Husband Neville B. Craig 1
Born: 1 Dec 1847 - Pittsburgh, Allegheny Co, PA 2
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Father: Isaac Craig (1822- ) 1
Mother: Rebecca McKibbin ( - ) 1
Marriage: 1 Jan 1880 3
Wife Margaret E. Sullivan 3
Born:
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Father: Daniel Sullivan ( - ) 3
Mother: Margaret Coffee ( - ) 3
Children
1 F Margarita Craig 3
Born: 25 Nov 1880 3
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2 F Winifred Neville Craig 3
Born: 23 Sep 1882 3
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3 F Edith Oldham Craig 3
Born: 22 Jul 1884 3
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4 F Rebecca Eleanor Craig 3
Born: 23 Jun 1888 3
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Died: 2 Aug 1898 3
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Spouse: Did Not Marry
5 F Lillian Craig 3
Born: 2 Jun 1889 3
Christened:
Died: 4 Sep 1889 3
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Spouse: Did Not Marry
General Notes: Husband - Neville B. Craig
He received his early education in the private schools of his native city and had passed through the first part of his junior year at the Western University in Pittsburgh, when he left that institution to enter the academic department of Yale, where, after taking the third sophomore and second senior mathematical prizes, he graduated in 1870. For some months afterwards he was a law student in the office of A. M. Brown, at Pittsburgh, but in September, 1871, resumed his studies at New Haven, as a student of civil engineering at the Sheffield Scientific School of Yale University, graduating a second time in 1873. Two weeks before completing his course in civil engineering he began his life work as an aid on the United States Coast and Geodetic Survey and for more than a quarter of a century afterwards continued in the almost uninterrupted practice of his profession, along the Atlantic Coast, through the whole Mississippi Valley, in ten different states of the Union, on the mountains and plains of Mexico, across the Andes in the Republic of Colombia, and through the vast primeval forests of Brazil. In his long professional career, Mr. Craig had, in addition to his service with the United States Coast and Geodetic Survey, prominent commissions in the service of seven different railways, two of them in Mexico, one in the Republic of Colombia, one in Brazil, and three in the United States. He served, altogether, about fourteen years in the Department of Public Works, of Philadelphia, and took part in the triangulation of the state of New York, under James T. Gardner, director. He was four times in the service of the United States Coast and Geodetic Survey, was six times engaged upon river and harbor improvements under the United States Army Corps of Engineers, and took part in many important surveys under this department.
One of the most memorable enterprises with which he was connected was an unsuccessful effort, in 1878, to construct a railway around the falls and rapids of the Upper Madeira river, near the western boundary of Brazil, so as to connect navigable waters above and below the falls and establish a great commercial highway between interior Bolivia and the principal seaports of the world. The expedition was the result of a great international scheme to exploit the vast and fertile territory drained by the Amazon and its tributaries, of worldwide consequence, but of special importance to the United States. The corps of engineers employed was of unquestioned ability, but the expedition failed on account of legal and financial complications, and partly because of the almost insuperable difficulties involved in exploring tropical forests and jungles. In 1907, Mr. Craig, at the request of the Madeira and Mamore Association, composed of the survivors of the expedition, wrote its history, which was published by the J. B. Lippincott Company, under the title of "Recollections of an Ill-fated Expedition to the Headwaters of the Madeira River in Brazil". This history attracted immediate attention both in this country and England, and was considered one of the chief literary achievements of a year of great literary activity. A modern critic of prominence has said of it;----"The work reads like a romance of adventure and there is no tale of recent travel or exploration that has greater fascination. In recognition of the permanent service of this narrative to geographical literature, the Royal Geographical Society, of London, elected the author, Mr. Neville B. Craig, a Fellow of that society, an honor only conferred on persons of high achievement." Mr. Craig was a member of the Society of the Cincinnati and of the Pennsylvania Society of Sons of the Revolution, in right of his great-grandfather, Major Isaac Craig, and was also a member of many other associations of a social, intellectual, patriotic and semi-political character.