David Evans Sr. (d. 1817)

While skilled and successful in his career as a carpenter, David Evans also had a strong interest in bettering the communities and networks in which he belonged. From 1789-1791 he served as a Common Councilman and was a member of the council’s committee to prepare a plan and estimate for the new city hall. In 1794, he became a Director of The Philadelphia Contributionship for the Insurance of Houses from Loss by Fire, founded by Benjamin Franklin and others,  the oldest property insurance company in the United States.

Evans had become acquainted with Franklin decades earlier when he became a member in Franklin’s Library Company. The carpenter donated a set of Abraham Swan's Collection of Designs in Architecture to the Company in 1764. In 1769, he became a director of the Library Company and became a member of the Carpenters’ Company. He was also a member of the American Philosophical Society. The following year, he resigned from the Library Company and the American Philosophical Society and soon thereafter stopped regularly attending the Carpenters’ Company meetings.

His sudden departure from these intellectual and fraternal orders most likely came from a newfound devotion to his religious community, the Society of Friends. Throughout the 1770s, Evans became increasingly more active in the Philadelphia Meeting. He became the representative to the Quarterly Meeting and served on the Yearly Meeting’s Meetings for Sufferings. Additionally,  Evans was often chosen to oversee marriages and to admonish members who had strayed from Quaker doctrine and values. Along with his role within the Philadelphia Meeting, his participation in the city’s government, and his work  with The Philadelphia Contributionship, Evans continued his trade as a carpenter and was responsible for designing and building both domestic and institutional buildings in the late 18th century.

Partially written by Roger W. Moss, Philadelphia Architects and Builders website.

Whitfield Jenks Bell, Patriot Improvers 1743-1768. Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society, 1997. 396-400.