86 Cincinnati Society of Natural History. 
with M. P. Cassilly, and George M. Davis, and engaged in the hard- 
ware business. This partnership lasted but three months, when, in 
consequence of some disagreement, Mr. Graham retired from the firm. 
His next venture was to supply troops at Prairie du Chien and Fort 
Snelling with army supplies. In 1823, he returned to Cincinnati, and 
formed a partnership with C. W. Gazzam, and engaged in the commis- 
sion and steamboat business, the firm acting also as agents and build- 
ers of boats in the Cincinnati and New Orleans trade. 
He was a leading Mason, and was one of the charter members for the 
organization of the LaFayette Lodge, to receive the distinguished 
foreigner, Marquis de LaFayette; and when, in 1825, the illustrious 
Frenchman came to Cincinnati, Mr. Graham delivered the welcoming , 
address; and in 1827 he took the 33d degree of the Scottish Rite, and 
was one of seven who organized the Scottish Rite Consistory in Ohio, 
now numbering 700 members. 
In May, 1817, Mr. Samuel W. Davis obtained from the Legislature 
of Ohio, a charter to supply the city of Cincinnati with water for 100 
years, He was, however, unable to keep to his contract, and in 1825 . 
offered to sell to the city his charter, and ten acres of ground with im- 
provements for $20,000. The offer was rejected. Mr. Graham witha - 
far sightedness, remarkable in a young man of 27, saw the importance 
of the project to the city, and with John P. Foote, Wm. Green, Davis’ 
B. Lawler, and Wm. 8. Johnston, purchased what the city had refused, 
for $30,000. Five times during the next fourteen years, the city de- 
sired a price to be set upon the works, and in 1839 purchased them for 
$300,000, just ten times the original cost. 
In 1827, Mr. Graham was married to Miss Ellen F. Murdoch, of 
Urbana, Ohio. He had five children by the marriage, only two of whom 
are now living, Mr. Robt. M. Graham, and Lavinia M., the wife of Mr. 
John M. Newton, Librarian of the Young Men’s Mercantile Library 
Association. 
In 1829, he was elected to the Legislature, and while there, as chair- 
man of the Finance Committee; detected and rectified abuses and 
frauds which had existed for some years. 
In 1829, he, in connection with A. Richards, was the owner of the 
first cotton mill in Dayton, Ohio, and of the first carpet factory 
west of the Alleghany mountains. At the same time he carried on a 
foundry for making cotton mills and other machinery. In 1835 he 
made a contract with some Mexican capitalists, to build and put into 
operation machinery for making fine cambric muslins in the Durango 
