Biographical Sketch of Antoine Bolmar (1797-1861); Chester County, PA Contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by John Morris . *********************************************************************** USGENWEB ARCHIVES NOTICE: Printing this file within by non-commercial individuals and libraries is encouraged, as long as all notices and submitter information is included. Any other use, including copying files to other sites requires permission from the submitters PRIOR to uploading to any other sites. We encourage links to the state and county table of contents. http://www.usgwarchives.net/ *********************************************************************** Source: "Biographical and Portrait Cyclopedia of Chester County, Pennsylvania, comprising a historical sketch of the county", by Samuel T. Wiley and edited by Winfield Scott Garner, Gresham Publishing Company, Philadelphia, PA, 1893, pp. 563-564. "Antoine Bolmar, who has been for a number of years in the employ of the Pennsylvania Railroad Company at Philadelphia, is a son of the distinguished French scholar and educator, Jean Claude Antoine Brunin de Bolmar, and was born at West Chester, Chester county, Pennsylvania, September 1, 1842. His boyhood was spent in West Chester, and his education was obtained in his father's academy at that place. On December 21, 1865, Mr. Bolmar was united in marriage to Antoinette R. Worthington, a daughter of Carver Worthington, of that borough, and to them were born three children, two sons and one daughter: Eugene A., who resides at St. Paul, Minnesota; Carver Worthington, deceased; and Anne S., who became the wife of Robert Hamill Newlin, of West Chester. Jean Claude Antoine Brunin de Bolmar, or Anthony Bolmar, as he came to be called at West Chester, was born in 1797, at Bourbon Lancy, a small town in the department of Saone-et-Loire, Lower Burgundy, France. In 1810 he entered the Imperial lyceum of Clermont-Ferrand, where he remained until after the downfall of Napoleon I, in 1815, and the following year went to the city of Lyons, where he began learning the silk business as an apprentice with the famous firm of Cordier & Co. There he remained until nearly twenty-one years of age, and as at that time he would have to draw his lot in the class of conscripts for 1819, he quit the silk business and enlisted in the French army, in order to secure the privilege of choosing the regiment with which he would serve. He selected the 6th Hussars, then commanded by Compte de Pernollet, of Lyons, served in the war of 1822 between France and Spain, and after six year in the army, again entered civil life. About 1826 he went to Switzerland, and from there to England and Scotland, and early in 1828 came to the United States and settled in Philadelphia. There he engaged in teaching the French language, and in the preparation of text books adapted to that purpose, not less than six or eight of which were published and widely used. When the Asiatic cholera made its appearance in Philadelphia in 1832, Mr. Bolmar retired to the borough of West Chester to continue his work on his school books, and was so pleased with the place that he remained a resident ever afterward. In 1834 he was prevailed on to take charge of the West Chester academy, which sprung at once in to wide popularity, and in 1840 he purchased the elegant building in which Mrs. Almira H. Lincoln's boarding school for young ladies had been conducted, and opened therein a boarding school for young men and boys. This school speedily became one of the most popular and flourishing educational institutions in the State, securing almost a world-wide celebrity and attracting students from many distant points, especially from the Southern States, the West Indies and South America. The energetic principal was regarded as the Napoleon of teachers, and educated many thousand of boys and young men, numbers of whom afterward distinguished themselves in different walks of life. He was noted for the strict discipline he maintained, and the semi-military exactness which characterized all his methods. He continued to conduct the establishment until 1859, when some business concerns required his presence in France, and the seminary was closed to allow him to visit his native land. On his return he attempted to re-open his school but his shattered health, which had been sensibly declining for some time, prevented the accomplishment of his purpose, and he died February 27, 1861, aged sixty-four years. Before he settled in West Chester he had married Adelaide Williams, and by that union had a family of ten children, two of whom died in infancy. Those who attained maturity were: Charles H., a resident of Topeka, Kansas, who has been elected and served one term as a member of the legislature of that State; Antoinette, E. M. C., S. P., Antoine, Henry C., now connected with the World's fair management in Chicago; Sophie Picot, married Jacob Heffelfinger, now deceased; and Lucy, who became the wife of Rufus T. Chaney, now connected with the navy department at Washington."