The Penn Club is a private social club in Philadelphia. It was organized on March 18, 1875, with a mission to heighten awareness of arts and culture at the time of the Centennial Exposition.
With an original home on 8th and Locusts streets in Philadelphia, the Club came to existence after the American Civil War and prior to the Centennial Exhibition. The organizers were among those whose characters had been formed during the period of the war and that of the reconstruction that followed. Morton McMichael, Jr. made the lease of 720 Locust Street with Horace Howard Furness. James P. Sims arranged the scheme of decoration and designed the mantel upon which McMichael and Wharton Barker placed the statue of William Penn, modeled in plaster by Muller. Henry Armitt Brown hung the picture said to represent William Penn. The membership was limited to 200.
The first president of the Club was Wharton Barker (1846âÂÂ1921), who was a prominent abolitionist and president of the Philadelphia Stock Exchange. He was also one of the original fifty members who founded the Union Club, which later became the Union League of Philadelphia.
The intention of the Club is expressed in its charter:
The Penn Club continues to this day, and meets in Center City, Philadelphia. The club is named for William Penn, and has no historical or current association with the University of Pennsylvania. The club's motto is: "Dum Clavum Teneam", which is taken from the Penn family's coat of arms.
The Penn Club recognizes contributions to society with an award that consists of a bronze bust of William Penn. The bust was created by Beatrice Fenton, and the original is kept at the Historical Society of Pennsylvania. Past awardees include:
Edwin Booth on November 29, 1875<br> John F. Hartranft on May 16, 1876<br> President Ulysses S. Grant on May 13, 1877<br> Walt Whitman on March 27, 1880<br> William S. Pepper, M.D. on February 22, 1881<br> Tommaso Salvini on January 16, 1883<br> Sir Henry Irving on December 1, 1883<br> John Patrick Ryan, Archbishop of Philadelphia on January 8, 1885<br> Gen. Lew Wallace on March 24, 1887<br> D. Hayes Agnew on March 4, 1889<br> J. William White on May 31, 1889<br> Adm. Robert Peary on November 12, 1892<br> Rev. Edward Everett Hale on November 14, 1893<br> John Sartain on April 26, 1894<br> Sir H. Beerbohm Tree on March 21, 1895<br> S. Weir Mitchell on November 17, 1900<br> Samuel W. Pennypacker on May 2, 1903<br> Joseph Swain on May 20, 1904<br> Philander Knox on November 12, 1907<br> John Luther Long on April 22, 1908<br> Viscount Northcliffe on November 9, 1908<br> William W. Keen, M.D. on February 20, 1909<br> Violet Oakley, Cecilia Beaux and Sara Yorke Stevenson on April 17, 1909<br> Martin G. Brumbaugh on March 17, 1910<br> Agnes Repplier on April 27, 1911<br> Leopold Stokowski on December 17, 1912<br> Boies Penrose on January 31, 1914<br> J. Hampton Moore on March 4, 1920<br> Cardinal Dennis Joseph Dougherty on November 7, 1921<br> George Wharton Pepper and George S. Pepper, President of the American Academy of Music, on May 16, 1922<br> John Philip Sousa on December 1, 1922<br> Gifford Pinchot on December 2, 1922<br> Cyrus E. Woods on December 22, 1923<br> W. Freeland Kendrick on March 19, 1924<br> Charles Curtis Harrison, Provost of The University of Pennsylvania on April 20, 1925<br> William W. Atterbury on October 31, 1925<br> John S. Fisher on December 3, 1927<br> John Ashurst III, Librarian of the Free Library of Philadelphia on February 28, 1928<br> Hon. Edwin Owen Lewis, Founder of the Independence National Historic Park on November 23, 1928<br> Joseph E. Widener on January 19, 1931<br> Thomas Sovereign Gates on April 20, 1931<br> William Wister Comfort on May 11, 1931<br> Cyrus H. K. Curtis on December 18, 1931<br> Adm. Arthur Japy Hepburn on November 17, 1933<br> Frederic A. Delano on February 26, 1934<br> Daniel C. Roper on February 28, 1935<br> Harold Willis Dodds on March 6, 1936<br> Samuel S. Fleischer on January 14, 1937<br> Eugene Ormandy on February 25, 1938<br> Prince Bertil of Sweden on May 13, 1940<br> 1st Earl of Halifax on October 23, 1944<br> Juan Antonio Rios on October 19, 1945<br> John Jay McLoy on May 14, 1948<br> Harold Stassen on January 14, 1949<br> Vijaya Lakshmi Pandit on April 29, 1950<br> Gaylord Harnwell on October 24, 1953<br> John Marshall Butler on November 19, 1954<br> William McChesney Martin, Jr. on January 20, 1956<br> Gen. Omar Bradley on October 30, 1959<br> Hon. William Warren Scranton on October 25, 1963<br> Andrew Wyeth on October 6, 1964<br> Robert Orville Anderson on November 18, 1969<br> Shelby Callum Davis on January 13, 1971<br> Earl Mountbatten of Burma and Dr. Harold Glendon Scheie on October 11, 1972<br> Rudolf Serkin on October 31, 1974<br> F. Otto Haas, President of Rohm and Haas on October 29, 1975<br> James Michener on November 1, 1976<br> James W. Symington on April 18, 2000<br> Peter Lawson Johnston, President of the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation on November 16, 2000<br> Anne dâÂÂHarnoncourt on October 23, 2001<br> Lord Roberts of Belgravia on April 18, 2002<br> Paul A. Volcker on October 20, 2003<br> Ernesta D. Ballard on October 21, 2004<br> Hon. William Webster on April 21, 2005<br> Constantine Papakakis on November 16, 2005<br> Joaquin Jackson on April 22, 2006<br> Charles Blockson on April 26, 2007<br> John Bolton on April 24, 2008<br> Joseph J. Rishel on April 22, 2009<br> Vince Papale on December 4, 2012<br> Dom Duarte Pio on April 18, 2013<br> Gen. John Keane on April 24, 2014<br> The Vidocq Society on October 28, 2014<br> Hon. John Lehman on April 30, 2015<br> G. Andrew Meschter on May 3, 2016<br> Thomas Ridge on October 17, 2018<br> Edward Gene Rendell on November 10, 2021<br> Robert P. George on November 21, 2022<br> Patrick J. Toomey, Jr. on November 28, 2023<br> Ketch Secor on April 22, 2025<br> Theodore Schick on March 24, 2026