General Ed Wright

WRIGHT

Posted By: Ken Wright (email)
Date: 4/15/2008 at 07:46:24

Pioneer Iowa Law-makers, 1894

GENERAL ED WRIGHT
By Charles Aldrich

In the autumn of 1855, the people of Cedar county elected to a seat in the Legislature a young farmer, who, during the intervening thirty-nine years has come to be one of the best known men in our State. It was but a few weeks after that body opened its memorable last session in Iowa City, before the people of Iowa began to hear of Ed Wright, and they have known him well and in many useful capacities from that time until now. Few men anywhere have been more continuously in office, and yet there is nothing in his character, or in his daily walk or conversation, to suggest or countenance the idea that he is an office-seeker. There is nothing demonstrative in his action or methods. His ways are very quiet, his manner eminently genial and pleasing, as become a man with a Quaker ancestry. Any idea of management, or acting for effect, is wholly foreign to his nature or to a fair understanding of the man. Moreover, no one is more outspoken or positive in the expression of his opinions. None of his utterances are of a doubtful nature or admit of dubious constructions. But he has, in all these years, been in active politics, and almost continuously in public office. There must be some reason unusual and extraordinary for such a successful career. But to those who know him intimately and well there is no fog or mystery connected with his success. One simple rule has governed his course through life, and that is, to do well and with all his might whatever his hands have found to do. The belief in his integrity, and that he is a perfectly safe and always judicious and reliable man – adequate to the performance of any task that he would undertake or any responsibility he would assume – is universal. The man to whom that kind of a reputation seems to attach as a natural consequence, to be part and parcel of his make-up, and who possesses the equally rare gift of contentedly biding his time, is pretty apt to be in demand, to be wanted. He will stand like a pillar in a community, while even greater men may fall by the wayside, “ die and make no sign.”

When he took his seat in the legislature the first subject to which he gave his attention was that of parliamentary law and the rules of the House. There were plenty of old, cultured, professional men in that body – men who, like Col. Crockett, could speak eloquently upon any occasion or upon none whatever! – but in a very short time Ed Wright possessed a better knowledge of the rules and precedents governing deliberative bodies than all the old stagers combined. When knotty questions arose during his long legislative career even Speakers would appeal to him to straighten out the kinks. He was listened to as one who spoke by authority, and he generally had his finger upon the section or clause in Cushing’s great Manual of Parliamentary Law which rendered his position unassailable. He easily acquired the confidence of everybody – those with whom he was associated intimately as well as the public at large. When he was once chairman of the Committee on Claims, he personally acquainted himself with the merits of every account brought against the State. If he recommended or opposed the payment of a claim, that settled its fate at once and finally.

But with all his great but quiet popularity, he is far from being an easy going person, without opinions or prejudices. He is one who does his own thinking. He has never been any man’s man. In fact, he has at times provoked the deepest hostility in influential quarter because he would submit to no domination. His standard of justice and right is his own, and from this mere outside influence never swerves him. And now, at the age of nearly 68, and close upon the time when the infirmities of years, and the exposures of a soldier’s life, will necessitate his abstention from all responsibility and care, he is still in the harness, at a post of arduous duty to which he was called because his services were needed, looking as carefully after every detail, and as scrupulously guarding the public interest, as at any time in his long, laborious and most useful career.

Ed Wright – and that is his whole name – not Edwin or Edward or Edgar – was born in Salem, Ohio, June 27, 1827, and is therefore at this writing (September, 1894) fairly entered upon his 68th year. His ancestors were Quakers. He was raised on a farm, acquiring his education at a district school, with a short term at the Atwater Academy, Portage county, Ohio. Upon leaving the academy he taught school winters up to 1849, spending the summers of 1846 and 1847 in acquiring the trade of carpenter and mill-wright. He was married in 1848 to Miss Martha Thompson, a lady of good education and unusual good sense and intelligence, who is remembered with great kindness and respect by hundreds of people in Cedar county and Des Moines.

He resided in Ohio until 1852, when he emigrated to Cedar county, Iowa, where he became a farmer. He was elected a member of the Iowa House of Representatives in 1855-57 and ’59.

In 1862 he was commissioned Major of the 24th – “Methodist” – regiment of Iowa Infantry Volunteers, serving until the end of the war. It would afford the writer, who confesses to a high admiration of General Wright, great pleasure to follow his military career somewhat minutely, and narrate many incidents of his service, but the limitations of space will not permit. He participated in the memorable battles of Champion Hills, Port Gibson, Winchester, Fisher’s Hill and Cedar Creek. He was severely wounded at Champion Hills and slightly at Cedar Creek. At Winchester his favorite horse, “Old Jack,” was killed under him by a solid cannon shot, while he sat upon his back, hurrying to the front with a box of cartridges. When the old horse fell, “the Major” shouldered the box and hurried to the advanced line where the cartridges were badly needed.

He won the reputation of a brave, efficient, vigilant, steady, resourceful officer, and was there, as everywhere, a favorite with those with whom he was associated. Returning from the war with the rank of Lieutenant Colonel and the brevet of Brigadier-General, he resumed his avocation as a Cedar county farmer.

In the autumn of 1865, he was again chosen to the Iowa House of Representatives and elected Speaker. He was a very successful presiding officer – the equal of any man who has ever occupied that position in our State – and the superior of most of them. I was that winter Clerk of the House, and I do not recall an instance in which he was disconcerted or “rattled” for a single moment. He was thoroughly informed upon every point of parliamentary law, and kept the House and himself well in hand. In the autumn of 1866 he was elected Secretary of State, which distinguished position he filled six years. In this, as in every other place to which he has been called, he won the most universal commendation. Retiring to private life in January, 1873, he was chosen Secretary of the Board of Capitol Commissioners, and Assistant-Superintendent of Construction, serving until 1884, when he became Custodian of the new edifice. This is a laborious position, requiring a man of good business habits, who, to be practical and efficient, would come very near being a “Jack-of-all-trades.” General Wright discharged its duties so satisfactorily that he was reappointed for each succeeding biennial period, as a matter of course, until the election of Governor Horace Boies. He was then succeeded by a Democrat.

The Executive Council almost immediately after he was relieved from the duties of Custodian of the building, placed him in charge of the improvement of the Capitol grounds, for which the legislature had made an appropriation of $100,000. He served until the following winter, securing plans for the work and getting it fairly commenced. He then resigned, recommending that the engineer who had been in his employ should be placed in charge of the work. This recommendation was adopted by the Executive Council.

When the Columbian fair was in progress a chief of the bureau of information was needed – and who so well qualified as General Ed Wright? If he did not have an answer at his tongue’s end, he knew where to find it promptly. He was sent for to take this place, remaining till the close of the Fair, and as usual winning “golden opinions” from his large and hourly changing constituency.

In April of the current year he was appointed Member of the Board of Public Works of the city of Des Moines, which place he occupies at this writing.