imported>JJMC89 bot III: Moving :Category:New York State Treasurers to :Category:New York state treasurers per Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Speedy

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Moving Category:New York State Treasurers to Category:New York state treasurers per Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Speedy

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'''Benjamin Knower''' (1775 [[Roxbury, Massachusetts|Roxbury]], now a borough of [[Boston, Massachusetts]] – August 23, 1839 [[Watervliet, New York|Watervliet]], [[Albany County, New York]]) was an American merchant, banker and politician.

==Early life==
By 1800 he had removed to [[Dutchess County, New York]]. Before 1810, he settled in [[Albany, New York]] where he sold hats made by his brother Timothy in [[Guilderland, New York]]. Local lore had it that the hats were made [[waterproof]] by immersion in the Bozenkill, a stream behind a mansion in [[Altamont, Albany County, New York|Knowersville]], a village of Guilderland.

==Career==
Knower was a [[presidential elector]] in [[1820 United States presidential election|1820]], voting for [[James Monroe]] and [[Daniel D. Tompkins]].

He was [[New York State Treasurer]] from 1821 to 1824, and was one of the leading members of the [[Albany Regency]]. On April 28, 1824, his daughter Cornelia (ca. 1801–1889) married State Comptroller [[William L. Marcy]].

Knower became rich as a financier of the [[Erie Canal]] and as a director of the [[Mechanics' and Farmers' Bank of Albany]], and served as the bank's president from 1817 until 1834 when he was forced to resign because of "financial embarrassments."<ref name="Howell1886">{{cite book |last1=Howell |first1=George Rogers |title=Bi-centennial history of Albany. History of the county of Albany, N. Y., from 1609 to 1886. With portraits, biographies and illustrations. [By] Howell [and] Tenney. Assisted by local writers |date=1 January 1886 |publisher=Dalcassian Publishing Company |pages=529–530 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=WVnVDwAAQBAJ |access-date=21 October 2021 |language=en}}</ref>

==Personal life==
On June 21, 1800, he married Sarah Van Kleek (1779–1833) at the Dutch Reformed Church in [[Poughkeepsie (city), New York|Poughkeepsie, New York]]. After the death of his first wife, on June 23, 1836, he married Sophia P. Castle (d. 1886) in [[New York City]].

He was buried at the [[Albany Rural Cemetery]] in [[Menands, New York]]. His home at [[Guilderland, New York]] known as the [[Knower House]] was listed on the [[National Register of Historic Places]] in 1982.<ref name="nris">{{NRISref|2009a}}</ref>

==Sources==
{{reflist}}
*[http://politicalgraveyard.com/bio/knill-knowland.html Political Graveyard]
*[https://books.google.com/books?id=E3sFAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA35 ''The New York Civil List'' compiled by Franklin Benjamin Hough (page 35; Weed, Parsons and Co., 1858) (Google Books)]
*[http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~knower/benjstem.htm Knower genealogy, at rootsweb] (giving wrong date of death)
*[http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~knower/benjdeath.htm Obit in ''The Annals of Albany'' by Joel Munsell (1859), at rootsweb]

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{{succession box | title = [[New York State Treasurer]] | before = [[Gerrit L. Dox]] | after = [[Abraham Keyser, Jr.]] | years = 1821–1824}}
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Knower, Benjamin}}
[[Category:1775 births]]
[[Category:1839 deaths]]
[[Category:New York state treasurers]]
[[Category:Politicians from Albany, New York]]
[[Category:American bankers]]
[[Category:Burials at Albany Rural Cemetery]]
[[Category:Businesspeople from Boston]]
[[Category:1820 United States presidential electors]]
[[Category:Businesspeople from Albany, New York]]

Benjamin Knower - Revision history

imported>JJMC89 bot III: Moving :Category:New York State Treasurers to :Category:New York state treasurers per Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Speedy