Marcus Hawley:

The Man Whose Business Fortune Was Newtown’s Good Fortune

By Jan Howard

Mary E. Hawley is well known for her many contributions to the town of Newtown and to her church. Newtown’s benefactress gave of her vast fortune and enriched the lives of those who live here.

But what of her father, whose talent as an astute businessman enabled him to amass the immense fortune that later benefited Newtown through his daughter’s gifts?

Marcus C. Hawley was probably the town’s first big-time entrepreneur. His life was closely interwoven with business activity and development on both the east and west coasts of the United States.

It was said that he sensed the needs of an expanding nation and made a fortune in hardware and agricultural implements. He foresaw the development of the west and invested extensively in railroads, steam ship lines and water works. As a result, his business became national in scope.

At one time he served as president of two railroads and a major water company. He was a director of the water works at Bridgeport and Houston, Tex., and vice president of the Bridgeport Steamboat Company.

He also became one of the large stockholders in the Oregon Improvement Company, the Oregon Railway & Navigation Company, the Oregon Short Line Company, the Northern Pacific Railroad Company, Union Pacific, and the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe.

As a railroad builder he and his associates opened up vast sections of the country to settlement and improvements.

In addition to the company hardware business in Bridgeport, he had an office in New York City, and he went there almost every day, making him perhaps the most frequent commuter on the New York, New Haven & Hartford Railroad. He was said to drive to Newtown station in a two-wheeled gig with a pair of Dalmatians running by it.

An extensive traveler, he crossed the American continent from ocean to ocean 96 times. He also made frequent trips to Europe and Mexico. He traveled to the Hawaiian Islands and spoke highly of them, believing them to be a desirable, necessary acquisition for the United States.

It was said of Mr Hawley that he was a “gentleman of character, of excellent business capacity and strict integrity, whose geniality and kindly personal traits have won him many friends.”

Mr Hawley was born in Bridgeport on January 9, 1834, the son of Thomas Hawley and Jane Maria (Nichols) Hawley of Monroe. He was a member of one of the oldest families of New England and descended from Joseph Hawley, who came to America from England in 1629-30 and in 1650 purchased property in Stratford.

Marcus Hawley’s grandfather, Captain Abijah Hawley, was head of the firm of Abijah Hawley & Company, which was engaged in the grain business and West Indies trade. His father, Thomas Hawley, became one of the leading businessmen of the city, operating a highly successful hardware business.

Mr Hawley was educated in private schools in Bridgeport and when he was 16 his father decided he should work at the family’s hardware store, where he received his preliminary business training.

Following the discovery of gold in California in 1849, Thomas Hawley founded a hardware and implement business in San Francisco under the name of Hawley & Company, with which Marcus Hawley was prominently connected. In 1882 the business was incorporated under the name of Hawley Brothers Hardware Company, with Mr Hawley as president and his brother, George, as vice president and treasurer. It eventually became one of the largest of its kind in the country. Its trade connections eventually reached across the country, with branches in Los Angeles and San Diego.

Mr Hawley, it was said, thoroughly mastered the business and enlarged its scope, studying and meeting the demands of the trade while also anticipating future requirements.

The firm’s agricultural interests were a large part of their business, and it was a common occurrence to ship out trainloads of agricultural goods. At one time, it was said, the business virtually controlled the California market on nails because it was the only jobber with large stocks in San Francisco and en route by sea. It was said that more than once Mr Hawley bought up all the stocks of nails and wire obtainable in New York, purchasing at one time 25,000 kegs of nails in one order and 40,000 in one week.

In 1856, Mr Hawley married Sarah A. Booth of Newtown, a daughter of Dr Cyrenius H. and Sarah (Edmond) Booth. They began their married life in Bridgeport, but moved to the Booth family homestead on Main Street in 1871 when it was remodeled.

Mr and Mrs Hawley had four children, but only Mary lived to adulthood. Three sons died young.

Locally, Mr Hawley was once president of the Newtown Library Association. It was said he was an ardent Republican, and was named several times by his party to make a “hopeless” run for the Legislature. At the time of his death he was warden of the borough.

He was a member of the South Congregational Church of Bridgeport and later a regular attendee and supporter of the Congregational Church in Newtown. He also took an interest in Trinity Church, where members of his family were communicants.

In January 1894, The Newtown Bee reported on the occasion of Mr Hawley’s 46th round trip from the Atlantic to the Pacific. Mr Hawley, The Bee noted, was reluctant to be interviewed.

 Mr Hawley started west on November 27, taking the Chicago Limited to Chicago and then the Atchison & Topeka to San Francisco, arriving December 3. He had found business there better than he had anticipated, especially in southern California. While in Los Angeles, Mr Hawley met with leading businessmen and found them confident that business had seen its worst, he said.

Mr Hawley said he found the climate in Los Angeles delightful and that his hotel table had been furnished with ripe strawberries. He attended Christmas festivities there and noted the decoration of the churches was superior to those of the east because they were in the “land of flowers.”

“By the way,” Mr Hawley said, “it was my good fortune to escape being on a train that was held up by robbers.” He was just 24 hours in advance of that train.

 On November 6, 1896, The Bee reported that Mr Hawley had met at his New York office with a representative of the Russian government who renewed his contract for another year with the Hawley Brothers’ Hardware.

Mr Hawley died at his home on January 15, 1899. In the January 20 issue, The Bee wrote: “He had passed a comfortable night, had taken some coffee or other refreshment shortly after awakening and while waiting for his breakfast, complained suddenly of feeling faint and called for air. His wife and daughter hastened at once to his side, a messenger was dispatched for Dr Smith, who quickly arrived, and applied proper restoratives, but Mr Hawley was beyond earthly aid and in a short space of time had breathed his last.”

The paper noted that Mr Hawley had been ill with “nervous prostration for about a month, which terminated on Sunday morning in heart failure.”

He was survived by his widow; his daughter, Mary; two brothers, George and Edward; and a sister, Mary Hawley Eaton. His brother, Walter, had died in 1892 and a sister, Jennie, died young.

His funeral was held from his residence, with the Rev G.T. Linsley and the Rev O.W. Barker officiating. Burial was in Newtown Cemetery.

In his eulogy, Rev Barker said he felt a sense of personal loss. “Coming as a young man to this my first pastorate, he often took occasion to befriend me. I shall miss his warm grasp of the hand, his kind word of greeting, his encouragement in many ways.”

One writer described Mr Hawley’s life as one of notable achievement. It was said he experienced keen joy in finding the solution for intricate and involved business problems and that he was so regarded for his judgment that other businessmen did not hesitate to follow his example.

On January 20, The Bee wrote: “Mr Hawley was a man of genial temperament, a pleasant gentleman to converse with, and scores of people throughout the Housatonic valley will learn of his death with regret. He was a man who delighted in business, and carried enthusiasm into everything he undertook. But withal he was conservative and wise in his business dealings, and it is supposed has left a large fortune.”

On April 21, 1999, The Newtown Bee printed the inventory of Mr Hawley’s estate, which totaled $531,810.50. It was this large fortune that made it possible for his daughter, Mary, to give so generously to the town she loved. But she remembered her father, giving $100,000 to the First Ecclesiastical Society in a trust fund for its use in memory of her father, the man who made all her good works possible.

Information for this story was found in the League of Women Voters’ Newtown Past and Present and Directions and Images, and the History of Fairfield County, Vol.  3, by Wilson.