Page:The Biographical Dictionary of America, vol. 09.djvu/168

 ROGERS

ROGERS

olJ. and later learned the printer's trade, and edited a political newspaper. lie was a Demo- cratic representative from Pennsylvania in the lotli congress in place of John Ross, resigned, and served also in the ICth. 17th and 18th congresses, 181S-24. He resigned liisseat in the ISth congress, April 20. 1824, having been appointed recorder of deeds for Northampton county. Pa., and was succeeded in congress by George Wolf of Easton. lie was a trustee of Lafayette college. 1826-32; was commissioned brigadier-general in the state militia, and in 18:31 was appointed U.S. naval olficer in Philadelphia. He is the author of: ^4 Xeic American Bkujruphical Dictionary: or Re- membrance of the Dcparti'd Heroes, Sages and Statesmen of America (182:!; 2d ed., 1829). He di.d in Philadelphia. Pa., Nov. 30, 1832.

ROGERS, Wiliiam, educator, was born in Newport, R.I., July 22. 1751; .second son of Capt. "William and Sarah Rogers. He was the first stu- dent at Rhodo Island college (Brown university) where lie was graduated. A.B., 17G9, A.M., 1772. He was principal of an academy at Newport, R.I., in 1770: was ordained to the Baptist ministry in May. 1772, and was pastor of the First Baptist church, Philadelphia, Pa., 1772-75; battalion chaplain in the Continental army, 1776-78; brig- ade chaplain, 1778-81. and retired from the army in 1781. He engaged in preaching, 1781-89, and was professor of oratory and English literature at the University of Pennsylvania, 1789-1811. He was twice married; first to a daughter of "William Gardner of Philadelphia, who died of yellow fever. Oct. 10, 1793; and secondly, Jan. 15, 1795, to Sunannah, daughter of Joseph Marsh of Philadelphia. He was vice-president of the Penn- sylvania Societj' for the Gradual Abolition of Slavery in 1790. and a member of the Maryland society in 1704; vice-president of the Philadel- pliia Society for Alleviating the Miseries of Public Prisons in 1797: chaplain of the Philadelphia militia legion in 1805; senior chaplain of the New- England society of Philadelphia in 1816; a rep- resentative in the state legislature, 1816-17, and vice-president of the Religious Historical society of Piiiladelphia in 1819. The honorary degree of A.M. was conferred on him by the Univei'sity of Pennsylvania in 1773; by Yale college in 1780 and by the College of New Jersey in 1786, and tliat of D.D. by the University of Pennsylvania in 1790. He was correspondent and editor of the Evangelical Magazine of London in 1802 and is the author of: .4 Circular Letter on Jxvstification (1785): An Introductory Praijer (llSd); A Sermon on the Death of the Rev. Oliver Hart (1796); Intro- ductory I^ayer Occasioned by the Death of Gen- eral Washington (1800, and a circular letter on Christian .Missions. He died in Philadelphia, Pa., April 7, 1824.

ROGERS, William Augustus, astronomer, was horn in Waterford, Conn., Nov. 13, 1832; son of David Potter and Mary Ann (Potter) Rogers; grandson of David and Mary (Potter) Rogers and of George and Mary (Stillman) Potter, and a de- scendant of James Rogers. He vvls graduated from Brown university in 1857; was married, July 15, 1857, to Rebecca Jane Titsworth: was a teacher at Alfred academy, 1857-58; professor of mathematics and astronomy there, 18"i8-70; studied theoretical and applied mechanics at the Sheffield Sc-ientific school of Yale, 1806-67. and astronomy at Harvard universit}'. where he .served as assistant for six months. During the civil war he served in the U.S. navy, 1864-65. He built and equipped the observatory at Alfred and was assistant at the Harvard observatory, 1870-77, and assistant professor of astronomy at Harvard, 1877-86. In 1886 he was chosen professor of as- tronomy and physics at Colby univer.sity, Water- ville. Me. He made a special study of the c(m- struction of comparators for the determination of differences in length, which resulted in the construction of the Rogers- Bond universal com- parator. In 1880 he went abroad to obtain au- thorized copies of the Engli.sh and French stand- ards of lengths which were used as the bases of comparison for the bars that he had constructed, and that were adopted as standards of length by all the important colleges, observatories and gov- ernment institutions. The honorary degree of A.M. was conferred on him by Yale in 1880: that that of Ph.D. by Alfred university in 1886 and that of LL.D. by Brown university in 1891. He was elected a fellow of the Royal society of Lon- don in 1880 and later became an honorarj' fellow; a member of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and its vice-president, 1882-83. presiding over the section in mathematics and astronomy and in 1886 he was chosen presi- dent of the American Society of Microscopists. He is the author of: Annals of Harvard College Observatory (5 vols.), and Obscure Heat as an Agent in Producing Expansion in Metals under Air Contact (1894). He died in Waterville, Me.» Marcli 1. 1898.

ROGERS, William Barton, educator, was born in Piiiladelphia, Pa., Dec. 7, 1804; son of Patrick Kerr and Hannah (Blythe) Rogers; grandson of Robert and Sarah (Kerr) Rogers and of James and Bessie (Bell) Blythe; great-grandson of Robert Rogers of Edergole, Ireland, andof James Bell, a mathematical instrument-maker of Lon- donderi-y, England. Patrick Kerr Rogers (1776- 1828) having published articles in the Dublin newspapers during the Irish Rebellion, hostile to the government, sailed for America to escape arrest, and arrived in Pliiladelidiia, Pa., in Au- gust, 1798. He was graduated from the ined-