Stephen C. Pattee, one of the most prominent, skilful, and prosperous agriculturists of Merrimack County, New Hampshire, lives in Warner, on a highly improved farm known as Maple Grange, which has been owned and occupied by his family for more than one hundred years. He was born on this ancestral homestead, January 11, 1828, son of Asa Pattee, and is of distinguished English and Colonial stock, tracing his descent from Sir William Pattee, who was physician to Cromwell and King Charles 2nd., and was knighted in 1660. Peter Pattee, son of Sir William, born in 1648 in Lansdown, England, emigrated to America when a young man of twenty-one years, settled first in Virginia, and a few years later removed to Haverhill, Mass.
His grandson, Captain Asa Pattee, commanded a company in one of the Colonial wars, about the middle of the eighteenth century, and later received a Captain’s commission from Governor Mcshech Weare. He was the first of the family to settle in Warner, and built the first frame house in the village, it being now known as the Dr. Eaton house. Captain Asa’s son John, grandfather of Stephen C. Pattee, settled at Maple Grange in 1786, taking up the land when it was in its primeval wildness, and was afterward throughout his years of activity engaged in the pioneer labor of clearing and improving. He was an industrious, temperate man, and lived to the ripe old age of eighty-five years. He married Eunice Sargent, a native of Dover, N.H., and the daughter of Benjamin Sargent, who owned the adjoining farm. They had three sons: Asa; Jesse, who removed to West Cambridge, Mass., now Arlington, where he made a fortune as a baker; and Cyrus, who was also a baker by occupation, but died on a farm in Haverhill.
Asa Pattee, son of John, inherited the homestead in Warner; and from his earliest youth until his demise he worked upon the soil, being engaged in general farming, stockraising, and lumbering. He married Sally Colby, whose father, Stephen Colby, a Revolutionary pensioner, was one of the early settlers of the town of Warner, where he occupied a farm about a mile east of the village, on which his grandson, Asa F. Colby, now lives. Asa and Sally (Colby) Pattee had five sons and two daughters, namely: Stephen C., the subject of this sketch; John H., who died in Troy, N.Y.; Susan; Luther, a physician, who was settled first at Candia, then at Wolfboro, and later at Manchester, where he practised from 1863 until his death in 1895; Asa, also a physician, and William Herbert, his twin brother, who died in infancy; and Emma, who died at a comparatively early age in womanhood. Susan Pattee first married A. Jackson Edmunds, and after his death became the wife of William H. Palmer. She died of consumption three years after her second marriage, leaving two children, neither of whom is living. Dr. Asa Pattee began practice in Merrimac, Mass., remaining there about five years, and then removed to Boston, where he practised about thirty years, or until his death, which occurred but a few months since, on May 31, 1897. Emma Pattee married first George Quimby, and afterward became the wife of E. C. Cole, editor of the Kearsarge Independent and Times. The Pattee homestead descended to Asa Pattee’s son Stephen, the present owner.
Stephen C. Pattee received his elementary education in the common schools of Warner, afterward studying at private schools in Contoocook and Bradford. He subsequently taught school in this State and Massachusetts for twenty years during the winter terms; and he has since been actively identified with the educational progress of his native town, having been for many years a member of the Board of Education, and by the will of the donor, the late Franklin Simonds, being made a life Trustee of the Simonds Free High School Fund of Warner. In his agricultural labors Mr. Pattee has met with eminent success, his judiciously conducted enterprises having yielded satisfactory results. In his earlier days he carried on general farming, then turned his attention to wool-growing, and when that was no longer profitable he raised lambs for the market. He has since made money in raising valuable horses, always Mambrino Wilkes, Almont Eagle, Vittoria, and a son of Viking. For several years he has made dairying his specialty, having a fine herd of grade Holstein and Jersey cows, each of which tests above the standard. He raises some grain every year, as wheat, oats, and corn; and at the World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893, he was awarded a diploma and a bronze medal for his exhibit of corn.
Mr. Pattee was one of the managers of the early agricultural association, which was merged into the Kearsarge Agricultural and Mechanical Association, which he has served as President, and which each year holds a fair in Warner. He is very prominent and active in grange work, and for several years served as one of the Executive Committee of the State Grange. He is an authority on all questions connected with agriculture, especially the raising of cercals, and was at one time employed by the Board of Agriculture to give an address on “Wheat Culture” before the Agricultural College at Hanover and at various local institutes throughout the State. He has written much on agricultural topics for the press, being a paid contributor to the People and Patriot, Boston Cultivator, New England Farmer, Country Gentleman, and Germantown Telegraph; and his articles invariably attract attention. In politics he has always been a straight Democrat, an attendant of all local conventions, and has served in all the township offices. Fraternally, he is an active Mason, belonging to Harris Lodge, F. & A. M.
On January 9, 1853, Mr. Pattee married Miss Sally Currier, who was born in Canterbury, N.H., and who died May 5, 1895, leaving three sons-Jesse B., William H., and George Quimby. Jesse B. Pattee, who was admitted to the bar in Plymouth County, Massachusetts, has a fine legal practice in Manchester, N.H., where he now resides. In the fall of 1896 he was elected a Representative to the State legislature for the term of 1897-98. William H. Pattee, who adopted what may well be termed the hereditary profession, received the degree of Doctor of Medicine at the Vermont University in Burlington, practised medicine for a time in Loudon, N.H., then spent ten years in Pelican Rapids, Minn., returning from there to Manchester, N.H., where he is one of the leading physicians. George Q. Pattee is a book-keeper in Boston.