George Dudley Seymour

George Dudley Seymour (October 6, 1859 – January 21, 1945) was an American historian, patent attorney, antiquarian, author, and city planner.[1] He was the noted authority and foremost expert on Nathan Hale, the American Revolutionary War hero.[2]

George Dudley Seymour
The Connoisseur by Mary Rogers Williams
Born(1859-10-06)October 6, 1859
Bristol, Connecticut
DiedJanuary 21, 1945(1945-01-21) (aged 85)
New Haven, Connecticut
Resting placeGrove Street Cemetery

Biography

George Dudley Seymour was born in Bristol, Connecticut, the son of Henry Albert Seymour and Electa Churchill.[3] He practiced patent law in Washington, D.C., and then in New Haven, Connecticut.[4] Seymour was a law graduate of Columbian College in Washington, D.C., and received an honorary Master of Arts degree from Yale University in 1913.[5] He was a member of the Walpole Society,[6] the American Antiquarian Society,[7] the Century Association,[8] the Cosmos Club,[9] and the Acorn Club.[10] Seymour was a former vice president of the American Federation of Arts, a trustee of the Wadsworth Atheneum, and chairman of the State Commission of Sculpture.[11][12] He was a close friend of William Howard Taft, John Singer Sargent,[13] and Gifford Pinchot,[14] and a cousin of Yale President Charles Seymour.[5]

Seymour extensively researched the life of the patriot Nathan Hale. He led the campaign for the statue of Hale on the Old Campus at Yale,[5] and convinced the federal government to print a Nathan Hale postage stamp in 1925.[15][16] In 1914, Seymour purchased the Nathan Hale Homestead in Coventry, Connecticut, which he restored and gifted to the Antiquarian & Landmarks Society.[17] Upon his death, Seymour gifted to the United States government the life size bronze statue Captain Nathan Hale by sculptor Bela Lyon Pratt;[18] the statue is located at the south facade of the United States Department of Justice headquarters in Washington, D.C.

Theodore Roosevelt and George Dudley Seymour in New Haven, April 1915.

Seymour was a leading figure in the municipal development of New Haven, and was the city's most fervent proponent of the City Beautiful movement.[19][20] The City Beautiful influence in New Haven was responsible for a series of formal public buildings, such as the New Haven County Courthouse and the New Haven Free Public Library, with traditional columns and pediments that reinforced the role of the green as a civic center of classical dignity.[21] In 1908, Seymour persuaded Yale to open the Peabody Museum of Natural History and the Yale University Art Gallery to the public on Sunday afternoons.[1][7]

He died on January 21, 1945, in New Haven, Connecticut and was buried in the Grove Street Cemetery.[5][2]

The George Dudley Seymour Papers, Seymour's collection of correspondence, writings, photographs, research files, and printed material, are housed within the Manuscripts and Archives in Sterling Memorial Library at Yale.[22]

George Dudley Seymour State Park in Middlesex County, Connecticut is named after him.[23]

See also

Bibliography
  • Hale and Wyllys (1933)
  • The Seymour Family (1939)
  • Documentary Life of Nathan Hale (1942)
  • New Haven: A Book Recording the Varied Activities of the Author in his Efforts Over Many Years to Promote the Welfare of the City of his Adoption Since 1883, Together with Some Researches into its Storied Past and Many Illustrations (1942)

References
  1. "The Bristol Press - PRIME TIME: The life and times of George Dudley Seymour". Central Connecticut Communications.
  2. "G. SEYMOUR, EXPERT ON HALE'S LIFE, DIES", The New York Times, January 22, 1945
  3. Leonard, John William; Marquis, Albert Nelson (1913). "Who's Who in America, Volume 7". Marquis, Albert Nelson; Leonard, John W. (1913).
  4. "Connecticut Journal", The New York Times, January 4, 1981
  5. "The Man Who Remembered Hale", Manuscripts and Archives, Yale University Library, 2009
  6. "Early American Houses: With A Glossary of Colonial Architectural Terms", Isham, Norman Morrison, 1928
  7. "GEORGE DUDLEY SEYMOUR", The American Antiquarian Society - OBITUARIES, Page 45, April, 1945
  8. "Reports, Constitution, By-laws and List of Members of the Century Association", Century Association (New York, N.Y.), 1911
  9. "Act of Incorporation and By-laws with a List of Officers and Members", Cosmos Club (Washington, D.C.), 1911
  10. "FORMER ACORN CLUB MEMBERS SINCE 1899", ‘’acornclubct.org’’
  11. "George Dudley Seymour", Connecticut Historical Society Museum & Library
  12. "The American Bar", J.C. Fifield Company, 1921
  13. "Past to Present", The New Haven Museum and Historical Society, Summer 2007
  14. Pinchot, Gifford (1947). Breaking New Ground. Island Press. ISBN 978-1-55963-670-4.
  15. "Nathan Hale: The Life and Death of America's First Spy", Phelps, M. William’’, 2014
  16. "Revolutionary times: New Haven’s role at America’s beginning", New Haven Register, July 19, 2018
  17. "The View From: Coventry; Mementos of a Revolutionary War Hero". The New York Times (June 13, 1993).
  18. "Captain Nathan Hale, (sculpture).", Smithsonian American Art Museum
  19. "A Modern History of New Haven and Eastern New Haven County, Volume 1", Hill, Everett Gleason, 1918
  20. "A Guide to Historic New Haven, Connecticut", Caplan, Colin M., 2007
  21. "Tomorrow is Here: New Haven and the Modern Movement", The New Haven Preservation Trust, 2008
  22. "Collection: George Dudley Seymour papers | Archives at Yale". archives.yale.edu.
  23. "DEEP: George Dudley Seymour State Park". www.ct.gov.
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