettleton established
himself in his profession in Toledo, Ohio, where he was in business for
five years, but in I902 returned to Detroit to the offices of Donaldson &
Meier, where he passed the next three years. In 1905 he again entered
business on his own account, and in I908, with Alfred E. Weaver,
formed the partnership of Nettleton & Weaver, an association which
has continued to the present time. They maintain offices at No. I405
Penobscot building.
As Mr. Nettleton is still in the prime of life, his originality and
enthusiasm in his chosen profession will bring him still greater eminence
than that which he now enjoys. He is a valued member of the Michigan