Everett H. Barney

Everett Hosmer Barney (December 7, 1835 –April 1, 1916) was an American businessman and inventor from Massachusetts.

Early and personal life Barney was born in Framingham, Massachusetts to Harriet Hosmer Barney (d. 1847) and Jaries Sidney Barney (d. 1859), the third oldest of an eventual six siblings. His father worked as a manufacturer in Saxonville, producing machinery for woollen mills. Barney attended public school in Framingham. in the early 1900s, and brought the first bicycle to Springfield, Massachusetts.

He personally enjoyed skating and canoeing, having taken up the sport in 1883. He won canoe meets at the Thousand Islands and Lake Champlain in 1886 and 1887, respectively. He was a charter member of both the Springfield Canoe Association (incorporated 1885) and the Springfield Boat Club (incorporated 1892) and, in 1903, became a life member of the American Canoe Association.

Although not attached to any one church, Barney was said to have Congregationalist affiliations.

From 1905 to 1910, Barney was involved in multiple regional organizations, including the Connecticut Navigational Association, the Connecticut River Improvement Association, the Connecticut Valley Historical Society, the Home Market Club, and the Republican Club.

His only child, George Murray Barney, was born on March 27, 1863. He had "business talent," and took up canoeing after his father became interested in the sport. He died unexpectedly at age 26 on May 29, 1889, from "lung fever". Following his son's death, Barney constructed a mausoleum on the estate, in which his son was interred, and in which he and his wife, Eliza Jane Knowles (1830–1905), were also eventually interred. thumb Barney died at his winter home in Orlando, Florida in 1916. He also kept a winter home in Osprey, Manatee County, Florida.

Career In 1851, Barney was hired as a contractor at Hinkley & Drury's, a Boston-based company which made locomotives. He teamed up with a business partner, John Berry, whom he knew from work in Boston, to form the Barney and Berry Company, which began to produce the ice skates that same year by leasing machinery from a gun factory. The steel for the blades was produced in Windsor Locks, Connecticut, while the sheet steel for the tops was imported from England. The company built a factory at the mouth of the Mill River in the South End of Springfield, Massachusetts in 1866;

Philanthropy Barney funded the first public playground in Springfield, known as Fort Gallagher, which was located "along the river bank" on Wilcox Street. He also funded the construction of boathouses for a local high school.