The Boston Brahmin or Boston elite are members of Boston's traditional upper class. They form an integral part of the historic core of the East Coast establishment, along with other wealthy families of Philadelphia, New York City, Virginia and Charleston. They are often associated with the distinctive Boston Brahmin accent, Harvard University, and traditional Anglo-American customs and clothing. Descendants of the earliest English colonists, such as those who came to America on the Mayflower or the Arbella, are often considered to be the most representative of the Boston Brahmins.
The term was coined by the physician and writer Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr., in an 1860 article in the Atlantic Monthly. The term Brahmin refers to the highest ranking caste of people in the traditional caste system in India. In the United States, it has been applied to the old, wealthy New England families of British Protestant origin which were influential in the development of American institutions and culture.
The term effectively underscores the strong conviction of the New England gentry that they were a people set apart by destiny to guide the American experiment as their ancestors had played a leading role in founding it. The term also illustrates the erudite and exclusive nature of the New England gentry as perceived by outsiders, and may also refer to their interest in Eastern religions, fostered perhaps by the impact in the 19th century of the transcendentalist writings of New England literary icons such as Ralph Waldo Emerson and Walt Whitman, and the enlightened appeal of Universalist Unitarian movements of the same period.
The nature of the Brahmins is hinted at by the doggerel "Boston Toast" by Holy Cross alumnus John Collins Bossidy:
And this is good old Boston,
The home of the bean and the cod,
Where the Lowells talk only to Cabots,
And the Cabots talk only to God.
While some 19th-century Brahmin families of large fortune were of bourgeois origin, others were of aristocratic origin. The new families were often the first to seek, in typically British fashion, suitable marriage alliances with those old aristocratic New England families that were descended from landowners in England to elevate and cement their social standing. The Winthrops, Dudleys, Saltonstalls, Winslows, and Lymans (descended from English magistrates, gentry, and aristocracy) were, by and large, happy with this arrangement. All of Boston's "Brahmin elite", therefore, maintained the received culture of the old English gentry, including cultivating the personal excellence that they imagined maintained the distinction between gentlemen and freemen, and between women and ladies. They saw it as their duty to maintain what they defined as high standards of excellence, duty, and restraint. Cultivated, urbane, and dignified, a Boston Brahmin was supposed to be the very essence of enlightened aristocracy. The ideal Brahmin was not only wealthy, but displayed what was considered suitable personal virtues and character traits.
The Brahmin was expected to maintain the customary English reserve in his dress, manner, and deportment, cultivate the arts, support charities such as hospitals and colleges, and assume the role of community leader. Although the ideal called on him to transcend commonplace business values, in practice many found the thrill of economic success quite attractive. The Brahmins warned each other against avarice and insisted upon personal responsibility. Scandal and divorce were unacceptable. The total system was buttressed by the strong extended family ties present in Boston society. Young men attended the same prep schools, colleges, and private clubs, and heirs married heiresses. Family not only served as an economic asset, but also as a means of moral restraint. Most belong to the Unitarian or Episcopal churches, although some were Congregationalists or Methodists. Politically they were successively Federalists, Whigs, and Republicans. They were marked by their manners and once distinctive elocution, the Boston Brahmin accent, a version of the New England accent. Their distinctive Anglo-American manner of dress has been much imitated and is the foundation of the style now informally known as preppy. Many of the Brahmin families trace their ancestry back to the original 17th- and 18th-century colonial ruling class consisting of Massachusetts governors and magistrates, Harvard presidents, distinguished clergy and fellows of the Royal Society of London (a leading scientific body), while others entered New England aristocratic society during the 19th century with their profits from commerce and trade, often marrying into established Brahmin families such as the Welds, Saltonstalls, Lymans, Sargents, Emersons, Winslows, Warrens and Winthrops.
Adams Family
Samuel Adams (1722–1803): Founding Father
John Adams (1735–1826): Founding Father and second President of the United States, husband of Abigail Smith Adams (1744–1818)
John Quincy Adams (1767–1848): sixth President of the United States
Charles Francis Adams, Sr. (1807–1886): Ambassador, U.S. congressman
Charles Francis Adams, Jr. (1835–1915): Civil War general
John Quincy Adams II (1833–1894): lawyer, politician
Charles Francis Adams III (1866–1954): U.S. Secretary of the Navy
Charles Francis Adams IV (1910–1999): industrialist, first president of Raytheon
Henry Brooks Adams (1838–1918): author
Brooks Adams (1848–1927): historian
Ivers Whitney Adams (1838–1914): founder of the oldest continuously playing professional baseball team, the Boston Red Stockings
Amory Family
John Amory Lowell (1798–1881): merchant
Thomas Coffin Amory (1812–1889): lawyer, author
Thomas Jonathan Coffin Amory (1828–1864): Civil War general
Ernest Amory Codman (1869–1940): surgeon
Cleveland Amory (1917–1998): author
Appleton Family
Patrilineal line:
Daniel Appleton (1785–1849): publisher
Frances Appleton (d. 1861): wife of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
George Swett Appleton (1821–1878): publisher
Jane Means Appleton Pierce (1806–1863): wife of U.S. President Franklin Pierce, was First Lady of the United States from 1853 to 1857
Jesse Appleton (1772–1819): second president of Bowdoin College
John Appleton (1816–1864): assistant Secretary of State, diplomat, U.S. congressman
John Appleton: Chief Justice of the Maine Supreme Judicial Court
John F. Appleton: lawyer and Union colonel in the American Civil War
John James Appleton (1789–1864): ambassador
Nathan Appleton (1771–1861): U.S. congressman and merchant
Nathaniel Appleton (1693–1784): Congregational minister
Samuel Appleton (1625–1696): military and government leader in the Massachusetts Bay Colony and Province of Massachusetts Bay
Samuel Appleton (1766–1853): merchant and philanthropist
Thomas Gold Appleton (1812–1884): writer and art patron
William Appleton (1786–1862): U.S. congressman
William Henry Appleton (1814–1899): publisher
William Sumner Appleton (1874–1947): philanthropist
Other notable relatives:
Thomas Storrow Brown (1803–1888): journalist, writer, orator, and revolutionary in Lower Canada (present-day Quebec)
Edward Augustus Holyoke (1728–1829): educator and physician
Alice Mary Longfellow (1850–1928): philanthropist and preservationist
Ernest Wadsworth Longfellow (1845–1921): artist
Alpheus Spring Packard (1839–1905): entomologist and palaeontologist
William Alfred Packard (1830–1909): classical scholar
Charles Storrow Williams (1827–?): Director of Railroad Transportation for the Confederate States of America
Edward H. Williams (1824–1899): physician and railroad executive
Bacon Family
Robert Bacon (1860–1919): U.S. Secretary of State
Robert L. Bacon (1884–1938): U.S. congressman
Gaspar G. Bacon (1886–1947): politician
Gaspar G. Bacon, Jr. (1914–1943): actor
Bates family
Originally from Boston and Britain:
Benjamin Bates I (c.1651–1710); merchant banker, family patriarch
Benjamin Bates II (c.1716 – 1820); member of the Hell Fire Club, revolutionary
Frederick Bates (1777–1825); politician
James Woodson Bates (1788–1846); judge
Joshua Bates (financier); Barings Bank partner, managed many Brahmin family fortunes, advised Adams family on Court protocol
Edward Bates (1793–1869); U.S. Attorney General
Benjamin Bates IV (1808–1878); philanthropist, namesake and benefactor of Bates College
Boylston Family
Thomas Boylston (b. 1644): doctor, family patriarch
Zabdiel Boylston (1679–1766): physician
Ward Nicholas Boylston (1747–1828): benefactor, Harvard University
Bradlee Family
Direct line:
Nathan Bradley I: earliest known member born in America, in Dorchester, Boston, Massachusetts, in 1631
Samuel Bradlee: constable of Dorchester, Massachusetts
Nathaniel Bradlee: Boston Tea Party participant, member of Massachusetts Charitable Mechanic Association
Josiah Bradlee I: Boston Tea Party participant; m. Hannah Putnam
Josiah Bradlee III (Harvard): m. Alice Crowninsheld
Frederick Josiah Bradlee I (Harvard): Director of the Boston Bank
Frederick Josiah Bradlee, Jr. (Harvard-1915): on the first All-American football team at Harvard; m. Chevalier Josephine de Gersdorff
Frederick Josiah Bradlee III: Broadway actor, author
Benjamin Crowninshield Bradlee (1921–2014) (Harvard-1942): Chief Executive Editor of The Washington Post
Samuel Bradlee, Jr.: lieutenant colonel during the American Revolutionary War
Thomas Bradlee: Boston Tea Party participant; member of Massachusetts Charitable Mechanics Association; Member of the St. Andrews Lodge of Freemasons
David Bradlee: Boston Tea Party participant; Captain in the Continental Army, member of the St. Andrews Lodge of Freemasons
Sarah Bradlee: "Mother of the Boston Tea Party"
Chaffee Family
Originally of Hingham, Massachusetts:
Thomas Chaffee (1610–1683), businessman and landowner
Jonathon Chaffee (1678–1766), businessman and landowner
Matthew Chaffee (1657–1723), Boston landowner
Adna Romanza Chaffee (1842–1914): U.S. general
Adna R. Chaffee, Jr. (1884–1941): U.S. general
Zechariah Chafee (1885–1957): philosopher, civil libertarian
John Chafee (1922–1999): U.S. senator
Lincoln Chafee (b. 1953): former U.S. senator, former Rhode Island governor, 2016 U.S. presidential candidate for the Democratic party
Choate Family
Rufus Choate (1799–1859): U.S. senator
George C. S. Choate (1827–1896): founder of Choate Sanitarium, Pleasantville, New York
Joseph Hodges Choate (1832–1917): lawyer, diplomat
William Gardner Choate (1830–1920): U.S. federal judge, founder of Choate Rosemary Hall
Sarah Choate Sears (1858–1935): art patron
Robert B. Choate, Jr. (1924–2009): businessman
Elizabeth Choate Spykman (1896–1965): writer
Coffin Family
Originally of Newbury and Nantucket:
Tristram Coffin (1604–1681): colonist, original owner of Nantucket
William Coffin (1699–1775): merchant, co-founder of Trinity Church
Sir Isaac Coffin (1759–1839): naval officer
Charles E. Coffin (1841–1912): industrialist, U.S. congressman
Charles A. Coffin (1844–1926): industrialist, co-founder of General Electric
Henry Coffin Nevins (1843–1892): industrialist
John Coffin Jones, Sr. (1750–1820): Speaker of the Massachusetts House of Representatives
John Coffin Jones, Jr. (1796–1861): U.S. Minister to Hawaii
Thomas Coffin Amory (1812–1889): lawyer, author
Thomas Jonathan Coffin Amory (1828–1864): Civil War general
T. Jefferson Coolidge (1831–1920), Financier, industrialist, and civic leader
John Coolidge (1906–2000): businessman; son of U.S. President Calvin Coolidge
Archibald Cary Coolidge (1866–1928): educator
John Coolidge Adams (b. 1947): composer
John Gardner Coolidge (1863–1936): U.S. ambassador
Charles A. Coolidge (1844–1926): U.S. Army general
John Cooper (1609–1669): colonist
Samuel Cooper (1725–1783): clergyman
Samuel D. Cooper, Jr. (1750–1824): revolutionary
Samuel D. Cooper III (1778–1853): trade merchant
Priscilla Cooper Tyler (1816–1889): First Lady of the United States
Theodore Cooper (1839–1919): civil engineer
Frederic Taber Cooper (1864–1937): writer
Crowninshield Family
Johann Casper Richter von Kronenscheldt: colonist
Jacob Crowninshield (1770–1808): U.S. congressman
Arent S. Crowninshield (1843–1908): U.S. Navy admiral
Caspar Crowninshield (1837–1897): Union Army general
Benjamin William Crowninshield (1837–1892): Union Army colonel
Frederic Crowninshield (1845–1918): first president of the National Society of Mural Painters
Benjamin Williams Crowninshield (1772–1851): 5th U.S. Secretary of Navy
Frank Crowninshield (1872–1947): creator and editor of Vanity Fair
Bowdin Bradlee Crowninshield (1867–1948): American naval architect
Descendants by marriage:
William Crowninshield Endicott (1826–1900): 5th U.S. Secretary of War
Frederick Josiah Bradlee, Jr. (1892–1970): on the first All-American football team (from Harvard)
Benjamin Crowninshield Bradlee (1921–2014): Editor-in-chief of The Washington Post
Quinn Crowninshield Bradlee (b. 1982): founder and CEO of FriendsOfQuinn.com
Cushing Family
Originally of Hingham, Massachusetts:
Caleb Cushing (1800–1879): U.S. congressman and Attorney General
John Perkins Cushing (1787–1862): China trade merchant, investor
Thomas Cushing (1725–1788): statesman, revolutionary
William Cushing (1732–1810): U.S. Supreme Court justice
Harvey Cushing (1869–1939): neurosurgeon
Descendant by marriage:
Albert Cushing Read (1887–1967): naval officer
Dana Family
Richard Dana (1699–1772): colonial Boston politician
Francis Dana (1743–1811): revolutionary
Richard Henry Dana, Sr. (1787–1879): lawyer, author
Richard Henry Dana, Jr. (1815–1882): lawyer, author (Two Years Before the Mast)
Delano Family
Columbus Delano (1809–1896): U.S. Secretary of the Interior
Jane Delano (1862–1919): founder of the American Red Cross Nursing Service
Paul Delano (1745–1842): naval officer
Franklin Delano Roosevelt (1882–1945): President of the United States
Frederic A. Delano (1863-1953): civic reformer and railroad president
Dudley Family
Thomas Dudley (1576–1653): Governor of Massachusetts, a founder of Harvard College
Anne Dudley Bradstreet (1612–1672): first American poet, wife of Royal Governor Simon Bradstreet
Joseph Dudley (1647–1720): Royal Governor of Massachusetts, President of the Dominion of New England, Chief Justice of New York, Member of Parliament, Lt. Governor of the Isle of Wight
Paul Dudley (1675–1751): Chief Justice of Massachusetts, member of the Royal Society, founder of the Dudleian lectures at Harvard
Paul Dudley Sargent (1745–1828): Army colonel and Revolutionary War hero
Dudley Saltonstall (1738–1796): Naval commodore during the Revolution and successful privateer
Dwight Family
Timothy Dwight IV (1752–1817): president of Yale University
Joseph Dwight (1703–1765): lawyer, French and Indian War veteran
James Dwight Dana (1813–1895): geologist
Eliot Family
Charles William Eliot (1834–1926): president of Harvard University
Charles Eliot (1859–1897): landscape architect
Samuel A. Eliot II (1862–1950): president of the American Unitarian Association
William Greenleaf Eliot (1811–1887): educator, Unitarian minister, and civic leader
Henry Ware Eliot (1843–1919) industrialist and philanthropist, co-founder of Washington University
T. S. Eliot (1888–1965): poet and winner of the 1948 Nobel Prize for Literature
Samuel Eliot Morison (1887–1976): maritime author
Theodore Lyman Eliot (1928-...), diplomat
Charles Eliot Norton (1827–1908): author
Emerson Family
Rev. William Emerson (1769–1811): clergyman; m. Ruth Haskins Emerson
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882): poet; m. Lydia Jackson Emerson
Endicott Family
Salem:
William Crowninshield Endicott (1826–1900): U.S. Secretary of War
Dedham:
Augustus Bradford Endicott (1818–1910): politician
Philip Endicott Young (1885–1955): industrialist
Henry Bradford Endicott (1853–1920): industrialist
Henry Wendell Endicott (1880–1954)
Fabens Family
Of Marblehead and Salem:
William Fabens (1810–1883): lawyer, member of Assembly, SenateWilliam Chandler Fabens (1843–1903): Lynn attorney, namesake of Fabens Building
Samuel Augustus Fabens (1813–1899): master mariner in the East India and California trade
Francis Alfred Fabens (1814–1872): mercantile businessman, San Francisco judge, attorney
Joseph Warren Fabens (1821–1875): U.S. Consul at Cayenne, businessman, Envoy Extraordinary of the Dominican Republic
George Wilson Fabens (1857–1939): attorney, land commissioner and superintendent of Southern Pacific Railroad, namesake of Fabens, Texas
Forbes Family
John Murray Forbes (1813–1898): industrialist
John Forbes Kerry (b. 1943): United States Secretary of State, senator from Massachusetts (1985–2013)
Elliot Forbes (1917–2006): conductor and musicologist
Robert Bennet Forbes (1804–1889): sea captain, China merchant, ship owner, writer
Gardner Family
Originally of Essex county:
Samuel Pickering Gardner (1767–1843): merchant
John Lowell Gardner (1808–1884): merchant
John Lowell Gardner II (1837–1898): merchant
Augustus P. Gardner (1865–1918): U.S. congressman
Jonathan Gillett (1609–1677): colonist
Edward Bates Gillett (1817–1899): Attorney
Frederick Huntington Gillett (1851–1935): 37th Speaker of the United States House of Representatives
Arthur Lincoln Gillett (1859–1938): clergyman
Mark Healey (1791–1872): originally of New Hampshire, merchant and first president of the Merchant's BankCaroline Wells Healey (1822–1912), writer, feminist, and abolitionist
Charles Henry Appleton Dall (1816–1886), first Unitarian minister to India
William Healey Dall (1845–1912), malacologist, paleontologist, and explorer of Alaska
Holmes Family
Abiel Holmes (1763–1837): clergyman
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (1809–1894): doctor, author
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. (1841–1935): U.S. Supreme Court justice
Jackson Family
Edward Jackson (1708–1757): colonist; m. Dorothy Quincy Jackson
Jonathan Jackson (1743–1810): merchant, revolutionary; m. Hannah Tracy Jackson
Charles Jackson (1775–1855): Massachusetts Supreme Court justice
Amelia Lee Jackson, who married Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. above
Patrick Tracy Jackson (1780–1847): co-founder of the Boston Manufacturing Company
Hannah Jackson: wife of Francis Cabot Lowell
Lydia Jackson: wife of Ralph Waldo Emerson
Lawrence Family
Samuel Lawrence (d. 1827): revolutionary
Amos Lawrence (1786–1852): merchant
Amos Adams Lawrence (1814–1886): abolitionist
William Lawrence (1850–1941): Episcopal bishop
William Appleton Lawrence (1889–1963): Episcopal bishop
Frederic C. Lawrence (1899–1989): Episcopal bishop
Abbott Lawrence (1792–1855): U.S. congressman, founder of Lawrence, Massachusetts
Luther Lawrence (d. 1839): politician
Descendant by marriage: Abbott Lawrence Lowell (1856–1943): president of Harvard University
Lodge Family
John Ellerton Lodge, married Anna Cabot
Henry Cabot Lodge (1850–1924): U.S. senator
George Cabot Lodge (1873–1909): poet
Henry Cabot Lodge Jr. (1902–1985): U.S. senator, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations
George Cabot Lodge II (b. 1927): Harvard Business School professor, 1962 U.S. Senate candidate from Massachusetts against Edward M. Kennedy
Henry Sears Lodge (b. 1930)
John Davis Lodge (1903–1985): 79th governor of Connecticut, U.S. ambassador
Richard Lyman (1580–1640): a founder of Hartford, Connecticut; cousin of Lord Mayor of London Sir John Lyman of the Lyman Baronets of England
Roswell Lyman: China trade merchant, had an interest in The Ann & Hope
Theodore Lyman (1753–1839): China trade merchant, commissioned Samuel McIntire to build one of New England's finest country houses, The Vale
Theodore Lyman II (1792–1849): brigadier general of militia, Massachusetts state representative, mayor of Boston
Theodore Lyman III (1833–1897): natural scientist, aide-de-camp to Major General Meade during the American Civil War, and United States congressman from Massachusetts
Theodore Lyman IV (1874–1954): director of Jefferson Physics Lab, Harvard; eponym of the Lyman series of spectral lines. The crater Lyman on the far side of the Moon is named after him, as is the Lyman Physics Building at Harvard.
George Williams Lyman (1786–1880): developed textile mills, director of the Boston and Lowell Railroad and the Columbian Bank, president of the Massachusetts Hospital Life Insurance Company. His first wife was Elizabeth Gray Otis, the daughter of Harrison Gray Otis (U.S. senator and mayor of Boston) and Sally Foster Otis, prominent Bostonians who built a noted Federal-style mansion still standing.
Arthur T. Lyman (1832–1915), and his sisters Sarah (Mrs. Philip H. Sears) and Lydia (Mrs. Robert Treat Paine)
Arthur T. Lyman, Jr. (1861–1933): married Susan Cabot. Director and officer of textile manufacturing companies and the Massachusetts Life Insurance Company. Board member of the Boston Symphony Orchestra and the Waltham Hospital. He was active in politics as president of the Democratic Club of Massachusetts, chairman of the State Democratic Committee.
Minot Family
Charles Sedgwick Minot (1852–1914): anatomist
George Richards Minot (1885–1950): winner of the Nobel Prize in Medicine
Henry Davis Minot (1859–1890): ornithologist
Susan Minot (b. 1956): author
Norcross Family
Original from Watertown, Massachusetts
Otis Norcross (1811–1882): mayor of Boston
Eleanor Norcross (1854–1923): artist
Otis Family
James Otis, Jr. (1725–1783): revolutionary
Mercy Otis Warren (1728–1814): playwright, revolutionary
Samuel Allyne Otis (1740–1814): politician
Harrison Gray Otis (1765–1848): U.S. senator, mayor of Boston
Parkman Family
Samuel Parkman (1751–1824): investor
George Parkman (1790–1849): philanthropist, victim of a highly publicized murder
Francis Parkman, Jr. (1823–1893): historian
Peabody
Peabody Family
Catherine Endicott Peabody (1808–1833)
Elizabeth Palmer Peabody (1804–1894): American educator who opened the first English-language kindergarten in the United States
Endicott Peabody (1857–1944): Episcopal priest and founder of the Groton School for Boys
Endicott "Chubb" Peabody (1920–1997): governor of Massachusetts
George Peabody (1795–1869): entrepreneur and philanthropist who founded the House of Morgan and the Peabody Institute
Joseph Peabody (1757–1844): merchant, shipowner, and philanthropist whose company sailed clipper ships in the Old China Trade from its base in Salem, Massachusetts
Mary Tyler Peabody Mann (1806–1887): American author
Nathaniel Peabody (1774–1855)
Richard R. Peabody (1892–1936): author of The Common Sense of Drinking, a major influence on Alcoholics Anonymous founder Bill Wilson
Sophia Amelia Peabody Hawthorne (1809–1871): painter, illustrator, and wife of American author Nathaniel Hawthorne
Perkins Family
James Perkins (1761–1822): founder of the Boston Athenaeum, pioneer of the China trade, merchant, philanthropist
Thomas Handasyd Perkins (1764–1854): merchant, philanthropist
Charles Perkins (1823–1886): art historian, philanthropist, founder of the Museum of Fine Arts
Edward Perkins (1856–1905): constitutional lawyer
Maxwell Perkins (1884–1947): literary editor of Ernest Hemingway, William Faulkner, and F. Scott Fitzgerald
Phillips Family
Christopher H. Phillips (1920–2008): politician and diplomat
Samuel Phillips, Jr. (1752–1802): politician, founder of Phillips Academy
John Phillips (1719–1795): educator, founder of Phillips Exeter Academy
John Sanborn Phillips (1861-1949): publisher of McClure's Magazine
Wendell Phillips (1811–1884): abolitionist
William Phillips (1920–2008): diplomat
Other notable relatives:
Samuel Phillips Huntington (1927-2008): Harvard Political Science Professor and Author; grandson of John Sanborn Phillips
Charles F. Brush (1849-1929): inventor and philanthropist
Bill Gates (1955-): billionaire software pioneer and philanthropist
Putnam Family
James Putnam (1725–1789): last attorney general in Massachusetts before American Revolution; judge and politician in New Brunswick
James Putnam (1756–1838): Canadian politician
Israel Putnam (1718–1790): American army general during the Revolutionary War
William Lowell Putnam (1861–1924) and Elizabeth Lowell Putnam
George P. Putnam (1887–1950): publisher, explorer, husband of Amelia Earhart
Katherine L. Putnam (1890–1983): wife of Harvey Hollister Bundy
Roger Lowell Putnam (1893–1972): politician, businessman
Quincy Family
Edmund Quincy (1602–1636): settled in Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1633
Josiah Quincy II (1744–1775): lawyer, revolutionary
Josiah Quincy III (1772–1864): U.S. congressman, mayor of Boston, president of Harvard
Dorothy Quincy Hancock: wife of John Hancock
Abigail Smith Adams (1744–1818): wife of John Adams
John Quincy Adams (1767–1848): President of the United States
Rice Family
Originally of Sudbury, Massachusetts:
Deacon Edmund Rice (1594–1663): colonist
Alexander Hamilton Rice (1818–1895): industrialist, mayor of Boston, governor of Massachusetts, U.S. congressman
Alexander Hamilton Rice, Jr. (1875–1956): physician, geographer and explorer
Americus Vespucius Rice (1835–1904): general, U.S. congressman
Edmund Rice (1842–1906): U.S. Army general, Medal of Honor recipient
Edmund Rice (1819–1889): U.S. congressman
Henry Mower Rice (1816–1894): U.S. senator
Luther Rice (1783–1836): Baptist clergyman, missionary to India
Thomas Rice (1768–1854): U.S. congressman
William Marsh Rice (1816–1900): businessman, founder of Rice University
William North Rice (1845–1928): geologist, educator
William Whitney Rice (1826–1896): U.S. congressman
William B. Rice (1840–1909): industrialist, philanthropist
Saltonstall Family
Leverett Saltonstall I (1783–1845): politician, educator
Leverett Saltonstall (1892–1979): U.S. senator
William L. Saltonstall (1927–2009): politician
Philip Saltonstall Weld (1915–1984): World War II commando, environmentalist
Colonel Epes Sargent (1690–1762): colonel of militia before the Revolution and a justice of the general session court for more than 30 years
Paul Dudley Sargent (1745–1828): Revolutionary officer, one of the founding overseers of Bowdoin College
Harrison Tweed (1885–1969): lawyer and civic leader
Tweed Roosevelt (1942–): great-grandson of President Theodore Roosevelt
John Sargent (1750–1824): Loyalist officer during the American Revolution
Winthrop Sargent (1753–1820): patriot, governor, politician, and writer; member of the Federalist Party
Judith Sargent Murray (1751–1820): feminist, essayist, playwright, and poet; her home is the Sargent House Museum
Daniel Sargent, Sr. (1730–1806): merchant, owned Sargent's Wharf in Boston
Daniel Sargent (1764–1842): merchant, politician
Daniel Sargent Curtis (1825–1908): lawyer, banker, trustee of the BPL, owner of Palazzo Barbaro
Henry Sargent (1770–1845): painter and military man
Henry Winthrop Sargent (1810–1882): horticulturist and landscape gardener
Lucius Manlius Sargent (1786–1867): author, antiquarian, and temperance advocate
Horace Binney Sargent (1821–1908): Civil War general, politician
John Singer Sargent (1856–1925): artist, considered the "leading portrait painter of his generation"
Charles Sprague Sargent (1841–1927): botanist, first director of Harvard University's Arnold Arboretum
Winthrop Sargent Gilman (1808–1884): head of the banking house of Gilman, Son & Co. in New York City
Epes Sargent (1813–1880): editor, poet and playwright
Francis W. Sargent (1915–1998): 64th governor of Massachusetts
Benjamin Crowninshield Bradlee (1921–2014) (Harvard-1942): editor of The Washington Post
Frances Sargent Osgood (1811–1850): poet, one of the most popular women writers during her time
Anna Maria Wells (née Foster; ca. 1794–1868): early American poet and writer for children
Sears Family
Richard Sears (1610–1676): colonist
David Sears II (1787–1871): philanthropist, merchant, landowner
Clara Endicott Sears (1863–1960): author, philanthropist
Mason Sears (1899–1973): politician and ambassador
Emily Sears: wife of Henry Cabot Lodge Jr.
John W. Sears (1930–2014): politician
Tarbox Family
John Tarbox (1645–1674): colonist
John K. Tarbox (1838–1887): U.S. congressman
Increase N. Tarbox (1815–1888): author
Thayer Family
Nathaniel Thayer, Jr. (1808-1883): Financier, Philanthropist. One of the most generous citizens of Boston.
Nathaniel Thayer, III (1851-1911): Banker
Bayard Thayer (1862-1916): Millionaire Sportsman. Noted Horticulturist
Eugene Van Rensselaer Thayer (1855-1907): Financier and Capitalist
Eugene Van Rensselaer Thayer, Jr. (1881-1937): Banker, Businessman
Thorndike Family
Israel Thorndike (1755–1832): merchant, politician
Augustus Thorndike (1896–1986): physician
George Thorndike Angell (1823–1909): lawyer, philanthropist
Tudor Family
William Tudor (1750–1819): lawyer, politician, founder of the Massachusetts Historical Society
William Tudor (1779–1830): cofounder of the North American Review and the Boston Athenaeum
Frederic Tudor (1783–1864): Boston's "Ice King", founder of the Tudor Ice Company
Tasha Tudor (1915–2008): illustrator and author of children's books
Richard Warren (1578–1628): London merchant, Mayflower passenger
James Warren (1726–1808): Army general, paymaster of American Army, president of Massachusetts Congress
Mercy Otis Warren (1728–1814): playwright, historian, pioneer feminist, revolutionary
Joseph Warren (1741–1775): major-general, hero/martyr of Bunker Hill, president of Massachusetts Congress, sent Paul Revere on his famous midnight ride
John Warren (1753–1815): founder of Harvard Medical School, surgeon at Bunker Hill, co-founder of the Massachusetts Medical Society
John Collins Warren (1778–1856): surgeon, gave first public demonstration of surgical anesthesia, a founder of The New England Journal of Medicine, president of the American Medical Association, founding dean of Harvard Medical School, and a founder of Massachusetts General Hospital
Winslow Warren (1838–1930): American attorney who served as Collector of Customs for the Port of Boston during the second administration of Grover Cleveland
John Collins Warren Jr. (1842–1947): surgeon and president of the American Surgical Association
Charles Warren (1868–1954): lawyer and legal scholar who won a Pulitzer Prize for his book The Supreme Court in United States History
Weld Family
Thomas Weld (born c. 1600): colonist, Puritan minister
William Gordon Weld (1775–1825): merchant
William Fletcher Weld (1800–1881): merchant, philanthropist
Ezra Greenleaf Weld (1801–1874): daguerreotypist
Theodore Dwight Weld (1803–1895): abolitionist
Stephen Minot Weld (1806–1867): politician, educator
George Walker Weld (1840–1905): philanthropist
Stephen Minot Weld, Jr. (1842–1920): Civil War general
Charles Goddard Weld (1857–1911): philanthropist
Isabel Weld Perkins (1877–1948): philanthropist
Philip Saltonstall Weld (1915–1984): World War II commando, environmentalist
Tuesday Weld (b. 1943): actress
William Weld (b. 1945): governor of Massachusetts, 2016 Libertarian Party Vice Presidential Candidate
Wigglesworth Family
Michael Wigglesworth (1631–1705): colonist, clergyman
Edward Wigglesworth (1693–1765): clergyman, educator
Richard B. Wigglesworth (1891–1960): U.S. congressman
Winthrop Family
John Winthrop (1588–1649): governor of Massachusetts Bay Colony
Lucy Winthrop Downing, mother of diplomat Sir George Downing, 1st Baronet, founder of New York, of Downing Street, London, and ultimately of Downing College, Cambridge UK. Lucy's letter to her brother Governor Winthrop provided the impetus for the founding of Harvard College.
John Winthrop the Younger (1606–1676): governor of Connecticut
Fitz-John Winthrop (1637–1711): governor of Connecticut
John Winthrop: married Anne Dudley, granddaughter of Thomas Dudley
John Winthrop (1714–1779): acting president of Harvard, pioneer of American science
Thomas Lindall Winthrop (1760–1841): lieutenant governor of Massachusetts
Robert Charles Winthrop (1809–1894): lawyer, politician, philanthropist
