Harper's Encyclopedia of United States History
Benson Lossing, Ed.

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Thayer, Eli 1819-1899

Educator; born in Mendon, Mass., June 11, 1819; graduated at Brown College in 1845; established the Oread Institute, Worcester, Mass., in 1848; member of the legislature in 1853-54, during which period he organized and founded the Emigrant Aid Company and endeavored to unite the North in favor of his scheme to send into Kansas anti-slavery settlers. His company founded Topeka, Lawrence, Manhattan, and Ossawatomie, of which places Gov. Charles Robinson said: “Without these settlements Kansas would have been a slave State without a struggle; without the Aid Society these towns would never have existed; and that society was born of the brain of Eli Thayer.” Mr. Thayer was a member of Congress in 1857-61. He invented an automatic boiler cleaner, an hydraulic elevator, and a sectional safety steamboiler. His publications include a history of the Emigrant Aid Company; several lectures; a volume of his speeches in Congress; and the Kansas crusade. He died in Worcester, Mass., April 15, 1899.