Frank Bestow Wiborg
Frank Bestow Wiborg (April 30, 1855 – May 12, 1930) was a businessman from Cincinnati who, with Levi Addison Ault, created the ink manufacturer Ault & Wiborg Company.[1]
Frank Bestow Wiborg | |
|---|---|
 Wiborg c. 1900 | |
| Born | April 30, 1855 |
| Died | May 12, 1930 (aged 75) |
| Education | Chickering Institute |
| Known for | Ault & Wiborg Company |
| Spouse |
Adaline Moulton Sherman
(m. 1882–1917) |
| Children | Mary Hoyt Wiborg Sara Sherman Wiborg Olga Wiborg |
| Parent | Henry Paulinus Wiborg |
| Signature | |
 | |
Early life
He was born on April 30, 1855 in Cleveland, Ohio. He was a son of Susan Isidora (née Bestow) Wiborg and Henry Paulinus Wiborg, a Norwegian immigrant.[2]
He attended the Chickering Scientific and Classical Institute, a public high school in Cincinnati, and graduated in 1874. He worked for Levi Ault to pay his way through school.[3]
Career
After graduating, Ault and Wiborg became business partners, founding the Ault & Wiborg printing ink company. By 40, he was a multimillionaire. The firm prospered with the development of colored inks based on coal-dye tars and the introduction of lithography, and expanded until its operations in multiple cities made it the world's largest ink manufacturer of its day.[4]
Wiborg later became the Assistant Secretary of Commerce and Labor in the Taft administration.[5]
Later life
Wiborg devoted most of his leisure time in his later years to writing books, including The Travels of an Unofficial Attaché, published in 1904, A Commercial Traveller in South America, published in 1905,[6] and Printing Ink: A History with a Treatise on Modern Methods of Manufacture and Use, published in 1926. Shortly before his death, he was working on a second volume of Printing Ink.[7]
Personal life
In 1882, Wiborg married Adeline Moulton Sherman (1859–1917), the daughter of Sarah Elvira (née Moulton) Sherman and banker Hoyt Sherman and a niece of General William Tecumseh Sherman and Senator John Sherman. Together they had three daughters:
- Sara Sherman Wiborg (1883–1975),[8] who married Gerald Murphy, son of Patrick Francis Murphy (whose family owned the Mark Cross Company), in 1915.[9][10]
- Mary Hoyt Wiborg (1888–1964),[11] a playwright who wrote the 1922 play Taboo that starred Paul Robeson.[12]
- Olga Wiborg (1890–1937),[13] who married Sidney Webster Fish, a son of Stuyvesant Fish in 1915, in East Hampton.[14][15]
He died of pneumonia at his home at 756 Park Avenue in New York City on May 12, 1930.[7][16]
East Hampton, New York
The Wiborg family spent summer vacations in the Hamptons, renting rooms and cottages in Amagansett and East Hampton Village before purchasing 600 acres just west of the Maidstone Club from Mrs. Marshall Smith in spring 1909. He expanded an existing cottage and eventually, in 1912, built a 30-room stucco mansion, known as The Dunes, that was among the largest in the area.[4]
Writings
- The Travels of an Unofficial Attaché (Privately printed, 1904)
- A Commercial Traveller in South America (New York: McClure, Phillips & Co. 1905)
- Printing Ink: A History with a Treatise on Modern Methods of Manufacture and Use (New York and London: Harper, 1926)
References
- "Ault & Wiborg Co., Cincinnati, Ohio". Colorants Industry History. Archived from the original on September 11, 2007. Retrieved August 15, 2015.
{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: unfit URL (link) - Drammensfamilien Wiborg by Terje Gudbrandson. Oslo: Reidar Wiborg Jr., 1971
- "Ault & Wiborg Co., Cincinnati, Ohio". Colorants Industry History. Archived from the original on September 11, 2007. Retrieved December 8, 2008.
Frank Bestow Wiborg, had been born in Cleveland, Ohio, in 1855, the son of Henry P. Wiborg, a Norwegian immigrant. He left home to seek his fortune and found his way to Cincinnati, where he was admitted to the Chickering Institute, a select college preparatory academy emphasizing the classics and sciences. Wiborg graduated in 1874, paying his way by peddling newspapers, and got work as a salesman for Levi Ault, impressing him with his abilities.
{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: unfit URL (link) - "Grandest of the Grand: Summer Residence of F.B. Wiborg | The East Hampton Star". www.easthamptonstar.com. Retrieved January 18, 2023.
- "Wife of ex-Government Official Pleads Not Guilty to Smuggling Charge" (PDF). The New York Times. September 28, 1913. Retrieved December 8, 2008.
Mrs. A.S. Wiborg, wife of Frank B. Wiborg, ex-Assistant Secretary of Commerce and Labor, has been indicted in the Federal District Court on two counts for smuggling. She appeared yesterday in court and through her counsel, John B. Stanchfield, entered a plea of not guilty.
- Wiborg, Frank Bestow (1905). A Commercial Traveller in South America: Being the Experiences and Impressions of an American Business Man on a Trip Through Panama, Ecuador, Peru, Chile, the Argentine and Brazil. McClure, Phillips & Company. Retrieved June 16, 2023.
- "Frank B. Wiborg Dies Of Pneumonia. Founded Ink Concern and Established Branches AllOver World. Overcame Many Setbacks. Wrote Books Based on Observations In Business and Travels". The New York Times. May 13, 1930. Retrieved November 20, 2011.
Frank B. Wiborg, last survivor of the Ault Wiborg Company, ink manufacturers, died yesterday afternoon at his home, 756 Park Avenue, from pneumonia, at the age of 75. He became ill last Thursday.
- Whitman, Alden (October 11, 1975). "Sara Murphy, Patron of Writers And Artists in France, 91, Dead". The New York Times. Retrieved June 16, 2023.
- "MISS WIBORG TO WED G. G. MURPHY; Daughter of Mr. and Mrs. F. B. Wiborg Betrothed to Son of Patrick F. Murphy. ACTIVE IN RELIEF WORK Her Engagement Follows the Marriage of Her Sister Olga to Sidney Webster Fish". The New York Times. September 25, 1915. Retrieved June 16, 2023.
- "The History of 40 Fifth Avenue". The New York Times. May 10, 1998. Retrieved June 16, 2023.
On Dec. 30, 1915, Wiborg's daughter Sara was married in the bay-windowed drawing room of No. 40 to her secret sweetheart of five years' standing, Gerald Murphy. Gerald and Sara Murphy later moved to France, where they were the center of a glittering circle of Europeans and American expatriates and gained fame as the models for Dick and Nicole Diver in F. Scott Fitzgerald's Tender Is the Night.
- "MARY HOYT WIBORG, AIDED FRENCH IN WAR". The New York Times. March 28, 1964. Retrieved June 16, 2023.
- "Early Actors and Directors". eO'Neill. Retrieved December 8, 2008.
Because of his performance in that play, the people involved in a production called Taboo asked him to be in it. The play was written by a white woman named Mary Hoyt Wiborg and treated a familiar theme of superstitions and myth among black people.
- TIMES, Special to THE NEW YORK (April 19, 1937). "MRS. SIDNEY FISH, A SOCIETY WOMAN; Member of the East Hampton Summer Colony Dies at Her California Home". The New York Times. Retrieved June 16, 2023.
- "Ms. Wiborg a Bride". The Washington Post. September 19, 1915. Archived from the original on October 18, 2012. Retrieved December 8, 2008.
Marries Sidney Webster Fish at East Hampton, L.I. Big Wedding Avoided Because of Recent Death of Bridegroom's Mother, Mrs. Stuyvesant Fish. Motion Pictures Taken of Party. After Breakfast and Dancing Couple Start on a Cruise. Miss Olga Wiborg, youngest daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Frank S. Wiborg, of New York, previously of Cincinnati, and Sidney Webster Fish, youngest son of Stuyvesant Fish, of Garrison and New York city, were married here today in St. Luke's Episcopal Church.
- "MISS WlBORG, BRIDE OF SIDNEY W. FISH; Youngest Daughter of Mr. and Mrs. F. B. Wiborg Married in St. Luke's, East Hampton. HER SISTERS ATTENDANTS A Simple Ceremony Owing to Recent Death of Bridegroom's Mother Honeymoon on Vanderbilt Yacht". The New York Times. September 19, 1915. Retrieved June 16, 2023.
- "Wiborg Funeral Saturday". The New York Times. May 14, 1930.
Funeral services for Frank B. Wiborg, ink manufacturer, who died on Monday at his home, 756 Park Avenue, in his seventy-sixth year, will be conducted at his home at 10 A. M. on Saturday by the Rev. Dr. Russell Bourne, rector of the Church of the Resurrection. A special train will leave the Pennsylvania Station at 11 A. M. for East Hampton, L. I., where a service will be held in St. Luke's Episcopal Church, of which Mr. Wiborg was a member. Burial will be in the East Hampton Cemetery, where Mrs. Wiborg was buried in 1917.
External links
- Gerald and Sara Murphy Papers, which contain Frank Wiborg's diaries, at the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University.