Pennypacker family

Samuel W. Pennypacker was born in Phoenixville, Pennsylvania in 1843. He descended from Hendrick Pannebecker, a Dutchman who worked as a surveyor for William Penn. His grandfather, Matthias Pennypacker, was a member of the General Assembly who helped write the state constitution in 1837; he was also president of the group of shareholders that led to the incorporation of the Philadelphia and Reading Railroad. Samuel's mother, Anna Maria Whitaker, came from a family that owned a local ironworks. His father, Isaac Pennypacker, was the first burgess of Phoenixville and held a professorship at the Philadelphia Medical College.

Isaac Pennypacker died while Samuel was still a boy, and the family moved in with his maternal grandfather, Joseph Whitaker. Samuel prepared for Yale University, but Whitaker refused to pay tuition until the boy had proven himself in the workforce. In 1863 Samuel enlisted in Company F of Pottstown, 26th Pennsylvania Emergency Regiment, which was the first force to meet the rebels at Gettysburg. Afterward, Whitaker was satisfied, and arranged for Samuel to study law at the University of Pennsylvania. He earned his bachelor of laws degree in 1866 and established his own law practice. By the end of the decade he received a doctor of laws from Franklin and Marshall College.

Pennypacker served on the Philadelphia Board of Education and was appointed judge of the Court of Common Pleas of Philadelphia. He became president of the Historical Society of Pennsylvania in 1900 and wrote extensively on early local and state history, English common law, the Supreme Court, genealogical topics, and several historical figures. In 1902 Pennypacker was elected governor of Pennsylvania with the support of veterans, agricultural interests, former governor and Civil War hero James Beaver, and President Theodore Roosevelt.

As governor of Pennsylvania from 1903 to 1907, Pennypacker signed legislation creating the Pennsylvania State Archives and the State Museum of Pennsylvania; he established Departments of Health, Highways, Mines, and Fisheries; he created the first statewide police force in 1905, whose integrity and efficiency earned acclaim from President Roosevelt and made it a model for other states. Pennypacker supported the Child Labor Act of 1905, which set a minimum age for factory and mine work and outlawed most night work. In 1906, Governor Pennypacker dedicated Pennsylvania's new Capitol building.

Pennypacker Mills, originally built around 1720, was purchased in 1747 by Peter Pennebacker. During the American Revolutionary War, George Washington used the Mills in 1777 as a headquarters prior to the Battle of Germantown, and also as a field hospital for injured soldiers after the battle. Samuel Pennypacker made the Mills his summer home in the early 1900s, and died there in 1916. The house continued to be occupied by his wife, Virginia Earle Broomall Pennypacker (1845-1922), and their children, Josephine Whitaker Pennypacker (1872-1962), Eliza Broomall Pennypacker (1874-1962), Anna Maria Whitaker Pennypacker (1876-1952), and Bevan Aubrey Pennypacker (1881-1954). The last Pennypacker to live in the Mills before it became public property was Bevan Pennypacker's son, Samuel W. Pennypacker II. Samuel W. Pennypacker II was interested in archaeology and anthropology and studied with Franz Boas.

Bibliography:

Pennsylvania Capitol Preservation Committee. "Samuel Whitaker Pennypacker (1843-1916)." Accessed October 5, 2011. http://cpc.state.pa.us/cpcweb/hist_pennypacker.jsp

From the guide to the Samuel W. Pennypacker family papers, Bulk, 1860-1916, 1821-1980, (Pennypacker Mills)