Hudson Valley

51300.

Whitehouse Shoe Factory, Po’keepsie, NY. This factory was the workplace of over 400 men, and almost everyone in the city would own a pair of shoes or boots made by J.O. Whitehouse and Company. John Osborne Whitehouse was born in Rochester New Hampshire in 1817 and worked on a modest farm until he was 18 years old. He then made his way into Brooklyn to begin his business career and he appears to have succeeded rather quickly. By the early 1860s he began the firm of J.O. Whitehouse and Company which manufactured boots and shoes, and it wasn’t long before he followed in the footsteps of several other entrepreneurs and brought his company to Poughkeepsie. In 1870, he hired local architect and builder J.I. Vail, to construct a massive factory that ran from Main street, north on Cherry and sat up against the Fall-Kill creek. At the height of its operations, the factory employed over 400 men. He also invested in trains and banks and was the largest stockholder in the Ninth National Bank of New York. 1872 was a very busy year for Whitehouse, as not only did he have a factory to oversee but he also established his own newspaper, The Poughkeepsie Daily News. Also during that year he was nominated to run for Congress for the 13th district. He managed to beat out the very popular General John Henry Ketcham and was elected again in 1874. He and his wife had built a home just off of Hooker Avenue which they called Mountain View and in 1868 they purchased Matthew Vassar’s Springside which they added to their property. There appears to be several tragedies in his life even as he appeared to succeed in business and politics. Though there were no reports in the newspapers, John’s daughter Fannie died in the February of 1865. The only written mention of the death is in the book “Old Poughkeepsie New York – 1865” which mentions that she burned to death when her dress caught on fire from a spark in the family home. She was only about 13 years old. Within a few years, two of John’s sons, Spencer and William, would die from consumption. In 1879, his factory was struck by lightning which started a massive fire and killed one of his employees. It was rebuilt soon after but is said to have cost him over $250,000 in losses. Finally, in 1880, his last son, James, who had worked with him at the factory, passed away, also from consumption. This last loss appears to have been too much for Mr. Whitehouse. His health quickly deteriorated and he passed away in August of 1881, at 64 years old. The New York Times claims that he was worth about three million dollars when he passed, all of which he left to his wife Fannie, and his last child Mary Josephine (who married Eugene Howell). The house appears to have remained in the hands of Fannie until her death in 1893, and later her daughter, but by the early 1900s it disappeared to make way for new development. There is no mention as to what became of the house or when or why it was torn down. Nor is there any further mention of the Whitehouse/Howell family in Poughkeepsie after 1910. As for the factory, it was rebuilt but in two different pieces, and not as large. The main portion on Cherry Street later became the home of a cigar factory. These two distinct buildings are still standing today. [Shannon Butler]