D. W. Wise

D.W. Wise, who, since March, 1881, has been engineer for the Chicago Terminal Railway Company's elevator Iowa, Fourteenth and Lumber streets, began sailing when but a young lad. He has held positions for long terms of service with large companies, and is highly esteemed by his employers.

He was born in New York City in 1848, son of Martin A. and Della (Sydney) Wise. The father was born in Wethersfield, Conn., and the mother in Virginia. Martin A. Wise was a printer, and was employed all his life in the office of the New York Tribune. Both he and his wife died in that city and are buried in Greenwood cemetery, New York. Daniel was reared in New York and New Brunswick, N. J., by his grandparents. Going to Albany, N. Y., he attended school and learned engineering and about 1863, or when a lad of fifteen, went to Oswego and commenced firing on a tug, doing harbor work; then on the tug Winslow, on the Detroit river, for one year. His next employment was on a tug in the Chicago river, after which he entered the employ of the Chicago & Northwestern railroad, going on the tug Escanaba, which boat was doing tugging at Escanaba and Fort Howard. He remained in the service of this company for three and a half years, and then for a year was engineer on the passenger boat Saginaw, of Chicago, and for the same period engineer of the propeller Jacob Barclay, from Milwaukee.

In 1873 Mr. Wise came to Chicago, and for years was engineer on tugs owned by Donaldson Bros., doing all kinds of lake tugging on the tug now known as the Judge Field. In 1876 he entered the employ of the Michigan Transportation Company, controlled by Leopold & Austrian, and was engineer on the Joseph L. Hurd, a passenger steamer plying between Chicago and Duluth, and all intermediate points. He remained with that company until he accepted his present position in 1881.

Socially, Mr. Wise is a prominent member of the M. E. B. A., Chicago Branch No. 4, and is at present financial secretary of the association, and is regarded as one of its most substantial and trustworthy members.

In 1876, in Chicago, Mr. Wise was married to Miss Mary E. Todd, who was born in Napoleon, Ark. To this union have been born two children: Sydney S. and Sarah Agnes.

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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.