Friends Burial Society Project
Josiah Hoopes
November 9, 1832 - January 16, 1904
ID# B19-6
by Jim Jones
HIS 480-80
Spring 1995
The history of West Chester's Quaker1 community in the
nineteenth century provides numerous examples of adaptation to
the rapid changes of the Industrial Revolution. From its
beginning as a collection of farms at the western edge of William
Penn's "Welsh Tract,"2 West Chester developed into a prosperous
agricultural community that successfully won recognition as the
county seat of Chester County in 1780.3 In this early period,
Quaker families like the Prices, Hoopes, Marshalls and Sharpleses
played prominent roles in the local economy as farmers and
landowners who shipped wheat and corn to markets in Philadelphia
and Wilmington.
The nineteenth century brought enormous change to West
Chester.4 The first change was population growth, which derived
both from the fertility of the local inhabitants, and immigration
----------------------------------------------------------------Year Total
Quakers
Quakers/Total
1800 374 50
13.4
1810 471 108 22.9
1820 553 168 31.5
1830 1244 229 18.4
1840 2152 317 14.7
1850 3172 412 13.0
1857 4357 463 10.6
1860 4757 490 10.3
1870 5630 564 10.0
1880 7046 596 8.5
1890 8028 605 7.5
Table I: Population of West Chester in the Nineteenth Century
----------------------------------------------------------------from Europe and the southern United States (see table I).5 The
second major change was the introduction of long distance
communications, as the state constructed roads6 and established a
postal system,7 and private companies built railroads8 and
telegraph lines.9 The third change was the foundation of
manufacturing enterprises that took advantage of the increased
availability of labor and the improved transportation connections
to growing markets throughout the United States.
By the time that the borough of West Chester was
incorporated in 1799,10 members of the Hoopes family had already
owned land in adjacent Goshen township for more than a century.
Josiah Hoopes was the son of Pierce and Sarah Hoopes, devout
Quakers of the fourth generation of Hoopes in the area. Pierce
worked as a farmer and lumberman,11 and by 1830, he operated a
shop in the borough.12 The following year, he married Sarah, a
prominent Quaker teacher.13 Their first son, Josiah, was born in
November of the following year, 1832.14 They had two more sons,
Abner and James Andrews, but only Josiah and Abner survived
childhood.15
Josiah's parents were very active in the local Quaker
community. Although they married at the Friends meeting in
Darby,16 Pierce and his wife Sarah became members of the West
Chester Friends meeting on High Street.17 After slavery split the
West Chester Friends in 1830,18 they remained members of the
Hicksite meeting on North High Street.19 Sarah became a minister
in the 1840s and later, a minister at the Birmingham Meeting
until her death in 1887.20 Pierce became one of the original
directors of the Friends cemetery in West Chester in 1871, and at
the time of his death in 1888, served as elder of the Birmingham
meeting.21
As West Chester changed in the nineteenth century, the two
brothers turned their family's land into one of the leading
nursery supply companies in the United States. Josiah Hoopes
started the company by building a greenhouse on one acre of his
father's land in 1853, and stocking it with specimens imported
from England.22 His brother Abner joined him in 1857,23which
allowed Josiah to open a stall at the West Chester market.24 They
changed the name to Hoopes Brothers, although an advertisement of
the period still referred to the business as the Cherry Hill
Nursery.25 In 1866, they took on a third partner, George Brinton
Thomas, to manage their books and run their office.26
The end of the Civil War inaugurated a period of prosperity
for both the Hoopes brothers and their company. Less than two
months after Lee's surrender at Appomattox Courthouse, Abner
married Malinda Marshall Worthington, the daughter of a prominent
West Chester family,27 and they had two children, Sarah Andrews
and Wilmer Worthington.28 In the next two decades, Abner became a
founding director of the Edison Electric Illuminating Company29
and the West Chester Board of Trade.30 By the time he died in
1920, Abner held investments in a wide variety of mining,
railroad and manufacturing companies.31
While Abner started a family and invested in new technology,
Josiah pursued a more intellectual life. He became an expert on
ornamental trees and had a species named after him.32 His Book of
Evergreens was published in 1868,33 and as the growth of middle
class incomes began to provide a market for leisure activities,
Josiah wrote on horticulture for a variety of magazines and
newspapers, including The New York Tribune. He also became
active in local and regional civic groups and served as a trustee
of the West Chester State Normal School,34 and president of the
State Horticultural Association of Pennsylvania.35
His research on ornamental and fruit trees earned Josiah a
national reputation. He served as the vice-president of the
American Pomological Society36 and became a member of the Academy
of Natural Sciences. He was also named an honorary member of the
Massachusetts Horticultural Society and the National Society of
Brazil. Josiah traveled widely in Europe and the United States,
where he obtained plant specimens for Hoopes Brothers & Thomas.37
By the turn of the century, Hoopes Brothers & Thomas had
expanded to serve much of the eastern United States. Thanks to
West Chester's excellent railroad connections to Philadelphia,
they were able to ship plants rapidly to the rest of the
country.38 Hoopes Brothers & Thomas opened a branch office in
Nashville in the late 1890s39 and occupied an office in the
prestigious Stephen Girard building in downtown Philadelphia in
1901.40
While Josiah was successful in his business and intellectual
endeavors, his personal life appears to have been less
successful. He married late, in 1898, when he was already 66
years old, and chose a woman who was thirty years younger than
himself.41 His bride, Ellen Agnes Morgan, was the daughter of a
local Catholic farmer and his wife, Patrick and Johanna Morgan.42
Their only child, Josiah Morgan Hoopes, was born just over a year
later,43 but since Josiah lived only six more years, he must not
have known his father well.
After Josiah's death in 1904,44 his brother Abner and nephew
Wilmer bought out the shares of Josiah and George Thomas,45 and
restructured the company in 1907, bringing in new investors from
Philadelphia and Montgomery County.46 Their efforts were
successful, because in 1932, during the height of the Great
Depression, Hoopes Brothers & Thomas (as the company continued to
be known) still employed more than one hundred people, making it
the third largest employer in West Chester.47 The lives of the two
cousins, Wilmer and Josiah Morgan, turned out very differently.
Wilmer was already thirty-four at the time of his uncle's death,
and he purchased ten percent of Hoopes Brothers & Thomas when it
reorganized in 1907.48 After his father died in 1920, Wilmer
became president of Hoopes Brothers & Thomas,49 although his
interests shifted as he became, first director and later,
chairman of the National Bank of Chester County.50 He remarried
at age sixty-four, and upon his death in 1955, he was a wealthy
man with investments in a variety of banking and manufacturing
concerns.51
Despite his family's long history as Quakers, Josiah Morgan
completed high school at St. Agnes Catholic High School in West
Chester, and attended Villanova University.52 Like his cousin
Wilmer, Josiah Morgan also married twice, but in Josiah's case
the reason was tragic. His first wife, Evelyn Tervey from
Lindenwold, New Jersey, died during childbirth in 1936. Josiah
Morgan married Ruth Sober, a nurse from the Chester County
Hospital a few months later, and sired two more children in the
next decade.53 He became a landscape architect and was at one
time, the West Chester borough Tree Commissioner,54 but he died
insolvent in 1972, with total assets of barely more than $700.55
CONCLUSION
Josiah Hoopes was a hard-working and intelligent man who
adapted his family's traditional occupation, farming, to the
changing world of the nineteenth century, and produced an
extraordinarily successful nursery business that earned him the
respect of people all over the world. His family ties were
strong enough for him to bring his brother into the business, but
he was also practical enough to bring in an outsider, George
Thomas, when the demands of the business grew beyond their
ability to manage it.
Josiah's vision proved inadequate in the long run, because
while he built up the business, his brother Abner built a family
and in particular, provided an heir. Although Josiah married and
produced an offspring late in his life, it was Abner, and his son
Wilmer, who inherited the business following Josiah's death in
1904. Both men became wealthy as they diversified their
interests, while Josiah's own son, Josiah Morgan, died nearly
penniless.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Primary Sources
"Application of Hoopes Brothers and Thomas, Co." (26 March 1907),
in Chester County Archives, Corporation Book 6, 143.
"Constitution of the Friends Burial Society" (17 August 1871), in
Chester County Archives, Corporation Book 1, pp372-374.
"Inventory and Appraisement of all goods, chattels and credits of
Wilmer W. Hoopes, late of the Borough of West Chester, Chester
county, Pennsylvania, deceased," Will #58800 (1955), in Chester
County Courthouse.
"The first and final account of Wilmer Worthington Hoopes,
Executor of the last will and testament of Abner Hoopes, late of
the Borough of West Chester, Chester County, Pennsylvania,
deceased," Will #37775, in Chester County Archives.
Chester Country Trust Company, "The second and final account"
(West Chester, n.d. [March 11, 1910]), in Chester County
Archives, Will n 29810.
Chester Country Trust Company, "The first and partial account"
(West Chester, 8 February 1906), in Chester County Archives, Will
n 29810.
Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, Department of Revenue, "Notice of
Filing of Appraisal #15-73-25711 (April 1972), in Chester County
Courthouse. (See Josiah Morgan Hoopes, Will #1973257.)
Secondary Sources
Carlson, Robert E., compiler and editor. Index to Chester Countv
(Pennsylvania) Biography. West Chester, 1983), 75.
Darlington, William. Directory of the Borough of West Chester,
for 1857: containing a complete history of the borough from its
first settlement to the present time .. West Chester, PA:
Wood & James, Publishers, E.F. James, printer, 1857.
Divine, Robert A., T.H. Breen, George M. Frederickson & R. Hal
Williams. America, Past and Present, vol. 1. Scott, Foresman and
Company, 1984.
Fuller, Gerald R., June Markus Hoopes & Lillian Fredsall Webster,
compilers and editors. The Hoopes Family Record, Vol. I, The
First Six Generations. Houston, Texas: The Hoopes Family
Organization, Inc., 1979.
Fuller, Gerald R., June Markus Hoopes & Lillian Fredsall Webster,
compilers and editors, The Hoopes Family Record, Vol. II, The
Seventh and Eighth Generations. Houston, Texas: The Hoopes
Family Organization, Inc., 1979.
Heathcote, Charles William. History of Chester County
Pennsylvania. West Chester, PA: Horace F. Temple, 1926.
Heathcote, C.W. History of Chester County Pennsylvania.
Harrisburg: National Historical Association, Inc., 1932.
Jacob, Norma, editor. Ouaker roots: the story of Western
Ouarterly Meeting of Philadelphia Yearly Meeting of the Religious
Society of Friends. Kennett Square, Pa.: Graphics Standard, Inc,
1980.
Marriage notice of Pierce and Sarah Hoopes in Friends
.Intelligencer, Vol. XLVII (1831), 338.
Meine, Franklin J., editor-in-chief. Webster's Encyclopedic
Dictionax:y. Chicago: Columbia Educational Books, Inc., 1940.
Obituary of Josiah Hoopes in Friends Intelligencer, Vol. LXI, n 4
(lst month, 23, 1904).
Obituary of Sarah Hoopes in Friends Intelligencer, Vol. XLIV, n
42. 10 month, 15, 1887.
Sharpless, Alfred, A History of Railroading in Chester County in
the Daily Local News (West Chester, January 20, 1898).
Thompson, W.W., editor. Chester County Pennsylvania and its
People. Chicago and New York: The Union History Company, 1898.
Wheeler,
American
Company,
William Bruce & Susan D. Becker, Discovering the
Past, 2nd edition, Vol. II. Boston: Houghton Mifflin
1990.
Wiley, Samuel T. Biographical and Portrait Cyclopedia of Chester
County, Pennsylvania, comprising a historical sketch of the
county. Philadelphia, Richmond IN & Chicago IL: Gresham
Publishing Company, 1893.
1
I
I have used the term "Quaker" throughout this essay for the sake of clarity, but the word "Quaker" was originally a
pejorative term used by English authorities to describe followers of James Naylor. They preferred the phrase
"Children of the Light" and refer to themselves as "Friends." Robert A. Divine, T.H. Breen, George M. Frederickson
& R. Hal Williams, America, Past and Present, vol. 1 (Scott, Foresman and Company, 1984), 53.
2
W.
W. W. Thompson, editor, Chester County Pennsylvania and its People (Chicago and New York: The Union History
Company, 1898), 70.
3
Charles
Charles William Heathcote, History of Chester County Pennsylvania (West Chester, PA: Horace F. Temple, 1926),
72.
4
For
For an overview of change in the United States in the late nineteenth century, see William Bruce Wheeler & Susan
D. Becker, Discovering the American Past, 2nd edition, vol. II (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1990), 51-57.
5
The
The figures for West Chester's total from 1800 to 1850 are from William Darlington, Directory of the Borough of
West Chester, for 1857: containing a complete history of the borough from its first settlement to the present time ...
(West Chester, PA: Wood & James, Publishers, E.F. James, printer, 1857), 22. The 1850 figures are confirmed by,
and figures for 1860-1900 were obtained from, Samuel T. Wiley, Biographical and Portrait Cyclopedia of Chester
County, Pennsylvania, comprising a historical sketch of the county (Philadelphia, Richmond IN & Chicago IL:
Gresham Publishing Company, 1893), 150. The figures for the Quaker population were calculated from gravestones
located at the Friends Burial Society cemetery on Rosedale Avenue in West Chester.
6
William
William Penn laid out Street Road (PA 926, two miles south of West Chester), in 1683. Norma Jacob, editor,
Ouaker roots: the story of Western Ouarterly Meeting of Philadelphia Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of
Friends (Kennett Square, Pa.: Graphics Standard, Inc, 1980), 2. For a reference to the Wilmington to Reading road
in 1803, see Heathcote, History of Chester County (1926), 90. For the road surveyed from Philadelphia to Strasburg
in 1793, and the road from New Hope to Oxford in 1830 (both of which passed through West Chester) see
Darlington, Directory of the Borough of West Chester, 19 & 36.
7
The first post office was created in 1804. Heathcote, History of Chester Countv (1926), 92.
8
Alfred
Alfred Sharpless, A History of Railroading in Chester County in the Daily Local News (West Chester, January 20,
1898), 5; Heathcote, History of Chester County (1926), 93.
9
The
The first telegraph line reached West Chester in 1851. Darlington, Directory of the Borough of West Chester, 45.
10
Heathcote,
Heathcote, History of Chester County (1926), 31.
11
Gerald R. Fuller, June Markus Hoopes & Lillian Fredsall Webster, compilers and editors, The Hoopes Family
Record, Vol. I, The First Six Generations (Houston, Texas: The Hoopes Family organization, Inc., 1979), 329.
12
Wiley,
Wiley, Biographical and Portrait Cyclopedia, 264.
13
Marriage
Marriage notice in Friends Intelligencer, Vol. XLVII (1831), 338.
14
Robert
Robert E. Carlson, compiler and editor, Index to Chester County (Pennsylvania) Biography (West Chester, 1983),
75.
15
Fuller
Fuller et al, The Hoopes Family Record, Vol. I, 329.
16
Ibid.,
Ibid., 329.
17
For a reference to Sarah as minister at the High Street Friends meeting, see Darlington, Directory of the Borough of
West Chester, 99.
18
Thompson,
Thompson, Chester County, 753.
19
The
The Hicksite division took place in 1827 when a group of Quakers led by Elias Hicks decided to take a more
activist stand against slavery. Wiley, Biographical and Portrait Cyclopedia, 95.
20
Sarah
Sarah Hoopes, death notice in Friends Intelligencer, Vol. XLIV, n 42 (10 month, 15, 1887), 664.
21
"Constitution
"Constitution of the Friends Burial Society" (17 August 1871), in Chester County Archives, Corporation Book 1,
pp372-374.
22
Fuller
Fuller et al, The Hoopes Family Record, Vol. I, 573.
23
Thompson,
Thompson, Chester County, 977. 24
24
Darlington,
Darlington, Directory of the Borough of West Chester, 114.
25
Darlington,
Darlington, Directory of the Borough of West Chester, 124.
26
Extract
Extract from George P. Donehoo, Pennsylvania, A History (n.d. [pre-1919]), concerning the firm of Hoopes Bros.
& Thomas Nursery Co., in Gerald R. Fuller, June Markus Hoopes & Lillian Fredsall Webster, compilers and editors,
The Hoopes Family Record, Vol. II, The Seventh and Eighth Generations (Houston, Texas: The Hoopes Family
Organization, Inc., 1979), 252.
27
They
They were married on May 22, 1865. Fuller et al, The Hoopes Family Record, Vol. I, 574.
28
Ibid., 574. Wilmer was born on November 9, 1871.
29
Thompson,
Thompson, Chester County, 610.
30
Thompson, Chester County, 890.
31
"The
"The first and final account of Wilmer Worthington Hoopes, Executor of the last will and testament of Abner
Hoopes, late of the Borough of West Chester, Chester County, Pennsylvania, deceased," Will #37775, in Chester
County Archives.
32
Picea
Picea ipungens glauca var Hoopesii. See Fuller et al, The Hoopes Family Record, Vol. I, 573.
33
Josiah Hoopes, The Book of Evercrreens (New York: Orange Judd Co., 1868).
34
Fuller
Fuller et al, The Hoopes Family Record, Vol. I, 574.
35
Ibid., 573.
36
Webster's
Webster's Encyclopedic Dictionary (Chicago: Columbia Educational Books, Inc., 1940), 556, defines pomology as
"the branch of knowledge that deals with fruits; the cultivation of fruit-trees."
37
Fuller
Fuller et al, The Hoopes Family Record, Vol. I, 573.
38
West
West Chester had two rail lines to Philadelphia via Malvern (finished in 1833) and Media (opened in 1858). From
Philadelphia, there were rail connections to the rest of the country. Sharpless, A History of Railroading, 1.
39
Thompson, Chester County, 978.
40
Extract
Extract from George P. Donehoo, Pennsylvania, A History (n.d. [pre-1919]), concerning Hoopes Bros. & Thomas
Nursery Co., in Fuller et al, The Hoopes Family Record, Vol. II, 252-253.
41
They
They were married on March 7, 1898. Fuller et al, The Hoopes Family Record, Vol. I, 573.
42
Darlington,
Darlington, Directory of the Borough of West Chester, 82. On Morgan's religion, see "Funerals" in Daily Local
News (West Chester, Thursday, March 18, 1902), 2. According to papers concerning the estate of Patrick Morgan,
he was a successful farmer who owned property in West Chester and Sadsbury township at the time of his death. See
"Inventory and Appraisement, Estate of Patrick Morgan," (West Chester, 12 April 1876), in Chester County
Archives, Will n l8O42.
43
Josiah
Josiah Morgan Hoopes was born on April 14, 1899. Fuller et al, The Hoopes Family Record, Vol. II, 250.
44
Josiah
Josiah Hoopes' obituary in Friends Intelligencer, Vol. LXI, n 4 (lst month, 23, 1904), 55.
45
Extract
Extract from George P. Donehoo, Pennsylvania, A History (n.d. [pre-1919]), concerning Hoopes Bros. & Thomas
Nursery Co., in Fuller et al, The Hoopes Family Record, Vol. II, 252; Chester County Trust Company, "The first and
partial account" (West Chester, 8 February 1906), in Chester County Archives, Will n 29810; Chester County Trust
Company, "The second and final account" (West Chester, n.d. [March 11, 1910]), in Chester County Archives, Will
n 29810.
46
"Application
"Application of Hoopes Brothers and Thomas, Co." (26 March 1907), in Chester County Archives, Corporation
B ook 6, 143.
47
C. W. Heathcote, History of Chester County Pennsylvania (Harrisburg: National Historical Association, Inc.,
1 9 3 2 ), 1 3 1 .
48
"Application of Hoopes Brothers and Thomas Co." (26 March 1907), in Chester County Archives, Corporation
B ook 6, 143.
49
Carlson,
Carlson, Index, 75.
50
Fuller
Fuller et al, The Hoopes Family Record, Vol. II, 251.
51
"Inventory
"Inventory and Appraisement of all goods, chattels and credits of Wilmer W. Hoopes, late of the Borough of West
Chester, Chester county, Pennsylvania, deceased," Will #58800 (1955), in Chester County Courthouse.
52
Fuller et al, The Hoopes Family Record, Vol. II, 250.
53
Fuller
Fuller et al, The Hoopes Family Record, Vol. II, 250.
54
Ibid.,
Ibid., 250.
55
Commonwealth
Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, Department of Revenue, "Notice of Filing of Appraisal #15-73-25711 (April
1972), in Chester County Courthouse. (See Josiah Morgan Hoopes, Will #1973-257.)