My Genealogy Hound

EDWARD Y. TOWNSEND, whose death occurred at his country home at Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania, November 5, 1891, in the fullness of a well-spent life, was for eighteen years the president of the Cambria Iron Company, and one of the most useful, representative business men of Philadelphia. During his entire lifetime he worthily upheld the name of a family that has been held in esteem since the days of William Penn. His ancestors in direct line were John W., William, John, and Joseph, and he was the fifth in lineal descent from the latter named, who was a younger brother of Richard Townsend, who was prominently connected with William Penn in the early history of the province of Pennsylvania. Joseph Townsend came to America in 1712, soon after the arrival here of William Penn, and purchased a large tract of land, including a part of the site of the present town or borough of West Chester, and extending westward to the Brandywine. In 1746 he built a dwelling near West Chester, which is still standing and in a fair state of preservation. Herein they lived, and they worshipped according to the tenets of the Society of Friends or Quakers.

Edward Y. Townsend was born in West Chester, Pennsylvania, October 4, 1824, a son of John W. and Sybilla K. (Price) Townsend, the latter named having been a daughter of Philip Price. His early education was acquired in Anthony Bolmar’s school at West Chester, which he left when eighteen years old to enter the wholesale dry goods house of Wood, Abbott & Co., of Philadelphia. This firm was composed of Richard D. Wood, James Abbott, Josiah Bacon, John Yarrow and others, and transacted a large and profitable business with the south and west. During his apprenticeship he made many business trips on horseback through the then unsettled wilderness of the frontiers, extending as far as Santa Fe, New Mexico. These journeys were made alone, and some of them consumed weeks and months. Wood, Abbott & Co, having subsequently dissolved, about the time Mr. Townsend became of age, he was taken into partnership in the new firm of Wood, Bacon & Co., where he continued until the acquisition of a large interest in the Cambria Iron Company by Richard D. Wood and his brother, Charles S. Wood, when in 1855 the firm of Wood, Morrell & Co. was organized and he became an active partner in it. The Cambria Iron Works were situated at Johnstown, Pennsylvania, and this concern was organized to lease the works and carry on the business of making iron rails, and to purchase the stock with the idea of ultimately reorganizing the company. Of the six partners that composed the firm, three took the active management of the business, namely: Charles S. Wood, Edward Y. Townsend, and Daniel J. Morrell. In 1857 the rolling mill was destroyed by fire, but the firm immediately rebuilt it and continued the business until 1861, when, one of the purposes of the partnership being carried out by the purchase or control of all the stock of the old Cambria Iron Company, that corporation was re-organized, Charles S. Wood becoming president, Edward Y. Townsend vice-president, and Daniel J. Morrell general manager. The company was one of the earliest to become interested in the Bessemer patent for making steel, and gradually increased the capacity of the works until it became one of the largest producers of steel rails in this country. Upon the death of Charles S. Wood, in May, 1873, Mr. Townsend was elected to the presidency of the company, which he held up to the time of his decease. In this wide field of usefulness his remarkable business qualities had ample scope, and they were eminently successful. With the assistance of an able board of directors, and by careful, conservative management, he was enabled to reduce the floating debt and to place the establishment on a sound financial basis, and in this way it was able to withstand and recover from the destructive flood of 1889 without embarrassment. That great disaster was an especial shock to Mr. Townsend’s kindly and sympathetic nature, and one from which he never fully recovered, as so many of his workmen and their families were swept away. When the news of the disaster reached him he hurried from his home, accompanied by a personal friend, Mr. J. Lowber Welsh, to the residence of Mayor Fitler, where he met in consultation several members of the Citizens’ Permanent Relief Committee of Philadelphia. Day after day his entire time and attention were absorbed by the company affairs, and his energy in getting the works started again helped to restore confidence in the future, which was almost as much needed as food, clothing or shelter. He donated generously to various worthy charities, and was ever ready and willing to counsel and help those who came to him for advice and assistance, and thus his death was sincerely mourned by all classes of men.

Mr. Townsend first became a resident of Montgomery county in 1868 when, with his wife and two sons, he came to spend the summer at Haverford. Five summers were thus spent by the family until Bryn Mawr was formed, when they passed two summers at the hotel erected there by the Pennsylvania Railroad Company. In 1874 Mr. Townsend purchased a few acres on Merion Avenue, where he enjoyed his summers, and five years later he purchased the adjoining property owned by the Tilghmans and extending along Montgomery Avenue, making about thirteen acres in all, in the middle of the new settlement of Bryn Mawr, on the north side of the railroad. The property was mostly unimproved farm land, and Mr. Townsend spent considerable time and money in grading it and having it cultivated and planted with rare trees, which now, after thirty years of growth, are monuments to his memory. There was an unsightly dam in the middle of the place on Montgomery Avenue, and he arranged with the Pennsylvania Railroad Company when widening the cut at Bryn Mawr to have the earth hauled in to fill up the low places, thus greatly improving the appearance of the place, and the creek which before flowed through the land was placed in a deep culvert. The only positions held by Mr. Townsend were directorships in the boards of the Philadelphia National Bank and the Philadelphia Trust and Safe Deposit Company. His political affiliations were with the Republican party, He was brought up in the Society of Friends, but of late years attended the Protestant Episcopal Church of the Holy Trinity, Nineteenth and Walnut streets, Philadelphia.

Edward Y. Townsend married Henrietta M. Troth, daughter of Henry and Henrietta Troth, the former named having been an honored and public-spirited citizen of Philadelphia. Their children are Henry T., and John W. Townsend.