Hilborne Lewis Roosevelt (December 21, 1849 – December 30, 1886) was a pioneering

organ Organ may refer to: Biology * Organ (biology), a part of an organism Musical instruments * Organ (music), a family of keyboard musical instruments characterized by sustained tone ** Electronic organ, an electronic keyboard instrument ** Hammond ...

builder, telecommunication engineer, and a member of the

Roosevelt family The Roosevelt family is an American political family from New York whose members have included two United States presidents, a First Lady of the United States, First Lady, and various merchants, bankers, politicians, inventors, clergymen, arti ...

Life

Roosevelt was born in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

to Silas Weir Roosevelt, a son of

Cornelius Roosevelt Cornelius Van Schaack "C.V.S." Roosevelt (January 30, 1794 – July 17, 1871) was an American businessman from New York City. He was a member of the prominent Roosevelt family and the paternal grandfather of U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt. Ea ...

and Mary West. He was thus a cousin of Presidents

Theodore Roosevelt Theodore Roosevelt Jr. ( ; October 27, 1858 – January 6, 1919), often referred to as Teddy or by his initials, T. R., was an American politician, statesman, soldier, conservationist, naturalist, historian, and writer who served as the 26t ...

and Franklin D. Roosevelt. Roosevelt did not take to either business or politics, the traditional Roosevelt family occupations. Instead, he was musically and mechanically inclined and wanted to be an organ builder from early childhood, entering an apprenticeship at an organ factory. He later traveled to Europe for further training in the field. His relatives frowned upon a mechanical occupation, but when he began to make money, his family was reassured. Roosevelt was particularly interested in the electric action organ, and was one of the first to study the application of new electrical devices to the manufacture of organ actions. He took out the first patent in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country Continental United States, primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., ...

for an electric action for the pipe organ when he was 20, and built the first electric action organ in the United States for the

Philadelphia Centennial Exposition The Centennial International Exhibition of 1876, the first official World's Fair to be held in the United States, was held in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, from May 10 to November 10, 1876, to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the signing of the ...

. Though primarily interested in the technical aspects, he had a good deal of business acumen as well, establishing factories in New York City,

Philadelphia Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the sixth-largest city in the U.S., the second-largest city in both the Northeast megalopolis and Mid-Atlantic regions after New York City. Since ...

, and

Baltimore Baltimore ( , locally: or ) is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Maryland, fourth most populous city in the Mid-Atlantic, and the 30th most populous city in the United States with a population of 585,708 in 2020. Baltimore was ...

. Hilborne founded the Roosevelt Pipe Organ Builders in 1870 with his brother Frank and built some of the largest organs in the United States during his career. Roosevelt was also widely known among electricians for inventing several details of the telephone including the automatic switch-hook, for which he received royalties for many years (even though

Thomas A. Watson Thomas Augustus Watson (January 18, 1854 – December 13, 1934) was an assistant to Alexander Graham Bell, notably in the invention of the telephone in 1876. Life and work Born in Salem, Massachusetts, United States Watson was a bookkeeper an ...

claimed to be the first), and held an interest in the

Bell Telephone Company The Bell Telephone Company, a common law joint stock company, was organized in Boston, Massachusetts, on July 9, 1877, by Alexander Graham Bell's father-in-law Gardiner Greene Hubbard, who also helped organize a sister company – the New Engl ...

Personal life

Roosevelt married Katherine Shippen on February 1, 1883, and had one child, Dorothy Quincy Roosevelt (born 1884). He died at his home in the

Chelsea Chelsea or Chelsey may refer to: Places Australia * Chelsea, Victoria Canada * Chelsea, Nova Scotia * Chelsea, Quebec United Kingdom * Chelsea, London, an area of London, bounded to the south by the River Thames ** Chelsea (UK Parliament consti ...

neighborhood of Manhattan at the age of 37 on December 30, 1886.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Roosevelt, Hilborne 1849 births 1886 deaths People from Chelsea, Manhattan American people of Dutch descent Businesspeople from New York City American pipe organ builders

Hilborne Roosevelt Hilborne Lewis Roosevelt (December 21, 1849 – December 30, 1886) was a pioneering organ builder, telecommunication engineer, and a member of the Roosevelt family. Life Roosevelt was born in New York City to Silas Weir Roosevelt, a son of Corne ...

Schuyler family American telecommunications engineers 19th-century American businesspeople American company founders