Hon. William W. Crapo, one of the leading, members of the Massachusetts bar, was born in Dartmouth, Bristol Co., May 16, 1830.

He was educated at the public schools in New Bedford, prepared for college at Phillips Academy, Andover, and subsequently entered Yale, where he graduated in 1852. Hhving decided upon the legal profession as his life-work, he commenced the study of the law in the office of the late Governor Clifford at New Bedford, and also attended the Dane Law School at Cambridge. He was admitted to the bar in February, 1855, and commenced practice in New Bedford, where he has since resided. In April following his admission to the bar he was appointed city solicitor, which office he held twelve years.

In 1856, Mr. Crapo entered the political arena, making his first speeches for John C. Fremont, the first candidate of the Republican party for President. In the autumn of the same year be was elected to the Massachusetts House of Representatives, and the following year, 1857, he was solicited to become the candidate of his party for State senator, which offered honor he declined.

Not only did Mr. Crapo soon secure a leading position at the bar, but he won in an especial manner the confidence of the citizens of New Bedford. All movements tending to advance the interests of New Bedford have found in him an earnest supporter. He was chairman of the commission on the introduction of water, and from 1865 to 1875 was chairman of the water board.

In all positions where business capacity, good judgment, and executive ability are needed his services are always in request. As guardian or trustee for the management of estates, his high character and business talent brought to him the tender of more business than he could possibly undertake. In the larger field of business enterprise and the management of financial affairs, his peculiar endowments and his entire trustworthiness have been fully recognized for many years. He has been for twelve years the president of the Mechanics' National Bank of New Bedford, is a trustee in one savings-bank and is solicitor for several others. He is a director in the Potamska Mills and the Wamsutta Mills corporations and other manufactories, and is associated in the management of several railroad corporations. He is a prominent manufacturer of lumber, and has interests in shipping. In his profession he is preeminently a business lawyer, being familiar with large commercial transactions in all their bearings. With the insurance business he has been familiar from a boy in his father's office, and was for many years a director in one of the old New Bedford companies. He is also president of the Flint and Marquette Railroad in Michigan, a part of which was organized and begun through his father's efforts.

Mr. Crapo is a scholarly man of great mental grasp, industry, and energy, which have enabled him to master and successfully carry through in all their detail the duties devolved upon him by so many varied interests.

He was elected as a representative to the Forty-fourth Congress to fill a vacancy, and was re-elected to the Forty-fifth, Forty-sixth, and Forty-seventh Congresses, declining in 1882 to longer be a candidate. Mr. Crapo early took a prominent position in Congress, and in the Forty-fifth Congress. He was a member of the Committee on Foreign Affairs, and in the Forty-sixth was in the Committee on Banking and Currency.

In the Forty-seventh Congress be was chairman of the same committee, and excited the admiration of the business men of the country by his skillful management of the bill for extending the charters of the national banks, a bill which was successfully carried through under his leadership in spite of all obstacles. In the tariff legislation, through which the tax on the capital and deposits of banks and bankers was removed, Mr. Crapo's familiarity with the subject was of great service, and secured the direct application of the law to the national banks. Other prominent services might be recalled if the limits of this sketch did not prevent. It is sufficient to say that his value as a legislator was recognized and highly appreciated, not only by his constituents, who knew the man, but by the country.

P. C. Headley, in his " Public Men of To-Day," in speaking of Mr. Crapo, says, "At the age of fifty Mr. Crapo finds himself well started in political life, in the full maturity of his powers, and possessing what some politician has so neatly termed 'the pecuniary basis.' In person be strongly resembles his father, a man of keenly intellectual physiognomy. The family is of French origin, regarding which there is a romantic tradition. Both father and son have a type of face which is French rather than English. The strong mental as well as physical resemblance of the son to the father is a striking illustration of Galton's doctrine of heredity."

Politically, Mr. Crapo is a Republican, and his political instincts are liberal and progressive. He is an exceptionally able legislator, and one of the most honored citizens of the commonwealth.

The degree of LL.D. was conferred upon him by Yale College in 1882.

Jan. 22, 1857, Mr. Crapo united in marriage with Sarah Ann Davis Tappan, daughter of George and Serena Davis Tappan, and their children are Henry Howland Crapo, born Jan. 31, 1862, Dow in senior class (1883) at Harvard University, and Stanford Tappan Crapo, born June 13,1865, now in the freshman class (1886) of Yale College.

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