Frederick Watts

Frederick Watts (May 9, 1801 – August 17, 1889), is called the “Father of Penn State University” and was a prominent agricultural reformer, lawyer and businessman who headed the U.S. Department of Agriculture as Commissioner of Agriculture from 1871-1877 under President Ulysses S. Grant.

He served as President of the Board of Trustees of Pennsylvania State University (originally known as the Farmer’s High School, then Pennsylvania Agricultural College) from its founding in 1855 through 1874 He was President of the Cumberland Valley Railroad from 1840 to 1873. This early, small-gauge railroad ran from Carlisle to Harrisburg in 1831 and introduced the first "sleeper cars" in America; the bunks were nothing more than three rows of upholstered boards that were folded up during the day and then hung from connecting leather straps at night for sleeping. The first such car, the "Chambersburg," began service in 1839 and the "Carlisle" followed soon afterwards.

Watts was born in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, the son of a prominent lawyer David Watts, and the grandson of a Brigadier General in the American Revolution, also named Frederick Watts. The young Frederick entered Dickinson College in Carlisle in 1815, but did not graduate because of the temporary closing of the school.

He practiced law and held positions in the local courts starting in the 1820s. In 1849 he was appointed as president judge of Pennsylvania’s Ninth Judicial District Court.

In 1827 Watts married Eliza Cranston, who bore three daughters before her death in 1832. In 1835 he married Henrietta Ege in 1835, who bore five sons and one daughter. He was a Whig and a member of St. John's Episcopal Church in Carlisle. He had a law office and residence at 20 East High Street, now part of the Fraternal Order of Eagles in Carlisle. He also lived with his family at "Creekside" on the Conodoguinet, an important example of brick Gothic Revival residential architecture, now on the Cumberland Valley Register of Historic Places, and also one of Carlisle's listed "Civil War Buildings." The covered wooden Watts Bridge spanned the Conodoguinet Creek near here, until it was destroyed by storm and vandals in the 1980s; it was then replaced by a concrete structure.

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