Hiram Burnett

Hiram Burnett (July 5, 1817 at Southborough, Massachusetts – 1906, in Seattle, Washington) was a well-known pioneer of the Puget Sound country, and an honored citizen of Seattle.

His parents were Charles Ripley Burnett and Kezia (Pond) Burnett, both natives of Massachusetts and descendants of colony pioneer ancestry, all of whom followed agricultural pursuits. His father and grandfather made ropes and harnesses as well as farmed.

Hiram Burnett's brother Joseph Burnett was a chemical inventor who originated American manufacture of vanilla extract and founded St. Mark's School in Southborough. Hiram's brother Henry Burnett a fireman and sister Mrs. Parker later Burnell joined him in Seattle. Hiram Burnett arranged passage for them with Asa Mercer.

He was educated in the public schools of the town of Southborough, Massachusetts and at the city of Worcester, Massachusetts. At the age of eighteen years he began learning the carpenter's trade in Framingham, and after four years of service went to Slatersville, Rhode Island, where he continued in that occupation.

He was married in Lowell, Massachusetts, in 1845, to Miss Elizabeth Merriam Gibbs of Framingham, and continued to reside in the State of Rhode Island until 1852, when, after providing comfortable arrangements for his family he started for California. Arriving in San Francisco, he found ready employment in one of the planing mills at $7 per day.

He remained in San Francisco until 1855, and then came to Port Gamble, Washington under engagement with the Puget Mill Company, (a company controlled by the Pope and Talbot families Pope & Talbot) as superintendent of their planing mill, in 1856 he returned to time East for his family, but instead of returning at once to the Pacific coast he located near Lawrence, Kansas. While in Massachusetts he was influenced by the abolitionist Rev. Thomas Wentworth Higginson to join the Massachusetts Emigrant Aid Company and take a part in the struggle known as Bleeding Kansas.

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