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Joseph Fitch

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American lawyer, politician, and judge

Joseph Fitch (August 27, 1857 – April 7, 1917) was an American lawyer, politician, and judge from New York.

Life

Fitch was born on August 27, 1857, in Flushing, New York, the only child of businessman Joseph Fitch and Avis Leggett.

Fitch attended the Flushing Institute. He then went to Swarthmore College in Pennsylvania, graduating from there in 1879. He then studied law in the office of Charles W. Pleasants in New York City from 1881 to 1882. He also attended classes in Columbia Law School. He was admitted to the bar in 1882 and began practicing law in New York City. From 1880 to 1887, he was Second Lieutenant of the Seventeenth Separate Company, New York National Guard. He later became the senior member of the law firm Fitch, Moore & Swan.

In 1885, Fitch was elected to the New York State Assembly as a Democrat, representing the Queens County 1st District. He served in the Assembly in 1886 and 1887. While in the Assembly, he originated and passed a bill that established the Cold Spring Harbor Fish Hatchery. He was a member of the Flushing Board of Education from 1893 until the consolidation of Greater New York. He was also counsel to the Flushing Village Board of Health from its organization in 1891 until the Greater New York consolidation. In the 1894 United States House of Representatives election, he unsuccessfully ran as a Democrat in New York's 1st congressional district. In 1898, he was appointed Deputy Commissioner of Water Supply, Borough of Queens. In 1905, he was assistant District Attorney of Queens County. In 1908, he was appointed City Magistrate.

Fitch was a member of the Freemasons, the Queens County Bar Association, the New York Law Institute, the League of American Wheelman, Phi Beta Kappa, and the New York State Bar Association. He was Episcopalian, and a vestryman in St. George's Church in Flushing. In 1886, he married Annie Loraine Rose. They had two children, Avis Loraine and Dorothea.

Fitch died of acute indigestion at his friend Desmond Nelson's home in Brookhaven, where he was staying while repairs were being made at his summer home in the town, on April 7, 1917. He was buried in Flushing Cemetery.

References

  1. Portrait and Biographical Record of Queens County (Long Island), New York. Chapman Publishing Co. 1896. pp. 437–438 – via Internet Archive.
  2. History of the Bench and Bar of New York. Vol. II. New York, N.Y.: New York History Company. 1897. pp. 156–157 – via Google Books.
  3. ^ Leonard, John W., ed. (1908). Men of America: A Biographical Dictionary of Contemporaries. New York, N.Y.: L. R. Hamersly & Company. p. 854 – via Google Books.
  4. The Evening Journal Almanac, 1886. 1886. p. 142 – via Internet Archive.
  5. McBride, Alexander, ed. (1887). The Evening Journal Almanac, 1887. Albany, N.Y.: Albany, N.Y. p. 162 – via Internet Archive.
  6. ^ The Brown Book: A Biographical Record of Public Officials of the City of New York for 1898-9. New York, N.Y.: Martin B. Brown Company. 1899. pp. 104–105 – via Google Books.
  7. Mohr, William F., ed. (1914). Who's Who in New York (City and State), 1914 (Sixth ed.). New York, N.Y.: Who's Who in New York City and State, Inc. p. 250 – via Google Books.
  8. "Magistrate J. Fitch Dead". The Rockaway News. Vol. XXII, no. 41. Far Rockaway, N.Y. 11 April 1917. p. 1 – via Digital Archives of the Hewlett-Woodmere Public Library.

External links

New York State Assembly
Preceded byLouis K. Church New York State Assembly
Queens County, 1st District
1886–1887 		Succeeded byJohn Cashow
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