HILL. Ill I I . 303 He has been grand dictator of the Knights of Honor for Massachusetts ; a prominent member of the Free Congregational society of Florence, and member of the school board of Northampton. He has also served as alderman and mayor of Northampton. In his earlier years, Mr. Hill enjoyed considerable celebrity in the national game of base ball, having been captain of the Florence club, 1865, '66 and '67, when this team was one of the most noted in New England. He was also manager of the Florence Dramatic Club, organized in 1863 to raise funds wherewith to purchase and send supplies to the soldiers. This organ- ization is still in existence. Mr. Hill was married in Northampton, July 7, 1869, to Kate Elizabeth, daughter of Eli and Julia C. (Clapp) Edwards. Of this union were four children : Florence Gaylord, Marion Louise, Annie Edwards and Samuel Irving Hill (the last two de- ceased). HILL, DON GLEASON, son of George and Sylvia Hill, was born July iz, 1847, at West Medway, Norfolk county. His father, who was a carpenter, had not the means to give his children an education, but taught them his trade, at which Mr. Hill was early put to work in order to earn the money necessary for future study. By close application and strict economv he was enabled at an early age to attend school at the YVesleyan Academy, Wilbra- ham. He was educated at Amherst Col- lege, class of 1869, and at the law school of the University of Albany, N. V., from which he received the degree of 1. 1., 1!., May, 1870, and soon after was admitted to the bar of New York. Returning to Medway he was for a time a student in the office of Charles H. Deans, but in June, 187 1, he removed to Dedham, and entered the law office of the late Hon. Waldo Colburn. Upon the recommenda- tion of Mr. Colburn he was admitted to the Norfolk county bar, September 25, 187 1, and remained with him until June, (875, when Mr. Colburn was appointed to the bench. Mr. Hill then began active practice in the office left him by his able instructor. In October, 1875, a law partnership was formed with Charles A. Mackintosh, an- other of Judge Colburn's students, under the firm name of Hill & Mackintosh, which continued a number of years. For several years past Mr. Hill has devoted himself almost exclusively to practice in probate and real estate law and convey- ancing. In 1875 he succeeded Judge Colburn as attorney of the Dedham Institution for Savings, and is also one of its trustees ; he is also the attorney of the Braintree Savings Bank, and frequently employed by other banks throughout the county. In 1880 he was elected to, and has since con- tinued to hold, the office of town clerk of Dedham. He takes a lively interest in antiquarian pursuits, and has recently edited two important volumes of ancient records — one of the births, marriages, and deaths recorded with the town records from 1635 to 1845 ! the other of the church records in DON GLEASON HILL. the town, covering the same period. At his suggestion, and under his direction, the town has caused them to be printed. In 1882 he was elected a selectman, assessor, and overseer of the poor, to which offices he has at times been re-elected, and at present is serving in the same capacity. He is a director in the Dedham Mutual Fire Insurance Company, and one of the trustees of the Dedham public library. The Dedham Historical Society, of which he is president, owes much of its present prosperity to his efforts during his membership. He has for several years been a member of the New England His- toric Genealogical Society.
