MENDENHALL
MENOCAL
Thomas Bennett and tie was graduated at South
Carolina college in 1820. He was admitted to
the bar in lb25, and settled in practice in Charles*
ton. He was a Federalist and opposed the nulllA*
cation act ; represented Charleston in the state
legislature, 1836-52 ; was chairman of the com-
mittee on ways and means, and influential in
directing the financial affairs of the state, oppos-
ing the suspension of 8i)ecie payments by the banks
in 1839. He took on active interest in the educa-
tional progress of the state from 1834, and with
W. J. Bennett reorganized the public school sys-
tem. He was returned to the state legislature in
1854, and succeeded in further advancing the
educational interests of the state. He was a
commissioner from South Carolina to Virginia to
secure co-operation against the Abolitionists in
1859. and was a deputy from South Carolina to
the convention held at Montgomery, Ala., Feb. 4,
1861, where he was chairman of the committee
to frame the constitution for the provisional gov-
ernment of the Confederate States of America,
adopted Feb. 8, 1861, by the deputies from Ala-
bama, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi
and South Carolina. He was api)ointed secretary
of the Confederate States treasury by President
Davis, Feb. 21, 1861, resigned in June, 1864, and
was succeeded by George A. Trenholm. He re-
tirt'd from politics at the close of the war and
devoted himself to educational work. He died in
Charleston. S.C., March 7, 1888.
MENDENHALL, Thomas Corwin, physicist, was born near Hanoverton, Columbiana county, Ohio, Oct. 4, 1841 ; son of Stephen and Mary (Thomas) Mendenhall ; grandson of James Men- deuhall, and a descendant of Benjamin Menden- hall, who came to Philadelphia, Pa., from the village of Mildenhall, Wilt- shire, England, about 1684. He taught mathematics and phy- sics in tliehigh school at Columbus, Ohio, 1868-78 ; and was professor of physics and mechanics in the Ohio State uni- vei-sity, 1873-78, from which institution he received the degree of Ph.D. in 1878. He was professor of experimental physics in the Imperial University of Japan at Tokio, 1878-81, and there established a physical laboratory and a meteoro- logical observatory, the latter being merged into tlie general tneteorological system, organized by the Japanese government. He was again pro-
T. D Vftu.c^e^^*'*^'*^
feasor of physics in the Ohio State university,
1881-83 ; organized and directed the Ohio Sbate
weather bureau in 1883-84, and invented a system
of weather signals from railroad trains. He was
professor in the U.S. signal corps at Washington,
D.C., where he organized and equipped a physical
laboratory in connection with the office of the
chief signal officer and carried on systematic
observations of atmospheric electricity. He also
gathered data in relation to earthquakes, in
which phenomena he became interested while in
Japan, and after the earthquake in Charleston,
S.C., in August, 1886, visited the city and made a
report with a co-seismic chart of the disturl>ed
area. He was president of the Roee Polytechnic
institute at Terre Haute, Ind., 1886-89 : su|)erin-
tendent of the U.S. coast and geodetic sur\*ey,
1889-94, and president of the Worcester Poly-
technic institute, Mass., 1894-1901. He resigned
and in July, 1901, was succeeded by Edmund
Arthur Engler. He lectured throughout the
United States, and while in Japan established the
first public lecture hall in that country. He was
chairman of the U.S. board of geographic names
from 1890 ; a member of the first Bering Sea com-
mission in 1891 ; of the U.S. and Great Britain
boundary line survey commission, 1892-94, and
of the U.S. Lighthouse board, 1889-94. He was
vice-president of the physical section of the
American Association for the Advancement of
Science in 1882, and president of the association
in 1888 ; president of the American Meteorolo-
gical society, 1898 ; chairman of the Massachu-
setts highway commission, 1896-1900, and was
one of the founders of the Seismological society
of Tokio in 1879. He was made a member of the
National Academy of Science, 1887 ; the American
Academy of Arts and Sciences, 1890; the Amer-
ican Antiquarian society, 1895 ; the Massachusetts
Historical society, 1896, and the American Philo-
sophical society in 1900. He rereivetl the degree
of LL.D. from the University of Michigan in 1887
and that of D.Sc. from the Rose Polytechnic in-
stitute in 1895. He received the Cullum medal
from the American Geographical society in 1901
for his researches in the Alaska boundary com-
mission. He contributed to scientific periodicals
and is the author of monographs, rejwrts and A
Centuri/ of Electricity (1887).
MENOCAL, Aniceto Qarcla, naval engineer, was born in Havana, Cul>a, Sept. 1, 1836. He was graduated at the Rensselaer Polytechnic institute, C.E., 1862, and returned to Cuba, where he was connected with the Vento water works at Havana. 1863-69. He removed to the United States in 1870, and was engineer of the depart- ment of public works in New York, 1870-72 ; chief engineer of the U S. Nicaragua canal sur- veying expedition, 1872-74, and of the Panama
