businessmen. Membership soared to 12,000, while the British chapter numbered less than 500. In the late 1940s, Penrose built the society's headquarters on Newcomen Road in rural Exton, Pennsylvania, complete with a 2,700 volume library and museum featuring a range of antique model steam engines operated by hand-cranking or electricity. Beside a chapel stood a belltower which played a carillon. Designed by the Philadelphia architect Briton Martin (1899–1983), the campus had offices, guest houses and a printing shop for Newcomen Publications, Inc., which Penrose founded to produce the society's corporate and academic histories, distinctive booklets illustrated with a mix of commissioned and antique engravings. At Seapoint Beach in Kittery Point, Maine, the society maintained a summer retreat with guest cottages in Tudor style. Penrose appeared to know personally the top executives of every major company in the United States, and by charisma and will, made Newcomen an important part of their lives. Called a "benevolent despot," he oversaw every detail on the society's production line of tributes to organizations, from editing and publishing an average of 55 booklet histories per year, to officiating across the country at 60–70 luncheons and dinners annually at which the histories were orated by their authors. Except for educators, expenses were usually paid by the enterprises being honored, which bought for distribution over 12,000 copies to enhance their reputations. It is no exaggeration to say that, in its heyday, anyone who was anyone in American commerce, manufacturing and academia belonged to The Newcomen Society in North America. In 1952, Time Magazine referred to Penrose as "a combination of P. T. Barnum and the Archbishop of Canterbury." It quoted him saying: "We are attempting to hold up to America the vision and the courage and the hard work and abiding faith -- make that a capital F -- of the men who years ago created the America which we have inherited." Reluctant to slow down with age, Charles Penrose, Sr. died suddenly in 1958, the year he finally became president. The chairmanship next went to his son, Charles Penrose, Jr. (1921–2007). By 1981, The Newcomen Society in North America had 17,000 members. Decline Following the retirement of Charles Penrose, Jr., membership declined during the stewardship of his successors. Despite its mandate to promote engineering and technology, Newcomen maintained clubby rituals that seemed dated in the age of the internet and video conferencing. Newcomen sold the Exton