Background
Obadiah Moses Brown was born on July 15, 1771 in Providence, Rhode Island, the only son of Moses Brown and Anna (Brown) Brown.
Obadiah Moses Brown was born on July 15, 1771 in Providence, Rhode Island, the only son of Moses Brown and Anna (Brown) Brown.
Obadiah was sent by his father, who had become a Quaker in 1774, to the Friends' Yearly Meeting School at Portsmouth, Rhode Island, in 1787, but this institution closed in October 1788, because of lack of funds, after four years of existence. Obadiah had almost no other formal schooling, but went directly into business. About this time his father formed a firm, consisting of William Almy (Moses Brown's son-in-law), together with Slater and Smith Brown, whose place was taken in 1792 by Obadiah Brown.
This company, known later as Brown & Almy, produced the first pure cotton goods made in the United States, all the previous warps having been linen. The Brown mills, located at Pawtucket, were immediately prosperous, and the Embargo Act of 1808 furnished an additional stimulus to manufacturing, whereby Obadiah Brown and his partners accumulated a considerable fortune.
When, early in the nineteenth century, it was proposed to reestablish the Friends' Yearly Meeting School, the Brown family took up the project. In 1814 Moses Brown offered a suitable tract of land, located in Providence, and when, in 1815, subscriptions were solicited, Obadiah Brown contributed $2, 000 for construction, $500 for furnishings, and $1, 000 annually for five years toward the school's maintenance.
Obadiah Brown and William Almy took the contract for erecting the main hall, and the former drove every day in his chaise to superintend the laborers. In 1817, when the available funds were exhausted, he and Almy agreed to provide half of the additional $7, 500 required, on condition that other Friends supply the remainder. The stipulation was met, and the building was completed.
After the school was formally opened in 1819, Obadiah and his wife, Dorcas, regularly attended meeting there, and it became his custom to present each scholar at graduation with a book as a token of his personal regard. Although his father was actually treasurer of the school, Obadiah watched over its affairs with a zealous care as a valuable member of the school committee.
When he died in 1822, after a brief illness, he left to the school the sum of $100, 000, the largest single bequest made to any institution of learning in the United States up to that time, and also a fine library of books and maps. The will, signed in 1814, was drawn up in his father's handwriting. The school thus founded has grown and prospered, and in 1904 was renamed the Moses Brown School.
The original building, since much enlarged, still stands as the central feature of the campus. Personally Brown was gracious and urbane, with an unostentatious and conciliating manner. When decisions were made, he was firm in standing by them, but he instinctively tried to avoid disputes.
Deeply committed to the Quaker doctrine calling for the abolition of slavery.
Brown was a member of the Society of the Abolition of Slavery and the Society for the Free Instruction of the Blacks.
Obadiah Moses Brown was a patient and industrious man, with much public spirit and a genius for wise philanthropy.
In 1798, Brown married Dorcas Hadwen, daughter of John and Elizabeth Hadwen, of Newport.