Purdy, Warren Grafton, 1843-1910

Biography

Transportation has almost become a science and certainly it has become an art in the last half century. The men to whom this is due are many of them now living and the department in which this vast development has most largely arisen is that of the railway. The public has become so familiar with the legends "Rock Island Route," "Lake Shore Line," or "Union Pacific System," and the like, that it is won't to forget that a half century ago these great systems had no existence and in many of them are leading officials who have been the monitors of all their marvelous extension and development almost if not quite from the beginning. Such is the case in the career of the well known Chicagoan Mr. Warren Grafton Purdy, the second vice president of the great Chicago, Rock Island and Pacific Railway system. Mr. Purdy is a Baltimorean and a man in the prime of life. John and Louisa A. Purdy were living in that Maryland city on the Chesapeake on May 20, 1843, when their son, Warren Grafton, was born. At that date none of the great railway lines in whose service he was to enter were in existence. He was a boy of but twelve years, attending the public schools of Baltimore when the first tracks of the Illinois Central Railway were laid in Chicago to let the Michigan Central trains reach the heart of the city. He was only that age too when the Rock Island Railway began putting into effect its newly declared policy of becoming a great trunk line with Chicago as its eastern terminal for its first incorporation had been made only six years before when he was but six years old.

During the next few years young Purdy was devoting himself to the course ofthe high school, which has since become Baltimore College and during the year 1859, was graduated therefrom at the age of sixteen. This was a rather youthful age for the young Baltimorean to undertake to seek his fortune in the West, but that was his determination.

Choosing Chicago as the scene of his career, he removed thither and entered upon what has proved to be a career of almost thirty-five years in connection with railway transportation. There were some incidental changes in the earlier part of it, but all his positions have been characterized by the greatest responsibilities, requiring comprehensiveness of view, wisdom in judgment, and skill in organization with an abundant capacity for details.

He was first employed in the service of the Illinois Central Railway as clerk in the store-rooms of its shops. After four years in this position and when he had barely reached his twentieth year, he accepted a better offer at St. Louis from the Ohio and Mississippi Railway. This service was of brief duration however for the exigencies of the Civil War called his particular talents into requisition in the quartermaster's department at Chicago where he became assistant when he was not quite twenty years of age. The active years of war, from 1863 to the disbanding of troops in 1865, occupied him to the fullest extent as chief clerk of the district with offices at Camp Douglas. A section of the army was still engaged in desultory warfare in various parts of Texas and the department was removed to Brownsville, that State where Mr. Purdy was in charge until the close of the hostilities.

At the first of the year 1867, a young man of but twenty four years, Mr. Purdy was unusually well equipped for such a position and was called to become the general book-keeper in the general offices of the Chicago, Rock Island and Pacific Railway at Chicago. This was the beginning of a long service of twenty-seven years in the employment of this great system in positions of the greatest responsibility and of successively increasing importance, a fact that is all the more significant when it is considered that these were the years of the formation of the vast system from its original plain trunk line to the present ramifications of nearly 3,700 miles of track.

From his position as general book-keeper, he was promoted to that of cashier later to the local treasurership and finally became secretary and treasurer. After two years in the latter position, he was elected to the position of second vice president in 1887, in addition to these duties. These facts speak for themselves of the value that the leaders of this great system place upon his abilities.

In fraternity life also Mr Purdy has had an eminent career. Becoming a member of the Masonic order in Blair Lodge in 1864, he was soon made its secretary and had passed the various degrees so rapidly that three years later he was first lieutenant commander of the Chicago Consistory. By his twenty-eighth year, he had entered the thirty thfrd and highest degree of Masonry as no doubt the youngest man upon whom the degree was ever conferred. He has been very active in the operations of the Knights Templars of Chicago serving as treasurer of Apollo Commandery No. 1 in 1879 becoming a charter member in the organization of Montjoie Commandery No. 33 and its eminent commander for three successive years, and acting as adjutantgeneral and one of the members of the executive committee which made the triennial conclave in Chicago so successful.

Mr. Purdy's remarkable administrative abilities led to his election as lieutenantcolonel of the Second Regiment, Illinois National Guards in 1885, a position he held for four years and then declined further service. He has also long been a member of the well known Union League Club in which he is a member of the board of managers and is an active member of the Social Club of Kenwood, the section of the city in which his residence is located. Mr. Purdy has had a married life of nearly thirty years as he was united in matrimonial bonds to a Chicago lady, Miss Acca Laurentia Colby on the 13th day of March, 1865 when he was but one year beyond his majority. Of the four children which have blessed this union, Ella Francelia Warren Frederick and Bertha A. are at the Kenwood home while the eldest William A. fills the responsible position of paymaster of the Chicago Rock Island and Pacific Railway.

Industrial Chicago: The commercial interests (Vol. 4). (1894). Chicago, Illinois: The Goodspeed Publishing Company. pg. 535-536

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