Jacob Ridgway

Jacob Ridgway
Born(1768-04-18)April 18, 1768
Little Egg Harbor, Province of New Jersey
DiedApril 30, 1843(1843-04-30) (aged 75)
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S.
Resting placeLaurel Hill Cemetery, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. U.S.
Spouse
Rebecca Rawle
​
​
(m. 1794; died 1817)​
Children4
RelativesEmily, Marquise de Ganay (granddaughter)

Jacob Ridgway (April 18, 1768 – April 30, 1843) was an American merchant and diplomat from Philadelphia. He served as Consul for the United States to Belgium during Thomas Jefferson's presidency.

Early life

Ridgway was born on April 18, 1768, in Little Egg Harbor, New Jersey. He was the youngest of five children born to John Ridgway and Phebe (née Bellanger) Ridgway, who were members of the Society of Friends.[1] His father died when he was around six or seven years old and his mother died when he was around sixteen, after which he went to Philadelphia with his older sister and her husband, who he chose as his guardian.[1]

Career

Ridgway studied the wholesale dry goods business under Samuel Shaw and succeeded as a partner in the business with his son, Thomas Shaw. He later went into partnership with his brother-in-law, James Smith, until the business was sold to Joseph Pryor.[1] Ridgway and Smith then went into the shipping business and were very successful before the Napoleonic Wars between England and France when their ships were seized. Finding it necessary to live abroad to protect their property, Ridgway moved to London where he ran the business before settling in Antwerp where he succeeded Isaac Coxe Barnet,[2] to serve as Consul for the United States appointed by President Thomas Jefferson.[1][a] While there, he also became a partner in Merton & Ridgway,[b] while still continuing the firm of Smith & Ridgway.[1][5]

While he was the United States' commercial agent at Antwerp, he corresponded with Secretary of State James Madison and Robert R. Livingston was America's Minister to France. Ridgway requested Livingston's assistance with procuring an acknowledgment of his commission from the French government.[6]

Real estate

While abroad, he sent his income back to Philadelphia to invest in real estate property.[1] In the early 1800s, as part of a larger land purchase, he acquired 40,000 acres (160 km2) that became Elk County. His nephew, James Gillis, convinced him the area could become a lucrative lumber camp due to the proximity of Elk Creek and the Clarion River, a tributary of the Allegheny River. The area, which was named Ridgway, Pennsylvania, in his honor, became an industrial center where they manufactured leather, iron, clay, and lumber products, silk goods, railroad snow plows, dynamos, and machine tools.[7]

Personal life

In the winter of 1794, Ridgway was married to Rebecca Rawle (1773–1817), a daughter of Benjamin Rawle and Hannah (née Hudson) Rawle. Together, they were the parents of:[8]

  • Susan Ridgway (1797–1885),[9] who married Thomas Rotch (1792–1840) in 1816.[10] After his death, she married, as his second wife, Dr. John Rhea Barton in 1843.[8][11]
  • Phoebe Anne Ridgway (1799–1857), who married Dr. James Rush in 1820.[8]
  • Caroline Ridgway (1804–1820), who died unmarried.[8]
  • John Jacob Ridgway (1807–1885), who married Elisabeth Willing (1819–1904) in 1836.[12]
  • Phoebe Anne Ridgway Rush.
    Phoebe Anne Ridgway Rush.
  • Susan Ridgway Rotch Barton.
    Susan Ridgway Rotch Barton.

After a three-week illness, Ridgway died on April 30, 1843, on Chesnut Street, opposite Independence Hall, in Philadelphia. He was interred at Laurel Hill Cemetery.[13] At the time of his death, he was the wealthiest man in Philadelphia, and was likely the second wealthiest person in the United States behind John Jacob Astor. His son managed his real estate empire.[14]

Descendants

Through his eldest daughter Susan,[15] he was a grandfather of Alice Caroline Barton (1833–1903), who married Edward Shippen Willing.[16] They were the parents of Susan Ridgway Willing (wife of Francis Cooper Lawrance Jr.),[17] John Rhea Barton Willing (who did not marry),[18] and Ava Lowle Willing (wife of John Jacob Astor IV until their divorce in 1910,[19] and, thereafter, to Thomas Lister, 4th Baron Ribblesdale).[20][21]

Through his only son John Jacob, he was a grandfather of Charles Henry Ridgway (1852–1913), a member of the English Club of Pau, France (and husband of Ellen Richards Munroe), and Emily Ridgway (1838–1921),[22] who married Etienne, Marquis de Ganay, a French aristocrat and art collector.[23] Emily was a friend of the American writer Edith Wharton,[24] and bought the Château de Courances in 1895.[25]

References

Notes

  1. ^ Belgium did not have formal diplomatic relations until 1832, when Hugh S. Legaré, the former Attorney General of South Carolina, became Chargés d'Affaires to Belgium.[3]
  2. ^ This has alternatively been referred to as Mestoris & Ridgway.[4]

Citations

  1. ^ a b c d e f Simpson, Henry (1859). The Lives of Eminent Philadelphians, Now Deceased. W. Brotherhead. p. 842. Retrieved 14 May 2020.
  2. ^ Jefferson, Thomas (2018). The Papers of Thomas Jefferson, Volume 40: 4 March to 10 July 1803. Princeton University Press. p. 719. ISBN 978-0-691-18487-6. Retrieved 14 May 2020.
  3. ^ "LEGARÉ, Hugh Swinton (1797-1843)". bioguideretro.congress.gov. Biographical Directory of the United States Congress. Retrieved 14 May 2020.
  4. ^ "Founders Online: To James Madison from Jacob Ridgway, 25 January 1803 (Abstract)". founders.archives.gov. Retrieved 14 May 2020.
  5. ^ United States Congress (1859). American State Papers: Documents, Legislative and Executive, of the Congress of the United States. Gales and Seaton. p. 461. Retrieved 14 May 2020.
  6. ^ "Founders Online: To James Madison from Jacob Ridgway, 9 May 1804 (Abstract)". founders.archives.gov. Retrieved 14 May 2020. [Original source: The Papers of James Madison, Secretary of State Series, vol. 7, 2 April–31 August 1804, ed. David B. Mattern, J. C. A. Stagg, Ellen J. Barber, Anne Mandeville Colony, Angela Kreider, and Jeanne Kerr Cross. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2005, pp. 200–201.
  7. ^ "Find a County". National Association of Counties. Archived from the original on May 31, 2011. Retrieved 2011-06-07.
  8. ^ a b c d Jordan, John Woolf (2004). Colonial And Revolutionary Families Of Pennsylvania. Genealogical Publishing Com. p. 160. ISBN 978-0-8063-5239-8. Retrieved 11 May 2020.
  9. ^ "A Widow's Charitable Bequests". The New York Times. 5 March 1885. Retrieved 14 May 2020.
  10. ^ "Susan Ridgway Rotch Barton. | Library Company of Philadelphia Digital Collections". digital.librarycompany.org. Retrieved 16 July 2018.
  11. ^ VanSant, Kimber (May 4, 2009). "Dr. John Rhea Barton Residence | 512 South Broad Street" (PDF). vansant.us. Archived from the original (PDF) on 11 July 2018. Retrieved 11 July 2018.
  12. ^ Keen, Gregory Bernard (1913). The Descendants of Jöran Kyn of New Sweden. Swedish colonial society. p. 188. ISBN 9780608318875. Retrieved 14 May 2020.
  13. ^ Westcott, Thompson (1876). The Official Guide Book to Philadelphia. A New Handbook for Strangers and Citizens. Philadelphia: Porter and Coates. p. 306. Retrieved 14 March 2021.
  14. ^ Encyclopaedia of Contemporary Biography, of Pennsylvania ... Atlantic Publishing & Engraving Company. 1898. p. 145. Retrieved 14 May 2020.
  15. ^ Browning, Charles Henry (1891). Americans of Royal Descent: A Collection of Genealogies of American Families Whose Lineage is Traced to the Legitimate Issue of Kings. Porter & Costes. p. 86. Retrieved 11 July 2018.
  16. ^ Klein, Randolph Shipley (1975). Portrait of an Early American Family: The Shippens of Pennsylvania Across Five Generations. University of Pennsylvania Press. ISBN 9780812277005. Retrieved 11 July 2018.
  17. ^ "THE NEWS OF NEWPORT" (PDF). The New York Times. October 17, 1899. Retrieved 16 July 2018. NEWPORT, R.I., Oct. 16. — Mrs. Edward S. Willing entertained at dinner this evening in honor of her daughter, Miss Susan Willing, whose engagement to Frank C. Lawrance of New York was formally announced. The wedding will occur Nov. 2.
  18. ^ "J.R. BARTON WILLING DEAD. Brother of Mrs. John Astor Succumbs to Diphtheria at 48" (PDF). The New York Times. September 3, 1913. Retrieved 11 July 2018.
  19. ^ "Would Probably Share $100,000,000 Estate with Stepmother in Event of His Father's Death". The New York Times. April 17, 1912. Retrieved 2008-08-11. Mrs. Ava Willing Astor, obtained her divorce from John Jacob Astor, in November, 1909
  20. ^ "Lady Ribblesdale Dead. First Wife of John Jacob Astor IV. Mother of Vincent Astor". The New York Times. June 11, 1958. Retrieved 2008-08-11. Ava Willing Ribblesdale, she took up residence here. She continued to be listed in the telephone directory as Lady Ribblesdale.....
  21. ^ The Historical Society of Pennsylvania (HSP), Frank Willing Leach, Genealogies of Old Philadelphia Families Published in the Sunday North American, vol. 1, p. 133.
  22. ^ "Marquise de Ganay". The New York Times. 19 September 1921. Retrieved 11 May 2020.
  23. ^ Mension-Rigau, Eric (2011). L'ami du prince: Journal inédit d'Alfred de Gramont (1892-1915) (in French). Fayard. p. 17. ISBN 978-2-213-66502-3. Retrieved 14 May 2020.
  24. ^ Gilder, Cornelia Brooke (2017). Edith Wharton's Lenox. Arcadia Publishing. p. 23. ISBN 978-1-62585-788-0. Retrieved 11 May 2020.
  25. ^ Adams, Henry; Levenson, Jacob C.; Samuels, Ernest (1982). The Letters of Henry Adams. Harvard University Press. p. 75. ISBN 978-0-674-52686-0. Retrieved 11 May 2020.

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