John Wiley Edmands (March 1, 1809 – January 31, 1877) was a member of the
United States House of Representatives
The United States House of Representatives is a chamber of the Bicameralism, bicameral United States Congress; it is the lower house, with the U.S. Senate being the upper house. Together, the House and Senate have the authority under Artic ...
from
Massachusetts
Massachusetts ( ; ), officially the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, is a U.S. state, state in the New England region of the Northeastern United States. It borders the Atlantic Ocean and the Gulf of Maine to its east, Connecticut and Rhode ...
.
Edmands was born in
Boston
Boston is the capital and most populous city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Massachusetts in the United States. The city serves as the cultural and Financial centre, financial center of New England, a region of the Northeas ...
on March 1, 1809. He completed preparatory studies, and graduated from
English High School of Boston
The English High School in Boston, Massachusetts, founded in 1821, is one of the first public high schools in the United States. Originally called The English Classical School, it was renamed upon its first relocation in 1824.''Encyclopædia Bri ...
. He became interested in
wool
Wool is the textile fiber obtained from sheep and other mammals, especially goats, rabbits, and camelids. The term may also refer to inorganic materials, such as mineral wool and glass wool, that have some properties similar to animal w ...
en mills in
Dedham and the Pacific Mills Company in
Lawrence.
Edmands was elected as a
Whig to the
Thirty-third Congress (March 4, 1853 – March 3, 1855). He declined to be a candidate for renomination in 1854, and returned to Pacific Mills and served as its treasurer. Edmands was a presidential elector on the
Republican ticket in 1868.
He died in
Newton on January 31, 1877. His interment was in
Mount Auburn Cemetery
Mount Auburn Cemetery, located in Cambridge and Watertown, Massachusetts, is the first rural or garden cemetery in the United States. It is the burial site of many prominent Boston Brahmins, and is a National Historic Landmark.
Dedicated in ...
in
Cambridge
Cambridge ( ) is a List of cities in the United Kingdom, city and non-metropolitan district in the county of Cambridgeshire, England. It is the county town of Cambridgeshire and is located on the River Cam, north of London. As of the 2021 Unit ...
.
Mill owner
Maverick Woolen Mills
Following
Benjamin Bussey's 1842 death, his woolen mill on
Mother Brook was sold in November 1843 to Edmands, who was then one of the partners in the company that served as the mill's selling agent, Amos & Abbot Lawrence. The land was purchased for $30,000 while the machinery, the stock, and materials were sold for more than $45,000. In 1850, he sold half of the company, which he renamed
Maverick Woolen Mill, to
Gardner Colby.
Merchants Woolen Company
In 1863, Colby and Edmands took in new partners, including Charles L. Harding, to form the
Merchant Woolen Company. The new company purchased the Maverick Woolen Mills and eventually all of the other mills on Mother Brook. By the 1870s, the Merchant's Woolen Company had monopolized all of the water in Mother Brook. In 1870, they were the largest taxpayer in
Dedham, Massachusetts
Dedham ( ) is a New England town, town in, and the county seat of, Norfolk County, Massachusetts, United States. Located on Boston's southwestern border, the population was 25,364 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census.
First settled by E ...
and, when the New York Times wrote about them in 1887, it described the company as "one of the largest
ndustrial operationsin the state."
References
Works cited
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1809 births
1877 deaths
Politicians from Boston
Massachusetts Republicans
Burials at Mount Auburn Cemetery
Whig Party members of the United States House of Representatives from Massachusetts
19th-century American businesspeople
19th-century members of the United States House of Representatives
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