INCIDENTS AMUSING AND OTHERWISE RELATING TO THE EARLY BAR AND COURTS OF SCOTT COUNTY. The first banquet of the Scott county bar was given at the Burtis House in honor of Judge A. H. Bennett, who had a short time previous retired from the bench.  This took place on the evening of January 3, 1859.  John P. Cook was toastmaster and John F. Dillon, then a yong man of twenty-six years of age, and who had succeeded Judge Bennett on the bench, was present.  Five dollars a plate was paid by the banqueters. Judge Dillon, in a reminiscent communication published in the Democrat, speaks of the early bar of Scott county in the following glowing terms: "It may be expected perhaps that I shall say something concerning the old and early bar of Davenport.  A few words must suffice.  Of the eariest territorial bar of Iowa, say from 1837 to 1846, its high order of ability has often been remarked.  I may not omit to mention that within this general period Samuel F. Miller came to Iowa, Mr. Justice Miller of the supreme court of the United States - perhaps the ablest constitutional lawyer of his day.  His frame, his features and majestic port, duly put in marble, might stand for a Roman Caesar in Rome's best days; but the Roman people, though noted for their legal genius, never produced a jurisconsult more wothy of perpetual honor than Mr. Justice Miller, and I hope that the state of Iowa and the bar of Iowa will yet join in erecting a statue to his memory at the capital of the state. "In Davenport we had Judge Grant, Judge Mitchell, Ebenezer Cook, and afterward John P. Cook, who were, in all respects, the peers of the Iowa lawyers above named.  The semi-annual terms of court in Davenport were also regularly attended by Knox and Drury of Rock Island, and often by lawyers from other places.  Court week, to hear the lawyers plead, ranked with the annual circus as one of the few entertainments possible in this new and distant region.  In early life I have spent many an hour in the old brick c ourthouse on Fourth street, listening to the trial of cases, at a time when I had no fixed purpose of becoming a lawyer myself.  Every day I used to see the erect form of Ebenezer Cook as he passed my father's house, walking to the fro, cane in hand, between his home on the Cook farm and his office in the town.  One day he was kind enough to stop and say to my mother that when I was old enough he wished me to enter his office and become a lawyer, which (after a detour by way of Dr. Barrows' office and a short course of medical instruction) came to pass in 1851.  In 1850 and 1851 I studied law by myself while keeping, for a livelihood, a small drug store at the corner of Third and Brady  I had no instructor or aid in my studies.  As a law student I was never in a law office or law school.  Of law schools there were but few in the country at the time, and none within my reach or means.  I recollect when reading in Kent about mortgages, I wished to see the form of such a document and that I was compelled to walk down to the courthouse, where Hiram Price was the recorder, and there had, on the records, my first inspection of this important instrument.  In 1852, Austin Corbin came to Davenport, bearing with him a letter of introduction to me from Judge Grant, who was holding court in Dubuque.  In May, 1852, Corbin moved my admission to the bar.  The last time I saw him in New York, just before his tragic, accidental death, he pleasantly admonished me, as we parted at the corner of Cortlandt and Broadway:  'John, don't you forget I am your godfather in the law.' "The old bar of Scott county, by 1855, and soon afterward, had been much enlarged and contained lawyers whose ability and character are an honor and an ornament to the city, the state and the profession.  I cannot name them all, but may mention Davison, True, Hubbell, Lane, Bills, Putnam, Rogers, Corbin, Dow, Cook, Waterman, French, and there were many others. "Noted as the bar of Davenport has ever been for its character, talents and learning, the present bar may look back with a sort of ancestral pride upon the first and oldest bar:  Knox, the most eloquent jury lawyer I have ever heard; Drury, the judicious counselor; Grant, the intrepid and fearless advocate; Mitchell, the comprehensive and well poised lawyer; Ebenezer Cook, whose judgment on legal questions and problems was as sure-footed as that of any man I ever knew; John P. Cook, a natural born trial lawyer, aggressive, bold, courageous, who, like General Taylor, was generally victorious, and who, like him also, never knew when he was whipped.  Some of the lawyers of other days have sons at your bar today, of whom it is high and just praise to say that they worthily rival their fathers and predecessors.  But I have rambled far afield and conclude by saying:  'Long live the Democrat.' " Debbie Clough G-erischer G-erischer Family Web Site http://gerischer.rootsweb.com/ Assistant CC, Iowa Gen Web, Scott County http://www.celticcousins.net/scott/ List Manager for: IASCOTT-L * G-erischer-L * D-encker-L Fitzpatirck-L * V-lerebome-L * Huntington-L * Otis-L * Algar-L EIGS-L * Pickens-L * McNab-L * Patris-L - Rankin-L