President Millard Fillmore Encourages American Invention

Letters of presidents relating to important inventions and promoting American inventors are great rarities, this being our first

With the death of President Zachary Taylor, on July 10, 1850 Vice President Millard Fillmore took office as president. Taylor’s death had been a surprise, and Fillmore was thrust into the Oval Office amidst the crisis leading up to the Compromise of 1850, which Fillmore supported though Taylor had opposed.

John R. St. John was an inventor from Buffalo, New York, who designed a mariner’s compass that would determine local changes in magnetic variation. It received a U.S. patent, and garnered a gold medal at the American Institute fair of 1849. That fair was established in 1829 “for the encouragement of agriculture, commerce, manufactures, and the arts,” and is considered the first world’s fair in the United States. The compass is now in the Smithsonian. St. John determined to take the invention to Europe in 1850, and there it would win a Prize Medal at the famous Crystal Palace exhibition held in London in 1851, followed by an English patent in 1852. In the early 1850s, St. John also won patents in the United States for a method of supporting the vanes of aquatic velocimeters (a speed measure), a lifting-jack, a steam heater, and an improvement in the construction of soap-boilers, among others.

President Fillmore wanted to encourage American invention, both domestically and in Europe, and wrote St. John a letter of recommendation to take to Europe with him. St. John would have used it when he arrived in England to display at the Crystal Palace exhibition. This is that letter.

Autograph letter signed, as President, Washington, September 18, 1850, just two months into his presidency, to inventor Robert St. John, recommending him to others. “Understanding from John R. St. John, Esq. of New York that he intends soon to visit Europe with certain inventions of his, I take pleasure in stating that Mr. St. John formerly resided in Buffalo, where I knew him many years, and where his family relations, who are highly respectful, yet reside. He has displayed a remarkable genius for invention, and it is said by good judges that his improvement in the Mariner’s Compass is of great importance to the commerce world. I do not pretend to judge of this matter myself, but I have no doubt of the great value of this invention, and I should hear with pleasure that in this enterprise, promising so much for the security of navigation, his success was equal to his merits. I beg leave to commend him to the favorable consideration of all who may know me.” With Fillmore’s free franked envelope still present.

Letters of presidents relating to important inventions and promoting American inventors are great rarities, this being our first.