“Coming to America at the age of fifteen years, Sigmund Sichel has established himself in a creditable position among Portland’s citizens of true worth and value. Not only has he won a creditable place in commercial circles but has also left the impress of his individuality upon the legislative history of the state and has been concerned in those movements which work for a cleaner, better city and a higher, nobler citizenship.
He was born in Germany, December 16, 1857, and is a son of Simon and Malie Sichel, the former a merchant. He acquired his early education in the public schools of Germany and completed his course in a private school. At the age of fifteen years he crossed the Atlantic to America and on the 1st of April, 1873, arrived in Portland, making his way to the home of an uncle. Solomon Hirsch. He immediately sought employment and was engaged in clerking in retail stores until 1879, during which period he carefully saved his earnings until his capital was sufficient to enable him to engage in business on his own account.”[1]
“Looking northward he spent six months at Nanaimo, but, returning to Oregon, found employment eighteen months in our metropolis.
In 1880 he went to Goldendale and engaged in the mercantile business in the firm of Lowengart & Sichel, doing a very thriving business. In 1887 he became sole proprietor; and his operations were quite extensive, his annual sales amounting to one hundred thousand dollars.
On May 13, 1888, Goldendale was destroyed by fire, Mr. Sichel being a heavy loser. Still he at once started again in business, but sold out his interest there and removed to Portland, and is the senior partner of Sichel and Mayer, who are engaged in the wholesale and retail tobacco and cigar trade. This last venture reaps a golden harvest; and such is due to the patronage of the numerous friends Mr. Sichel has made through courtesy and fair dealing.” [2]
“ He conducts his business interests along well defined lines of activity and enterprise and has achieved results which are of a most substantial and gratifying character.
In 1903, when the city was granted a new charter, Mr. Sichel was made a member of the executive board by appointment of Judge George H. Williams and also became police commissioner, in which capacity he served for three years. In 1904 higher political honors were conferred upon him in his election to the state senate for a term of four years. He left the impress of his individuality upon many measures which were enacted and have found their way to the statute books of the state. He was the author of the bill providing a whipping post for wife beaters and also of the bill which allows the state to imprison a man who deserts his wife, his earnings to go to the wife. He was also instrumental in securing the passage of a law which reserved for the state the beautiful Multnomah Falls, among the highest falls of the country. He gave earnest and stalwart support to every measure and movement which he believed would benefit the state, and in the discharge of his public duties ever placed the general welfare before personal aggrandizement and the good of the commonwealth before partisanship.
In July, 1909, he was appointed on the executive board of public commissioners by Mayor Joseph Simon and was made chairman of the committee on city lighting. His labors in behalf of Portland have ever been of a practical and effective character, producing results which have constituted important factors in the city’s development.
On the 23d of October 1888, Mr. Sichel was married to Miss Sarah Solomon, a native of Gloucester, Massachusetts, and unto them have been born two daughters, Ruth and Marian Josephine. Fraternally Mr. Sichel is connected with the Masons, in which he has attained the thirty-second degree of the Scottish
Rite, and is also a member of the Mystic Shrine. He likewise belongs to the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks and was at one time grand president of the B’nai B’rith. He is serving on the board of governors of the Commercial Club and is a member of the Concordian Qub. He is president of the congregation of Beth Israel of Portland and was one of the first fifty members of the American Jewish committee. He was the vice president of the first Hebrew Benevolent Society of Portland. He is a correspondent of the Industrial Removal Society of New York, is president of the Society of Social Hygiene and has been a member of the ways and means committee of the Rose Festival Association. The extent and scope of his activities indicate the nature of his interests. He is a deep student of the vital, political, social and economic problems, has informed himself thoroughly on many subjects relative to the public welfare and at all times casts his aid and influence on the side of progress, reform and improvement.” [3]
Senator Sigmund Sichel, the father of whipping-post law” in Oregon – 1907
Portland, Ore., Jan. 10. – Senator Sigmund Sichel, the father of whipping-post law” in Oregon, is spiking his guns for a bitter fight which will be a feature of the legislative session next month. The Bar association of Multnomah county, is at the back of a movement to repeal the whipping-post law, and Senator Sichel, who drew up, introduced and successfully engineered the hard fight which placed the law on Oregon’s statute books two years ago, is preparing to battle against the repeal, tooth and nail.
Oregon is one of the few states providing for the official whipping of wife beaters, and the Oregon law is perhaps the most conservative of any, in drafting the measure, Senator Sichel intended it to be more of a deterrent influence, preventing brutal men from beating their wives, than a means of wreaking punishment upon the offenders. That his intention was carried out in the actual working out of the whipping-post law is attested by the statement of District Attorney John Manning of Multnomah county, in which Oregon’s largest city in situated. Mr. manning declares that wife-beating has decreased fully ninety per cent since the passage of the whipping-post law, and that, while the fining and even imprisonment of wife-beaters for atrocious brutalities was formerly a matter of almost daily occurrence, since the whipping-post law has been in force it has been necessary to punish only two men at the post.
The Sichel law is so drafted that the penalty of official lashing is to be ministered only in deliberate and brutal cases, the fine or term of imprisonment serving as a penalty where the wife beater can show that extreme aggravation or had other partial justification. The criminal is further guarded front unjust or undue suffering at the fact that three different tribunals must pass upon a case before the offender be sentenced.
Senator Sichel will go to the coming session at Salem next month armed with the written testimonials of police judges, superior court judges and district attorney, warmly commending the law, and Gov. Geo. E. Chamberlain who was recently quoted in favor of repeal, has assured Senator Sichel that instead of favoring the repeal, he will be one of the law’s most ardent defenders.
Senator Sichel, while acting as police commissioner, witnessed the abuse of women in the lower walks of life, many being compelled to lead a life of shame under the fists of men who had married them for the revenue they could bring from the dives, and this determined him to devise some means effective protection for these unfortunate women.
In the whipping-post law this means has been found, says Senator Sichel, for the ninety percent decrease in wife beating has proved it. In fight against the law’s repeal, Senator Sichel will have the support of the women as well as a generous proportion of the men. [4]
Masonic History
He likely was Raised during the years he was in Goldendale, Washington. He affiliated with Harmony Lodge #12 in Portland, in 1892. He joined the Oregon Scottish Rite becoming a member before 1896. He was Elected KCCH on October 24, 1907. He died about December 12, 1917 in Portland, Oregon.
[1] Portland Oregon Its History and Builders…, Gaston pages 149-150
[2]History of the Pacific Northwest Oregon and Washington 1889.
[3] Portland Oregon Its History and Builders…, Gaston pages 149-150
[4] [“Wife Beating Now Decreasing – In Oregon Because of the “Whipping Post” Law. – Since Establishment of Law Only Two Men Have Been Whipped – Ninety Per Cent Decrease. – Despite Good Law Has Done, Some in the State Want Law Repealed.” Logansport Daily Reporter (In.), Jan. 10, 1907, p. 5]
About the author:
Michael D. Robinson 32° KSA, was the second Master Mason Raised in Esoterika Lodge #227, and the first member Raised in that Lodge to serve as Worshipful Master. He was elected Master in 2013 and 2014, and currently serves as Historian. He is also Historian for Research Lodge #198 and Eugene Lodge #11 and District Deputy of District #13. Brother Robinson was appointed Historian of the Scottish Rite Orient of Oregon in December of 2014. He was the recipient of the “Novus Astorum” from the Portland Valley Scottish Rite in 2010, and the Hiram Award from Esoterika Lodge in 2012. In March of 2015 he was made Secretary of the Eugene Valley, and Director of the Work for that Valley in January of 2017.
