Program

NYS Historic

Subject

People

Location

103 Water St, Hermon, NY 13652, USA

Lat/Long

44.467465, -75.232508

Grant Recipient

Town of Hermon

Edson Mason Scofield was born in 1867 in the town of Hermon, New York. He attended Hermon High School, graduating in 1883, and later studied at Union College. Scofield became a prominent engineer, builder, and inventor, gaining recognition as an authority on reinforced concrete construction and bridge engineering.

By the early 1890s, Scofield was working as a bridge engineer in Louisville, Kentucky, and later for the American Bridge Company in Youngstown, Ohio. In 1902, he was living in Beaver Falls, Pennsylvania, where he served as president of the National Bridge Company. In 1903, he co‑founded the Scofield Construction Company with his brother, G. M. Scofield, operating out of Philadelphia. The firm was later known as Scofield Engineering & Construction Company.

Scofield held several patents, including the co‑invention of a slide rule device for calculating logarithmic measurements in 1901. In 1906, he developed improvements for retaining walls and reinforced concrete‑steel construction, along with supporting devices for reinforcing bars. He later coinvented a concrete chair used in structural construction in 1920.

During World War I, Scofield was employed by the U.S. Shipping Board to build freighters in San Diego and constructed navy ships along the West Coast. His engineering  company began operating in California in 1918, specializing in high‑rise construction. Scofield officially relocated west with his family around 1920 and became president of the Pacific Marine & Construction Company. That same year, the company built the Cuyamaca, a 7,500‑ton concrete oil tanker, noted as the first concrete ship launched in Southern California shipbuilding history.

Scofield Engineering & Construction Company was responsible for numerous notable California buildings, including the Biltmore Hotel and Theater, United Artists’ Theater, the Pacific Finance Building, the Pacific Southwest Building, the California Petroleum Building, and the Sears Roebuck & Company Building. In 1929, Scofield was appointed to the Board of Water and Power Commissioners of Los Angeles. Known to have amassed significant wealth, he was said to have been a millionaire.

Edson M. Scofield married his first wife, Lizziemac, in 1894 and later married a woman named Ethel. He had two children, George and Alberta. He died in December 1939.