History of Detroit, a chronicle of its progress, its industries, its institutions, and the people of the fair City of the straits, / by Paul Leake ... [Vol. 3]

HISTORY OF DETROIT

873

Nathaniel Hodges, son of Ezekiel and father of Henry Clay Hodges,
was born in Washington county, New York, in the year 1787, and was
reared to adult age in the old Empire state, whence he removed to
Grand Isle county, Vermont, in 1813. He was in the government
service during the War of 1812. Nathaniel Hodges was recognized as a
man of strong character, was ever firm and courageous in defense of his
convictions, was broad and liberal in his views, was a deep student of
history, and possessed a remarkable memory. In politics he was a
Henry Clay Whig and he continued to vote the Whig ticket until the
organization of the Republican party, when he gave his allegiance
thereto and became a staunch supporter of the policies of President
Lincoln. H, di'ed in March, 1869, in his eighty-third year.
Clarissa (Phelps) Hodges, mother of Henry Clay Hodges, was born
in the town of South Hero, Grand Isle county, Vermont, in the year
1793, and was a representative of the Connecticut branch of the Phelps
and Pearl families which settled in Hartford county and vicinity in the
colonial days. At the early age of twelve years she became a member
of the Methodist Episcopal church, and she was ever a devoted student
of the Bible, besides which she was recognized as an able contributor
to the religious papers of the day until she had attained to her eightyfifth year. She was ninety-one years of age at the time when she was
summoned to the life eternal, and her memory is revered by all who came
within the sphere of her noble and gracious influence.
Henry Clay Hodges was born in the township of South Hero, Grand
Isle county, Vermont, on the 2d of March, 1828, and was reared under
the invigorating influences and environments of the old Green Mountain
state, where he was accorded the advantages of the common schools of
his native county. It is needless to say that his academic opportunities
were limited in scope, owing to the conditions and exigencies of time and
place, but this early handicap did not prove sufficient to retard in the
least the symmetrical development of his intellectual faculties. At the
age of sixteen years he entered upon an apprenticeship to the trade of
carriage-making, and within the ensuing four years he had so far mastered his trade as to enable him to start in business for himself. On the
first day of December, 1850, as a young man of twenty-two years, he arrived in Detroit, and from this city he soon afterward went to Marshall,
the judicial center of Calhoun county, where he became clerk and cashier
of the Michigan Central hotel, which was at that time the most celebrated between New York and Chicago.
In 1852 Mr. Hodges began the study of law, under the preceptorship
of Judge James R. Slack, of Huntington, Indiana, and while prosecuting
his law studies also taught in the country schools of the vicinity during
the winter terms. In 1853 he returned to Michigan and located at Niles,
Berrien county, where he entered the employ of J. F. Cross and Company, which controlled marble quarries in Vermont. The following
year he was admitted to partnership in the business and removed to
Fond du Lac, Wisconsin, where the firm established branch quarters.
Mr. Hodges maintained his home in Wisconsin until 1862, when he returned to Michigan and entered into partnership with his brother,
Charles C. Hodges, and Edward Barker, under the firm name of Barker,
Hodges & Brother. This. firm assumed the general agency for the Connecticut Mutual Life Insurance Company, of Hartford, for the states of
Michigan, Wisconsin, Iowa and Minnesota. In 1864 Mr. Barker retired
and the firm then became Hodges Brothers, with headquarters in Detroit. In addition to their operations in the field of life insurance the
Hodges brothers were among the pioneers in the real-estate business in
Detroit, and they largely handled their own property, which included a
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