Paul Revere Entrepreneur
Paul Revere Entrepreneur
The American patriot Paul Revere we all learned of in school, immortalized in Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s poem “Paul Revere’s Ride“, tells of only a single, isolated event in Revere’s life. Although mostly forgotten, perhaps Revere’s greatest contribution to his country may be in his transition from gifted silversmith to businessman, entrepreneur and industrialist, much of which occurred in the Town of Canton, Massachusetts.
Gilbert Stuart’s portrait of a 78 year old Paul Revere commissioned by his son Joseph Warren Revere
In 1801, at age 65, Paul Revere risked “every farthing” he owned to set up a mill to roll copper into the sheets that would keep the hulls of the fledgling U.S. Navy’s boats barnacle-free and protected from rot and worms. He chose a site in what is now Canton, Massachusetts to be home to the new mill. Revere was familiar with the site. In 1776 the Continental Congress commissioned him to oversee the construction of a gunpowder mill there. The land’s proximity to waterpower provided by the Neponset River made the site a natural choice for a business that needed large amounts of energy to build new products.
Revere purchased the site, using $25.000 of his own money and a $6,200 loan, from two men who owned and operated a large iron forge and two nearby factories. The site included a two-story frame house, a triphammer shop, and a “cole” (sic) house. A legal question of his rights to use water power supplied by the Neponset was eventually resolved.
The Revere Copper Company landed its first major contract in 1802 — an order for 6,000 feet of copper sheathing to cover the dome of the relatively new Massachusetts State House in Boston.
Singapore’s Revere Bell on display at the National Museum of Singapore in February 2015. The inscription of the bell is: “Revere, Boston 1843. Presented to St Andrew’s Church, Singapore, by Mrs Maria Revere Balestier of Boston, United States of America”.
The bells were reportedly “of superior metal and sound” and typically weighed about 900 pounds. At least two of the Revere bells hung in Canton. One, installed in the First Parish Unitarian Universalist Church in 1824, remains there today, according to late Canton Historical Society member Ed Bolster. Another hung in the belfry of the Baptist Church in South Canton in 1839, but was later replaced with a steel bell.
Canton Dale
Paul Revere wrote a poem to express how much he enjoyed his busy and productive Canton Dale life that included managing the mill, hunting, reading, socializing with neighbors and relaxing. A few verses are reproduced below:
At early morn I take my round,
Invited first by hammer’s sound;
The furnace next; then Roleing-Mill;
‘Till Breakfast’s call’d, my time doth fill;
Then round my Acres (few) I trot,
To see what’s done and what is not.
Give orders what ought to be done,
Then sometimes take my Dog and Gun.
Under an aged spreading Oak.
At noon I take my favorite Book
To shun the heat and feed the Mind,
In elbow chair I sit reclined…
At eve’ within my peacefull Cot,
Sometimes I meet, and sometimes not,
The Parson, Docter; or some Friend,
Or neighbour kind, one hour to spend;
In social chat, our time we pass;
Drink all our Friends, in parting Glass
The Parson, Docter; neighbour gone
We prepare for bed, and so trudge on.
