Elisha Slade Converse (July 28, 1820 – June 5, 1904)
Elisha Slade Converse and Mary Diana Edmands Converse
Elisha Slade Converse, the third son of Elisha and Betsey (Wheaton) Converse, was born in Needham, Mass., July 28th, 1820. When he was four years old his parents moved to Woodstock, CT. Spending his childhood there, under the wholesome restraint and kindly influences of New England rural life, he was trained in habits of industry and integrity, and in the essentials of an English education. In his thirteenth year he was sent to Boston, that he might have the advantage of its superior schools. He remained there until sixteen years of age, when he returned home.
During the next three years he learned the trade of a clothier, and when nineteen years old, he engaged in that business on his own account in the village of Thompson (CT), continuing there five years. In 1844 he again went to Boston, `where he made a change to the wholesale shoe and leather trade. The business was new to him, but he soon familiarized himself with its details, and during his connection with it the reputation and success of the firm became well established.
In 1847 he moved his place of residence to Stoneham, Mass., and in 1849 to Malden. In 1853 he accepted the office of treasurer of the Malden Manufacturing Company, a firm licensed by Charles Goodyear to produce rubber footwear in Malden. With production restarted, in 1855, the corporate name was changed to the “Boston Rubber Shoe Company.” Over the next 50 years, Elisha Converse would take on additional roles of buying and selling agent, general manager and president. He was also president of the First National Bank of Malden, president of the Boston Belting Company and of the Rubber Manufacturers’ Mutual Insurance Company, director of the Revere Rubber Company and of the Exchange National Bank of Boston, trustee of the Five Cent Savings Bank, trustee of the Boston Safe deposit & Trust Company and a member of the board of trustees of Wellesley College.