My Genealogy Hound

JAMES S. EWING, Bloomington; was born on the 19th day of July, A. D 1835, in the same year as his business companion, Mr. Stevenson; he was born, nursed and cradled in a log cabin, relic of the pioneer days of Illinois, when the “Star of Empire” had just begun its journey westward, located at Panther Grove, in what is now Woodford Co., but was then embraced in McLean. He accompanied his parents when they removed to Bloomington in 1840, and has remained for nearly four decades a citizen of this city; the rudimentary principles of education were obtained in the old-fashioned schoolhouse of that day and stage of Western civilization; over the boys and girls of the village, most of whom attended this school, Dr. W. C. Hobbs ruled in the old-time, pedagogic simplicity and dignity; later young Ewing entered the school opened by the learned Rev. Reuben Andrews, in the old Methodist Church, and from this humble beginning developed the present Illinois Wesleyan University; Mr. Andrews’ school was attended by Ewing until 1853, when he began a course of study at Jubilee College, located in Peoria Co.; in 1856 he entered the Junior year in Centre College, at Danville, Ky. Mr. Ewing graduated in June, 1858, and in January following (1859), was admitted by the Supreme Court of Illinois, to practice as an attorney and counselor at law; at that day aspirants to legal honors were catechised, examined, and their intellectual capacity for the law sounded at Chicago, a committee of “experts” being appointed for that purpose by the Supreme Court; on this occasion the awful presence consisted of the learned Norman B. Judd, Ebenezer Peck and Corydon Beckwith, each of whom was at that time a distinguished practicing lawyer. His license is signed by Sidney Breese (recently deceased), Pinkney Walkner and John D. Caton, the gentlemen who at that time occupied the Supreme Bench of the State; cotemporary with the names mentioned was Judge David Davis, who was then Judge of McLean County Circuit Court, and the following resident attorneys, the only ones in active, practice: George O. Robinson, Walter M. Hatch, R. E. Williams, M. W. Packard and E. M. Prince. Mr. Ewing formed a partnership with the Hon. John B. Cohrs, now of Pekin, with the style of the firm Ewing & Cohrs. After a year of practice, the alliance parted company by mutual consent and individual permission, Mr. Cohrs to go to Pekin, and Mr. Ewing to Philadelphia, where the latter entered the law office of Hon. John C. Bullitt, and worked for a salary for about one year; he then returned to Bloomington where he has since remained. In 1869, Mr. Ewing formed the present partnership with the Hon. A. E. Stevenson. Politically, the subject of this sketch is a Democrat of a pronounced type, though not a bitter partisan; in the earlier days of his professional career he took a lively interest in politics, but he has never been a candidate, and with the accumulation of business, he has to a great extent eschewed politics.