John Boynton an obscure and retiring manufacturer of Templeton, Massachusetts, had started life as a farmer, later becoming a peddler of tinware. During all those years he had cherished a desire for a practical education. It was always beyond his reach, but in 1865, at the age of 73, he had the satisfaction of providing the means for other young men to secure what he had been denied. He contributed $100,000, practically all his wealth, for the purpose of founding a technical school. All details of the plan he left to others.
The men who developed the program for what was to become the Worcester Polytechnic Institute were David Whitcomb, Mr. Boynton’s cousin and confidant, the Reverend Seth Sweetser, a Worcester minister, Emory Washburn, former governor of Massachusetts, and George F. Hoar, later a distinguished United States senator. The comprehensive plan which they worked out, much of it written by Dr. Sweetser, provided for a combination of technical education and practical instruction in a commercial plant. It was an entirely novel idea at the time.