Biography
James McCormick Cameron (1865-1949) was born in Harrisburg at the Cameron
homestead, 407 N. Front Street, Harrisburg.
He attended Harrisburg Academy Phillips Exeter and Harvard College,
the latter of which he graduated in 1853. He studied law under his father
and was admitted to the bars of Dauphin and Cumberland Counties, but
his interest was in the steel business. Before becoming a national figure
in politics, his grandfather, Simon
Cameron, had built the canal and railroad between Harrisburg and
Sunbury, PA and canals in Louisiana. James entered the steel business
after college, managing the old Paxton furnaces, along with Col.
Henry McCormick, when it was merged with the Iron & Steel Company.
He was also owner and director of the Elk River Coal and Lumber Company,
Dundon, VA, a director fo the Buffalo Creek and Gauley Railroad Company,
direcotr fo the Harrisburg Bridge Company, director fo the Harrisburg
Railways Company and member fo the Dauphin Deposit Trust Company.
James also had six farms in the tobacco belt of northern Lancaster
county in Senator J. D. Cameron's estate. He raised hackney horses,
which he loved to drive in his younger days. In fact, he was remembered
as a cultivated man: a great sportsman -- a hunter of caribou. He is
also remembered as the keeper of the family's estate -- one who, according
to a contemporary family friend, "viewed himself as the 'conservator'
of the family's fortunes"
He was elder and Sunday School teacher of the Presbyterian Church,
Harrisburg, and president and trustee of the Young Men's Christian Association.
He was also contributor to the Home for the Friendless, Harrisburg.
His siblings were Mary Cameron, Mrs. W. H. (Lillie Cameron) Bradley,
Mrs. Chandley (Rachel C.) Hale, Jrs. Alexander Rodgers, and Mrs. J.
William Clark, the mother of Federal Judge William J. Clark of New Jersey.
James lived in Harrisburg's Front and State home of J. Donald with
his sisters, Miss Mary Cameron, and Mrs. Joseph Bradley, until February
5, 1927, when he married Mrs. Anna Scott Robinson, Jr. He divided his
time between his new home at 319 North Front Street, Harrisburg and
his farm in Donegal, PA until his death. His wife died September 7,
1944.
Written and compiled from original sources, McCormick Family Papers,
by MaryAlice Bitts
This site is sponsored by the Center
for Pennsylvania Cultural Studies at the Pennsylvania
State University at Harrisburg, in cooperation with the Historical
Society of Dauphin County, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. Director of
the McCormick Family Papers Project at the Center is Professor Michael
Barton.Learn more about the
Center, and the program that sponsors this project
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