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[Home] [Hall-of-Fame Donations] To become a member of the Waltham Museum Hall-of-Fame you must be nationally known and have lived in Waltham. |
The Waltham Museum’s Hall-of-Fame March 10, 2005 (64 Members)
The
Waltham Museum’s Hall-of-Fame consists of men and women who were known, or
whose achievements were known, on a national level, persons usually found in
encyclopedias. Also, part of, or all of they’re achievements were connected
with Waltham, or the member was born in Waltham, or lived in Waltham, or died
and buried in Waltham.
Waltham
1630 to 1738 (Part of Watertown)
John
Winthrop
– Governor of Massachusetts Bay Colony. Led the first band of explorers
along the Charles River in 1631 into what is now Waltham.
John
Oldham – Received the
first grant of land within what is now Waltham. His murder by Indians on Block
Island in 1636 led the Pequot War.
Waltham
1738 to 1816
Samuel
Livermore
– (1732-1803) Delegate to the Continental Congress. Helped adopt the Federal
Constitution. Elected to the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate.
Jonathan
Brewer – A colonel who
was wounded at Bunker Hill. He fought under George Washington during the
Revolutionary War.
Christopher
Gore – Governor of
Massachusetts in 1809 and from 1813 to 1816 he was a member of the U.S. Senate.
Boston
Manufacturing Company
Francis
Cabot Lowell – Co-founder
of the Boston Manufacturing Company. The City of Lowell is named after him.
Patrick
Tracey Jackson –
Co-founder of the Boston Manufacturing Company and also the world’s first
bleachery and dye works.
Paul
Moody – Machinery and
power loom designer for the Boston Manufacturing Company. Moody Street is named
after him.
Civil
War
Nathaniel
P. Banks –
Governor of Massachusetts in 1857, one of the founders of the Republican Party,
Major-General during the Civil War, and later the speaker of the U.S. House of
Representatives.
George
H. Maynard – Won the
Congressional Medal-of-Honor during the Civil War. Later made Major.
Theodore
Lyman – Son of Theodore
Lyman the philanthropist, he was on General Meade’s staff during the Civil
War. Wrote a book called Meade’s Headquarters.
Philanthropist
Theodore
Lyman – Founder of the
Lyman School for Boys. He was Mayor of Boston in 1834.
Waltham
Watch Company
Aaron
Dennison – Founder of the
Waltham Watch Company in 1849. First known as the Boston Watch Company.
Royal
Robbins – Responsible for
the success of the Waltham Watch Company from the business point of view.
Duane
Church – Master
watchmaker and great designer and inventor of watch making machinery.
Charles
Vanderwoerd – Designer of
complicated watch making machinery and watch parts. Later, founder of the
Waltham Watch Tool Company and the United States Watch Company.
Charles
S. Moseley
– Mechanical engineer and designer of watch making machinery for Waltham,
Nashua and the Elgin Watch Company.
Ezra
T. Fitch – President of
the Waltham Watch Company from 1885 to 1910, the greatest years of the company.
D.
D. Palmer - Palmer taught and made watches at 1 Spruce Street in Waltham from 1869
to until he died on April 9, 1907. Part of this period he was a supervisor at
the watch factory.
Edward
Howard - Born in 1813, he helped Aaron
Dennison start the Waltham Development Company. Later it was known as the
Waltham Watch Company. In 1857 he started the Howard Watch Company in Boston.
Inventors
Francis
Fields – A dentist who
accidentally invented chalk crayon in Waltham in 1835.
Luther
Atwood – Chemically
produced kerosene in Waltham in 1855.
William
Atwood – Equally
shares in the first production of kerosene with his brother.
Francis
Davis – Invented power
steering in Waltham in 1926.
John
Lally – A master mason
who invented the Lally column in the 1890’s plus 9 other patents in the
building trade.
Albert
Champion – Employed by
the Waltham Manufacturing Company during the first few years of the 20th
century. He was one of the first
motorcycle racers. Invented the Champion sparkplug.
John
Roberts – Paper
manufacturer and designer in Waltham. Roberts section of Waltham named after
him.
Henry
Richardson – Invented the
first emery wheel and emery cloth in 1880. Started Waltham Emery Wheel Company.
Charles
Herman Metz –
Manufacturer and designer of bicycles, motorcycles, and cars in Waltham. Holder
of many design patents on these vehicles.
Abner
Doble – Started making
steam cars in Waltham in 1912. He went on to become one of the greatest
manufacturers of steam cars.
Zenas
Parmenter – Responsible
for the success of the crayon business in Waltham during the last century. The
Parmenter Crayon Company became the American Crayon Company.
Edwin
Stoddard Lincoln - For a
number of years he maintained an electrical laboratory in Waltham for electrical
testing and research. He is the author of Electrical Savings in Industry
(1924), Electrical Testing in Industry (1925), and others. He was listed
in the National Encyclopedia of American Biography.
Educator
Thomas
Hill – President of
Antioch College (1859 to 1862) and president of Harvard (1863 to 1868). The
former Hill School in Waltham was named after him.
Medicine
Dr.
Alfred Worcester –
Founder of the Waltham Training School for Nurses. Eminent physician and Waltham
Historian.
Aviation
Pioneer
Earle
L. Ovington – He was the
first person to successfully fly an airplane over Waltham and Boston on June 15,
1911.
Music
Effie C. Carlton
– Wrote the music to “Rock-A-Bye-Baby”. Buried at Mount Feake Cemetery in
Waltham.
Dot
Slamin Hill - She was first nationally known in 1933 when she won the world’s
high school baton twirling contest. After World War II she organized a 65 piece
all-male marching American Legion band which performed all over the world.
Author
James J. Fahey
– Wrote Pacific War Diary. One of the best selling books of
World War II.
Annie
Payton Call
- She is listed in the 1920 edition of Who’s, Who in America.
She is author of some nine books. She was a teacher and Principal at Mount
Prospect School on Worcester Lane in Waltham for many years.
George Robert Gissing
- In 1877 while only 20 years old he was teaching English at the old
Waltham High School. He then moved back to England and wrote best selling novels
for the rest of his life.
Sports
Pat Carroll
– On October 28, 1896, he ran the mile in 4 minutes 25 seconds to become the
United States Champion.
Joseph Lazaro
– Winner of the National Blind Golfers Tournament on seven occasions.
Joseph T. Lawless
– In the 1920 World Olympics he won the Gold Medal for the 1,000 yard
shoot while representing the USA.
Angelo Mosca
– Professional football player and famous wrestler. He is a member of the
Canadian Football Hall-of-Fame.
Fred Smerlas
– Professional football player in the National Football League. He was
selected as an All Star five times.
John L. Daley
– America’s Olympic Bantam-weight boxing Champion in 1928. He went on to win
the Silver Medal in this event at the 1928 Olympics.
Shawn
McEachern - A graduate of Waltham High School in 1992 he became a long time
hockey player in the National Hockey League. Also played hockey in the Olympics
for the US hockey team.
Law
F. Lee Bailey
– Who was born in Waltham in 1933, became a nationally prominent attorney with
Dr. Samuel H. Shepard case and others.
Government
Robert
Luce
- Served in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1919 to 1935 and from
1937 to 1941 from the 13th District of Massachusetts which included Waltham
where he lived.
Clarence
Decatur Howe - Born in
Waltham on January 15 1886 and graduated from Waltham High School in 1903. His
career was spent in Canada where he became Minister of Transportation in 1936
and Minister of Munitions during World War II. He died in Montreal on December
31, 1960.
Military
Major
General Franklin M. Davis, Jr.
- One of the highest ranking officers from Waltham since Nathaniel Banks.
Highly decorated in World War II and the Vietnam War.
Rear Admiral Ernest G. Small (1888-1944) - A native of Waltham who became a naval officer during World War I. In World War II he was commander of the cruiser Salt Lake City which took a hit from the Japanese on March 26, 1943 but managed to stay afloat. In 1945 a new destroyer, the U.S.S. Ernest G. Small was named for him and his honor.
Architect
Henry
M. Richardson
- A nationally known architect who designed the historical Paine Estate
in Waltham.
Artist
Eliot
O’Hara - Left his position as the superintendent of the O’Hara Waltham Dial
Company and became one of America’s foremost water-colorist. Author of three
books on water coloring.
Religion
Dr.
John W. McDevitt
- The Superintendent of Schools in Waltham from 1942 to 1960. He was
elected supreme knight of the Knights of Columbus in America in 1964. In 1971,
Pope Paul VI honored him with the Order of Pius IX, the highest papal honor
which can be conferred on a Catholic layman who is not a head of state.
Raytheon
Percy
Spencer – Perfected the magnetron tube for Raytheon during World War II.
Also, developed microwave cooking.
Vannevar
Bush - One of Raytheon’s three founders who gained fame as a scientist,
educator, and author. In 1934 Raytheon relocated to Waltham from Cambridge.
He
later was involved with the Manhattan Program in Washington, D.C.
Lawrence
C. Marshall
- Marshall became president of Raytheon in 1928 and CEO in 1948. Under
his leadership Raytheon was a pioneer in radio tubes and the development of
radar.
Charles
Francis Adams - Adams
became president of Raytheon of Waltham in 1948 and CEO in 1964. He made
Raytheon internationally known for producing both military and civilian
products.
Nursing
Elinor
D. Greggs - She graduated from the Waltham Training
School for Nurses in 1911 and became a Red Cross nurse. She posed for the famous
World War I poster as a Red Cross Nurse. After the war she became a well known
nurse on Indian Reservations in America and later was the national supervisor of
all nurses on Indian Reservations.
Fashions
Yolanda
(Deduca) Celluci
- She is one of the most successful business women in Waltham’s
history. She now operates a multi-million dollar fashion empire on Waverly Oaks
Road in Waltham. She has appeared as a judge in the Miss World and Miss Universe
competitions.
Capitol
Police
John
Michael Gibson
- A 42 year old Waltham native, he was one of two Capitol police officers
killed in a shoot out in the Capitol building in Washington, D.C. on July 24,
1998. A lone gunman stormed the Capitol building. Gibson managed to wound the
gunman before he died. The incident was reported all over the world.
Sea
Scout’s Founder
Arthur
A. Carey - A businessman of Waltham who started the Sea Scouts of America in
Waltham in 1912. He used the
schooner Pioneer for training boys on the Charles River. Listed in Who’s, Who
on America in 1920.
Sesame
Street
Carroll
Spinney - Born in Waltham on December 26, 1933. In 1969 he became world famous
as Big Bird and Oscar the Grouch on Sesame Street.
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