Theodore Marshall Foote, 1845-1914

Inventor and Consulting Engineer

Theodore Marshall Foote was born on the 19th July 1845 in Stockbridge, son of farmer Lucius (Lucretia) Foote (1812-1889) and Lura, born Kilburn (1822-1880), married in January 1840. Both parents were born in the nearby village Lee, and around 1850 they had a farm near Troy in Rensselaer County, New York, and they had five children: Mary Jane (1840-1927), Ann Jennette (1842-1933), George Lucius (1844-1917), Theodore Marshall, and the youngest Frank Miller (1850-1883) born in Troy.

Theodore M. Foote married Mary Emma, born Mesick (1852-1931), on the 15th October 1874 in Brooklyn, New York. Children: Theodore Marshall Foote Jr. (1876-1961) and Emma Lura Foote Vose (1880-1974).

As an inventor Theodore M. Foote had a total of 38 patents to his name: 29 American patents, five Canadian patents, two British patents, one Austrian and one French patent. The first ten American patents and one Canadian patent were filed from 1870 until 1875 with Charles Adams-Randall (1846-1923), fellow inventor born in Rochester, Plymouth County in Massachusetts. The first British patent was filed 1877 by Charles Adams-Randall in London, England. The Foote & Randall (Telegraph Construction Co.) chemical automatic telegraph system was used from 1880 until 1884 by the American Rapid Telegraph Co. founded 24th February 1879 by major shareholders Edwin Reed and James M. Brown, both of Bath in Maine, and Thomas Wallace of Ansonia in Connecticut. Involved in the company were also former journalist and patent trustee Daniel H. Craig, railroad company president Horatio G. Angle, and probably also Simeon J. M. Bear, inventor of improved telegraphic circuits filed for patent in 1875. The Foote & Randall System was also used by Rapids' successors, the Bankers and Merchants Telegraph Co. founded 24th March 1881 by John B. Yale and Julian L. Yale, and United Lines Telegraph Co. founded 29th June 1885, headed by investor Edward S. Stokes, assisted by the Canadian born electrical engineer Francis W. Jones, and company secretary Dwight Townsend. The three companies became part of The Postal Telegraph Co. (Postal Telegraph-Cable Co.) organized by the Irish born industrialist John William MacKay.

Theodore M. Foote worked as a telegrapher in Lyndhurst Township, Bergen in New Jersey, in the 1880s, and in the 1890s he also lived with his family for a few years at 197 South Canal Street in Chicago, Illinois. In 1890 the East Chicago & Whiting Railroad Co. was formed with a capital stock of $100,000 by Theodore M. Foote, realtor Charles Huntoon (1850-1918), and lawyer Frank Weeks (1851-1919), to build an electric line connecting the towns in the Calumet basin.

In 1897 Theodore M. Foote, his brother George L. Foote, and Henry G. Pierson founded Foote, Pierson & Co. at 82-84 Fulton Street in New York as a successor to E. S. Greeley & Co., a firm founded in 1865 by Edwin S. Greeley and Luther G. Tillotson. Manufacturers and importers of railway and telegraph supplies. The brothers Theodore and George knew Henry G. Pierson from their hometown Troy in Rensselaer County. Later also George's son Frank M. Foote was involved in the company.

Theodore M. Foote was in 1910 as a consulting electrical engineer living at 218 Brighton Avenue in Allston, and died at the Peter Bent Brigham Hospital in Boston on the 15th October 1914 (the 40th wedding day). He was interred at Newton Cemetery, Newton, Section I-South, Range 31, Grave 26 (unmarked grave). His widow Mary and the children, electrical engineer Theodore Jr.* and school teacher Emma Lura*, were cremated and interred at Waterside Cemetery in Marblehead, no markers at the Western Slope plot SG 16/17 except a stone for a baby girl Carolyn Reynolds Cutter (1933-1934) and mother Frances May Cutter (1905-1980). In the twenties Mary lived with Emma Lura at first 41 Front Street and later at 110 Front Street in Marblehead. Emma Lura's husband Raleigh Draper Vose (1885-1938), married in 1924, was a sales-manager, and he was interred at the family plot at Pine Grove Cemetery, Lynn, Massachusetts. The wife of Theodore Jr., Alfa May Price Foote (1881-1949), married in 1901, was interred at the family plot at Spring Hill Cemetery, Danville, Illinois.

Saturday the 19th July 2025 it was 180 years since the inventor and telegraph pioneer Theodore Marshall Foote was born in Stockbridge, Massachusetts.

Gert J. Almind

* The urn with Theodore M. Foote Jr. was released for interment at Harmony Grove Cemetery in Salem but redirected to the grave site of his mother at Waterside Cemetery in Marblehead. Theodore (Ted) Marshall and Alfa May had three daughters: Madge Evaline (1902-1983), Emma Eleanor (1905-1934), and Edna Elizabeth (1913-1990).

* It seems that in the late forties Emma Lura co-owned an antiques shop with Silas Brainerd Duffield Jr. (1870-1951) at Front Street in Marblehead. In the forties both Theodore Jr. and Emma Lura shared the house at 38 Front Street with Silas B. Duffield Jr., a well-known antiques dealer and proprietor of the Sea Horse Diner. Silas Brainerd Duffield Jr. was buried in the same Western Slope plot at Waterside Cemetery.