My Genealogy Hound

CHARLES PHILIP COLEMAN, who is general storekeeper for the Lehigh Valley Railroad, is one of the youngest officials of that road, but is clear-headed, enterprising and discriminating in his business methods, having organized and systematized the department of which he is now the chief. A native of Baltimore, Md., he was born March 28, 1865, and is the son of William W. and Ellen G. (Hiss) Coleman, natives respectively of Baltimore and Harford County, Md.

The grandfather of our subject, Charles R. Coleman, was born in Baltimore, and became President of the Mechanics’ Bank of that city and a prominent man in financial circles. The great-grandfather, John Coleman, was a native of England, and settled in Maryland, where he became a large land-holder. Late in life he retired, and became a resident of Baltimore. The family were connected with the Episcopal Church.

For many years William W. Coleman was a banker in Baltimore, first operating a private concern, but later becoming Cashier of the Farmers’ and Planters’ National Bank. His death occurred in July, 1890, when he had attained the age of fifty-one years. He was a cousin of Bishop Leighton Coleman, of the Episcopal Church. His wife was a daughter of Philip Hiss, a manufacturer and extensive property owner in Maryland. The maternal grandfather of Mrs. Coleman was William Rogers, who came to this country with Lord Baltimore, and was among the original settlers of the city named in the latter’s honor. The Hiss family were members of the Methodist Episcopal Church. Mrs. Coleman died in 1880, aged forty-two years. Of her four children, two sons and two daughters, Charles P. is the eldest.

In attendance at the private schools of his native city the boyhood years of Charles P. Coleman were passed. For one year he was a student in the Shenandoah Valley Academy, after which he pursued his studies for a year and a-half in the Virginia Miltary Institute, of Lexington, Va. Returning to Baltimore, he was employed in the Northern Central shops as a machinist for eighteen months, and in 1884 he entered Lehigh University, taking the course in mechanical engineering. While there he was one of the editors of the Lehigh Burr, and for two years was Captain of the La Crosse team.

In 1888 Mr. Coleman became a clerk in the passenger department of the Lehigh Valley Railroad, then being made traveling car agent. At the expiration of three months he accepted a position as chemist and engineer of tests, in which capacity he was employed for a year and a-half. The following two years he was assistant to the General Superintendent, H. S. Goodwin. In 1892 he received the appointment to serve as general storekeeper under the Reading lease, a new position and office created by the Reading Company. He was the first to occupy the position, and organized the department, which he placed in running order. The headquarters were for six months in South Bethlehem, but were then removed to Packerton. Twenty-two clerks and eighty foremen and laborers are under Mr. Coleman’s charge, and he also supervises the local supply stores along the Lehigh Valley between Buffalo and New York, some fourteen in number.

In South Bethlehem, in 1891, Mr. Coleman married Helen Douglass, daughter of Rt.-Rev. N. S. Rulison, Bishop of central Pennsylvania. Mr. and Mrs. Coleman have a son, Douglas Rulison. They are members of the Episcopal Church of the Nativity. Politically Mr. Coleman votes with the Democratic party. Fraternally he is a member of the college society, the Sigma Phi, and is a member of the American Institute of Mining Engineers.