Bucks County PA Archives Biographies.....Eastburn, George
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Joe Patterson, Patricia Bastik & Susan Walters Dec 2009

Source: History of Bucks County, Pennsylvania; edited by 
J.H. Battle; A. Warner & Co.; 1887
Solebury Township


   GEORGE EASTBURN teacher, 700 North Broad street, 
Philadelphia, born in Solebury township, Bucks county, 
November 25, 1838, is the great-great-great-grandson of 
Robert Eastburn, who, with his wife Sarah, and their minor 
children, was received at a monthly meeting of Friends held 
at Philadelphia December 26, 1713, as members from the 
monthly meeting of Brigham, in Yorkshire, England.  As 
evidenced by the minutes of Philadelphia monthly meeting 
Robert was a prominent and influential member until his 
death in 1755.  Samuel Eastburn, the second son of Robert, 
came from England with his parents.  He married Elizabeth 
Gillingham, a member of Abington monthly meeting, in 1728.  
He and his wife removed to Solebury and settled on a large 
tract of land lying northeast of the present Center Hill, 
becoming members of Buckingham monthly meeting March 6, 
1729, by certificate from Abington monthly meeting.  They 
have seven children, of whom Robert, the youngest, born June 
23, 1739, inherited a part of the homestead, which continued 
to be the ancestral abode during his lifetime.  Samuel 
Eastburn was a prominent minister of the gospel.  Much of 
his time during the latter part of his life was spent in 
visiting meetings in different parts of Pennsylvania and New 
Jersey, at which he preached to the edification and 
spiritual comfort of his hearers.  Robert Eastburn married 
Elizabeth Duer, a member of Falls monthly meeting, 11th mo., 
22nd, 1763.  After her death he married on 9th mo., 16th, 
1785, Rachel Paxson.  He was a man of positive character, 
discreet in action and very prosperous in business, having 
added to his inherited possessions two of the best farms in 
the fertile limestone valley of Solebury.  Moses Eastburn, 
born 4th mo., 1st., 1768, the oldest son of Robert and 
Elizabeth, was the second of their five children.  On 10th 
mo., 21st, 1790, Moses married Rachel, daughter of John and 
Mary Knowles, who, in a line of descent through his son, 
Robert Sotcher, was a great-granddaughter of John Sotcher, 
William Penn's trusted friend, whom he delighted to call 
"Honest John" and to whom the great founder consigned the 
care of his domestic affairs at Pennsbury on his first 
departure from America.  Moses and Rachel Eastburn had 
eleven children, of whom only two now survive.  They are 
Rachel Eastburn, who lives at Langhorne, and Moses, who 
resides on the farm formerly occupied by his father, which 
was brought by Robert Eastburn in 1770 from Abraham Heed, 
and which was the birthplace of all the children of Moses 
and Rachel Eastburn.  Moses Eastburn, Sen., was a man of 
marked personal characteristics.  He was distinguished for 
his strict integrity and enterprising spirit, sparing 
neither pains nor cost in the encouragement of whatever he 
believed would be of substantial benefit to the community.  
After the marriage of his son Moses he retired with his 
daughters Sarah and Rachel upon his property at Limeport, 
where he died in 1846, the death of his wife having occurred 
in 1842. Jacob Eastburn, the fifth child of Moses and 
Rachel, was the father of the subject of this sketch.  He 
was born September 14, 1798, and died August 26, 1860, on 
the farm which his father bought for him about the time of 
his marriage and upon which all his surviving children were 
born.  He was a member of Solebury monthly meeting and was 
noted for his unassuming manners, his kindness of heart and 
great generosity, helping many of his poorer neighbors in 
such an unostentatious way as to obey the scriptural 
injunction not to let his left hand know what his right hand 
did.  He also deserved the blessing promised to the 
peacemakers, his kind offices being often called for in that 
capacity. His beneficial influence was widely felt in the 
community and he died regretted by a large circle of 
mourning friends.  He was married in 1829 to Elizabeth K. 
Taylor, who, being descended through a line from his 
daughter, Mary Sotcher (who married Mahlon Kirkbride about 
1725), was a great-great-granddaughter of John Sotcher.  She 
was born at Dolington, in Upper Makefield township, in 1805, 
and died in 1877.  She was a woman of wonderful energy and 
rare executive ability.  She was prominent in the 
transaction of business, in Friends' meetings, serving as 
chief officer in some meeting continuously from early 
womanhood until feebleness of age necessitated retirement, 
having been chief clerk some time in her life of the whole 
series of meetings from the little preparative meeting at 
home to the great yearly meeting held in Philadelphia. Jacob 
and Elizabeth K. Eastburn had ten children, three of whom 
died in infancy.  The survivors are:  Robert, justice of the 
peace of Lower Makefield; Ellen E., wife of Samuel Hart, of 
Doylestown township; Mary Anna, wife of J. Simpson Betts, of 
New Hope; Elias, now sheriff of Bucks county; Timothy T., 
justice of the peace of New Hope borough; Sarah T., wife of 
Mark Palmer, of Lower Makefield township, and George, who 
was born next after Mary Anna.  He worked on the homestead 
farm in summer and attended district school in winter until 
his seventeenth year.  During the winters of 1855-56 and 
1856-57 he attended the Friends' Central school in 
Philadelphia, of which Aaron B. Ivins, a native of Bucks 
county, was principal.  In the summer of 1856 he taught in 
the octagonal school-house near Lumberville, which was the 
last educational work done in that building, the oldest 
school edifice in that part of the county.  From April, 
1857, to July, 1858, he taught at Edge Hill, Abington 
township, Montgomery county, and in September, 1858, became 
assistant to Mr. Ivins in the Friends' Central school.  He 
taught in that institution five years, in which time he 
prepared himself in classics for admission to Yale college, 
where he took the regular four years' course in the 
academical department and graduated with the degree of B. A. 
in 1868.  In 1871 his alma mater conferred upon him the 
degree of Master of Arts.  Having long before dedicated his 
life to the cause of education he in October, 1868, opened 
an English and classical school for the preparation of boys 
for business and for admission to college.  He commenced his 
school with seven pupils at Broad and Market streets, 
Philadelphia.  Constantly increasing success attending his 
instruction, after two other removals, he, in the summer of 
1877, establishing his school at his present location, Broad 
street and Fairmount avenue, where he has the most 
completely equipped institution of the kind in the city, 
neither pains nor expense being spared to keep it abreast of 
the most modern developments in the profession.  On 
September 8, 1870, Mr. Eastburn was married to Mary O. 
Davis, of Cream Ridge, N. J., who died on May 8, 1873, 
leaving one child, Holmes D., born May 15, 1872.  On July 
12, 1876, he was married to Elizabeth M. Beale, of 
Philadelphia, who is the mother of two children:  George, 
Jr., born August 31, 1877, and Agnes G., born October 16, 
1878.  Professor Eastburn's chosen life-work has been 
successful.  Devoting himself to it with ardor he has laid 
the educational foundation of many young men who are now 
holding enviable positions in the legal and medical 
professions, in mercantile life and as students in many of 
the best colleges in the land.  While at college Mr. 
Eastburn resigned his birthright membership in the Society 
of Friends and united with the Congregational church of Yale 
college, and upon his return to Philadelphia he brought his 
certificate of church membership to the Central Presbyterian 
church, of which he is now a deacon, a trustee and an elder. 
Professor Eastburn is deeply interested in the promotion of 
education and all kinds of true culture.  He is 
vice-president of the Schoolmasters' association and a 
member of the Franklin Institute, the Historical society of 
Pennsylvania, the Pennsylvania Horticultural society and the 
Fairmount Park Art association.