Don Alonzo Watson
Born(1807-06-15)June 15, 1807
Palmer, Massachusetts
DiedJanuary 1, 1892(1892-01-01) (aged 84)
Rochester, New York
OccupationBusinessman
Spouse
Caroline M. Manning
​
(m. 1855)​
Signature

Don Alonzo Watson (June 15, 1807 – January 1, 1892) was a Rochester, New York businessman and philanthropist who, with Hiram Sibley helped found Western Union.

Biography

Don Alonzo Watson was born in Palmer, Massachusetts on June 15, 1807.[1]

He was educated at public schools, and trained as a machinist in Boston. In 1832,he moved to Honeoye Falls, New York, where he met Hiram Sibley. They were partners in a profitable machinery business for eight years.[1]

He married Caroline M. Manning in 1855, and they had three children.[1]

In 1856, he was a major investor in Sibley's new Western Union company.

Watson purchased a building for Rochester Homeopathic Hospital which became Genesee Hospital in Rochester.[2] Watson also endowed a professorship to the University of Rochester in acknowledgment of the college's achievements in political science and history.[3]

He died at his home in Rochester on January 1, 1892, and was buried near Sibley in Mount Hope Cemetery.[4]

References

  1. 1 2 3 Hall, Henry, ed. (1896). America's Successful Men of Affairs: An Encyclopedia of Contemporaneous Biography. Vol. II. The New York Tribune Company. p. 837. Retrieved December 8, 2021 – via Internet Archive.
  2. ↑ The History of the Genesee Hospital Archived February 6, 2007, at the Wayback Machine, Via Health
  3. ↑ Political Scientist Appointed to Watson Professorship, University of Rochester Press Releases
  4. ↑ "Don Alonzo Watson". Democrat and Chronicle. January 2, 1892. p. 10. Retrieved December 8, 2021 – via Newspapers.com.


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