Bio of HALL, Stephen Crosby (b.1834), Hennepin Co., MN
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EXTRACTED FROM: History of Minneapolis, Gateway to the Northwest; 
Chicago-Minneapolis, The S J Clarke Publishing Co, 1923; Edited by: Rev. 
Marion Daniel Shutter, D.D., LL.D.; Volume I - Shutter (Historical); 
volume II - Biographical; volume III - Biographical

STEPHEN CROSBY HALL - Vol II, pg 514-518
When the great middle west was first opening up to settlement and to
civiliza­tion, Stephen Crosby Hall made his way to the Mississippi valley and
for many years thereafter was a prominent figure in connection with the
utilization of the natural resources of this section of the country.
The record of progress must give due recognition to him' for what he
accomplished in the way of utilizing the advantages that nature offered to those
who would bear the hardships and the privations of frontier life. He is classed
with those who aided in laying broad and deep the foundation upon which the
present progress and pros­perity of this section of the country rests and in
every locality where he operated he was honored as a man of splendid business
capacity and enterprise, whose labors were direct and tangible factors in the
improvement of his district, as well as in the upbuilding of his individual
fortune.
Stephen Crosby Hall came to this section of the country from the Empire state,
his birth having occurred at Penn Van, New York, August 16, 1834, his parents
being Deacon Jonathan and Anna (Whitaker) Hall, who originally resided at
Passaic, New Jersey. One of the sisters of Stephen C. Hall became the wife of
Rev. Luther Littell, a prominent Presbyterian minister of Orange county, New
York.
In his youthful days Stephen C. Hall was much interested in mathematics and this
led him to take up the study of civil engineering, a knowledge of which proved
to him of the greatest value when in later years he entered the wilds of
Michigan as a lumberman. His initial step in the business world was made as a
clerk in New York city but after two years passed in the eastern metropolis he
went to Michigan, locating in the great pine forest on White river. For several
weeks he carried the mails to and from that locality in a carpetbag but at
length a regular route was estab­lished and a post office was secured, to be
known by the name of Whitehall, the name being obtained from the river and the
surname of the Hall brothers. Today a city of about two thousand inhabitants is
there and the district has become a very popular summer resort. It was for a
number of years the chosen home of the renowned Alex­ander Dowie, later founder
of the city of Zion.
Mr. Hall had been a resident of Michigan for but a brief period when he took up
surveying and in this way he obtained most comprehensive knowledge of the
tim­ber resources of the country and the location of the best timber tracts.
About a year and a half later he built a sawmill, which, however, he soon sold.
Making claim to land he soon acquired title to two thousand acres in what
surveyors reported to be an impassable marsh, but this he drained and converted
into one of the finest farming sections of Michigan and in more recent years it
was exchanged for valuable property holdings in Minneapolis. Not only did Mr.
Hall obtain a marked land but he also secured valuable tracts of pine land,
making his own investigations, selections and surveys. While thus engaged he
spent many nights under the stars in the forest, depending upon the fires which
he built to protect him from the wolves, then most numerous in the timber
regions and often very ravenous in the winter months when it was hard to obtain
food. With the acquirement of pine land Mr. Hall began exten­sive logging
operations, having at first fifteen hundred acres of pine, to which be added
until he had nearly three hundred thousand acres near Houghton lake. He employed
between two and three hundred men and utilized a hundred horses in an effort,
which he accomplished, to put fifteen million feet of logs in the lake in a
single season. In the '70s he operated several sawmills, being associated with
Thomp­son Brothers & Company of Chicago, the output of his mills being shipped
largely to that city. In order to facilitate trade he built the steamer Stephen
C. Hall at Grand Haven and used it in transporting the output of his sawmills to
the city. He became the president of the Bay State Lumber Company of Menominee,
Michigan, and also of the S. C. Hall Lumber Company, of which his son-in-law,
Thomas H. Shevlin, was the manager. As the woods of Michigan became cut over his
further operations as a lumberman led him to buy timber lands in Minnesota and
thus eventually he was induced to take up his abode in Minneapolis in 1884. For
a time he conducted busi­ness in partnership with Colonel James Goodnow in the
North Star Lumber Company and in 1886 the Hall & Ducey Lumber Company was
incorporated, with Mr. Hall as the president and manager. This corporation
became one of the most extensive in its operations in Minnesota, cutting
regularly forty million feet of lumber and con­ducting a business that
aggregated three-fourths of a million dollars annually. The Hall & Shevlin
Company, of which Mr. Hall was the president, was organized in 188G and erected
a new mill with a capacity of forty million feet. In 1888 the payroll of the two
companies averaged eighteen thousand dollars a month, a sum which would be much
more than doubled at the present time, owing to the notable increase in labor
prices. The upper Mississippi valley owes its marvelous development in large
measure to these lumbermen who made their way into the forests and developed an
industry, which constituted the basic source of progress and prosperity here. In
addition to his other activities Mr. Hall was a member of the Minneapolis Lumber
Exchange, which at the time of his death passed a set of resolutions as a
memorial to him, giv­ing evidence of the high regard entertained for him by
reason of his splendid qualities.
On the 8th of April, 1862, Mr. Hall was married to Miss Alice Clark of Grand
Haven, Michigan, and they became parents of four children, the mother and three
Children surviving the husband and father. Alice A. became the wife of Thomas H.
Shevlin and died in 1910; Emma is the wife of Charles A. Bennett of Los Angeles,
California; Hattie is the wife of Edwin Shevlin of Portland, Oregon; and Stephen
A. died in 1914. He married Miss Cecilia A. Kent and they had one child, Stephen
A., Jr., who was of the third generation of that name.
Mr. Hall was at all times a progressive and public-spirited citizen, who
mani­fested his interest in the general welfare in many tangible ways. He served
as super­visor and as county treasurer while in Michigan. He was an active
member of the Congregational church there, serving as president of its board and
also displaying a most unfaltering zeal in his interest in foreign missions. At
one time he personally supported a missionary in Japan and he gave generously to
every cause which he believed would further the religious progress of his
fellowmen. After coming to Min­neapolis he took a most helpful interest in the
Young Men's Christian Association and in the work of the Westminster
Presbyterian church, in which he placed his membership. He contributed most
generously toward the erection of the house of worship, which stood on Nicollet
avenue between Seventh and Eighth streets. His benefactions were many but were
always most unostentatiously made, for he closely followed the admonition not to
let the left hand know what the right hand doeth. His life was ever the
expression of high and honorable principles and when he passed away his death
was most deeply felt, not only by his immediate family but by his many friends
and his business associates. An accident terminated his life, for while in the
sawmill, he slipped and fell a distance of twenty-six feet, striking upon
timber, whereby the life spark was extinguished.
Following the demise of her husband Mrs. Hall took up the heavy responsibilities
that were thus so suddenly thrust upon her and displayed admirable judgment and
ability in directing the large interests of which she then assumed control. She
grad­ually converted outside interests into Minneapolis property and has here
erected some of the largest and finest buildings of the city, including the
structure at the corner of Nicollet avenue and Eleventh street and another at
the corner of Hennepin avenue and Seventh street. She was instrumental in
promoting the organization of the Colonial Realty Company to look after the
various properties which she had acquired and of this company she became
president. Like her husband, she has been actively interested in the work of the
church and in many important charities. She is equally a patron of art,
literature and all those forces which make for cultural uplift.