Inheriting a good name but nothing else, Barnard B. Savage started out for himself at an early age and what he has accomplished is represented in the fact that he is now at the head of the firm of B. B. Savage & Company, conducting an extensive and profitable business in the manufacture of mattresses, spring beds and upholstered and couch hammocks at Nos. 3 to 7, inclusive, on Factory street. He was born January 21, 1852. in Portland, Connecticut, a son of the late Luther Savage, who was also a native of Portland. The ancestry of the family can be traced back to Middletown, Connecticut, in the year 1638, the original ancestors having come from England. Luther Savage was a ship carpenter and farmer and at one time owned many acres of land on the Connecticut river, being quite well-to-do. He married Mary Jane Buck, also a native of Portland and a representative of an old family of this state who were among the founders of Bucktown, Connecticut. Her father, Barnard Buck, was a carriage manufacturer. Mrs. Savage passed away in Portland, at the old homestead, in 1911, at the advanced age of eighty-two years. In the family were five children, of whom three are yet living: Barnard B.; John B., who is a resident of New Haven; and Harriett J., who occupies the old homestead.
     Barnard B. Savage acquired his education in the public schools of Portland and in Chase's Academy at Middletown. His early life was spent upon the home farm with the usual experiences of the farm-bred boy who works in the fields through the summer months and attends school in the winter seasons, with a fair amount of play to vary the monotony. At the age of fifteen years he started out to earn his own living and was first employed in the country store owned by the Gildersleeves. This was a department store at Gildersleeve's Landing. His first salary was three dollars per week and all he could eat of the store's supplies, such as crackers, cheese and molasses. He there remained for two years, after which he interested his father in purchasing a mattress factory for him in Portland, at which time corn shucks were purchased from the farmers and made into mattresses. The business was established in an old barn in Portland and from that start has developed the present enterprise. In 1871 Mr. Savage removed to New Haven and started the plant. His first location was at Nos. 9 and 11 Long Wharf and there he continued to successfully conduct the business until 1897, when the plant was removed to its present location. There is a three-story building one hundred and forty by forty feet, well equipped with the latest improved machinery to facilitate work of this character. Employment is now given to fifty people and this is the largest manufacturing enterprise of the kind in the state, its products being shipped to all parts of the country, although principally sold in New England, New York, Pennsylvania and the east. The business now approximates one hundred and fifty thousand dollars per year and has become one of the important productive industries of New Haven, owing to the capable management, the persistent effort and the honorable methods of Mr. Savage.
     In 1872, Mr. Savage was married in Portland to Miss Carrie G. Hurlbut, a native of that place and a daughter of David and Electa Hurlbut. They became the parents of two children: Jessie Isabelle, the wife of William Scott Eames, manager of the Trap Rock Company of New Haven; and Harry, deceased. The wife and mother passed away in 1902, at the age of forty-nine years. In August, 1906, Mr. Savage was married to Miss Lillian R. Corrigan, a native of New York city.
     In his political views Mr. Savage is a republican, supporting the party where national issues are involved but casting an independent ballot at local elections. Fraternally his is a Mason, having been made a member of the order in West Haven. He belongs to the First Methodist church, is chairman of its board of trustees and is quite active in its work. His entire life is guided by its teachings and he is a man of many sterling qualities, reliable in business, enterprising in citizenship and at all times actuated by a spirit of progress and improvement. With the inheritance of a good name only as a capital with which to begin life, he started out and step by step has advanced, each point in his career bringing him a broader outlook and wider opportunities.