Cyrenius A. Newcomb (1837-1915)
The following biography is from Bethuel M. Newcomb’s 1923 Andrew Newcomb and His Descendants
Mr. Newcomb belonged to a line of Newcombs that played an active part in the Revolutionary War. He was educated in the common schools of New York and later attended the Massachusetts State Normal School at Bridgewater, and the Clinton Liberal Institute in New York. At the age of eighteen, he began work in the dry goods business in Hannibal, NY; two years later he accepted a clerical position with the dry goods firm of N.H. Skinner, of Taunton, Mass., and nine years later became a partner in the business.
In 1868 he sold out his interest and removed to Detroit, Mich., where he became one of the founders of the Newcomb-Endicott Co., one of the largest mercantile firms in the west. He continued to be president of this company up to the time of his death, although he had given up active business two years previously, owing to failing health.
Mr. Newcomb was a leader in reform and philanthropic work; was a member of several boards of charity, and was active in civil and political affairs, though never holding political office. He had been a member of the Universalist Church for many years; resided, Detroit, where children were born.
The caricature is from the book A Gallery of Pen Sketches in Black and White (Newspaper Cartoonists’ Association of Michigan, Detroit: W. Graham Printing Co., 1905).