In all works of charity and philanthropy, Mr. White was foremost or
prominent. He was deeply interested in the establishment of the New
Hampshire Asylum for the Insane and the State Reform School; in the
Orphans' Home, at Franklin, which he liberally endowed; and the Home for
the Aged, in Concord, which was his special care. The Reform club of
Concord, though not an eleemosynary institution, received substantial
benefits from his generosity; and to him, in a great measure, it owed
its very existence during the reaction which followed the first
enthusiasm.
Besides his extensive interest in the express company, his farm,--which
is one of the most highly cultivated in the state,--his charming summer
retreat on the borders of Lake Sunapee, and his real estate in Concord,
he was interested in real estate in Chicago, in hotel property in the
mountain districts, in railroad corporations, in banks, in manufacturing
establishments, and in shipping. He was a director in the Manchester &
Lawrence, the Franconia & Profile House, and the Mount Washington
railroads, and in the National State Capital Bank; a trustee of the Loan
and Trust Savings Bank of Concord; also of the Reform School, Home for
the Aged, and Orphans' Home, and other private and public trusts.
In 1875, Nathaniel White was candidate for governor, of the Prohibition
party; and he had a vast number of friends in the Republican party, with
which he was most closely identified, who wished to secure his
nomination for the highest honor within the gift of a state, by the
Republican party. In 1876 he was sent as a delegate to the Cincinnati
convention, which nominated Mr. Hayes for president. During the summer
of 1880, he was placed by his party at the head of the list of
candidates for presidential electors. With all these honors thrust upon
him, Nathaniel White was not a politician, although firm in his own
political convictions. The office sought the man, and not the man the
office.
Nathaniel White was blessed in his marriage relations. His history is
incomplete without a narration of the perfect union, complete
confidence, and mutual trust and assistance between him and his wife,
during a married life of nearly half a century. November 1, 1836, he was
married, by Rev. Hubert Bartlett, of Laconia, to Armenia S., daughter of
John Aldrich, of Boscawen, who survives him. Mrs. Armenia S. White is of
good old Quaker stock, descending, in the sixth generation, from Moses
Aldrich, a Quaker preacher who emigrated to this country in the
seventeenth century and settled in Rhode Island: and on the maternal
side, from Edward Dotey, a pilgrim who landed in the Mayflower. She was
born November 1, 1817, in Mendon, Mass., her parents removing from Rhode
Island at the time of their marriage. In 1830, she went with her parents
to Boscawen, where she lived until her marriage. Mrs. White has been her
husband's companion and helper in every good work.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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