Fernando Cortez BEAMAN, Congress, MI (1814-1882)

BEAMAN, Fernando Cortez, a Representative from Michigan; born in Chester, Vt., June 28, 1814; moved with his parents to a farm in Franklin County, N.Y., in 1819; attended the district schools and Malone Academy, Malone, N.Y.; taught school; moved to Rochester, N.Y., in 1836; studied law; moved to Manchester, Mich., in 1838; was admitted to the bar and commenced practice in 1839; moved to Tecumseh in 1841 and practiced law there and in Clinton; moved to Adrian in 1843, having been appointed prosecuting attorney for Lenawee County, and served until 1850; city attorney of Adrian; member of the convention that organized the Republican Party “under the oaks” at Jackson, Mich., in 1854; delegate to the first Republican National Convention, at Philadelphia in 1856; mayor of Adrian in 1856; judge of the probate court of Lenawee County 1856-1860; elected as a Republican to the Thirty-seventh and to the four succeeding Congresses (March 4, 1861-March 3, 1871); chairman, Committee on Roads and Canals (Thirty-ninth Congress); declined to be a candidate for renomination in 1870; returned to Adrian and resumed the practice of law; appointed judge of probate of Lenawee County in 1871, elected to the same position in 1872, and reelected in 1876; appointed United States Senator to fill the vacancy caused by the death of Zachariah Chandler in 1879, but declined the appointment owing to ill health; declined appointments to the State supreme court and as United States Commissioner of Indian Affairs; died in Adrian, Lenawee County, Mich., September 27, 1882; interment in Oakwood Cemetery.

Source: Biographical Directory of the United States Congress, 1771-Present