George Franklin Huff (July 16, 1842 – April 18, 1912) was a

Republican Republican can refer to: Political ideology * An advocate of a republic, a type of government that is not a monarchy or dictatorship, and is usually associated with the rule of law. ** Republicanism, the ideology in support of republics or agains ...

member of the

U.S. House of Representatives The United States House of Representatives, often referred to as the House of Representatives, the U.S. House, or simply the House, is the lower chamber of the United States Congress, with the Senate being the upper chamber. Together they ...

from

Pennsylvania Pennsylvania (; ( Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state spanning the Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes regions of the United States. It borders Delaware to its southeast, ...

Biography

George F. Huff was born in

Norristown, Pennsylvania Norristown is a municipality with home rule status and the county seat of Montgomery County, Pennsylvania Montgomery County is a county in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. It is the third-most populous county in Pennsylvania and the 7 ...

. He attended the public schools in Middletown, Pennsylvania, and later in

Altoona, Pennsylvania Altoona is a city in Blair County, Pennsylvania. It is the principal city of the Altoona Metropolitan Statistical Area (MSA). The population was 43,963 at the time of the 2020 Census, making it the eighteenth most populous city in Pennsylvania. ...

. At the age of eighteen he worked for the

Pennsylvania Railroad The Pennsylvania Railroad (reporting mark PRR), legal name The Pennsylvania Railroad Company also known as the "Pennsy", was an American Class I railroad that was established in 1846 and headquartered in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It was named ...

car shops in Altoona. He moved to

Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania Westmoreland County is a county in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, United States. As of the 2020 census, the population was 364,663. The county seat is Greensburg. Formed from, successively, Lancaster, Northumberland, and later Bedford co ...

, in 1867 and engaged in

bank A bank is a financial institution that accepts deposits from the public and creates a demand deposit while simultaneously making loans. Lending activities can be directly performed by the bank or indirectly through capital markets. Because ...

ing in

Greensburg, Pennsylvania Greensburg is a city in and the county seat of Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania, United States, and a part of the Pittsburgh Metro Area. The city lies within the Laurel Highlands and the ecoregion of the Western Allegheny Plateau (ecoregion), W ...

. He later became largely identified with the

industrial Industrial may refer to: Industry * Industrial archaeology, the study of the history of the industry * Industrial engineering, engineering dealing with the optimization of complex industrial processes or systems * Industrial city, a city dominate ...

and

mining Mining is the extraction of valuable minerals or other geological materials from the Earth, usually from an ore body, lode, vein, seam, reef, or placer deposit. The exploitation of these deposits for raw material is based on the economic via ...

interests of western Pennsylvania. He was a delegate to the

1880 Republican National Convention The 1880 Republican National Convention convened from June 2 to June 8, 1880, at the Interstate Exposition Building in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Delegates nominated James A. Garfield of Ohio and Chester A. Arthur of New York as the offic ...

. He was a member of the

Pennsylvania State Senate The Pennsylvania State Senate is the upper house of the Pennsylvania General Assembly, the Pennsylvania state legislature. The State Senate meets in the State Capitol building in Harrisburg. Senators are elected for four year terms, staggered ev ...

from 1884 to 1888. Huff was elected as a Republican to the Fifty-second Congress. He was again elected to the Fifty-fourth Congress. He was not a candidate for renomination in 1896. Huff was again elected to the Fifty-eighth and to the three succeeding Congresses. He served as chairman of the

United States House Committee on Mines and Mining The United States House Committee on Mines and Mining is a defunct committee of the U.S. House of Representatives. The Committee on Mines and Mining was created on December 19, 1865, for consideration of subjects relating to mining interests. It ...

during the Sixtieth and Sixty-first Congresses. He was not a candidate for renomination in 1910.

Personal life

On March 16, 1871, Huff married the former Henrietta Burrell, a daughter of Jeremiah M. Burrell, President Judge of the Tenth Judicial District of Pennsylvania. They were the parents of eight children. Along with sixty-odd wealthy Western Pennsylvanians including

Andrew Carnegie Andrew Carnegie (, ; November 25, 1835August 11, 1919) was a Scottish-American industrialist and philanthropist. Carnegie led the expansion of the American steel industry in the late 19th century and became one of the richest Americans i ...

Andrew Mellon Andrew William Mellon (; March 24, 1855 – August 26, 1937), sometimes A. W. Mellon, was an American banker, businessman, industrialist, philanthropist, art collector, and politician. From the wealthy Mellon family of Pittsburgh, Pennsylva ...

and

Henry Clay Frick Henry Clay Frick (December 19, 1849 – December 2, 1919) was an American industrialist, financier, and art patron. He founded the H. C. Frick & Company coke manufacturing company, was chairman of the Carnegie Steel Company, and played a maj ...

, Huff was a member of the elite

South Fork Fishing and Hunting Club The South Fork Fishing and Hunting Club was a Pennsylvania corporation which operated an exclusive and secretive retreat at a mountain lake near South Fork, Pennsylvania, for more than fifty extremely wealthy men and their families. The club was ...

whose earthen dam at

Lake Conemaugh The South Fork Dam was an earthenwork dam forming Lake Conemaugh (formerly Western Reservoir, also known as the Old Reservoir and Three Mile Dam, a misnomer), an artificial body of water near South Fork, Pennsylvania, United States. On May 31, ...

failed on May 31, 1889, causing the

Johnstown Flood The Johnstown Flood (locally, the Great Flood of 1889) occurred on Friday, May 31, 1889, after the catastrophic failure of the South Fork Dam, located on the south fork of the Little Conemaugh River, upstream of the town of Johnstown, Pennsylv ...

. He died in

Washington, D.C. ) , image_skyline = , image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan, ...

, in 1912, aged 69. He was interred in St. Clair Cemetery in

. Huff's

Dupont Circle Dupont Circle (or DuPont Circle) is a traffic circle, park, neighborhood and historic district in Northwest Washington, D.C. The Dupont Circle neighborhood is bounded approximately by 16th Street NW to the east, 22nd Street NW ...

mansion, designed by

Horace Trumbauer Horace Trumbauer (December 28, 1868 – September 18, 1938) was a prominent American architect of the Gilded Age, known for designing residential manors for the wealthy. Later in his career he also designed hotels, office buildings, and much of ...

and

Julian Abele Julian Francis Abele (April 30, 1881April 23, 1950) was a prominent Black American architect, and chief designer in the offices of Horace Trumbauer. He contributed to the design of more than 400 buildings, including the Widener Memorial Library at ...

and built in 1906, was sold by his widow in 1913 to the Argentine Ministry of Foreign Relations, and has since housed the Embassy of Argentina.

References

Sources

*
The Political Graveyard
1842 births 1912 deaths People from Norristown, Pennsylvania Republican Party Pennsylvania state senators American bankers Politicians from Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania Republican Party members of the United States House of Representatives from Pennsylvania 19th-century American politicians People from Dupont Circle 19th-century American businesspeople {{Pennsylvania-Representative-stub

Biography

Personal life

See also

References

Sources