John Kimball (1821 - 1913)
Born at Canterbury (NH); died at Concord (NH).
Master mechanic, businessman, local and state legislator.
Portrait by U.D. Tenney, 1883.
Presented to the State by Mr. Kimball, before 1893.

Kimball (1821 - 1913) was born at Canterbury (NH) but grew up and attended schools at Boscawen (NH). His father died in 1834, when Kimball was thirteen years old. His mother appears to have died soon thereafter, and after a year at Concord (NH) Academy Kimball entered a four- year appren- ticeship (1837 - 1841) as a machinist with his father's cousin, William W. Kimball.

Kimball learned how to build mills and machines during his apprenticeship. He worked not only at local towns - Boscawen, Suncook, Manchester - but at Lawrence and Lowell (both MA) as well. When the Concord Railroad opened a new machine repair shop and a new railroad car shop at Concord (1848) the young man applied for a job, and within two years he was the master machinist for both complexes (served 1850 - 1858).

Kimball was a founder of the new Republican Party in New Hampshire (1856). He was elected to Concord's City Council in 1856, and was president of the Council in 1857. Twice elected a State Representative (1858, 1859), Kimball was Concord's City Marshall and Tax Collector in 1859. President Lincoln appointed Kimball Collector of Taxes for the Second District (Merrimack and Hillsborough counties), and Kimball set a national record of $7 million in tax revenues collected during his tenure (1862 - 1869).[ The Manchester mills produced most of this money for the federal government.]

In his later years Kimball continued active in state and local politics. He was elected to the State Senate (1880 - 1883; President of the Senate 1881 - 1883). He was a deacon of his church for forty-two years, and gave to the Orphans' Home for decades.

References: D. Hamilton Hurd, ed. History of Merrimack & Belknap Counties, New Hampshire (1885); George H. Moses, New Hampshire Men (1893); Frances M. Abbott, Memorial Volume: John Kimball, 1821 - 1913 (1913).