Samuel W. Bridgham


Samuel Willard Bridgham was the first mayor of Providence, Rhode Island.

Early life

Bridgham was born on May 4, 1774, in Seekonk, Massachusetts. He graduated from Brown University with the class of 1794, at the age of twenty.

Career

Bridgham became a lawyer before entering politics. He served nineteen terms in the Rhode Island General Assembly, two of those as the Speaker. He also served as Attorney General of Rhode Island for four years. Bridgham stood as the Federalist candidate in the 1821 Rhode Island gubernatorial election, but lost to William C. Gibbs. When Providence was incorporated as a city in 1832, he was elected its first Mayor. He served in that office until his death in 1840, at the age of 66. Bridgham became the first mayor of Providence at a time when disorder and vice threatened the city. His solutions were free public education, temperance, and relief for the poor. He laid down foundations for good municipal government in Providence and served during one of the city's most significant expansions of the public school system.
Outside politics in 1821 he was elected Trustee of Brown University. He served as Brown's Chancellor from 1828 to 1840. For nineteen years he was the President of the Benevolent Congregational Society in Providence. Bridgham was elected a member of the American Antiquarian Society in 1813.

Personal life

In 1798, he married Elizabeth Paine. Together, they were the parents of six children:
Bridgham died on December 28, 1840 in Providence and was buried in the North Burial Ground.

Descendants

In 1869, Bridgham's grandson Samuel Willard Bridgham, married Fanny Schermerhorn, a niece of Caroline Schermerhorn Astor, who was known as the "Mrs. Astor" and was the leader of New York society during the Gilded Age.