In the early struggles for advancing the schemes of railroads, the accomplishment of which has made Cleveland the great city of commerce and manufactures, no one was more active than Mr. Starkweather. When the project of building the Cleveland & Columbus road was at a stand-still, and was on the point of being, for the time, abandoned, as a final effort a meeting of the business men of Cleveland was called. The speech of Mr. Starkweather on that occasion, parts of which are quoted to this day, had the effect to breathe into that enterprise the breath of life, and from that meeting it went immediately onward to its final completion. So well were the services of Mr. Starkweather in behalf of that road appreciated at the time, that one of the Directors proposed that he should have a pass upon it for life. Mr. Starkweather, in 1852, was the first Judge elected to the Court of Common Pleas for Cuyahoga county, under the new constitution of the State, in which position he served for five years with ability and satisfaction to the members of the Bar and the public generally. For a considerable portion of his term, the entire docket of both civil and criminal business devolved on Mm, when an additional Judge was allowed the county. He presided at some very important State trials, in which, as in the disposition of a very large amount of civil business, he exhibited abundant legal learning and judicial discrimination. Since he retired from the Bench he has been known as a citizen of wealth, of retired habits, but of influence in public affairs, and retaining to the full the conversational gifts which have made him the life and charm of social and professional circles. Indeed it may be said that either at the Bar, in well remembered efforts of marked brilliancy as an advocate, or on the Bench, occasionally illuminating the soberness of judicial proceedings, or in assemblies on prominent public occasions occurring all through his life, eloquence, wit and humor seemed ready to his use. A fine _belle lettres_ scholar, classical, historical and biographical adornments and incidents seemed always naturally to flow in to enrich his discourse, whether in private or public. He has often been spoken of as of the Corwin cast, perhaps a slight personal resemblance aiding the suggestion. He certainly has the like gifts of the charming conversationalist and the popular orator, in which last capacity, for many years, he was the prompt choice of the public on leading occasions, such as at the grand reception given to Van Buren after his defeat in 1840; the magnificent reception tendered by the city to Kossuth; at the completion of the Cleveland & Columbus Railway on the 22nd of February, 1852; at the dedication of Woodland Cemetery, and at many other times when the public were most anxious to put a gifted man forward. [Illustration: Truly Yours, Moses Kelly] Moses Kelly.