Moses Kimball

**The below is from a Memorial Pamphlet in my possession.  Also at bottom is a scan of a written letter from Helen F Kimball (Moses' daughter) to Boston Transcript.

Memoir of Moses Kimball by Charles A Cummings
Reprinted from the New-England Historical and Genealogical Resister for October, 1902.

Moses Kimball, for fifty years a familiar and picturesque figure in the life of Boston, was of good Old Puritan ancestry, being descended from Richard Kimball, of Rattlesden in the county of Suffolk, and his wife Ursula, who came over in 1634, and after living two years in Watertown, were among the founders of the town of Ipswich in Essex county, with which town their descendants have been since identified.

Moses Kimball was of the seventh generation from Richard, and was born October 24, 1809, at Newburyport.  His mother was Nancy Stacy of Gloucester, who traces her descent from Simon Stacy and Elizabeth Clark, who were married in London in 1620, through Thomas, John, Nymhus, and Benjamin.  Nearly all his ancestors were among the early settlers of New England.  Among them are the Rev. Samuel Worcester, for twenty years the first minister of Salisbury, John Davis, Robert Lord, John Low, John Perkins, and Mary Ward, sister of Nathaniel Ward.  Other names which appear in the family genealogy, are Boreman, Thompson, Knight, Dodge, Eaton, Waite, Call, Edwards, Littlehale, Lancton, Babson, Batchelder, Gill, Buswell, Harraden, Somes, Prince, Hazeltine.

While Moses was yet a child, his parents removed to Sandy Bay, now known as Rockport, on Cape Ann.  Here his uneventful boyhood was passed among the simple and wholesome surrounding of a New England country home, with the usual experience of the district school in the "little red schoolhouse."  At the age of fifteen, this chapter of his life came to an end, and the boy came to Boston to seek his fortune.  An elder brother was in business here, and with him the young Moses took his first steps in the practical work of life.  But the kind of work was not to his taste.  The buying and selling in a store did not afford a sufficient outlet for the restless energy which was characteristic of his temperament, and he embarked on several ventures, one after another, with indifferent success.  In the first of these ventures he shared in the ruin which overtook the multitudes of older and more experienced men of business in the memorable and disastrous "Eastern Land" speculation.

The second venture was the purchase, in 1833, of the New England Galaxy, one of the earliest weekly newspapers of Boston, founded and edited by Joseph T Buckingham.  In this enterprise he was associated with William J Snelling.  Under the new direction the paper made itself conspicuous by its fearless and persistent attacks on the gambling establishments of the city and suburbs, and reached a large sale.  But the enterprise was not successful, and the paper was sold after a few months, at a serious loss.

Mr. Kimball next formed, in 1836, an association called the New England Printing Company, for the publishing of Engravings of important pictures, chiefly those of historical interest.  Trumbull's great picture of the Signing of the Declaration of Independence, and and Stuart's Washington, were among those of which great numbers were distributed and made popularly known.

The year 1837 was a year of calamity and of great business depression all over the country, and Mr. Kimball again found himself without business or prospects.  But during the next year, with the assistance of his brother David, he bought the great part of the collections of the old New England Museum, which was breaking up, added to them from sundry other sources, made arrangements for a lease of the building on Tremont and Bromfield streets (later the site of the Horticultural Building), and in 1841 opened the Boston Museum, a collection of objects extremely miscellaneous in character, the greater part naturally of little importance, but including many things of real value and interest.  Among them were a large number of stuffed birds and animals, lately acquired with satisfaction by the Boston Society of Natural History and incorporated with their collections, and several remains of Greek sculpture, one at least of which is now in the Museum of Fine Arts.  The pictures included several historical portraits by Copley, which were one by one parted with, to descendants or relatives.

In 1843, the theatre was added to the attractions of this establishment, though in deference to the still lingering Puritan feeling in the community, the dangerous word was avoided, -- the hall in which the performances were given being called the "lecture-room."  From a similar consideration, no performances were given on Saturday evenings.

The enterprise was successful from the start.  It was soon evident that the space at the disposal of the Museum was far too limited for its needs.  In conjunction with Mr. David Kimball, a fine new building was erected at large cost, which included a spacious and lofty hall of distinctly architectural character for the Museum proper, and a well appointed theatre in the rear.  Mr. Kimball's failures were now all behind him.  The establishment, which was opened in November, 1846, was complete and on a firm and permanent basis, and its hold upon the interest and support, we might almost say affection, of the community, grew stronger year by year and brought a steady prosperity to its founder.  Mr. Henry A Clapp, writing many years later, says of it:

  "The Museum was in a distinctive and peculiar sense the theatre of the capital of Massachusetts, partly because of its age and unbroken record as a place of amusement,  -- even more because of the steady merit of its performances and the celebrity of many of its performers. **** It is safe to say that no theatre extant in America to-day has been as intimately connected with the life of its dwelling-place, as the Museum with the life of Boston and of nearly three generations of its inhabitants."

So much for the private business history of Mr. Kimball.  It well illustrates many of his great qualities, but the real interest of his career lies in another field, -- the field of public work. Although he retained his proprietorship and control of the Museum until a few years before his death, yet his personal management of its affairs came to an end in 1860.  For many years his interest in public matters had been constant and strong.  His first appearance in political life was in 1844, as a consequence of a speech by Daniel Webster at a Whig meeting, in which he urged, as one of the most imperative duties of Congress, the revision of the naturalization laws.  For the first time in our history, an apprehension was awakened in many minds as to the influence of the Irish vote in the national elections, and the Native American party came into existence.  In 1844, in a convention of which Mr. Kimball was chairman, Thomas A Davis was nominated for mayor of Boston, and after a contest of nearly three months, in which the Whigs nominated successively Josiah Quincy, Jr., Thomas Wetmore, Samuel A. Eliot, William T. Eustis, and William Parker, at the end of eight elections, or attempted elections, Mr. Davis was chosen mayor. The next year the party nominated Henry Shaw for governor of Massachusetts, and Mr. Kimball stumped the state with great vigor for two months.  But the movement had no success.  The time was not yet ripe, the first impulse had died out, and ten years more were to pass before the principals of the Native American party were to achieve a brief triumph in Massachusetts.

Mr. Kimball's public life divides itself into two chapters, comprising respectively his services to the city and to the state.  In 1848, he was a member of the Common Council, and in 1851 an alderman.  Of his work upon these boards there is little to be said, except it be in connection with an incident which created for a time a tempest in the Boston teapot, and of which the fruits were made to appear as often as, in later years, Mr. Kimball was presented as a candidate for public office.  This was the refusal by the Board of Alderman to grant the use of  Faneuil Hall to a committee of gentlemen for a reception to Daniel Webster.  The hot excitement created during the previous year by the seventh of March speech had not yet subsided; the historic hall had been refused, shortly before, to Samuel Hoar, Wendell Phillips and others for a meeting of those who were outraged by Webster's course, and the feeling of a majority of the Board was that the measure which had been meted to the anti-slavery men should be meted to their opponents.  Mr. Kimball introduced the resolution declining to grant the use of the hall, and the rage of the Webster men was directed mainly against him.  Looking back over the interval of half a century, it is easy to see the unwisdom of both the refusals.  The resentment of the Webster Whigs towards Mr. Kimball never cooled, and his action on this occasion was no doubt the cause, more than any other, of his successive defeats in the elections for the mayoralty in which he was a candidate.  Of these there were three, in 1858, 1860 and 1868.  The most unscrupulous methods were, especially in the last contest, freely used to ensure his defeat.  But it is doubtful if they were needed, since Mr. Kimball's record, in the Legislature and elsewhere, as a fearless and formidable enemy of all manner of jobs, was of itself quite sufficient to make him an unpopular candidate with the majority of city voters, or rather with those by whom the votes of a majority were controlled.

Mr. Kimball's most important service to the city was in the various boards of charitable and kindred work, -- the Directors of Public Institutions, of which he was for ten years the president, the Board of State Charities, of which he was the first chairman in 1869, the Board of Health, Lunacy and Charity in 1879.  In all these important positions, to which no salary was attached, his energy, his business capacity, his talent for organization, his vigilance in protecting the treasury of the city or state from the schemes of greedy money-makers, made his services of inestimable value.

Mr. Kimball was, however, most widely known from his long experience in the Massachusetts Legislature.  He was a senator for a single year only, in 1854, but his service in the House of Representatives, beginning in 1850 and continuing with occasional interruptions till 1876, brought him in contact with men of influence from every part of the state.  He was from the first a prominent and influential member, and inevitably so, for his keen interest in all the important measures which came up, and his restless and active mind, led him to mingle often in the debates.  His speaking was extremely characteristic, forcible, vivacious, going straight to the point, sharply seasoned with wit, anecdote and sarcasm, and holding the attention of his audience unvaryingly.  One of his colleagues, in some reminiscences printed shortly after his death, says:

  " When I was a member of the Senate, and Mr. Kimball still a member of the House, I remember how quickly the Senate lobbies would be cleared when the word was passed round -- 'Kimball is speaking.'  As chairman of the Finance Committee, of which I was a humble member, Mr. Kimball did Massachusetts a service which should never be forgotten.  he was in a constant fight, fighting all sorts of jobs and schemes, and he won every battle.  He saved the state an immense amount of money."

With his removal to Brookline, in 1882, Mr. Kimball's long service in the Legislature came to an end.  But his activity in other directions continued unabated.  He was five times elected a state director of the Boston and Albany Railroad, beginning in 1864, and when the state ceased to hold its interest in the road, he was chosen a member of the regular board, and held that position until his death.  He took much pleasure in his work, and was to the end a punctual and efficient officer.

Mr. Kimball's many and absorbing affairs, public and private, did not prevent him from taking a lively interest in everything which concerned the general welfare of the community.  As early as 1850, we find him offering, through the Boston Society for Medical Observation, a prize for the best essay on the treatment and prevention of croup, the prize being awarded by a committee consisting of Dr. John Ware, Dr. John Jeffries, and Dr. Edward H. Clarke; and twenty years later, prizes to the Rockport Agricultural Association for the best exhibit of shade trees set out in the streets of that town, for the best loaf of bread exhibited at the annual fair, and for kindred things.  In 1879, he commissioned Thomas Ball to make a replica of his bronze group emblematic of Emancipation, which had been set up in Washington, and presented it to the city of Boston.  The gift was accepted, not without a long and bitter debate in the Common Council, in which the personal enemies of Mr. Kimball revived the old feuds and grievances; and interesting exercises accompanying its formal acceptance were held in Faneuil Hall, in which Gov. Talbot, Mayor Prince, Rev. Phillips Brooks, John G. Whittier and others took part.

Mr. Kimball made three journeys to Europe, in 1867, 1872 and 1877-78.  In these, his open and receptive mind, always learning gladly, from men not less from books, found ample opportunity for acquiring new and varied knowledge.  He was to the last a constant reader, reading attentively and retaining what he read.  During the later period of his life, his correspondence with friends whom he had met abroad was of much interest.  One of these, an English country gentleman of distinction, writes him:

  "I learn a great deal from your letters -- your own internal politics, your opinions on public events in this old country worded in the best and clearest language, so that no reading can be more interesting and instructive.  I am so alive to this fact that I take the liberty of circulating your letters among two or three of my friends who are capable of appreciating them."

Mr. Kimball's vigorous constitution, unweakened by illness (for he was never seriously ill in his life), yielded slowly to the advances of age.  But an accident in 1883, in which he narrowly escaped instant death ( he attempted to get on board a railroad train in motion, and was dragged a quarter of a mile or more before the train could be stopped), although he made a remarkable recovery, probably hastened in some degree the gradual decline.  Yet it was only those very near to him who could observe during the last two or three years of his life the failure of his powers.  The death of his wife, which occurred in the autumn of 1894, after a union of sixty years, was a shock from which he had no strength, and perhaps no wish, to rally; and his own death followed hers, after a short three months.  He died February 21, 1895, terminating a membership of seventeen years in this Society.

Mr. Kimball's salient characteristics were incorruptible integrity, quick intelligence, strong good sense, right judgment, inflexible resolution, directness, a habit of methodical and systematic work.  These were the qualities which kept him so long at the head of the finance committee of the House, and of the various charitable boards of the city and state, and which would have made him invaluable as mayor.  With these, however, there went a certain impatience of opposition, and a lack of the disposition to conciliate, which kept him from being popular in the political sense, and which awakened in many quarters, as we have seen, a bitter and lasting enmity.  But they also drew to his side multitudes of strong and constant friends, whose loyal affection made ample compensation for the trials which came to him.  His own affections were quick, warm and enduring.

**Added below this last paragraph by his daughter Helen.

Mr. Kimball married, June 25, 1834, Frances L. A. Hathaway, daughter of John Hathaway of Boston.  She was born in Dighton, Mass, which had been the home of her ancestors for many generations. -- the first of the name, Nicholas Hathaway, having come to America about 1639.

Editor of Boston Transcript,

Dear Sir,

In common with the many distinguished men who have been honored, this year is the hundredth anniversary of my father's birth, Oct 24.  Since he was a useful and respected citizen of Boston, you may like to notice this, and I send the accompanying memorial with its outline of his life.

Yours truly,

Helen F Kimball.