Augustus Hemenway

{{short description|American politician}} {{Use mdy dates|date=May 2025}} {{Infobox officeholder |image=File:Augustus Hemenway Jr by William Notman c1875.jpg |caption = Hemenway c. 1875 |office = Member of the<br>Massachusetts House of Representatives<br>from the 4th Norfolk district |term_start = 1890 |term_end = 1891 |birth_date = 1853 |death_date = {{death date and age|1931|1853}} |alma_mater = Harvard University }}

'''Augustus Hemenway''' (1853–1931) was a philanthropist and public servant in Boston, Massachusetts, in the latter part of the 19th century. He was educated at Harvard University, the son of Edward Augustus Holyoke Hemenway and Mary Tileston Hemenway. His siblings were Edith Hemenway Eustis (1851-1904), Charlotte Augusta (d. 1865), Alice, (d. in infancy), and Amy.<ref name="Lawrence1904">{{cite book|last=Lawrence|first=Robert Means|title=The descendants of Major Samuel Lawrence of Groton, Massachusetts: with some mention of allied families|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=osY6AAAAMAAJ&pg=PA227|access-date=18 January 2013|edition=Public domain|year=1904|publisher=Printed at the Riverside press|pages=227–|isbn=9780608318417}}</ref>

In 1878, he donated the Hemenway Gymnasium to Harvard and expanded it in 1895; he also served as an overseer of the university. He supported a number of other institutions in the Boston area, including the Museum of Fine Arts, Massachusetts Eye and Ear Infirmary, Groton School, Metropolitan Park Commission, and MIT. In December 1881, he married Harriet Lawrence, who became the cofounder of the initial Audubon Society; the Massachusetts Audubon Society; they had 5 children.

[[File:Frank Weston Benson 1919 Augustus Hemenway.jpg|thumb|''Augustus Hemenway'', by Frank Weston Benson, 1919]]

Hemenway served in the Massachusetts House of Representatives in 1890 and 1891.<ref>Who was who in America.</ref> Upon his death in 1931, it was said of him: "In the various interests ... thrust upon him he never failed to do his full share in attending to the work at hand."<ref>Augustus Hemenway. Bulletin of the Museum of Fine Arts, Vol. 29, No. 174 (Aug. 1931); p. 58.</ref>

==References== {{reflist}}

==Further reading== *{{cite news|title=Augustus Hemenway dead near Boston; Helped Start the Metropolitan Park System--Served as a Harvard Overseer|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1931/05/26/archives/augustus-hemenway-dead-near-boston-helped-start-the-metropolitan.html|work=New York Times|date=May 26, 1931|page=33}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Hemenway, Augustus}} Category:1853 births Category:1931 deaths Category:American philanthropists Category:Members of the Massachusetts House of Representatives Category:Politicians from Boston Category:Harvard University alumni Category:Activists from Boston Category:19th-century members of the Massachusetts General Court