Seneca Augustus Ladd was born in Loudon, NH on April 29, 1819 to Gideon Ladd, a chaise and carriage builder, and Polly (Osgood) Ladd.
Ladd attended the town school from childhood through his teenage years but was less than a model student. Ladd acknowledged that "school books and rules were hard tasks for him, and to obtain knowledge in that way was much like trying to take on fat by eating saw-dust bread."
Only one teacher truly understood Ladd’s individual learning methods, and catered to his needs. John L. French, future bank president himself, allowed Ladd to learn in the ways that best suited him. French left Ladd to his own devices, and at the end of the year awarded him a silver Spanish coin worth about six cents as a reward for his success. Ladd kept the coin for the remainder of his life.
At age 13, Ladd left Meredith to learn the trade of carriage building, the same trade his father had practiced. Upon his return to New Hampshire’s Lakes Region, Ladd bought several mills and started a carriage manufacturing business, which he operated quite successfully until it burned down 11 years later. After his business and life’s work was destroyed, he leased the nearby cotton factory, filled it with the proper equipment, and began to manufacture pianos and melodeons there. He predicted that the piano would eventually become the American musical instrument of choice – that every person who could afford to buy one would want a piano in their home, and continued to pursue this enterprise, traveling back and forth between Meredith and Boston, for the next 18 years of his life.
In 1869, after noticing that his piano factory workers were not successfully saving any of their earnings, Ladd and his associates established the Meredith Village Savings Bank; Ladd was named treasurer (equivalent to today’s President and CEO). The Bank’s first home was in the building that now houses the Meredith Historical Society on Main Street in Meredith.
Ladd married Susan Tilton of Meredith in March of 1840. Sadly, she passed away the same year Ladd’s carriage manufacturing business burned to the ground. They had two children together, Fannie C.A. Ladd and Charles F. A. Ladd. Ladd was remarried in 1852 to a woman named Catherine. Together, they had a daughter, Virginia B. Ladd.
Ladd was a life-long learner and devoted member of the community in which he lived and worked. He spent many of his days as a student of geological and meteorological science; he was an honorary member of the NH Antiquarian Society, resident member of the NH Historical Society, member of the Pilgrim Society of Plymouth, Mass., and lifetime member of the NH Home and School of Industry.
*Source: History of Merrimack and Belknap Counties, New Hampshire Philadelphia: J.W. Lewis & Co., 1885, 1108 pgs.
