SAMUEL HALLIDAY. It is a pleasure for the writer to take up the careers
of men who through long years of residence in Southern Illinois have by
their upright lives and splendid deeds won for themselves the enduring
respect and regard of their fellow-citizens. Major Edwin W. Halliday was so
conspicuously identified with the affairs of Cairo for nearly forty years
that it is meet, now that his work here is finished and he is now retired to
his California home, to set forth some of the essentials of his active and
successful life, that the reader and student of events and men of local
renown may not be deprived of the knowledge of one character who made his
influence felt in building a commercial mart at the junction of the Ohio and
Mississippi rivers. Major Halliday was born in Meigs county, Ohio, June 11,
1836, a son of Samuel Halliday, who served as auditor of Meigs county for
thirty-five years.
Edwin W. Halliday left the parental roof as a
youth, equipped with a fair education and bent on hewing his path among the
almost unblazed courses of the Ohio Valley. He chanced to enter upon a
career of steamboating on the Ohio river and made himself so useful that he
was soon given the position of clerk on a packet that ran those waters, his
river career only terminating when his zeal to get into the military contest
between the north and south urged him to enlist. Notwithstanding the origin
of his birth, he chose sides against his home and entered the Confederate
army, becoming a member of General N. B. Forest's cavalry, and won a major's
commission before the doom of the Confederacy was sealed at Appomattox. When
there was no longer need of his services as a soldier, Major Halliday sought
a business opportunity in Cairo, where some of his four brothers had already
located, and with one of them, W. P., he engaged in the merchandise business
here. While success came to him as a merchant, his old love for the river
seemed to force him again into some feature of its trade and he engaged in
business at the wharf, establishing a wharf-boat company, putting a fleet of
tugs and other boats in service to do the local "switching," subsequently,
in 1873, incorporating the wharf boat company and remaining its president
until he removed from the state. His foresight enabled him to discover the
future of rapid transit in Cairo, and at a critical stage in the affairs of
the company which promoted the street railway he took over its stock and for
many years owned and operated the system. He witnessed the growth of this
and the Cairo City Electric Light and Gas Company, which he brought into
existence, into a valuable property, and in 1903 he sold these holding to
the W. P. Halliday Estate. He was a large owner of the stock of the Halliday
Hotel and new life sprang into it when the magic touch of the Hallidays was
applied. Prom early life the Major seemed to regard a dollar as a measure of
personal energy spent in its acquirement and he felt it his bounden duty to
apply his accumulations where they would yield returns that would be
productive of the best results to the community at large. His life was
strikingly domestic, in that when he was not at business he was with his
family. He made his sons his companions, and when they were ready he took
them into business with him and taught them the scheme of life as it had
unfolded itself to him. He declined proffers of public office, as did all of
his brothers except Thomas W., who was mayor of Cairo for ten or twelve
years. He was not a member of any fraternity and never joined the church,
although he was liberal in supporting movements of a religious nature. Major
Halliday was married during the war to Miss Emma Witherspoon, and both now
reside in their home at San Diego, California. Their children were: Miss
Alice, who resides in San Diego; Samuel, a prominent business man of Cairo;
Edwin L., president of the Cairo Ice and Coal Company; Mrs. Walter H. Wood,
whose husband is the senior member of the firm of Wood and Bennett Company,
of Cairo; Mrs. J. J. Jennelle, Jr., of Seattle, Washington; Mrs. Edward L.
Gilbert, of Cairo; Miss Martha, living at San Diego, California; Mrs. E. L.
Kendall, of Chicago; and Fred D., who is secretary and treasurer of the
Globe Milling Company, of San Diego, California.
Samuel Halliday,
the major's first son, succeeded him as president of the Cairo Wharfboat
Company, and is the senior member of the firm of Halliday & Phillips. He was
born at Columbus, Kentucky, September 4, 1869, and has resided in Cairo
since 1871. After being educated in the high school he became associated
with his father's interests as a youth and in 1901 was made president of the
wharfboat company. On February 25, 1895. Mr. Halliday was married to Miss
Nellie B. Gilbert, daughter of Miles Frederick Gilbert, one of the leading
members of the Cairo bar, and one child, Louise, has been born to their
union, June 20th, 1899.
Extracted 06 Nov 2018 by Norma Hass from 1912 History of Southern Illinois, Volume 3, pages 1692-1694.
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| Scott MO | Mississippi MO | Ballard KY |
