Nicholas Roosevelt (inventor)
inventor

Nicholas Jacobus Roosevelt or Nicholas James Roosevelt (December 27, 1767, New York City – July 30, 1854, Skaneateles, New York) was an American inventor, a major investor in Upstate New York land, and a member of the Roosevelt family. His primary invention was to introduce vertical paddle wheels for steamboats.
Early life
Nicholas Roosevelt was born on December 27, 1767, in New York City. He was the son of Jacobus Roosevelt (1724–1777) and Annatje (née Bogart) (b. 1728), who wed on December 2, 1746. His siblings were: Anna (1748–1794) who married Andrew Heermanse, John (b. 1755), Jacobus (1759–1840), Helena (1761–1843), and Maria Roosevelt (b. 1763).
After the death of his mother, his father remarried, on July 14, 1774, to Elenora Gibson, widow of Mr. Thompson.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Nicholas Roosevelt (inventor)” is inventor. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Nicholas, Roosevelt and inventor, not as a finished interpretation.
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Biographical claims are most persuasive when dates, appointments and relationships can be traced to records created close to the events described. The source revision retrieved here is dated May 25, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q15461418. VIAF identifies the subject as 60400246. The Library of Congress control number is n81040820. 2 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1767, 1854, 1724 and 1777.
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This entry incorporates text from “Nicholas Roosevelt (inventor)” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.