Cary, John Watson 1817 - 1895
railroad lawyer, politician, b. Shoreham, Vt. He graduated from Union College, Schenectady, N.Y. (1842), studied law, and was admitted to the New York bar in 1844. In 1850 he moved to Racine and in 1859 to Milwaukee. A Democrat, he was state senator (1853-1854), mayor of Racine (1857), a Milwaukee railroad commissioner (1866), a member of the Milwaukee board of councilors (1868), and state assemblyman (1872). In 1859 he became head of the legal department of the La Crosse and Milwaukee R.R. Co. and in 1863 continued as general counsel of its successor, the Milwaukee & St. Paul (renamed the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railway Company, 1874). In this capacity (1863-1895) Cary conducted all of the company's extensive legal actions and advised its general policies. He was the author of The Organization and History of the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railway Company (1892). After 1890 he made his home in Chicago. E. B. Usher, Wis. (8 vols., Chicago, 1914); A. W. Derleth, Milwaukee Road (New York, 1948); Milwaukee Journal, Mar. 29, 1895; Wis. Blue Book (1872); J. R. Berryman, ed., Bench and Bar of Wis. (2 vols., Chicago, 1898).
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[Source: Blue book]