Joseph Wharton

Joseph Wharton (March 3, 1826 – January 11, 1909) was an American industrialist. He was involved in mining, manufacturing and education. He founded the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, co-founded the Bethlehem Steel company, and was one of the founders of Swarthmore College.

Early years

Wharton was born in Philadelphia in 1826, the fifth child of ten in a liberal Hicksite Quaker family. His parents, William Wharton and Deborah Fisher Wharton, were both from prominent early American immigrant families of Quaker descent. Interestingly, both of Wharton's grandmothers were named Hannah and were from Newport, Rhode Island. Wharton's maternal grandfather, Samuel R. Fisher ran a prosperous mercantile business and shipping packet line between Philadelphia and London, and his grandmother Hannah Rodman was a descendant of Thomas Cornell, the ancestor of Ezra Cornell who founded Cornell University. Wharton's youth was spent in the family's house near Spruce and 4th Streets in downtown Philadelphia and at the country mansion "Bellevue". Wharton's father was a typical gentleman, and did not hold a regular job because he had several illnesses, but oversaw his estate, served on the Philadelphia School Board, and was active with his wife Deborah in the Hicksite ministry. From their country estate, the family often went to the nearby Schuylkill River, visited neighboring estates such as Deborah's grandfather Joshua Fisher's The Cliffs, and went on weekend horse and carriage excursions to the countryside surrounding Philadelphia, sometimes attending the smaller Quaker Meetings.

Joseph Wharton (1707–1776)

Joseph Wharton (born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, August 4, 1707; died there on July 27, 1776) was a successful merchant, and the owner of "Walnut Grove," a country place on Fifth street, near Washington Avenue, Philadelphia, on which the Mischianza of 1778 was held. The house was the finest of its day near that city. It was torn down in 1862, to make room for a schoolhouse. He was called "Duke Wharton", because of his stately bearing.

Family

He was the uncle of Pennsylvania governor Thomas Wharton Jr. and father of Continental Congressman Samuel Wharton, Philadelphia mayor Robert Wharton, and United States Marine Corps commandant Franklin Wharton. He married Hannah Carpenter (1711–1751) and after her death Hannah Owen (1720–1791), a widow.

Joseph Wharton; 1st marriage, Philada. March 5, 1729–30, Hannah, daughter of John Carpenter, by his wife, Ann Hoskins. She was born in Philada. Nov. 23, 1711, and deceased in July 14, 1751. He married secondly, in June 7, 1752, with Hannah, widow of John Ogden, and daughter of Robert Owen, by his wife, Susannah Hudson. She was born in Philadelphia in March 16, 1720-1, and died in Jan. 1791. By his 1st wife he had eleven children, all born in Philadelphia.