James Fowle Baldwin

James Fowle Baldwin

• James Fowle Baldwin's Wikipedia Page
• Find A Grave Memorial ID # 96339625
• Middlesex Canal, Wikipedia
• Boston & Lowell Railroad, Wikipedia

JAMES FOWLE 5, Loammi 4, James 3, Henry 2, Henry 1

NOTED CIVIL ENGINEER, part of the Loammi Baldwin family of civil engineers

James Fowle Baldwin, son of Loammi Baldwin and Mary Fowle, was b. April 29,1782, in Woburn, Middlesex County, Massachusetts. Like his brothers, Loammi Jr, and George Rumford, he was a prominent civil engineer. Altho the Baldwin brothers work on the Middlesex Canal resulted in that endeavor becoming one of the main thoroughfares in New England, its use was severely restricted during the winter months.When a charter was granted to build a railroad to connect the Boston and Lowell sections of Massachusetts to New Hampshire and Vermont, it was to James Fowle Baldwin that the Board of Directors came. It was a favorable charter because in addition to the right to build and operate a railroad between Lowell and Boston, it also gave a thirty-year monopoly on the right to have a railroad there.

The quality of freight traffic on the Boston and Lowell was high. However, the level of passenger traffic was not anticipated. Soon this would result in another charter being granted; that of the Boston and Maine Railroad. Spurs, double tracks, and constant upgrades were constructed. The railroad allowed the growing textile and manufacturing industries to provide speedy delivery of goods to a substantial portion of New England..

In 1825 the subject of the water supply for Boston attracted his attention. After much opposition, his plan was adopted on Mar. 30,1846; ground was broken on Oct. 25,1848, and the Long Pond (Lake Cochituate) site was developed. He had the pleasure of seeing his plan, at last, come to fruition and the public fountain playing before a large concourse of people. He was for several year a senator from Suffolk in the Massachusetts general court, and the first president of the Boston Society of Civil Engineers. He was a prominent member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

On July 28, 1818, he married with SARAH PARSONS PITKIN, daughter of Samuel and Sarah Pitkin (Parsons). They had three sons, all of whom died in childhood. One at the age of eight in 1829; and the other two from typhus fever in 1834, at the ages of fifteen and six years.

The Baldwin Genealogy from 1500 to 1881 (1881)
Author: Baldwin, C.C. (Charles Candee), 1834-1895
Subject: Baldwin Family
Publisher: Cleveland, Ohio [Leader printing company]
Possible Copyright status: NOT_IN_COPYRIGHT
Pg. 628