Charles Augustus Wheaton (1809–1882) was a businessman and major figure in the central New York state abolitionist movement and Underground Railroad, as well as other progressive causes. He was one of the founders of the First Congregational Church in Syracuse, which took an abolitionist stand, and was part of the Vigilance Committee that formed in 1850 to resist the Fugitive Slave Law. In 1860 he moved to Northfield, Minnesota, where he was one of two men who donated the land to found the Carleton College campus. There he served with the Minnesota legislature. The father of a total of 17 children, he had an active family life. He later became the editor of two local newspapers. Early life and education Charles Augustus Wheaton was born on 1 July 1809 in Amenia, New York, the son of Augustus Wheaton, a farmer and drover, and his wife. He had two brothers. The parents purchased a farm in the town of Pompey in Onondaga County in 1807. They migrated there from Dutchess County with their family in 1810. They had followed three of the elder Wheaton's sisters: Lydia, Sylvia and Loraine, who had already moved to Pompey with their families, part of a westward migration of many in the state in the years after the American Revolutionary War. Charles attended the Pompey Academy, a well-regarded boys' school. Charles Wheaton's eldest brother Orlin J. became a farmer and drover like their father. Their brother Horace served as a Representative from New York in the US Congress and later became the fourth mayor of the city of Syracuse. He also became a partner with Charles in his future hardware business in Syracuse. Marriage and family Wheaton married Ellen Douglas Birdseye on June 24, 1834, at the First Presbyterian Church in Syracuse, where they were both members for a time. They had been neighbors in Pompey. He was 25 and she was 18. She was the second of twelve children of Electa (née Beebee) and Victory Birdseye. The father was one of Onondaga County's leading politicians. Birdseye practiced law and served two terms in Congress. He was postmaster of Pompey Hill for 22 years, district attorney of Onondaga County for 14 years, and held numerous other political offices. The original Birdseye House is now part of the Onondaga County Freedom Trail. A descendant founded Birds Eye Frozen Foods. Charles and Ellen Wheaton had twelve children together,