Biography of Thomas J. Keating (Joanne Archer)
Comptroller 1878-1884
2001/4/16
I've loaded the Bio in word format in the notes section. I hope that was the way to do it. I will bring the bio on disk tonight in case I need to fix this later. It seems like there should be a link from this page to the Bio?
As I stated in the journal there are still a few issues to be resolved with the Bio. Overall, I have approached by tryint to focus on his life as a whole and how that prepared/led to the office of Comptroller. When I fully focus on the history of the office I expect to find some additional infromation that may enlighten his biography. The two areas that need some slight refinement are 1) the issue of his debt when he died. This may be an issue I can't resolve and 2) his run for Senate in 1884. I have read the local papers for this time period but didn't find any details. I need to check the baltimore sun for the days around the convention but ran out of time this time.
2001/3/2 and 2001/3/3
The Denton Journal article available in Keating's bibliographic files indicated that Keating was in debt when he died. This seemed intrigueing so I spent an hour at UMBC looking for the Keating's obituary in the Baltimore Sun. I found an obituary and small article in the June 2, 1898 Baltimore Sun. The article gives a description of his personality saying he was a "strong character" with an "agressive, enterprising nature". It also said "He seemed to have a strong hold upon the people of his county, although he was opposed by many of the foremost citizen's of Queen Anne's county" interesting! The obituary was very useful because it listed all the offices he held (which are outlined below)
attended Centreville Academy
graduated Princeton 1848
studied law in office of Judge Carmichael, admitted to practice in 1851.
1857 purchased Centreville States Rights (newspaper), upheld the Southern view of political questions until 1864. An organization called the "homeguard" destroyed the office after he refused to apologize for sentiments published in the paper.
1860 elected state's attorney for Queen Anne's county (held until 1876).
1867 elected a member of the constitutional convention.
1874 ran for congress but defeated by Gov. Thomas
1875 chairman of State convention
1877 elected to comptroller
1884 became first presiden tof Queen Anne's National Bank
1894 elected tax commissioner
1893 chairman of county democratic central committee
left behind 5 children: Prof. Harry Keating, Dr. Frank Keating, Thomas J. Keating, Jr, Arthur Keating.
I decided I wanted to follow up on the Denton article that Keating was in debt and tried to locate his will at the Archives (1 hour). I ran into some difficulty navigating the records (not understanding how they were organized). Eventually using the Wills Index I located the following information for Keating:
Libre: EEc
No.1
Folio: 86
Testator: Keating, Thomas J.
Executor: Thomas J. Keating, Jr.
Date of Probate: May 8, 1951
The date of probate is throwing me because it's 53 years after he died. I was unable to locate the will because that particular microfilm was missing from the shelves.
Other microfilms used (or to be used):
Estate Dockets: CR 8764
Wills Index: CR 8768
Inventories: Cr 882, 2nd half
Wills: CR57-3
I looked at the Iventories but couldn't figure out how they were organized.
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