Nathaniel Wheeler

Nathaniel Wheeler (b. Watertown, Litchfield county., Connecticut, September 7, 1820; d. Bridgeport, December 31. 1893) was an American manufacturer and legislator. He became a Senator in Connecticut under the Democrats.

Family background He was the son of David and Sarah (née De Forest) Wheeler and grandson of Deacon James and Mary (née Clark) Wheeler. The founder of his branch of the family, Moses Wheeler, born in Kent, England, was in New Haven, Conn., as early as 1641, and probably was one of the founders of that town. He removed, in 1648, to Stratford, Connecticut, where he carried on his trade of ship-carpenter. He also farmed, and kept the ferry across the Housatonic.

He became an extensive landholder and died in 1698, aged 100 years. Sarah De Forest was descended from a Huguenot family, of Avesnes, France, some of whose members fled to Leyden, Holland, to escape persecution. In 1636 Isaac, son of Jessen and Marie (née Du Cloux) De Forest, emigrated from Leyden to New Amsterdam, and there married Sarah Du Trieux, who bore him 14 children. One of them, David, settled at Stratford. David Wheeler, father of Nathaniel, was a carriage manufacturer.

The latter was admitted to the firm of Warren, Wheeler & Woodruff, which in 1851 was reorganized as Wheeler, Wilson & Co., and in October, 1853, as the Wheeler & Wilson Manufacturing Co., with a capital of $160,000. For lack of adequate facilities, the business having increased largely, the firm, in 1856, moved to Bridgeport, Connecticut, occupying the old Jerome Clock Co. building, to which additions were made from time to time, until it covered about eight acres in 1899. Nathaniel Wheeler was made general manager on the organization of the company, and in 1855 was elected president, retaining his old office. and was one of the commissioners for the building of the state capitol at Hartford. He was a director of the New York, New Haven and Hartford railroad and of the City National Bank, an incorporator of the People's Bank, vice-president of the board of trade and of the board of education in 1885-86. He favoured every project to benefit Bridgeport and was held in high esteem.

Family

Nathaniel Wheeler was married twice: first, at Watertown, November 7, 1842, to Huldah Bradley, who bore him four children and died in 1857, leaving a son, Samuel, and a daughter, Ellen B., wife of Edward Harral; second, to Mary E. Crissey, who bore him four sons, two of whom, Archer and William Bishop, with their mother, survived. Nathaniel Wheeler died at his residence on Golden hill, Bridgeport, on December 31. 1893.