Karl Sigismund Blackwell (pp. 84 - 84): born 1879; tutored, public schools, academy, college, A.M., M.D., specialist, associate professor of medicine at Medical Coll. of Vir.; member of many clubs; high status.

Family: father: clergyman and chaplain, A.M., DD., large churches, influence.
wife: daughter of vice-president of a Richmond savings bank.
brothers: one president of Randolph-Macon Coll., one principal of Norfolk Academy, one professor of English in the Coll. for Women, one (young) instructor at St. Christopher's school.

Evaluation: Here a whole family of boys moves into positions becoming to the sons of a distinguished and educated clergyman. Young men seeking to rise face this kind of "monopoly" or "competition," whichever one wishes to call it.


Walter F. Delany (p. 91): born 1868; attended private school, public schools, and the Mechanics Inst. of Vir. Was machinist to age of 42; now manufacturers' agent. "The very comfortable residence he lives in is his own property."

Family: father: blacksmith.
brothers and sisters: one plumbing and steam fitting contractor, one wife of a steam fitter, one machinist, one steam fitter.
daughters: one high school graduate who works in a life insurance office, one wife of a "member of a real estate firm," one lives at home.

Evaluation: Subject belongs to the less influential of the middle class, an improvement over his earlier years, perhaps. The family as a whole shows much rigidity.


Hon. Berkley Dickensen Adams (p. 98): born 1875; private and public schools and college; farmer, merchant, legislator, state commissions and boards; upper middle class status.

Family: father: farmer, lumberman, owner of bottling works.
father's father; captain in Confederate army, farmer.
mother's father: Col. Dickensen, captain in Civil War, brother of state legislator.
wife: daughter of merchant and sup't of quarries.
brothers: three farmers; one farmer, merchant, and lumberman; one with father in bottling business.
children: one law student at W. and L. Univ.; one ass't manager of subject's 1250-acre farm (the same one which had come down from the ancestors); three now attending school.

Evaluation: Subject added politics to the multiple interests of his father; successful committeeman. He received perhaps the best schooling of all the boys. The total family pattern is consistent.


Claude C. Coleman (p. 106): born 1879; a surgeon, major in army, man of note. He gives no ancestral data. He married Julia Langhorne Cone, daughter of Mrs. Archibald Pleasants Cone of Richmond, indicating a mixture of some of the older planter families with newer professional elements.


Henry C. Riely (pp. 112 - 113): born 1874: tutor and university training, lawyer, clubs. Dignified, conservative type; status high.

Family: father: lawyer, lieutenant colonel in Civil War; AB. at W. and L.
father's father: farmer, grandson of pioneer.
father's mother: daughter of Colonel Jos. Gratham.
mother: "member of old and well-known Vir. family. Her great-grandfather was a colonel in the Rev. and received large land patents."
wife: daughter of Dr. Evans, physician; was educated in private schools.

Evaluation: No change of status between father's house and son's. Subject, his father, his mother, his wife -- all belong close together in social standing.


M. B. Staples (p. 120): born 1868; (very short account of subject given) public school education; started as retail grocer in 1892; now wholesale grocer. "$60,000 capitalization, three outside salesmen, a 2-storey building, 56 x 105." Son now president of company. Father was a farmer.

Evaluation: Insufficient information. However, one notices that son take his place as father's successor.

Norman Call (p. 125): born 1880; public schools and Mechanics Institute; at seventeen was stenographer and clerk in (small) railway office, became sec'y to the president of the road; is now vice-president of the company. Belongs to several clubs, lodges, etc.

Family: father: co-founder of Watt-Call Plow Company.
father's father: "ship-builder and owner," physician by profession.
mother: Sally E. Watt, descendant of James Watt.
wife: daughter of a prominent clergyman who was a college president; herself a graduate of Sullins.
brothers: one business executive in Atlanta, one president of a Richmond bank, one a graduate of Medical College of Vir., now practicing in Richmond, one assistant treasurer of railway, one traffic manager of tobacco corporation.
father's brother: "prominent physician and surgeon."
one ancestor: brother-in-law of Chief Justice Marshall.

Evaluation: Vice-president of railway started as stenographer and clerk in company. But when one contemplates his father, his uncle, his brothers, there is nothing unusual in finding him in the upper middle class. Subject's marriage was also favorable.