Richard M. Atwater
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Richard Mead Atwater, Sr. | |
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Born | Providence, Rhode Island, U.S. | August 10, 1844
Died | 1922 Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania, U.S. |
Occupation | Chemist |
Spouse | Abby Sophia Greene |
Children | Sophia Mead Atwater Christopher Greene Atwater Ethelwyn Morrill Atwater Richard Mead Atwater, Jr. David Hastings Atwater Anna Dorothea Atwater Maxwell Wanton Atwater Elizabeth Arnold Atwater Marjory Garrison Atwater |
Richard Mead Atwater, Sr. (August 10, 1844 – 1922) was a chemist and public official in New Jersey and Pennsylvania involved in early scientific glass-making.
Early years
Atwater was born in
Education
Atwater lost his father at the age of 10. He was obliged to work and help his widowed mother carry on with her five children, getting up before dawn six days a week to fold and deliver newspapers. The work did not pay much but he learned the value of networking. He attended public school until he was 15, then attended the Friends Boarding School of Providence.
After graduating, he taught for a term at a public school in Wakefield, Rhode Island, meeting local industrialist Roland Hazard, then moving on to teach at a local private school, where he met his future wife Abby Sophia Greene. He attended Brown University and graduated in 1865, and was made Quaker Trustee of Brown University in 1878. Immediately after graduating, he found employment in Millville, New Jersey as a tutor. He served a short term as Superintendent of Schools in Millville.
Glass works
Atwater was soon hired as Assistant Manager in the manufacture of scientific
Marriage, family life, and mayor
Atwater married Abby Sophia Greene in 1867 in
Berlin
In the late 19th century,
Syracuse
After three years the family returned to
Paris
In August 1900 Atwater attended the Paris Exposition with his wife. He was offered the position of Director of the European office for the Johnson Harvester Company, which after some consideration of the challenge he accepted. Again, he entered into the local culture, and after several months sent for his family. They resided in Paris for six years. The business, very different from his earlier experiences in the glass and chemical industry, was a general retail and wholesale operation in France and throughout Europe into Russia. Through his earlier experience in Berlin, Atwater had become familiar with the continental way of doing business, but he found the French language and customs unfamiliar. He ran the Paris office where only one clerk could speak English, learning French without any formal instruction. His freight and docking facilities for the shipping and receiving of goods were so well organized that when relief shipments were sent to France after World War I, the Harvester Docks in Paris were used for this purpose. During this time Richard and Abby Sophia were very active, enjoying tandem bike rides to destinations outside the city. The years were also successful for the business. At the end of the six-year term, the Johnson Harvester Company asked him to extend his contract, but by then all of the children had returned to America, and he had adequate savings for retirement.
Honors and retirement
In 1904 Atwater attended the meeting of the International Chemical Congress in
References
- Richard Mead Atwater -- Abby Sophia Greene Atwater: Their Ancestors, Their Lives, Their Descendants, Ed. by Sylvia Bothe, Lucy M. Bullock, Sarah A.G.Smith, and Anne M Thomson.
- Atwater Books, Origin of Our Summer Home, Vol I, 1881-1889
- The Atwater Papers - 1891 - 1899, Ed. by Norma P.H. Jenkins, Corning Museum of Glass Library, 1971.
- Records of the Sea Isle City Historical Society, Sea Isle City, NJ, including the above Atwater books.
- Chapter on the Atwaters, in Shore Chronicles -- Diaries and Travelers' Tales from the Jersey Shore, 1764-1955. By Margaret Thomas Buchholz: http://www.down-the-shore.com/chronexp.html
- Atwater, R. M. (1893) "The Glass-Making Industry in America". Engineering Magazine 4:883-897.
- [1] at www.ettc.net
- National Park Service: Southern New Jersey and the Delaware Bay (Chapter 5) at www.cr.nps.gov
- BLM Historic Bottle Homepage at www.blm.gov
- Brandywine Battlefield Park
- Semet-Solvay Co. in Syracuse, NY