The streetcars were considered a necessity for those who needed to commute in the growing city. Widener noticed a need for public transport and branched out into streetcar railways, horse-drawn commuter cars that would hold a dozen or so people. The position was the most lucrative political office in the city since the treasurer accrued all interest from city deposits as spoils of office. He remained involved in politics, and in 1873, was appointed as city treasurer of Philadelphia. While in his twenties, Widener became business partners with William L. In 1858, at the age of 24, Peter Widener married Hannah Josephine Dunton Widener, and the couple had three children, Harry (who died in his teens), George, and Joseph. After the Civil War, he invested his earnings in a chain of butcher shops that would become very successful. Widener earned $50,000 (roughly $850,000 today) from the meat contract. During the Civil War, the position enabled him to obtain a contract to supply mutton to the Union Army within 10 miles of Philadelphia. The market shop became a social gathering place, and within a short time, Widener was elected Republican leader of the 20th Ward. As a teenager, he began a butcher apprenticeship and later opened a shop in a local market. Lynnewood Hall (photo courtesy of Library of Congress)īorn on November 13, 1834, to German immigrant parents, Peter Widener was raised in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. After construction, the mansion stood on a large 480-acre estate in Elkins Park, Pennsylvania. Lynnewood Hall was built between 18 for streetcar tycoon, prolific art collector, and an investor in the ill-fated Titanic, Peter Arrell Browne Widener. The stately home was once one of the finest homes in Pennsylvania, but due to its complex and sad history, the magnificent house now sits shuttered and in a state of disrepair. Lynnewood Hall is a spectacular Neoclassical Revival masterpiece and is considered one of the greatest surviving Gilded Age mansions in the United States.
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