Patrick Tracy Jackson (August 14, 1780 – September 12, 1847) was an American manufacturer, one of the founders of the

Boston Manufacturing Company The Boston Manufacturing Company was a business that operated one of the first factories in America. It was organized in 1813 by Francis Cabot Lowell, a wealthy Boston merchant, in partnership with a group of investors later known as The Boston A ...

Waltham, Massachusetts Waltham ( ) is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States, and was an early center for the labor movement as well as a major contributor to the American Industrial Revolution. The original home of the Boston Manufacturing Company, ...

, and later a founder of the

Merrimack Manufacturing Company The Merrimack Manufacturing Company (also known as Merrimack Mills) was the first of the major textile manufacturing concerns to open in Lowell, Massachusetts, beginning operations in 1823. History After the death of Francis Cabot Lowell o ...

, whose developments formed the nucleus of Lowell, Massachusetts.

Early life and education

He was born in Newburyport, Massachusetts, the youngest son of Jonathan Jackson and his second wife, Hannah Tracy Jackson, who was the daughter of Irish-born merchant Patrick Tracy. He enjoyed more schooling than most young men in post-Revolutionary America, attending Newburyport public schools as well as the private Dummer Academy. Growing up in a commercial family, however, Jackson was anxious to prove his business acumen, so in 1795, at the age of fifteen, he served as an apprentice clerk to William Bartlett, a wealthy Newburyport merchant, and as

captain's clerk A captain's clerk was a rating, now obsolete, in the Royal Navy and the United States Navy for a person employed by the captain to keep his records, correspondence, and accounts. The regulations of the Royal Navy demanded that a purser serve a ...

to his elder brother Henry. He spent several years at sea on behalf of Bartlett and his brother Henry from 1799 to 1808, impressing experienced merchants and sea masters with his drive and knowledge of

navigation Navigation is a field of study that focuses on the process of monitoring and controlling the movement of a craft or vehicle from one place to another.Bowditch, 2003:799. The field of navigation includes four general categories: land navigation, ...

and maritime commerce. He completed four trading voyages abroad between 1800 and 1807, which gave him the opportunity to gain "experience in the Eastern trade and a respectable capital base".

Business career

Jackson established himself in

Boston Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...

as a merchant specializing in the

East East or Orient is one of the four cardinal directions or points of the compass. It is the opposite direction from west and is the direction from which the Sun rises on the Earth. Etymology As in other languages, the word is formed from the fac ...

and

West Indies The West Indies is a subregion of North America, surrounded by the North Atlantic Ocean and the Caribbean Sea that includes 13 independent island countries and 18 dependencies and other territories in three major archipelagos: the Greate ...

trade. Despite curtailed shipping interests during the

War of 1812 The War of 1812 (18 June 1812 – 17 February 1815) was fought by the United States, United States of America and its Indigenous peoples of the Americas, indigenous allies against the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, United Kingdom ...

, Jackson collaborated with brother-in-law

Francis Cabot Lowell Francis Cabot Lowell (April 7, 1775 – August 10, 1817) was an American businessman for whom the city of Lowell, Massachusetts, is named. He was instrumental in bringing the Industrial Revolution to the United States. Early life Francis Cabot ...

(1775–1817) to establish a textile factory in

, and founded the

with him and the other "

Boston Associates The Boston Associates were a loosely linked group of investors in 19th-century New England. They included Nathan Appleton, Patrick Tracy Jackson, Abbott Lawrence, and Amos Lawrence. Often related directly or through marriage, they were based in ...

" in 1813. The Waltham factory was the first to integrate all the steps of converting raw

cotton Cotton is a soft, fluffy staple fiber that grows in a boll, or protective case, around the seeds of the cotton plants of the genus '' Gossypium'' in the mallow family Malvaceae. The fiber is almost pure cellulose, and can contain minor pe ...

into cotton

cloth Textile is an umbrella term that includes various fiber-based materials, including fibers, yarns, filaments, threads, different fabric types, etc. At first, the word "textiles" only referred to woven fabrics. However, weaving is not the ...

into one mill building. On February 10, 1818, Jackson,

Daniel Pinckney Parker Daniel Pinckney Parker (1781-1850) was a prominent merchant, shipbuilder, and businessman in 19th-century Boston, Massachusetts. Biography Daniel Pinckney Parker was born on August 30, 1781, in Southborough, Massachusetts, to Benjamin and Abigail ...

, and other members of the

, were granted the charter of the

Suffolk Bank Suffolk Bank was a private clearinghouse bank in Boston, Massachusetts, that exchanged specie or locally backed bank notes for notes from country banks to which city-dwellers could not easily travel to redeem notes. The bank was issued its corpor ...

by the

Massachusetts General Court The Massachusetts General Court (formally styled the General Court of Massachusetts) is the State legislature (United States), state legislature of the Massachusetts, Commonwealth of Massachusetts. The name "General Court" is a hold-over from th ...

. Jackson, Parker, the other charter's holders, and the bank's directors met periodically from February 27 to March 19 at the Boston Exchange Coffee House to discuss the organization of the bank. On April 1, 1818, the bank opened for business in rented offices on State Street until the bank moved permanently to the corner of State and Kilby Streets (currently occupied by either

75 State Street 75 State Street is a high-rise office building located in the Financial District of Boston. Built in 1988, it was designed by Gund Architects of Boston, in association with Skidmore, Owings and Merrill, in the Postmodernist style. The 31-story ...

or Exchange Place) on April 17. Jackson owned 300 shares of the bank. By 1820, the limited waterpower of the

Charles River The Charles River ( Massachusett: ''Quinobequin)'' (sometimes called the River Charles or simply the Charles) is an river in eastern Massachusetts. It flows northeast from Hopkinton to Boston along a highly meandering route, that doubles b ...

led Jackson and his colleagues to establish the

to produce printed

calico Calico (; in British usage since 1505) is a heavy plain-woven textile made from unbleached, and often not fully processed, cotton. It may also contain unseparated husk parts. The fabric is far coarser than muslin, but less coarse and thick than ...

cloth at the Pawtucket Falls on the

Merrimack River The Merrimack River (or Merrimac River, an occasional earlier spelling) is a river in the northeastern United States. It rises at the confluence of the Pemigewasset and Winnipesaukee rivers in Franklin, New Hampshire, flows southward into M ...

. In 1822 he appointed himself as agent of

Proprietors of Locks and Canals The Proprietors of Locks and Canals on Merrimack River is a limited liability corporation founded on June 27, 1792, making it one of the oldest corporations in the United States. Its named incorporators were Dudley Atkins Tyng, William Coombs, Jose ...

, gaining the ability to determine "who could start what mill and where in Lowell, and for how much". Incorporated as the town of

Lowell, Massachusetts Lowell () is a city in Massachusetts, in the United States. Alongside Cambridge, It is one of two traditional seats of Middlesex County. With an estimated population of 115,554 in 2020, it was the fifth most populous city in Massachusetts as of ...

, in 1826, it was named for

. In 1830, problems of transportation and communication by

canal Canals or artificial waterways are waterways or engineered channels built for drainage management (e.g. flood control and irrigation) or for conveyancing water transport vehicles (e.g. water taxi). They carry free, calm surface flo ...

and

turnpike Turnpike often refers to: * A type of gate, another word for a turnstile * In the United States, a toll road Turnpike may also refer to: Roads United Kingdom * A turnpike road, a principal road maintained by a turnpike trust, a body with powers ...

convinced Jackson to oversee the construction of the Boston & Lowell Railroad, the first railroad to receive a charter from the

, and established the standard American rail gauge. On May 27, 1835, it made its maiden trip to Boston, with Jackson,

George Washington Whistler George Washington Whistler (May 19, 1800 – April 7, 1849) was a prominent American civil engineer best known for building steam locomotives and railroads. He is credited with introducing the steam whistle to American locomotives. In 1842, Tsa ...

, and James Baldwin aboard. Although Jackson had hoped to retire after the railroad began operating in 1835, but his poor business decisions did not make that possible. For example, In the late 1830s, he liquidated nearly all of his interest in the Lowell Mills to invest it into real estate, which turned into a disaster. He died from a sudden attack of

dysentery Dysentery (UK pronunciation: , US: ), historically known as the bloody flux, is a type of gastroenteritis that results in bloody diarrhea. Other symptoms may include fever, abdominal pain, and a feeling of incomplete defecation. Complications ...

on September 12, 1847.

Family

In 1810 he married Lydia Cabot, whose second cousin

would become an important business partner (Francis Cabot Lowell was also married to Patrick's sister Hannah). Patrick and Lydia had nine children, including the writer Anna Cabot Jackson Lowell. He was also the brother of Charles Jackson, grandfather of

Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. (March 8, 1841 – March 6, 1935) was an American jurist and legal scholar who served as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1902 to 1932.Holmes was Acting Chief Justice of the Un ...

Holmes' father was a student of another brother, physician James Jackson.

References

Sources

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Jackson, Patrick Tracy 1780 births 1847 deaths American manufacturing businesspeople Businesspeople from Massachusetts People of the Industrial Revolution American textile industry businesspeople People from Newburyport, Massachusetts People from Lowell, Massachusetts 19th-century American businesspeople The Governor's Academy alumni