Bio of John S. Case
As found in REPRESENTATIVE MEN OF MAINE
A Collection of Biographical Sketches.
Prepaired under the direction of Henry Chase
Portland, ME.
The Lakeside Press, Publisher
1893

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MR. CASE was born in Belgrade, Me., in 1823. His father, like most of the small farmers in the State at that day, was a poor man, and it was necessary for the subject of this sketch, at an early age, to be constantly employed upon the farm, where he lived until he was eleven years of age, when he removed with his father to East Thomaston, then a small village in the town of Thomaston, now Rockland. Here he remained, engaged in different kinds of labor, until he was seventeen years old, when he left his home and went to Militown, N. B., and hired out with a lumber merchant, for whom he worked three years, receiving for his services one hundred and fifty dollars per annum, and was paid for the full time, having worked over-time enough to balance all that taken for pleasure. He was employed in the woods in winter, and in the mills in summer; returned home, and after attending a private school for two terms (which, with the exception of three short winter terms at a district school years before, was all the time he had spent in a school room), he then bought, with a few dollars he had saved, a small stock of goods, and commenced business in a small way on an island in Penobscot Bay, which after two years’ trial was abandoned. He then entered a dry goods store as clerk, where he remained six years, commencing with a salary of two hundred dollars, and ending the last year with seven hundred. Having obtained a thorough knowledge of the business, he remained in the dry goods trade with the late William Wilson, under the firm name of Wilson & Case, and for some years did a prosperous business. On the last day of 1857 he sold out to his partner, and in January, 1858, entered the firm of Francis Cobb & Co., then continuing business under the firm name of Cobb, Wight & Case. This concern, in addition to its large mercantile trade, built ships, and were large manufacturers of lime, to which business was added, later on, that of quarrying and manufacturing granite. This latter branch of the firm’s business was finally merged into and became a part of the Bodwell Granite Company, one of the largest concerns of the kind in the country, having been brought from small beginnings to its present capacity under the superior business management of the late Governor Bodwell, who was its President. Mr. Case was for many years a l)irector, and is now Vice-President of that corporation. In 1868 he withdrew from the firm of Cobb, Wight & Case, and established his present business with his father-in-law, under the firm name of White & Case, which still continues, although Mr. White has been dead some years. In 1876, with his former partners, he bought a large lime plant in the West, and established the “Glencoe Lime Company,” of St. Louis, Mo., of which he is President. He has been for many years a Trustee of the Rockland Savings Bank, and was five years its President. He has been a Director of the Rockland National Bank, and is now its President; was a l)irector of the Knox & Lincoln Railroad Company when that road was sold to the Maine Central Railroad Company. Mr. Case is widely and favorably known as an enterprising, progressive, and able business man. He has always been identified with all the business interests of his growing and prosperous city, the credit and advancement of which have always been his greatest pleasure. In 1852 he was married to Lucy C. White, and has two children, a son and daughter. In 1854, when Rockland was made a city, he was a member of the City Government, and for many years was elected to the various offices that are provided by her charter. He was Mayor of the city in 1880, re-elected in 1881; Mayor in 1883, and again re-elected in 1884. Mr. Case was Representative in the Legislature in 1868 and 1869; 1880, and 1881. He was delegate to the Republican National Convention at Chicago in 1880, Elector-at-Large in 1884, and President of the Electoral College which returned the State for Blame & Logan. In politics, a Republican. Religious preference, Congregationalist.