John Stevenson

John Stevenson (c. 1718 – March 23, 1785), a Scot, pioneer merchant and developer of Baltimore, Maryland, if not indeed its actual founder, was known as the "American Romulus." Records indicate that John Stevenson and his brother, Henry, also a doctor came to British North America from Ireland in 1734. On November 13, 1735, Stevenson married Mary Tipton; she died December 6, 1736. Merchant John Stevenson, "a native of Londonderry, in the Kingdom of Ireland, and of a very respectable Family", was born c. 1718. He had "lived upwards of forty years" in Baltimore at his death in 1785 "and was formerly one of its most eminent Merchants." "He was the first Exporter of Wheat and Flour from this Port, and consequently laid the Foundation of its present commercial Consequence." Stevenson began by shipping flour to Ireland which turned Baltimore from a sleepy city trading in tobacco to a trading powerhouse rivaling New York, Philadelphia and Boston. Baltimore being a port nestled alongside a vast wheat growing countryside and much closer than these other cities. Baltimore restructured the city's economy based on flour. Trails were transformed into roads, and flour mills were built along the Jones Falls, Gwynns Falls, and Patapsco River. Warehouses were built on the wharves that extended into the harbor. The roads from Baltimore soon extended all the way to Pennsylvania, and Baltimore ships sailed not only to Ireland, but to ports in Europe, the Caribbean, and South America. Sometime in these early years Stevenson met his lifelong friend and business partner Jonathan Plowman Jr. Stevenson and Plowman Jr. remain known for their partnership trading in indentured servants, particularly during the 1750s and 1760s, according to the National Park Service. The fact that Plowman Jr.'s father was brought over as an indentured servant at age 12 may only testify to the goodwill of the two. Plowman Sr. most likely encouraged Stevenson to help bring the poor and oppressed out of England and to a new life and a new chance for success in America, much as he and his son had done.