• Born: 31 Jan 1826, Marblehead MA
• Died: 5 Feb 1904, New York City NY

  General notes:

Jeweler and watchmaker

  Events in his life were:

• Apprenticed about 1840 to James Appleton in Portland ME
  

• He was a partner circa 1855 with Royal Elisha Robbins in New York City NY as ROBBINS & APPLETON. On 9 May 1857, the firm purchased the bankrupt Waltham Watch Company, paying $41,500 for the factory plus two mortgages amounting to $14,380 in liabilities, renaming it Appleton, Tracy & Co. After a rough beginning, the company merged with the Waltham Improvement Company in 1859, forming the American Watch Company which became the largest watch manufacturer in the country.

• He appeared on the 1870 census taken at Ipswich MA, listed as a jeweler.

• Obituary printed in the New York Times (New York City NY) on 6 Feb 1904
  DANIEL F. APPLETON DEAD
  Delegate to the Fremont Convention of '56 and Founder of Waltham Watch Company.
  
  Daniel Fuller Appleton, well known as a merchant and manufacturer of watches, died last night at 9:15 o'clock at his residence, 28 East Thirty-sixth Street. He was seventy-eight years old last Sunday.
  Mr. Appleton was born in Marblehead, Mass., the son of Gen. James Appleton, and was educated in the public schools of Portland. He was trained in the watchmaking business by a brother, and became the partner of his employer under the firm name of Robbins & Appleton. In 1857 the firm became the owners of the then new and small watch works at Waltham, Mass. From this grew the American Waltham Watch Company, which now employs 2,500 hands, and to which Mr. Appleton gave his constant attention for half a century.
  Mr. Appleton was a member of the first National Convention of the Republican Party held in Philadelphia in 1856, when Gen. Fremont was nominated for the presidency. He was President of the New England Society in 1878 and 1879, and for a time was Vice President of the Union League Club. He was a member also of the Century, Metropolitan, Grolier, and Seawanhaka-Corinthian Yacht Clubs, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
  He was twice married, first in 1853 to Julia, daughter of Nicholas P. Randall, and in 1889 to Susan, daughter of the Rev. John P. Cowles of Ipswich, Mass., and had three sons and two daughters—Francis Randall, Randolph Morgan, and James Waldingfield Appleton; Mrs. Gerald Livingston Hoyt of this city, and Mrs. Charles S. Tuckerman of Boston.