In 1819, a young Chauncey Rose started his first business – a sawmill serving settlers in the wilds of western Indiana. Fifty years, and many successful ventures later, Rose laid the foundation for the first private engineering college west of the Alleghenies.
Like all skilled entrepreneurs, Rose had a knack for seeing a need and filling it--including the needs of the less fortunate. In Terre Haute alone, Rose endowed an orphanage, a charity hospital and a ladies’ aid society, and founded The Terre Haute School of Industrial Science (later renamed Rose Polytechnic in his honor), making him one of the most generous philanthropists of his day.
The Sawmill Society gives Rose-Hulman entrepreneurs a forum for sharing insights, experience and inspiration with each other, while keeping the Rose spirit of giving alive.
