Biography

08/13/1815 - 01/18/1891

Albert Gallatin Brodhead (D10) Carbon, Monroe, Pike, Wayne Counties 1870-1871 (D13) Luzerne, Monroe, Pike Counties 1872

Early Life:

Albert Gallatin Brodhead, born August 13, 1815, Dingman’s Ferry, Pike County, Pennsylvania; son of Garret Brodhead and Cornelia Dingman Brodhead; store clerk, 1827-1834; engaged, mercantile business,1834-1841; married, Sally Ann Tolan Brodhead, 1838, children, Richard Milton Brodhead, Cornelia D Brodhead Enbody, Ellen Toland Brodhead Webb, Mary Bradford Brodhead Hamlin, Annie Lockhart Brodhead Houser; clerk, judge, 1842-1849; engaged, bookkeeping, 1850; railroad superintendent, 1850-1891; Carbon County treasurer; associate district judge, Carbon County, 1869-1874; elected, Democrat, Pennsylvania State Senate, 1870-1872; elected, Speaker, 1871; delegate, Democratic National Convention, 1876; died, January 18, 1891 (aged 75 years, 158 days) Mauch Chunk Cemetery, Jim Thorpe, Carbon County, Pennsylvania.

Early Career:

At age twelve, went to Conyngham, Luzerne County, with his uncle, A. G. Gallatin, in whose store he served as a clerk, 1827-1831; spare time studied; at age sixteen, he went to Chestnut Hill, Northampton County (now Monroe), and for two years served in the firm of Brodhead and Brown.

Returned to the employment of his uncle in Conyngham, 1834. After three years, went with W. H. Cool as a partner, engaged in a mercantile business at Beaver Meadow, Carbon County, Pennsylvania, and Cool and Brodhead prospered for several years. Retiring from the firm, moved to Mauch Chunk, Pennsylvania, 1841.

Clerk, Judge Asa Packer, 1842-1849.

Bookkeeper, Fatzinger and Salkeld, who conducted a store and foundry, resigned, 1850

Appointed, superintendency, Beaver Meadow Railroad and Coal Company, until the properties were merged into those of the Lehigh Valley Railroad Company, 1850-1864; superintendent, Beaver Meadow Division, Lehigh Valley Railroad, 1864-1891.

Professional titles; business ownership; board memberships; local government; club memberships:

Mason, member, Carbon Lodge, No. 242; founder, member, Mauch Chunk Lodge, No. 76. Independent Order of Odd Fellows, 1842, was its first noble grand.

Pennsylvania Politics:

Carbon County treasurer. 

Mauch Chunk (now part of Jim Thorpe) judicial district, associate district judge, Carbon County, 1869-1874

Elected, Democrat, Pennsylvania State Senate, 10^th district, Carbon, Monroe, Pike and Wayne Counties, 1870-1871; elected, Speaker, 1871; committee assignments, Agriculture and Domestic Manufactures, Congressional Reform, Education, Roads and Bridges, Vice and Immorality, chairman, Retrenchment and Reform.

Elected, Democrat, Pennsylvania State Senate, 13th District, Luzerne, Monroe, Pike Counties, 1872; committee assignments, Banks, Congressional Reform, Education, Vice and Immorality.

Pennsylvania Delegate, Democratic National Convention, 1876; member, Credentials Committee.

Legacy:

Presumably named for: Albert Gallatin. The last Democratic Speaker or President Pro Tempore of the nineteenth century.

Descendant of famed Pennsylvania settler Daniel Brodhead, Albert was the nephew of United States Senator Richard Brodhead and a cousin of Henry Linderman, director of the United States Mint.

Cited:

Smull’s Legislative Handbook, (1870) Smull, J.A., (Editor) Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, pages 431, 438-440.

Smull’s Legislative Handbook, (1871) Smull, J.A., (Editor) Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, pages 428, 430, 436-438.

Smull’s Legislative Handbook, (1872) Smull, J.A., (Editor) Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, pages 501, 503, 506-508.

https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/30716147/albert-gallatin-brodhead