Norwood Penrose Hallowell autograph album

Norwood Penrose Hallowell was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, on April 13, 1839, the son of Morris Lonstreth Hallowell and Hannah Smith Penrose. He entered Haverford College in 1851, and left in 1853. He studied at Harvard University between 1857 and 1861, where he met Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr., who later served as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. Hallowell's family was strongly Quaker and abolitionist, so he and his family were involved on the side of the Union during the Civil War. He held a variety of military positions in Massachusetts, eventually becoming a colonel. After the war, he was a merchant in New York City with Hallowell, Prescott & Co. He was also a broker in Boston and was the president of the National Bank of Commerce of Boston. He married Sarah Wharton Haydock in 1868, and they had six children: Anna Norwood Hallowell; Robert Haydock Hallowell; Norwood Penrose Hallowell, Jr.; John White Hallowell; Esther Fisher Hallowell; and Susan Morris Hallowell.