Sacramento
County
Biographies
EDMUND
C. ATKINSON
Since 1872 the Sacramento Business College,
founded by Mr. Atkinson, has been one of the prominent and noted educational
institutions of the Pacific Coast. It has become popular as a place to attain a
thorough and reliable business education and graduates have been very
successful in securing and holding good positions in the leading commercial
houses in this State. It now occupies the whole upper story of Hale Bros’. block, one of the finest buildings in Sacramento. The
proprietor, Edmund Clement Atkinson, has given most of his useful life as a
teacher and educator.
He was born at Charleston, Maine,
November 17, 1837. The early part of his life was spent on a farm, attending
school, teaching and as a student at Waterville
College. He was for several years a teacher in Comer’s Commercial College,
Boston, and afterwards joint owner of a chain of commercial colleges at
Janesville and Oshkosh, Wisconsin, and Rockford, Illinois, known as Atkinson
& Reed’s Business Colleges. He is a native of Maine and a descendant from
Sir Hugh Atkinson, of Oxfordshire, England, whose
coat of arms, consisting of a cross voided between four rampant lions
represented on a blue field, and surmounted by a helmet, is still in the possession
of the Atkinson family. This portrait is a very fair likeness. His scholarly
attainments, classical education and literary pursuits, coupled with natural
ability, render him an able and fluent write, and a most interesting and
impressive speaker.
As a Mason, he is earnest, zealous
and faithful, and as a presiding officer in a Masonic Lodge he has no superior
on the Pacific coast. His Masonic character is a living exemplification of the
principles of the Order. He is member and Past Master of Sacramento Lodge, No.
40, a Companion of Sacramento Chapter, No. 3, Royal Arch Masons, and a Knight
Templar in Sacramento Commandery No. 2.
In 1882 he was elected Senior-Grand
Warden, and for two years thereafter was re-elected to the same position. At
the Annual Convoction (sic) of 1885 he was advanced
to Deputy Grand Master, and at the communication of 1886, he was elected M. W.
Grand Master.
He still resides in the city of
Sacramento, and devotes his whole time to the duties of his position as
principal of his business college.
Transcribed By: Cecelia M. Setty.
Source: “Illustrated Fraternal Directory Including Educational
Institutions on the Pacific Coast”, Page 129, Publ. Bancroft Co., San Francisco.
Cal. 1889.
© 2012 Cecelia
M. Setty.