Background
Philip was born in Mount Radnor, Colesville, Maryland, in 1776. He was third son of Evan and Rachel (Hopkins) Thomas.
Philip was born in Mount Radnor, Colesville, Maryland, in 1776. He was third son of Evan and Rachel (Hopkins) Thomas.
When he went to Baltimore to work, the town had a population of only 15, 000. In 1800 he began business for himself as a hardware merchant.
He was already prominent as president of the Mechanics' Bank when the means by which Baltimore might retain its important trade with the "Ohio country" came under anxious discussion. The National Road had been Baltimore's link with the extending settlements in the Ohio and Mississippi valleys, and had contributed to make the city the third in the Union by 1827. But the Erie Canal had been opened in 1825, and the "Pennsylvania system of public works, " connecting Philadelphia with Pittsburgh, had been begun the following year. The speed and cheapness of transportation which these offered threatened to draw off western trade to New York and Philadelphia. Maryland and Virginia joined in reviving the project of the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal, designed to run from Georgetown to the Youghiogheny. Thomas was made a Maryland commissioner in this undertaking, but withdrew after a year, convinced that the canal could do nothing commercially for Baltimore.
Interested by an account of the newly completed Darlington and Stockton Railroad in England, he immediately began to investigate the railroad as a means of solving the transportation problem, and in February 1827, with George Brown, 1787-1859, he called a meeting of business men at which he explained the superiority of railroads over canals. The call of a second meeting the same month declared it would "take under consideration the best means of restoring to . Baltimore that portion of the western trade which has recently been diverted from it by the introduction of steam navigation and by other causes". Within a week Thomas, as chairman of a subcommittee on definite plans, reported in favor of a "double railroad" to the Ohio. Progress thereafter was rapid. The Maryland act to charter the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad was approved February 28, 1827, and the actual incorporation took place April 24. Except for the Mohawk and Hudson Railroad, chartered two months earlier, the Baltimore and Ohio thus became the first railroad chartered in the United States to carry passengers. Thomas was made president and a director. Charles Carroll of Carrollton laid the first stone, July 4, 1828.
Thomas was unfaltering in overcoming the many difficulties which presented themselves once the first enthusiasm had died down – the delays in payment of Baltimore's subscription, the hostility of the Chesapeake and Ohio directors, the discord over the route of the road, the unexpected costs of excavation in the first westward miles, the designing of a locomotive which would go around curves, the refusal of Congress to remit the import duty on scrap iron for the tracks. When he resigned the presidency in 1836, the road had reached Harpers Ferry and the chief mechanical problems had been solved.
He took active part in protecting the Indians of New York against the taking of their reservations by land speculators, and for this the Senecas made him "Chief Sagouan" (Bountiful Giver) and constituted him their representative in Washington. He was president of the Mechanical Fire Company, the first president of the Maryland Bible Society, and advanced $25, 000 that the state might begin the erection of the Washington monument in Baltimore.
He died in Yonkers, N. Y. , while on a visit to his daughter some years after his retirement from business.
Like his father and his first ancestor in America, Philip Thomas, who came to Maryland from Wales about 1651, Thomas was a Quaker.
He was a stout man, clean-shaven, with high forehead, prominent nose, and a pleasant expression.
On April 20, 1801, he was married to Elizabeth George of Kent County, Md.
