Linus Yale

Life & Legacy

Linus Yale (April 27, 1797 – August 8, 1858) was an American businessman, inventor, metalsmith and politician. He was a founder with his son Linus Yale Jr. of the Yale Lock Company, an American manufacturer of bank locks, and served as the first Mayor of Newport, New York. His family were also notable gun-machine makers in Vermont and Massachusetts during the Civil War, supplying Lincoln's Union Army with muskets and interchangeable parts.
Toward the end of his life, Yale's enterprise obtained from the US Treasury Department the contract to become the sole supplier of all the new bank locks, mints, sub-treasuries and custom-houses in the United States.