Later Years
Rochester remained an active participant in the growth of the town and county he founded, playing many pivotal roles in the development of its economy and status. He played an active role in politics, helped found churches and banks, and served as the first president of the Rochester Athenænum (which would later become Rochester Institute of Technology). During the last two years of his life, Rochester made few public appearances, but rather spent most of his time with his now rather large family, including his 28 grandchildren still living at the Colonel's 79th birthday.
Suffering from a protracted and painful illness, Rochester died May 17, 1831. He was interred at Mount Hope Cemetery in Rochester. His gravestone features a paraphrase of Christopher Wren's epitaph: "SI QUÆRIS MONUMENTUM, CIRCUMSPICE" ("If you seek his monument, look around you").
Read more about this topic: Nathaniel Rochester
Famous quotes containing the word years:
“The expansive nature of truth comes to our succor, elastic, not to be surrounded. Man helps himself by larger generalizations. The lesson of life is practically to generalize; to believe what the years and the centuries say against the hours; to resist the usurpation of particulars; to penetrate to their catholic sense.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“I had lived over twenty years without the legal right to be alone one hour M to have the exclusive use of one foot of space M to receive an unopened letter, or to preserve a line of manuscript “from sharp and sly inspection.””
—Jane Grey Swisshelm (1815–1884)