Person:George Wolf (24)

Who’s Who in America. ^S1
Wolf, George (Aug. 12, 1777-Mar. 11, 1840), congressman from Pennsylvania, governor, was born in Northampton County, Pa., the son of George and Mary Margaret Wolf. His father emigrated in 1751 from Alsace, Germany, to Northampton County, where he established himself on a farm in Allen Township. The boy obtained his education in a classical school near home. After completing his course he worked for a time on his father’s farm and later acted as principal of the local academy. He was clerk in the prothonotary’s office in Easton, and, with his regular duties, he read law in the office of John Ross, a lawyer of that county and later a judge of the state supreme court. At the age of twenty-one, he was admitted to the bar, and, opening an office in Easton, he soon built up a lucrative legal practice. On June 5, 1798, he married Mary Erb. They had nine children. The following year he entered politics as an adherent of the Republican-Democratic party in the state and was appointed postmaster of Easton in 1801. After he served for a time as clerk of the orphans’ court of Northampton County. He was a member of the lower house of the state legislature in 1814. After his defeat for the state Senate in the next election, he devoted his time to his legal practice. Elected to the federal House of Representatives and reelected three times, he served from Dec. 9, 1824, until he resigned in 1829, before the Twenty-first Congress convened. In Congress he was an ardent supporter of the protective tariff and other measures designed to foster American industry. In 1829 he was elected governor on the Democratic ticket and resigned his seat in Congress. To this office he was reelected in 1832. The period of his governorship of six years was one of great activity and intensity of feeling in Pennsylvania, as in the nation as a whole. At the outset, party organizations were being disrupted by the anti-masonic movement, and the state was in the midst of its elaborate and expensive program of internal improvements, which through mismanagement had brought it to the verge of bankruptcy. He soon reestablished the credit of the state through the practice of economy, the reorganization of the financial system of the state and the institution of new taxes. Acting on his recommendation, the legislature in 1830 appointed a commission to revise the statute law of the state, a revision that was badly needed since no revision of any consequence had been made for more than a century. The most enduring achievement of his administration was the passage of the free public school act in 1834. This, the main objective of his policy, he advocated in public addresses and in messages to the legislature with such fervor and logic that the public gradually came to its support. Although an admirer of President Jackson and a stanch upholder of his policy with reference to the nullification proceedings of South Carolina in 1832, he disapproved of the Presidents’ attitude toward the Second United States Bank, and he signed a resolution of the legislature instructing the congressmen from Pennsylvania to labor for the renewal of the bank charter. This action was partly responsible for the disruption of the Democratic party in the state and Wolf’s defeat for a third term in 1835. In 1836 President Jackson appointed him to the newly created post of comptroller of the treasury. Two years later he resigned from this office to accept the collectorship of customs at the port of Philadelphia, a position he held until his death. [C. A. Beck, Kith and Kin of George Wolf (1930); Pa. Archives, 4 ser., Vol. V (1900); W. C. Armor, Lives of the Governors of PA (1872); H. J. Steele, “The Life and Public Service of Governor George Wolf,” Pro. Pa. German Soc., vol. XXXIX (1930).]

For more information, see the EN Wikipedia article George Wolf.

1.   George Wolf, in Who's who in America. (Chicago [Illinois]: A.N. Marquis, 1899-).
2.   George Wolf, in Wikipedia: The Free Encyclopedia.
3.   Beck, Clara A. Kith and kin of George Wolf, governor of Pennsylvania, 1829-1835. (Easton, Pa.: J.S. Correll Co., 1930).
4.   .

   Schools of State to Honor Founder, Northampton County arranges Celebration at Birthplace of Governor Wolf. Centennial Anniversary.
   Bethlehem, Feb. 24, 1934.—Northampton County, the birthplace of Governor George Wolf, “Father of the Pennsylvania Public Schools,” will take a leading part in the Statewide celebration of the centennial anniversary of free education in this State, in the week of April, which has been designated by an official proclamation issued recently by Governor Pinchot, largely at the instance of State Senator Warren R. Roberts, of this city. Preliminary plans have been laid by a countywide committee of Northampton for a celebration to be held on Saturday, April 6, or Sunday, April 7, in the Liberty High School auditorium in this city, followed by a pilgrimage to Bath for a ceremony at the Wolf Academy, the first free public school in this State, and the building in which Governor Wolf learned his A, B, C’s and later was a teacher…..George Wolf is the only Governor of this State who was a native of Northampton County. He was born on August 12, 1777, in East Allen Township, Northampton County, near the present Borough of Bath, about eight miles north of this city. It was eight years after his birth that the private school now known as the Wolf Academy was erected, close to his home, about a mile south of Bath, in the East Allen Township. The school was erected by the citizens of the Scotch-Irish settlement near Bath in order that their “sons should have a better education that they could secure elsewhere.” Roberts Andrews, a graduate of Trinity College, Dublin, was the first principal. It came to be known as the Wolf Academy at a later date and is still known by that name, although it is private property today….
   Cradle of Public Education in State
   The old Wolf Academy, near Bath, Pa., the first free public school building in this State, which is still standing. It was erected in 1785. It was converted into a public school immediately upon the passage of a creating free public education in this State in 1834 under Governor Wolf. The old school will be the object of a pilgrimage in connection with a centennial anniversary program to be held in Bethlehem early in April.
   
   George Wolf is the grandfather of E. H. Wolf of Guthrie Center and better known as Judge Wolf. He is also the great grandfather of Sid Wolf, Mrs. Fon Moore, and Mrs. Charles Heise of Guthrie Center and also of Mrs. Arthur Shaefer of Stuart, Iowa.

5.   Article from the centennial celebration of Wolf School. Governor Wolf Building: Until the mid 1800's Easton's children were taught at home or at church. Built in 1893, the Governor Wolf School building has elaborate brickwork, stained glass windows, a bell tower and a spiral staircase in the left tower. The stone entry, called Penny Arch, is topped by a marble globe of the world paid for by school children's pennies. The Wolf Building now houses Northampton County Human Services. The former school on North Second Street was named for Governor Wolf of Easton, founder of the Pennsylvania Free Public School System and proponent of the 1834 School Act. The Act was zealously supported by Wolf but was met with great resentment by the local German population, who feared that formal instruction would be in English. The farming population also opposed the act because adults needed the children at home for farm chores. The loss of church-based education added hostility. Had it not been for Wolf's determination the act may have been repealed. It did, however, cost him his bid for re-election.