Loammi Baldwin (Senior) was born in Woburn, Massachusetts on January 21, 1745. He was the son of James and Ruth (Richardson) Baldwin, and a third-generation descendant of Deacon Henry Baldwin, one of the first settlers of Woburn, and a subscriber to the 'Town Orders' drawn up at Charlestown, a neighborhood of Boston, for the regulation of the new settlement in December 1641. James Baldwin was a carpenter by trade and is reported to have been the master workman in the erection of the Burlington meetinghouse in 1732. Loammi received a common school education under the instruction of Master John Fowle, a noted teacher of the grammar school in Woburn. Following his father, Loammi apprenticed to a cabinet maker. From an early age, he had a strong desire to acquire knowledge, devoting attention to mathematics. With a view to obtaining an acquaintance with Natural and Experimental Philosophy, he and his schoolmate, Benjamin Thompson (later known as Count Rumford) attended weekly lectures on math and physics by Professor John Winthrop in Cambridge; and the two made crude instruments for themselves to illustrate the principles they had heard about in the lectures. Loammi Baldwin was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1782 and received an Honorary Master of Arts Degree from Harvard University in 1785.
At the start of the Revolutionary War in 1775, Loammi Baldwin enlisted in the regiment of foot commanded by Colonel Samuel Gerrish, and rapidly advanced to the rank of lieutenant-colonel. When Col. Gerrish retired from the army in August of 1775, Loammi was put at the head of the regiment and commissioned a colonel. This regiment was originally stationed at the Boston lines and by close of 1775, it included ten companies. Through the end of 1775, Col. Baldwin remained near Boston; but in April 1776, he followed George Washington to New York City, and when Washington was compelled by the superior numbers of the enemy to evacuate New York and retreat across the Delaware River, Baldwin and his men followed. On the memorable night of December 25, 1776, they accompanied the Commander-in-Chief in the desperate expedition, which resulted in the capture of the Hessian troops at Trenton. In 1777, Col. Baldwin was honorably discharged from the Continental Army due to ill health.
Baldwin was elected to various public offices between 1780 and 1796. In 1780, he was appointed High Sheriff of Middlesex County, Massachusetts and was the first to hold office in the county following adoption of the State Constitution that year. He also represented Woburn in the General Court for many years, 1778-1784. He was also a member of the General Court during the years 1800-1804. Loammi was always interested in farming, and in the cultivation of fruit; and is noted for developing the well-known Baldwin apple.
Loammi Baldwin became a land surveyor and engineer in 1765. His notable civil engineering accomplishment was the design and construction of the Middlesex Canal from 1793 to 1803. He was one of the original corporators and a principal proprietor of this 27-mile summit level waterway link between Boston harbor to the Merrimack River near present-day Lowell, Massachusetts. Baldwin relied on British engineer William Weston to help him survey and lay out the canal's path. The Middlesex Canal provided low-cost and efficient freight transport for almost five decades (1803-1853), helping to establish the canal in the U.S. as a viable means of economic development. He assembled a large library of civil engineering books, which partially burned in 1899 – the remainder were given to the Woburn Public Library (now at Harvard University). ASCE designated the Middlesex Canal a National Historic Landmark in 1967.
Baldwin married in 1772 and had five children with his first wife Mary (1747-1786), daughter of James Fowle, Esq., town clerk of Woburn: 1. Cyrus; 2. Mary; 3. Benjamin Franklin; 4. Loammi (Jr); and 5. James Fowle. He married again in 1791 and had two children with his second wife Margaret (1747-1799), daughter of Josiah Fowle, of Woburn: 1. Clarissa; and 2. George Rumford. Each of his five sons were engaged in civil engineering projects of some type.
Loammi Baldwin died on October 20, 1807, and is buried in the family tomb at Woburn, Massachusetts.
Life & Works of Loammi Baldwin, Civil Engineer - GL Vose 1885 - HathiTrust (https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=hvd.hb0b80&seq=1)
Middlesex Canal Association – Towpath Newsletter Oct 2006 - "Short Biographies of James Sullivan and Loammi Baldwin"
(http://middlesexcanal.org/towpath/towpathtopicsOct2006.htm)
Who Am I – Neal FitzSimons: A Series of Historical Columns written by Neal FitzSimons that appeared in Civil Engineering magazine from 1965 to 1973 - March/April 1965 edition, page 1.
