Page:Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography (1900, volume 5).djvu/702

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668
STERNE
STEUBEN

elation in 1885 for his essay on "Disinfectants," and he has invented automatic beat-regulating apparatus. Besides contributions to scientific journals on his specialties, he has published "Photo-Micrographs, and how to make them " (Boston, 1883) "Bacteria" (New York, 1884); and Malaria and Malarial Diseases" (1884).


STERNE, Simon, lawyer, b. in Philadelphia, Pa., 23 June, 1839. He was graduated in the law department of the University of Pennsylvania in 1860, and established himself in practice in New York city. In 1862 he was elected lecturer on political economy in Cooper union. He was on the staff of the “Commercial Advertiser” in 1863-'4, was a founder of the American free-trade league in 1864, and in 1865 published the “Social Science Review.” Taking an active part in the movement for the purification of municipal politics, he was chosen secretary of the committee of seventy in 1870, and drafted the charter that was advocated by that committee. In 1876 he was appointed by Gov. Samuel J. Tilden on a commission to devise a plan for the government of cities, in 1879 acted as counsel for the New York board of trade and transportation and chamber of commerce in the investigation of abuses in railroad management, which resulted in the appointment of a board of railroad commissioners for the state of New York. He was also a leader in the movement that resulted in the creation of the inter-state commerce commission, drafting the inter-state commerce bill in conjunction with the committee of the United States senate. In 1885 he was appointed by President Cleveland a commissioner to examine and report on the relations between the railroads and the governments of western Europe. An essay that he read before the American bar association on “Slip-shod Legislation” led to the appointment in 1888 of a committee of the legislature to consider reforms in the drafting of laws. He has been a frequent writer on economical and political subjects, contributed articles on “Cities,” “Legislation,” “Monopolies,” “Railways,” and “Representation” to John J. Lalor's “Cyclopædia of Political Science and United States History” (1881-'3), and is the author of “Representative Government and Personal Representation” (Philadelphia, 1870) and “Constitutional History and Political Development in the United States” (New York, 1882; 4th ed., 1888).


STETEFELDT, Carl August, mining engineer, b. in Holzhausen, near Gotha, Germany, 28 Sept., 1838. He was educated at the gymnasium in Gotha, the University of Göttingen, and at the mining-school in Clausthal, where he was graduated in 1861. Soon afterward he came to this country, and since that time he has been engaged in the practice of his profession as a mining engineer and metallurgist. At present (1888) he devotes himself principally to consultation, and has his office in New York. He is widely known through the mining districts by his invention of the Stetefeldt furnace, which is extensively used in the west for the roasting of silver ores preparatory to the extraction of the metal by either amalgamation or lixiviation. Mr. Stetefeldt has been a member of the American institute of mining engineers since 1881, and was its vice-president in 1885-7. Besides technical papers he has written “The Lixiviation of Silver Ores with Hyposulphite Solutions” (New York, 1888).


STETSON, Charles Augustus, hotel-proprietor, b. in Newburyport, Mass., 1 April, 1810; d. in Reading, Pa., 29 March, 1888. His father was proprietor of a hotel in Newburyport. The son adopted the same calling, and after taking charge of the Tremont house, Boston, in 1830, and Barnum's hotel, Baltimore, in 1833, became proprietor of the Astor house, New York, in 1837, and kept it till 1875, for the first twenty years of this period in partnership with Robert B. Coleman. In 1851 he was quartermaster-general of New York, and he was usually known by his military title. Gen. Stetson acquired a wide reputation as a hotel-keeper in the days when the Astor house was almost the only large hotel in New York, and became intimate with many eminent men, including Daniel Webster, Henry Clay, Rufus Choate, and William H. Seward. The Astor house was the scene of all the great public dinners of those times, and the regular resting-place of congressmen from the eastern states in going to and returning from Washington. During the civil war Gen. Stetson showed many acts of kindness to soldiers on their way through New York, and he was publicly thanked by Gov. John A. Andrew, of Massachusetts.


STEUART, Richard Sprigg, physician, b. in Baltimore, Md., 1 Nov., 1797; d. there, 13 July, 1876. He was educated at St. Mary's college, Baltimore, and studied medicine at the University of Maryland, receiving his degree in 1822. Beginning practice in Baltimore, he was elected in 1828 president of the Maryland hospital for the insane, which he reorganized, and of which he was president till his death. He was an active coadjutor of Dorothea L. Dix in her efforts to improve the condition and treatment of the insane, occupied a good position among the alienists of the country, and lectured to the public on the subject of insanity. Mainly through his efforts the Spring Grove insane asylum was built for the state of Maryland at a cost of $850,000. the result of public and private contributions. — His son, James Aloysius, physician, b. in Baltimore, Md., 3 April, 1828, was graduated at St. Mary's college in 1847 and at the school of medicine of the University of Maryland in 1850. He established himself in practice in Baltimore, and became physician to the city general dispensary, and assistant physician to the Maryland hospital for the insane. Since 1875 he has been health commissioner, registrar of vital statistics, and president of the city board of health. Under his management the health department has been reorganized, and the annual death-rate has been reduced from 26 to 19 per thousand. He checked an incipient outbreak of yellow fever in 1886, and has aided in suppressing two epidemics of small-pox.


STEUBEN, Frederick William Augustus Henry Ferdinand von, known in this country as Baron Steuben, German soldier, b. in Magdeburg, Prussia, 15 Nov., 1730; d. in Steubenville, N. Y., 28 Nov., 1794. His father, a captain in the army, took him when a mere child into the Crimea, whither he was ordered. The boy was only ten years old when the father returned to Prussia. He was educated in the Jesuit colleges at Neisse and Breslau, and distinguished himself as a mathematician. At fourteen he served with his father in the war of 1744, and was present at the siege of Prague. At the age of seventeen he entered as cadet in an infantry regiment, and in two years was promoted to ensign, and four years afterward to lieutenant. He served in the seven years' war and was wounded in the battle of Prague. In 1754 he was made adjutant-general in the free corps of Gen. John von May, but after the death of the latter he re-entered the regular army in 1761, and was taken prisoner by the Russians at the capitulation of Colberg. In 1762 he was made aide to Frederick the Great, and took part in the celebrated siege of Schweidnitz, which closed the military