Lydia Moss Bradley
Lydia Moss Bradley (born July 31, 1816 in Vevay , Indiana , † January 16, 1908 in Peoria , Illinois ) was an American philanthropist . She was the first American woman to make it to the board of directors of a bank and was also the first to sign a marriage contract. She is also the founder of the Bradley Polytechnic Institute .
Life
Lydia's parents, Zeally Moss and Jennett Glasscock Moss, were from Virginia . Her father gave up his plantation in Kentucky because he did not want to earn his living from slave labor . He went to Indiana, where the family built a farm. This is where Lydia and her brother William S. Moss were born. She showed business acumen early on when she sold her self-reared riding horse in order to make a deposit on a piece of forest for the proceeds. That seemed a strange decision at the time, as horses were the only means of transportation in sparsely populated areas.
On May 11, 1837, at the age of 26, she married Tobias S. Bradley, five years her senior, in Vevay. He ran a boat that went as far as St. Louis and later expanded his well-run business to include a timber warehouse and a sawmill. In 1833 Lydia's father died and left her his farm.
In 1847 they sold their Vevay property and moved to Peoria, Illinois with Lydia's mother. Here Lydia's brother William was already a successful businessman who owned the steamship "Avalanche", on which Tobias got on as captain. He later became a partner in Williams' distillery and they jointly ran Moss, Bradley & Co. Bradley was an exceptionally good businessman: he ran a ferry, bought land and shares in First National Bank, and eventually became its president.
Blows of fate
Lydia gave birth to six children, only daughter Laura of whom reached adolescence.
- Rebecca, born February 20, 1839, lived until September 2, 1845.
- Clarissa, born October 26, 1843, died in 1847.
- Tobias, born April 28, 1847, died in 1847
- Laura, born on April 24, 1849, died in 1864 - she was 14 years old.
- Mary died on April 25, 1852 - before her first birthday.
- William died on August 25, 1855 at the age of two.
With Laura's death, all of her goals and hopes were dead. In the years that followed, Lydia and her husband Tobias thought about what they could do with their wealth for other children. Their first idea was an orphanage. They went to Montreal to see it, but came to the conclusion that such an institution was not what they wanted because the children grew up dependent.
Services
In May 1867, her husband died suddenly and unexpectedly in a carriage accident at the age of 56 without leaving a will with instructions for Lydia. Since the 51-year-old sole heir to a fortune of around half a million was not familiar with her husband's business, she hired lawyer WW Hammond as managing director and asset manager. She met with him every day until her death. She became a director on the board of directors of the First National Bank of Peoria, a position she held for over 25 years.
Two years after her husband's death, Lydia remarried. She signed a prenuptial agreement with her second husband, Edward Clark, by which, in the event of a separation, each would keep the share they had brought into the marriage. They were divorced after just four years.
She had 680 acres (approx. 270 hectares) of marshland, which she owned, drained, divided it into plots, built fences and leased it as arable land with small farmhouses. The initially sparse harvest prompted them to send soil samples to Champaign for analysis . It was found that the earth, although good, was poor in potash (kali). By enriching the soil accordingly, she managed to achieve richer harvests with the farms. The neighboring farms also followed their example and the value of the land rose dramatically. The land she bought at $ 10 per acre was now worth $ 140. One of her great strengths and the key to her success was that she sought advice from experts. She was aware of her limited knowledge due to a lack of school education and informed herself about all areas that were of interest to her in order to then make her decision.
She used her financial success, among other things, for various charitable purposes. She took out the $ 30,000 mortgage on the Church on Main Street, renamed Bradley Memorial Church in memory of her husband. She also donated land for a hospital to St. Francis Hospital and established the first public library in Peoria. In 1884 she built a retirement home for women. In 1891, in memory of her daughter Laura, she made the land available to the city for the construction of 100 acres of Bradley Park and proposed the establishment of a park administration to the local council.
However, it was particularly important to her to found a school in which young people from Peoria and the surrounding area between the ages of 14 and 20 could learn a trade so that they can become independent and earn their own living. That was true for boys and girls alike. In 1877 she attended the Rose Polytechnic Institute to get a first impression of such a school. She also sent WW Hammond to the Washington School for Boys in St. Louis, the Throop Polytechnic Institute in Pasadena , the Armor Institute and the Lewis Institute in Chicago , so that she could develop new ideas for her own school, which she precisely stated in her will wanted to describe.
Parsons Bradley Horological School
On March 30, 1892, Lydia Bradley entered into an agreement with the owners of the watch factory “Peoria Watch Company” and James R. Parsons, owner of the Parsons Horological Institute in La Porte , Indiana and owner of the tools, machines and equipment of that institute, which said that they buy the majority of the shares for $ 30,000 - payable in cash - which ensure the necessary supplies for the factory and the school to continue running. The agreement also stated that James R. Parsons would continue the school as principal in a new location and that Lydia would provide him with the money he needed to buy the school building in LaPorte. Finally, she moved the institute to Peoria on the site where the Polytechnic would later be located. The students could work in the watch factory and study in the institute. Later, a bicycle factory was added in addition to the clock and a new trade branch in Peoria. In 1892, however, the bicycle factory was destroyed by fire, while the institute continued to exist until it became a separate department with 70 students (The Horological Department - later renamed Westlake) in the Bradley Polytechnic Institute in 1897.
Bradley Polytechnic Institute
Finally, in October 1896, she asked Dr. William Rainey Harper from the University of Chicago asked for a visit and presented her plans to them. After studying these and drawing up a list of the expected costs, he was able to convince Mrs. Bradley to build the school while she was still alive and promised her further advice.
The Bradley Polytechnic Institute was founded on November 13, 1896. Mrs. Bradley provided 17.5 acres (71,000 m²) of land, $ 170,000 for buildings, equipment and library, and $ 30,000 per year for running costs.
The inauguration took place in late 1897. President was Oliver J. Bailey. William R. Harper and Albion Small of the University of Chicago served on the Board of Trustees. The Bradley Polytechnic Institute was one of the “affiliates” of the University of Chicago. The graduates of the two-year college course were the future students in Chicago.
This school became the joy of its age. She never interfered with the line. Satisfied with the progress, the Polytech signed over their remaining property for the benefit of their lifetime. On the founding day in 1906, she announced an additional donation for the construction of the Hewitt gymnasium.
Mrs. Bradley died of old age on January 16, 1908 in her Peoria home, she was 91 years old.
In 1998, Lydia Moss Bradley was posthumously inducted into the National Women's Hall of Fame .
literature
- Charles Truman Wyckoff (Ed.): Bradley Polytechnic Institute. The first decade, 1897-1907 . Bradley University, Peoria 1908
- Porte County Historical Society (Ed.). La Porte, Indiana and Its Environs . Arcadia Pub. (Sc) 2002. ISBN 978-0-7385-1969-2 .
- Louis AR Yates: A Proud Heritage: Bradley's History 1897-1972 . Bradley University, Peoria 1974.
- Allen A. Upton: Forgotten Angel: The Story of Lydia Moss Bradley . Biography, self published in 1988 OCLC 32666579 ; NA 2005, OCLC 65177390 .
- Nina Collins: An Industrious and Useful Life: The history of home economics at Bradley University . (1994)
- William A. Clarey: Building Bradley Business A history of the Foster College of Business Administration . (1995)
Web links
- Lydia Moss Bradley - Biographical Sketch
- Bradley University History with photo of Parsons Horological School in the foreground
- Grave in Springdale Cemetery, Peoria
- Lydia Moss Bradley Article by Barbara B. Brown
- Bradley University history
Individual evidence
- ^ Bradley Polytechnic Institute. The first decade, 1897-1907 Wyckoff, pp. 38-39
- ^ Bradley Polytechnic Institute. The first decade, 1897-1907 page 124
- ↑ Bradley University and Its Watchmaking Past in "Preoria Magazine"
- ^ Bradley Polytechnic Institute. The first decade, 1897-1907 . Editor: Charles Truman Wyckoff. Bradley University, Peoria 1908
- ↑ History of Bradley University
- ^ National Women's Hall of Fame
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Bradley Moss, Lydia |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | American woman, first woman on a bank's board of directors, founder of the Bradley Polytechnic Institute |
| DATE OF BIRTH | July 31, 1816 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Vevay, Indiana |
| DATE OF DEATH | January 16, 1908 |
| Place of death | Peoria (Illinois) |