MORGAN HAYES, senior member of the firm of Hayes & Wilson, carriage makers of Washington, Penn., was born in Hartford county, Conn., March 13, 1820; received his education there and learned the carriage makers' trade in the town of Hartford. Morgan Hayes settled at Washington, Penn., October 15, 1841, and in partnership with his brother and uncle (who had been keeping a hotel in the borough) established a carriage shop in rear of the court-house. Burned out there, the company purchased the old Presbyterian church building, now vacant and the property of the S. B. & C. Hayes estate. In 1871 the shop was established in the old Methodist church building, 54 North Franklin street, where business is now carried on. As a coincidence, it may be related that a brother in Columbus, Ohio (now of the firm of M. & E. K. Hayes), conducted an industry of the same nature in an old church building. In 1871 our subject formed a partnership with John S. Wilson, who had served an apprenticeship with him, for the manufacture of all kinds of carriages, buggies, spring wagons, etc., which has since continued with well-merited success. Politically, Mr. Hayes is a Democrat, in religion a member of the Second Presbyterian Church, in which he is an elder. He is the oldest carriage maker in Washington, and built the first buggy in the county. He has in his possession a buggy he made in 1843, and sold July 3, that year; but some years ago he bought it back, and has exhibited it since at the county fair. This vehicle is now half a century old, is good and sound, and a venerable reminder of the days immediately following the "Hard Cider Campaign." Some years ago, Rev. Charles Hayes published a voluminous work, on the Hayes family, at Westfield, N. Y., which is a standard genealogy back to 1640. It does not treat of the family before the Reformation.

Text taken from page 253 of: Beers, J. H. and Co., Commemorative Biographical Record of Washington County, Pennsylvania (Chicago: J. H. Beers & Co., 1893). Transcribed May 1997 by Paula Talbert of Caldwell, OH as part of the Beers Project. Published May 1997 on the Washington County, PA USGenWeb pages at http://www.chartiers.com/.

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