No. 4356 Joseph Francis Howland, 1845-1914
From American Series of Popular Biographies. Massachusetts Edition. This Volume Contains Biographical Sketches of Representative Citizens of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Boston: Graves & Steinbarger, 1891.
Joseph Francis Howland, president of Walter Baker & Co., Ltd., chocolate manufacturers, of Boston, Dorchester district, was born in New Bedford, Mass., January 22, 1845, son of Frederick P. and Sarah Slade (Marvel) Howland, married Helen Delano March 17, 1870. He is of the ninth generation in descent from Henry Howland, the founder of this branch of the Howland family in New England. The line is: Henry, Zoeth, Nathaniel, James, James, Timothy, Abner, Frederick P., Joseph Francis.
In the record of the allotment of cattle at Plymouth in 1624, Henry Howland is mentioned as owner of the black cow. It is supposed that he came over with his brother Arthur, who settled at Marshfield; and the conclusion that they were brothers of John Howland, the “Mayflower” Pilgrim, is supported by the fact that Humphrey Howland of London, England, in his will, probated in 1646, names as his brothers Arthur, John and Henry. Henry Howland was one of the earliest settlers of Duxbury, where he was a large landholder. He served as Constable in 1635, and for some years as Highway Surveyor. About the year 1657 he joined the Society of Friends. Imprisonment and fines for holding Quaker meetings and for entertaining Quakers followed at various times, and in 1659 for this cause he was disfranchised. Yet he kept the faith, as did his wife, Mary Newland.
Zoeth Howland was killed by the Indians in the time of King Philip’s War. Nathaniel, son of Zoeth by his wife, Abigail, was one of the leading citizens of Dartmouth (then including New Bedford, Westport, Fairhaven, Acushnet) and an approved minister of the Society of Friends. He married Rose Allen, a member of the Apponeganset meeting. James, son of Nathaniel, born in 1689, a birthright Friend, lost his membership by marrying out of meeting. His wife was Deborah Cook.
James Howland, Jr., son of James and Deborah, married Elizabeth Wing. His son Timothy, the seventh of a family of fifteen children, married Hannah Dillingham, and was the father of four children. Of these Abner, the eldest, born in 1782, married first Susan Shearman, by whom he had one child, and second, in 1809, Elizabeth Bliss, by whom he had seven.
Frederick P., the third child, was born October 28, 1811, in New Bedford. He was a ship-carpenter. For more than a quarter of a century of his active life he resided in California, having gone there as one of the earliest of the forty-niners. There his business was the buying of ships; and among the noted condemned vessels he bought to break up was the “Cadmus,” in which Lafayette came to this country. In 1876 he became a resident of Boston, where he died February 19, 1890. His wife, whose maiden name was Sarah Slade Marvel, died in Boston, October 17, 1887. She was born in 1813, and they were married in 1832. They had four children: Sarah Jane, born in 1833; William Frederick Plummer, born in 1835; Charles Henry, born in 1840; and Joseph Francis, the subject of this sketch, known as J. Frank Howland. Sarah Jane died in 1866, survived by her third husband, Davis A. Blake, and no children. Charles Henry Howland married first Mary A. Cook , and, second, Elizabeth M. Ray, by whom he had six children, namely: Frederick William born in August, 1880; George Alchorn, born in August, 1876; Jessie E., born in December, 1874 (deceased); Joseph Francis, (deceased); Sarah Jane, born in April, 1886,; and Francis, born in February, 1889. George Alchorn Howland married Delia Maria Morell, of Franklin. They have one child, Florence Emerson, born March 18, 1899.
J. Frank Howland attended the public schools until he was sixteen years of age. He then made a trip to California, where he remained for a year. Returning to his native city in 1862, he was employed in the law office of Brigadier-general Richard A. Peirce until September, 1863, when he entered the Boston office of Walter Baker & Co. The assiduity with which he discharged his duties and his readiness in learning the details of the business soon won the confidence and strong personal regard of the Hon. Henry L. Pierce, the owner and manager of the works. Mr. Pierce was often absent from his office for long periods during his frequent visits to Europe and while discharging his duties in the various positions to which he was elected in the city, State, and national governments; and during those absences Mr. Howland was entrusted not only with the direction of the great and constantly growing business of the Walter Baker Company, but with Mr. Pierce’s personal financial affairs.
When the company was reorganized as a corporation in 1895, Mr. Howland was made president and general manager. During his unbroken service of thirty-six years the business has steadily increased until the comparatively small concern of 1863 has come to be the largest manufacturing establishment of its kind on this continent. It is not too much to say that this remarkable result is due in large measure to the intelligent, conscientious, and unremitting labors of Mr. Howland.
He has often been urged to accept nominations or appointments to State and city offices; but, with the exception of two years’ service in the City Council of Boston (1882-83), he has always declined public office. In the way of business he served several years as director in the Laurel Lake Mills, Fall River, director in the Blue Hill National Bank of Milton, and as one of the trustees of Cedar Grove Cemetery.
Mr. Howland is a member of the Algonquin Club of Boston, the Temple club (the oldest social club, in Boston), Dorchester Yacht Club and Wollaston Golf Club.