| Saunders | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Current region | East Coast of the United States |
| Place of origin | United Kingdom (England) |
| Founded | 15th century |
| Estate(s) | Pitchcott Manor Saunders-Willard House William Saunders House |
The Saunders family is an American family of important industrialists and politicians.
The earliest documented member of the family is William Saunders (c. 1430 - 1488) of Amersham, a cap-maker and dyer. The Saunders family had many branches in England, with movement and inter-marriage between them. Members were known to be very wealthy landowners who inherited or bought manors and were involved in the cloth trade in some way – as cap-makers, dyers, or cloth merchants. [1] Members of the family were highly educated, with several graduates from Oxford and Cambridge. [2]
The Saunders first appeared in North America in the 17th century with Tobias Saunders, whose Amersham origin is disputed. Members held political positions in New England, and the family played an integral role in the foundation of Salem, New Hampshire, Lawrence, Massachusetts, and Westerly, Rhode Island. [3] The village of Saunderstown, Rhode Island, was named in honor of John Aldrich Saunders, who settled there in 1856. [4]
Daniel Saunders Jr. and Charles W. founded the Grafton County Lumber Company in 1874. While the company office and sales department was in Boston, the logging operations centered about Livermore, New Hampshire and included the Sawyer River Railroad and a large sawmill. Every building in Livermore belonged to the Saunders, along with 30,000 acres of timberland. Daniel gave up his share in the company in 1880 to his son Charles G. After the death of Charles G. Saunders, the inheritance passed to his three sisters. Logging and sawmill operations continued until 1928, and the mostly-logged out land was sold to the U.S. Forest Service in 1935.
In 1861, E. A. Saunders, Sr., founded the E. A. Saunders & Sons, Wholesale Grocer and Importer Company. It specialized in fine cigars and tobacco manufacturers’ supplies. Prior to its establishment, E. A. Saunders, Sr. worked as a country merchant in New Kent County, Virginia. He was involved in the Grafton County Lumber Company and owned vessels, city real estate, farms, plantations and bank stock to a considerable amount. [5] The company acted as a sole proprietorship from 1876 to 1883, and then his son, E. A., Jr., acquired an interest with him. In 1890 another son, W. B. was admitted, and the three constituted the firm. At its height, the company had several locations throughout Virginia, and was believed to have surpassed $1 million in sales a year. [6] Adjusting for inflation, this would amount to approximately $37 million in 2024. [7]
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Lawrence is a city located in Essex County, Massachusetts, United States, on the Merrimack River. At the 2020 census, the city had a population of 89,143. Surrounding communities include Methuen to the north, Andover to the southwest, and North Andover to the east. Lawrence and Salem were the county seats of Essex County, until the state abolished county government in 1999. Lawrence is part of the Merrimack Valley.
North Andover is a town in Essex County, Massachusetts, United States. At the 2020 census the population was 30,915.
Livermore is an unincorporated civil township and ghost town in Grafton County, New Hampshire, United States. It was briefly inhabited as a logging town in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The site of the former village is approximately 16 miles (26 km) west of North Conway, about 1.5 miles (2.4 km) off U.S. Route 302 via the U.S. Forest Service Sawyer River Road. The logging operation was established by Daniel Saunders Jr. and Charles W. Saunders, members of the Saunders family. The town was named for Samuel Livermore, a former United States senator who was the grandfather of Daniel Saunders' wife. The population was reported as two at the 2020 census.
Andover is a town in Essex County, Massachusetts, United States. It was settled in 1642 and incorporated in 1646. At the 2020 census, the population was 36,569. It is located 20 miles (32 km) north of Boston and 4 miles (6.4 km) south of Lawrence. Part of the town comprises the census-designated place of Andover. It is twinned with its namesake: Andover, Hampshire, England.
New England is the oldest clearly defined region of the United States, being settled more than 150 years before the American Revolution. The first colony in New England was Plymouth Colony, established in 1620 by the Puritan Pilgrims who were fleeing religious persecution in England. A large influx of Puritans populated the New England region during the Puritan migration to New England (1620–1640), largely in the Boston and Salem area. Farming, fishing, and lumbering prospered, as did whaling and sea trading.
The Eagle-Tribune is a seven-day morning daily newspaper covering the Merrimack Valley and Essex County, Massachusetts, and southern New Hampshire. It is the largest-circulation daily newspaper owned by Community Newspaper Holdings Inc., and the lead property in a regional chain of four dailies and several weekly newspapers in Essex County and southern New Hampshire.
Benjamin Pickman Jr. was a U.S. Representative from Massachusetts.
The Taft family is an American political family of English descent, with origins in Massachusetts. Its members have served in the states of Massachusetts, Ohio, Rhode Island, Utah, and Vermont, and the United States federal government, in various positions such as representative (two), governor of Ohio, governor of Rhode Island, senator (three), secretary of agriculture, attorney general, secretary of war (two), acting secretary of defense, president, and chief justice.
David Nevins Jr. was a wealthy Yankee merchant in the city of Methuen, Massachusetts during the industrial boom of the late 19th century.
Charles Henry Tenney was proprietor of C. H. Tenney & Co., established 1868, and become one of the most successful commissioned merchant and hat dealers in the world. He was also a director of the Bank of the Manhattan Company and life trustee of the Bowery Savings Bank.
Dudley Leavitt Pickman (1779–1846) was an American merchant who built one of the great trading firms in Salem, Massachusetts, during the seaport's ascendancy as a trading power in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Pickman was a partner in the firm Devereux, Pickman & Silsbee and a state senator. Among the wealthiest Salem merchants of his day, Pickman used his own clipper ships to trade with the Far East in an array of goods ranging from indigo and coffee to pepper and spices, and was one of the state's earliest financiers, backing everything from cotton and woolen mills to railroads to water-generated power plants. Pickman also helped found what is today's Peabody Essex Museum.
The Daniel Cragin Mill, known in the twenty-first century as the Frye's Measure Mill, is a historic watermill established in 1858. The mill was added to the U.S. National Register of Historic Places in 1982.
The Merrimack Valley is a bi-state region along the Merrimack River in the U.S. states of New Hampshire and Massachusetts. The Merrimack is one of the larger waterways in New England and has helped to define the livelihood and culture of those living along it for millennia.
Tobias Saunders was a Deputy to the Rhode Island General Assembly, a Conservator of the Peace and a founding settler of Westerly, Rhode Island.
Edward A. Lawrence, Sr., A.M., D.D. was a 19th-century American Congregational pastor and author. He ministered to congregations in Haverhill, Massachusetts, Marblehead, Massachusetts, and Orford, New Hampshire. He was also a professor of Ecclesiastical History and Pastoral Duty at the Theological Institute of East Windsor, Connecticut, and wrote several publications, books, pamphlets, and essays.
Abigail Barker was among those accused of witchcraft during the Salem witch trials of 1692.
