Person:Eugene Canfield (1)

Eugene Canfield was born in Arlington, Vermont, in May, 1837, and descended in the sixth generation from Thomas Canfield, who came from England and settled at Milford, Conn., in 1646. His maternal grandfather, Martin Deming, was one of the heroes of Bunker Hill, and served through the revolutionary war. Harman Canfield, his father, was a well-known lawyer of Vermont. Eugene, the subject of this sketch, was fitted for college at Burr & Burton seminary, at Manchester, Vt., and entered Williams college in 1853. He was unable to complete his course on account of health, and entered his father's law office. He was admitted to the bar and practiced law at Arlington until 1860, when he went to Aurora, Ill., and commenced the practice of his profession. He was city attorney of Aurora in 1861 and 1872, and in the latter year was elected state senator in Kane and Dupage counties by a majority of 4,000. He was an ardent republican and a fine lawyer.

Senator Eugene Canfield was married in 1868, to Emily, daughter of Benjamin Hackney, of Aurora, one of the founders of the C.B.& Q. railroad and Jennings Seminary. He came to the sound in 1883 and purchased for himself and others 25,000 acres of choice land, most of which, in the years of depression and discouragement that followed, he became possessed of. His wife and two daughters joined him later. He at once, upon acquiring Whatcom interests, became a leading citizen of Whatcom county. It was due to his enterprise and ambition that Nelson Bennett and associates were introduced to Bellingham Bay, and the Fairhaven & Southern road was built. He was one of the builders of the first local electric road and the G street wharf. At the time of his death, April 6, 1892, Senator Canfield was president of the First National bank of New Whatcom. For the last twenty years of his life he was afflicted with a hereditary deafness.

(From The Daily Reveille, April 7, 1892; his picture also appears in the article.)

Eugene T. Canfield, 1861
Mr. Canfield was born May 21, 1837, in Bennington, Vt., and settled in Aurora, Ill., in 1860. He is one of three people to hold the position of Kane County State's Attorney in 1861. He was city attorney for Aurora from 1861 to 1872. He married Emily Hackney on Nov. 4, 1868. He served in the Illinois State Senate for many years and unsuccessfully ran for Illinois Attorney General. In the 1880s, he moved to Whatcom County in far northwest Washington State, where he was a pioneer in the development of the land and railroads in the Pacific Northwest. Mr. Canfield accumulated considerable property in the vicinity of Puget Sound and in Oregon. He was president of the Bellingham Bay Railroad and Navigation Co. His property, purchased from the government at a low price, increased in value many times over. At the time of his death, in April 1891, he was said to be worth well more than $1 million.