Armstrong County PA Archives Biographies.....Brown, Esq, James E. May 5, 1799 - November 27, 1880
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Source: History of Armstrong County, Chicago: Waterman, Watkins and Co. 1883.
Author: Robert Walter Smith, Esq.

  ...A history of Armstrong county would be radically 
incomplete without a sketch of James E. Brown, Esq., who, 
more than any other individual person, was identified and 
connected with its growth and development; nearly its entire 
history was compassed by his life and included within the 
period of his active business experiences.

  Mr. Brown's ancestry has been traced back two hundred 
years.  His remote progenitor was James Brown, a Scotchman 
and a soldier in the famous Enniskillen dragoons (according 
to an old song, composed entirely of men 'six feet two 
without a shoe'), killed at the battle of the Boyne.  He 
left a son James, who had two sons - John by his first wife 
and James by his second.  John Brown had a son John, who 
married Margaret Eaton, and after her death an Irwin.  His 
children were, by his first wife:  Mrs. Betty Thompson, Jane 
Hughes, Nancy Montgomery, John, Joseph, Robert, George, 
James and William; by his second wife:  Thomas, Frank, 
Irwin, Margaret and Mary.  John Brown, who became the father 
of these children, was fourteen years of age when his uncle 
James Brown, son of Grazilla Kennedy, was born, and these 
two, uncle and nephew, were the grandfathers of James E. 
Brown, who was the fifth possessor of the name in the direct 
line of the family.  His father was Robert Brown, a true 
type of the Scotch-Irish, was born in Ireland in 1775, and 
came to this country about the year 1795.  Soon thereafter 
he was married to Rebecca, daughter of James Brown, a 
soldier of the revolutionary war, then living in Carlisle.

  After his marriage he settled near Ebenezer, in the 
adjoining county of Indiana, where, on the 5th day of May, 
1799, his first child, James E., was born.

  About this period the eyes of the frontier settlers were 
directed to the valley of the Allegheny river, and to the 
new county of Armstrong, through which it extended, then 
recently organized.

  The father, Robert Brown, after several visits to the new 
settlements, moved his family thither and took up his 
residence at the mouth of the Cowanshannock creek.  The town 
of Kittanning was laid out in the year 1804, and at about 
that time he removed to it, becoming one of its earliest 
citizens.  He soon acquired a large amount of property 
within and adjoining the village, and contributed very much 
to its improvement by the erection of many of the houses, 
the first tenements in that place.  During life he occupied 
a prominent position as a citizen.  For many years at the 
beginning of this century he held a commission as justice of 
the peace, and after a long and useful life died on Easter 
Sunday, April 4, 1858, at the advanced age of 83.

  In the first years of the settlement of the new town, 
extremely few facilities for education existed; civilized 
life had then barely a foothold on this frontier soil, but 
the boy James E., already ambitious and restless even in 
childhood, availed himself of every attainable means to 
advance his education, totally ignoring the usual amusements 
and devoting the whole time of his juvenile years to the 
reading and study of such books as the scanty settlement 
could supply, at a very early period manifesting an aptitude 
for mathematics, in which he always excelled, as evidenced 
by the accuracy of the numerous and extensive surveys 
subsequently made by him throughout his own and the 
adjoining counties.

  In the course of time a select school was established, 
over which the then accomplished teacher, Master Elliott, as 
he was called, presided.  An unplastered room in the then 
unfinished jail was set apart for the purpose.  In this 
place many of the future prominent citizens of the town 
received their first regular instruction.  The youthful 
student was one of the first enrolled, and was soon 
recognized as the first in scholarship, retaining his 
precedence till the teacher had no longer a place or 
anything to teach his precocious pupil.

  In those days penmanship was regarded an indispensable 
requisite to a good education, and teachers themselves 
rating more by their handwriting and good spelling than by 
any other test of scholarship.  In this the pupil also 
excelled, an accomplishment that early in life brought him 
into prominence as the village scribe, copyist and 
accountant, youthful employments tending to fit and prepare 
him to the active duties of his subsequent career. At an 
early age he opened a store on his own account on the 
northeast corner of Market and Water streets.  While thus 
engaged, on March 2, 1819, he was married to Miss Phebe 
Bratton, daughter of the late venerable Robert Parks, one of 
the original settlers of Armstrong county.  Two years later 
he was appointed prothonotary of the county, a position in 
which he acquired considerable practical and legal 
knowledge, but was not admitted to the bar until 1860. 
Before this he had secured the agency from some of the large 
landed proprietors living in the East, who were owners of 
many undivided tracts of land in this section of the state; 
the care, subdivision and sale of these tracts was committed 
to him.  Many of these he afterward purchased or received in 
payment for his services.

  After his term of office expired he was commissioned as a 
justice of the peace.  He also formed a 
mercantile-partnership with the late Alexander Colwell, a 
gentleman of large means and excellent business judgment.  
In a few years this firm was dissolved, and he then became 
associated with the late Andrew Arnold, and with him and 
others undertook several experiments in boring wells for 
salt, which, however, were unsuccessful.

  In the year 1841 he formed another partnership with Thomas 
McConnell and the late David Patterson, under the firm name 
of Brown, McConnell & Patterson. Retiring from this firm, 
his attention was next directed to the development of the 
rich mineral resources of the county.

  In 1845, in conjunction with his brother, John P., and 
brother-in-law, James Mosgrove, he erected and put into 
operation the well known Pine Creek Furnace, which proved 
throughout many subsequent years a most successful and 
profitable enterprise.

  In 1847 he organized the Kittanning Iron Company, and 
erected the rolling-mill and factory at Kittanning, which, 
under various partnership changes, he continued to 
superintend and control till the year 1858.

  In 1856 the first bank in Kittanning was established, 
known as the Kittanning Bank.  He was its principal 
stockholder and continued to be its president during its 
chartered existence.  Immediately after the passage of the 
national banking act he organized the First National Bank of 
Kittanning, only fifty-five preceding it.  Of this he was 
also nearly the exclusive owner, and his recognized 
financial experience and large means contributed to 
establish it as one of the most undoubted and secure 
institutions in the country.  During the later years of his 
life his attention was chiefly directed to its management, 
and he continued its president till his death.

  His business judgment was unsurpassed and enabled him to 
discern successful results from the very inception of his 
multifarious enterprises, and so strong was his own 
confidence in this discernment that he did not hesitate to 
engage in projects from which the more timid would 
cautiously shrink, so that in the course of his tireless and 
busy life he had become identified directly or indirectly 
with an almost inconceivable variety of enterprises and 
duties.  He had delved into the hills for their hidden 
minerals and made them largely contribute to his wealth.  He 
had bored into the depths of the earth years ago to tap the 
undercurrents of salt water, wholly unconscious then that 
from a lower stratum he would subsequently be largely 
engaged in extracting a much more valuable deposit of 
petroleum.  He was the projector and principal owner of the 
bridge spanning the Allegheny river at Kittanning and the 
chief owner of the one at Parker.  He was largely interested 
in the railroad from Parker to Butler, a stockholder and 
director in several pipe line and transporting companies, 
and more recently in a refining company, and in the year 
preceding his death reorganized a company to erect a large 
blast furnace and rebuilt the long dismantled rolling mill 
at Kittanning, all now in successful operation. Energy, 
enterprise and a fearless and indomitable will were the 
predominant traits of his character.  To these qualities, in 
a life commenced in unpropitious poverty and beset 
throughout with many obstacles, may be attributed the 
ultimate financial success that crowned its close. His first 
wife and most faithful partner throughout many years of his 
ceaseless toil died November 1, 1864, leaving surviving her 
an only daughter, Mrs. Jane B. Finlay, who also died on 
December 30, 1876.  Afterward, on November 27, 1865, he was 
married to Miss Kate L. Hughes, who with one son, James E. 
Brown, their only offspring, still survives.  His own 
unexpected death, after a brief illness, occurred on 
November 27, 1880.

  Mr. Brown was throughout the greater part of his life a 
member of the Presbyterian church, and always took a deep 
interest in all that tended to its success.  From its 
earliest organization he was connected with the Sunday 
school work of his church, and for upward of forty years 
preceding his death had been its constant superintendent and 
head.  He contributed very largely to the mission work of 
his church, and gave largely and always unostentatiously to 
many charities.  In social intercourse Mr. Brown was always 
kind, considerate, courteous, unassuming in manner, and as 
free from display as the plainest citizen.

  The Rev. A. Donaldson, in his remarks at the funeral of 
Mr. Brown, thus spoke of the religious element in his life:  
'Whilst unremitting in attention to his vast and complicated 
business concerns during six days of the week, on the 
Sabbath of the Lord he was a diligent, devoted and 
successful student of his Bible.   As an elder, beyond most 
others, he was determined to uphold his pastor's hands.'  He 
was further spoken of as 'an elder whose place can never be 
supplied.'  Dr. Donaldson further said:  'In the Presbytery 
often, in the synod several times, and in the general 
assembly his presence was prized and his influence was great 
and good.'

  In personal appearance Mr. Brown united characteristics of 
form and feature that would attract attention from every 
observer.  He was very erect, upward of six feet in height, 
of symmetrical proportion, quick and active in his 
movements, and physically a perfect specimen of that sturdy 
manhood that can assert its power by merely external 
influences.  His features were of the true Scotch-Irish 
type, regular and at the same tie prominent, with a florid 
complexion, clean blue eyes and light-brown hair.

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