San Francisco County
Biographies
ISAIAH D.
KEITH
The success of the Pacific Typesetting & Type Foundry Company of San Francisco is largely attributable to the expert management of Isaiah D. Keith, who is now president of the concern, and is an acknowledged authority on printing and typesetting. He was born in New Bruswick, Canada, July 4, 1883, and is a son of the late Henry Havelock Keith and his wife, Frances Elizabeth (Keith) Keith.
Isaiah D. Keith is descended on both the paternal and maternal sides from old Canadian families of Scotch blood. The first of the name in Canada was Seth Keith, who arrived about the time of the Revolutionary war. Henry Havelock Keith was born in New Brunswick in 1861, and in the dominion was reared and educated. He settled in Boston, Massachusetts, about 1895, and later moved to Toledo, Ohio. During his early life he was engaged in teaching, and in later years had charge of one of the departments of the Overland Automobile Company in Toledo. He was a well educated man and a skilled mechanic. His death occurred in Toledo, Ohio, in the year 1924. His widow is also a native of New Brunswick, Canada, and is now residing in Toledo. By her marriage, she was the mother of three children, two of whom are living: Myrtle, who is the wife of James Haddon of Toledo; and Isaiah D.
The education of the latter was received in the grade and high schools of Medfield, Massachusetts, his graduation having occurred in 1899. Immediately thereafter he started out to earn his own living, and he chose the printer’s trade as his future life’s vocation. A wise choice it has proved to be, but it was one which required years of apprenticeship and very meager wages. He first worked in Boston and in Norwood, Massachusetts, in various capacities, and his first salary was three dollars per week, which at the time appeared to him as plenty of money. In 1907, having progressed most satisfactorily in his printing and typesetting education, he accepted a position with the Lanston Monotype Machine Company of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Here he learned more advanced phases of the printing business. On May 27, 1917, he went to Los Angeles, California, as sales representative of the Lanston Monotype Machine Company, and also acted as efficiency engineer for all of the manufacturers of monotype machines. In 1920, he came to San Francisco for the purpose of taking over the Pacific Typesetting & Type Foundry Company, which had been established about three months and had reached a place of financial distress. Mr. Keith became president of the concern, and in very short order placed it on a paying basis. Under his intelligent guidance, the organization has prospered, and now it rates as one of the largest of its kind in San Francisco. An average of ten skilled workmen are employed by the company, and the trade field is largely local. Mr. Keith’s ability in the typesetting and type-founding field is due to his most energetic application to the business through the years. Beginning in the Norwood days, when he was an humble apprentice in the J. S. Cushing Company, until the present, he has studied, observed, and applied the principles and truths he has learned, and has kept abreast of the times consistently.
Mr. Keith has been twice married. On Christmas day of 1906, he was first married to Miss Cleo Gehman, a native of Massachusetts, and a daughter of George and Fannie Gehman. To this union there was born a daughter, Margaret Frances, whose birth occurred in Los Angeles, September 12, 1918. Mr. Keith was married secondly in Berkeley, California, February 28, 1925, to Mrs. Mary M. Carlyle, who was born in Allegheny county, near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The family residence is situated at 2806 Derby street in Berkeley, California.
In his political views, Mr. Keith is independent. He attends the Presbyterian Church; is a member of the San Francisco Chamber of Commerce; and fraternally is affiliated with the Masons, belonging to Michael Arnold Lodge, No. 636, F. & A. M., in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
Transcribed by: Jeanne Sturgis Taylor.
Source: Byington, Lewis Francis, “History of
San Francisco 3 Vols”, S. J. Clarke Publishing Co.,
Chicago, 1931. Vol. 2 Pages 354-356.
© 2007 Jeanne Sturgis Taylor.
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