Andrew Nicholas Petersen

Andrew Nicholas Petersen (March 10, 1870 – September 28, 1953) was an American patternmaker, foundry company executive, and Republican politician who served as a U.S. Representative from New York from 1921 to 1923. Over the course of a varied career in industry and public life, he combined technical expertise in manufacturing with service in the legislative branch of the federal government, representing the interests of his constituents during a period of post–World War I adjustment and economic change.

Born on March 10, 1870, Petersen came of age in the late nineteenth century, when industrialization and the expansion of manufacturing were transforming the American economy. He learned the trade of patternmaking, a skilled craft essential to the foundry and metalworking industries, and entered a field that required both technical precision and practical engineering knowledge. His early work in this trade provided the foundation for his later rise to executive positions in the foundry business and informed his understanding of the needs of American industry and labor.

As his experience and responsibilities grew, Petersen advanced from the shop floor into management, becoming a foundry company executive. In this capacity he was involved in overseeing production, managing workers, and addressing the challenges of industrial organization in the early twentieth century. His professional background gave him firsthand insight into issues such as wages, working conditions, and the impact of tariffs and transportation costs on manufacturing, perspectives that would later shape his approach to public policy and representation in Congress.

Petersen entered national politics as a member of the Republican Party, which at the time was closely associated with pro-business policies, protective tariffs, and a strong interest in economic development. Drawing on his industrial background and community standing, he sought and won election to the United States House of Representatives from New York. He was elected to the Sixty-seventh Congress and served a single term from 1921 to 1923, a time marked by the nation’s transition from wartime to peacetime conditions, debates over fiscal policy, and the early years of Prohibition.

During his tenure in the House of Representatives, Andrew Nicholas Petersen participated in the democratic process and contributed to the legislative work of the Sixty-seventh Congress. As a Representative from New York and a member of the Republican Party, he represented the interests of his constituents in a state that was a major center of finance, commerce, and manufacturing. Serving during a significant period in American history, he took part in deliberations on issues affecting both his district and the broader national economy, bringing to bear his experience as a patternmaker and foundry executive on questions of industrial and economic policy.

After leaving Congress in 1923, Petersen returned to private life and to the pursuits that had defined his professional career before his election. His post-congressional years were spent outside the national political spotlight, but his earlier work in industry and his service in the House remained part of the broader story of New York’s representation in Washington during the early twentieth century. He lived through the Great Depression, the New Deal era, and World War II, witnessing further transformations in the industrial and political landscape he had once helped to shape.

Andrew Nicholas Petersen died on September 28, 1953. His life spanned more than eight decades of profound change in the United States, from the height of the industrial age through two world wars and into the postwar period. Remembered as both a skilled industrial professional and a one-term Republican Representative from New York, he exemplified the connection between the nation’s manufacturing base and its elected leadership in the years following World War I.