Rutherford Hayes was born in Brattleboro on this day in 1787. The name would become much better known when his son, Rutherford B. Hayes, became president of the United States.

Hayes, the father, spent time as a clerk for a merchant in Wilmington and then working for a mercantile firm in Dummerston. Hayes was well-liked and Dummerston records recall him as “Captain of a militia company, a very handsome man, the flower of the Hayes family.”

Hayes died suddenly, leaving a son, a daughter and a pregnant wife. Two and half months after the father’s death, Rutherford B. Hayes was born.

The Vermont Book Of Days photo.