In 1845, Mr. Blair, then in the prime of his vigor, being but fifty-two years old, resolved to quit a business in which he had been uniformly successful, and spend the remainder of his life in enjoying what he had acquired by diligence and enterprise. He was then the oldest merchant in the city, having been in business over a quarter of a century. For the past twenty-four years he has taken life easy, which he has been able to do from the sensible step he adopted of quitting active business before it wore him out. At the age of seventy-five he is still hale, hearty and vigorous, looking younger than his actual years, and possessing that great desideratum, a sound mind in a sound body.
Familiar as is the name of Philo Scovill, but few of our citizens are aware that he was one of Cleveland's earliest merchants. It appears that circumstances, not altogether the choice of Mr. Scovill, induced him to come to Cleveland with a stock of drugs and groceries. His father was a millwright, and had brought up his son to the use of tools. He had no taste for his new calling, and so worked out of the store-keeping as speedily as possible, and commenced the erection of dwellings and stores in the then new country, being only second in the trade here to Levi Johnson. He continued in the building business until 1826, when he erected the Franklin House, on Superior street, on the next lot but one to the site of the Johnson House. Mr. Scovill at once became the landlord, and continued as such for twenty-three years, excepting an interval of a five years' lease.
About 1849, he left the hotel business to attend to his real estate interests. He was successful in his hotel business; and from time to time invested his surplus capital in lands adjacent to the city, which, within the last few years have become exceedingly valuable. Streets have been laid out upon his property, and inducements offered to settlers that insured a ready sale, and materially aided the growth of the city.
Mr. Scovill, as a man, has enjoyed the confidence of his fellow citizens to an unusual degree. He was hardworking, resolute, and exactly fitted by nature for the pioneer life of his choice, a life that, though toilsome, has left him still hale and vigorous, with the exception of the fruits of overwork, and perhaps exposure, in the form of rheumatism.