Captain Daniel M. Becker

Captain Daniel M. Becker (deceased) was a representative of a family which came from Holland and located in New York State soon after Hendrick Hudson made his discoveries. The Dutch name was Van Becker, but it was gradually changed to Becker by American use and brevity. With a party of their relatives the family located on a farm on the coast in New York, which place is now owned and occupied by Frederick Becker, a brother of our subject.

Captain Becker was born April 22, 1834, in Charleston, N. Y., but shortly after his birth the family removed to Three Mile Bay, where he attended the common schools. At an early age he and three of his brothers - Calvin, William and Hiram - went upon the lakes, being the first of the family to embrace a maritime life, and all became owners of vessels or captains, sailing for many years. Hiram died in Chicago in 1892. Daniel Becker left home at the age of sixteen and first sailed as mate on the Minnehaha. He was later on several different schooners, and had command of the Florida, Bahama, Thomas Mott, Brightie, Negaunee and Ahira Cobb. From the last named he went to the Everett, of which he was captain up to the week before his death, which occurred at Milwaukee, in December, 1890. He had made his home in Cleveland since 1875, and from 1874 until 1884, was a ship broker and a member of the Board of Trade in that city. During all these years he commanded vessels not a man on board was ever lost. He was a highly respected citizen of Cleveland, and a prominent member of the Ship Masters Association and of the Masonic Order.

On December 25, 1857, Captain Becker was united in marriage to Miss Mary Kelley, a young lady of Irish ancestry, whose father, Michael Kelley, was a pilot on salt water and spent the latter part of his life in Chicago. The Captain and his wife became the parents of six children, namely: Minnie, now the widow of Webster Roberts, who died in 1887; William H. of Cleveland, who married Mamie Gibson and is a member of the firm of J.H. Outhwaite & Co.; Zuleika, who died in 1884; Calvin, who died in infancy; Calvin, who married Nora Creegan, and resides in Cleveland, and Daniel, Jr., deceased.

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Volume I

This version of Volume II is based, with permission, on the work of the great volunteers at the Marine Captains Biographies site. To them goes the credit for reorganizing the content into some coherent order. The biographies in the original volume are in essentially random order.

Some of the transcription work was also done by Brendon Baillod, who maintains an excellent guide to Great Lakes Shipwreck Research.