Leverett Alcott was born in Walcott, New Haven county, Connecticut, in 1820. From early boyhood his taste was for mercantile pursuits. At the age of seventeen he obtained a position in an extensive country store at Bristol Basin, on the Farmington Canal, (now Plainville.) By diligence and perseverance, he was soon promoted from the duties of errand boy to a responsible position, and in course of time stood at the head of all the clerks in the establishment.

For the benefit of neophytes in commercial life, it may not be uninteresting to state how boys were made merchants in those days, and the remuneration they received for services. They were not (as is too often the case at the present time) transformed in a few months from crude green boys to merchants, but were obliged to learn the business by actual experience. An arrangement was made in this case for three years, on the following conditions: fifty dollars for the first year, seventy-five dollars for the second year, and one hundred dollars for the third and last year, with board in his employer's family. With this modest salary it required the utmost care and rigid economy to clothe and keep himself; but where there's a will there's a way, and the economy thus practiced in early life was no detriment in laying the foundation for a sound business career in after life. After having fulfilled his engagement with his employer, he spent some three years of mercantile life at the South, but the customs of the country, and the barbarous system of slavery were so repulsive to his feelings that he abandoned that field for the more congenial and prospectively profitable activities of the West, and in December, 1842, landed at Medina, in this State. In the Spring of 1845, a mercantile copartnership was formed with Mr. Augustus W. North, under the firm name of North & Alcott. During the subsequent Fall he married Miss Mary A. Williams, with the view of permanently settling at that place, but the mercantile prospects, and the growth of the town not appearing satisfactory to his views, the firm of North & Alcott was dissolved and the business discontinued, to be reconstructed and opened in a wider field and on a broader basis. Accordingly, in the Spring of 1849, (just twenty years ago,) a business arrangement was entered into with his present partner, Mr. Burrett W. Horton, a former school mate, under the firm name of Alcott & Horton. The business was to be the retailing of dry goods, and located at 177 Superior street, in Harrington's Block. The beginning was a moderate one, with a very limited capital, but what was lacking in capital was made up in energy, industry and perseverance. At first a retail trade only was contemplated, which was continued some four years, when the rapid growth of the city and increase of business induced them to open a wholesale department in the lofts of their store. Subsequently they closed their retail business and occupied the whole building for their jobbing trade; but their apartments were soon found to be too strait for their rapidly growing trade, and in August, 1855, they removed to the large new store, No. 141, in Clark's Block.

Mr. Alcott has a knowledge of human nature that imparts a keen perception of the character and motives of men, and hence, almost instinctively knows whom to trust. He is also quick in forming his judgment, ready in the adaptation of means to secure an end, vigorously prosecutes his plans, and seldom fails of a successful issue.

In a young and vigorous country like the United States, where so many opportunities are offered to ambition and laudable enterprise, and where too often, everything else but gold is lost sight of, it is refreshing to find some among our heaviest merchants, who recognize the fact, that man "cannot live by bread alone." Mr. Alcott, through all his active life has found time to attend to his religious duties. He has been for a long time connected with the Second Presbyterian Church, and for many years one of its elders. He was formerly President of the Young Men's Christian Association; actively engaged in missionary Sunday School work in the city--taking a lively interest in all Christian labor; a ready and willing giver toward public improvements, and all benevolent enterprises.