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- Newspaper Article - Wednesday, June 20, 1894 Pulaski Democrat - Pulaski, New York - Hudson Sampson, Esq., of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, has just set up a granite monument over the family lot in Pulaski cemetery. It is an elegant affair, weighing ten thousand pounds. The monument is rustic in design, and is greatly admired by all who have seen it. Mr. Sampson's parents and two sisters are buried on the plot in question.
HUDSON SAMSON (deceased), for many years one of the leading funeral directors of Pittsburg, was born in Pulaski, Oswego Co., N. Y., April 29, 1840. His parents were Jonathan M. and Elizabeth (Draper) Samson, of an old New England Quaker family. There were four children in the family, two daughters, who died when young; Hudson Samson (deceased), and Dexter M. Samson, who is still living in Los Angeles, Cal. The father died in Pittsburg, Jan. 3, 1894, at an advanced age. Mr. Samson was educated in the common schools of Pulaski, and prepared for college at the old Pulaski academy. On account of ill health he did not attend college, but came to Pittsburg in December, 1859, when nineteen years old. On Feb. 14, 1862, Mr. Samson married Miss Susan Gilmore, of Utica, N. Y. They had six children, four of whom died in infancy, while one daughter. Miss Cora L., died Feb. i, 1898. In 1859 Mr. Samson entered the undertaking business in Pittsburg, and was probably the oldest undertaker in the city, in point of service, at the time of his death. In 1861 he took Robert Fairman as a partner, and the business was successfully conducted under the firm^ name of Fairman & Samson, until 1875. During the last fifteen years of his life he was ably assisted by his son, Harry G. Samson, who now succeeds his father in the business. In 1884 Mr. Samson erected a beautiful funeral chapel at No. 433 Sixth Ave., which was considered at the time it was built to be the finest and most complete in the United States. He early considered the idea of erecting a crematory, and, in 1885, built a model establishment. It was the second of its kind in the United States, and soon became famous. It first came into prominence in 1891, when the body of Emma Abbott, the famous opera singer, was cremated there. Mr. Samson was perhaps the most conspicuous layman of the Methodist Episcopal church in western Pennsylvania, and was one of the bulwarks of the Pittsburg church union, being its president for many years. He was deeply interested in city evangelization, and was an officer, for a long time, of the National union. It was his custom for a number of years past to build a church each year. This he accomplished through the Church Extension society of the Methodist Episcopal church, and, as a result, many frontier town congregations are happy in their modest and comfortable little buildings, not knowing where the money came from that made them possible. Mr. Samson guaided this pet way of doing good very jealously, and few, even of his most intimate friends, knew that he had followed it for nearly a score of years. Mr. Samson was president of the National city evangelization union of the Methodist Episcopal church. He was also a trustee of the Young Men's Christian association, a member of the advisory board of the Young Women's Christian association, a member of the board of the Methodist Episcopal deaconesses home, and a member of the board of the Pittsburg free dispensary. He was a member of the board of trustees of Allegheny college, Meadville, Pa., and of Beaver college, Beaver, Pa. He was treasurer of the Anti saloon league of Allegheny county, and for the past ten years had been one of the most consistent members of the Oakland Methodist Episcopal church. He was a delegate to the general conference of the Methodist Episcopal church, held in Chicago, 111., in 1900. For several terms he was president of the National and State funeral directors' associations, and was one of the most progressive and widely known men in his profession. Mr. Samson was a thirty second degree Mason, and a member of Franklin lodge, No. 221, also of Tancred commandery, Knights Templars. During Mr. Samson's business career, in Pittsburg he had been fortunate in his investments, and thereby had amassed a considerable fortune. After a long and useful career he died, July 14, 1903. Thus, we have briefly incorporated in this sketch of the life of one of Pittsburg's leading citizens, a summary worthy the emulation of all who aspire to the nobler aims of true and beneficent citizenship.
From:
Memoirs of Allegheny County, Pennsylvania
personal and genealogical with portraits.
Publishers: Northwestern Historical Association
Madison, Wis. 1904.
Newspaper Obituary - Wednesday, July 22, 1903 Pulaski Democrat - Pulaski, New York - Was a Native of Pulaski - Hudson Samson was born in the village of Pulaski, April 29, 1840 and died at his home in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, July 14, after a very brief illness. Mr. Sampson left this village many years ago a poor boy and went to Pittsburgh, where he entered into the undertaking business and in manifest enterprise he was ahead of all, and became known as the greatest man in his profession in the state. He was a son of Jonathan and Elizabeth Draper Samson, who resided in this village in the fifties. In February 1862 Mr. Samson married Miss Susan Gilmour of Utica. They have had six children, only one, Harry G. is living, and he has been associated with his father for the past fifteen years. The fun has the most complete undertaking establishment in the country, which includes a crematory. In social and public life Mr. Samson was widely known. He was deeply interested in church work It is said that for the past twenty-five years he has built a church a year, in poor communities in the east and west, this work was done without sustentation or display and his charity has not been confined entirely to this work, for many hearts ache to know a fiend has been taken away. In church life he was a Methodist and is associations with many religious and reform works of his city tells of his great usefulness. He was an enthusiastic Mason and has been enlightened to the thirty-second degree. In his death the city loses a man to whom all looked with confidence and esteem. His life work was exhaustively described in the daily papers of Pittsburgh and his funeral, which was held Thursday, was modest to what it would have been had the people had their desires met. He had been in usual health until the Sunday before he died, when he was attacked with acute indigestion and in forty-eight hours death claimed him. Mr. Samson was cousin of W. L Lane of this village. Dr. William H. Lane, of Watertown, went to Pittsburgh to attend the funeral.
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1840 - 1903 (63 years)