Henry Wheeler DeForest (October 29, 1855 – 1938) was an American railroad executive, capitalist and industrialist.

Early life

DeForest was born in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

on October 29, 1855. He was a son of Henry Grant DeForest and Julia Mary (

née A birth name is the name of a person given upon birth. The term may be applied to the surname, the given name, or the entire name. Where births are required to be officially registered, the entire name entered onto a birth certificate or birth re ...

Weeks) DeForest. Among his siblings was older brothers Lockwood DeForest, a painter and interior designer, and Robert Weeks DeForest, a lawyer, financier, and philanthropist. DeForest paternal grandfather was Lockwood DeForest, a prominent South Street merchant and direct descendant of

Jessé de Forest Jessé de Forest (1576 – October 22, 1624) was the leader of a group of Walloon Huguenots who fled Europe due to religious persecutions. They emigrated to the New World, where he planned to found New-Amsterdam, which is currently New York Ci ...

, of

French Huguenot The Huguenots ( , also , ) were a religious group of French Protestants who held to the Reformed, or Calvinist, tradition of Protestantism. The term, which may be derived from the name of a Swiss political leader, the Genevan burgomaster Beza ...

ancestry, whose

Dutch West India Company The Dutch West India Company ( nl, Geoctrooieerde Westindische Compagnie, ''WIC'' or ''GWC''; ; en, Chartered West India Company) was a chartered company of Dutch merchants as well as foreign investors. Among its founders was Willem Usselincx ...

helped to settle

New Amsterdam New Amsterdam ( nl, Nieuw Amsterdam, or ) was a 17th-century Dutch settlement established at the southern tip of Manhattan Island that served as the seat of the colonial government in New Netherland. The initial trading ''factory'' gave rise ...

. Through his mother, he was distantly related to Frederic Church, the

Hudson River The Hudson River is a river that flows from north to south primarily through eastern New York. It originates in the Adirondack Mountains of Upstate New York and flows southward through the Hudson Valley to the New York Harbor between Ne ...

landscapist, and his maternal grandfather was Robert Doughty Weeks, the first President of the

New York Stock Exchange The New York Stock Exchange (NYSE, nicknamed "The Big Board") is an American stock exchange in the Financial District of Lower Manhattan in New York City. It is by far the world's largest stock exchange by market capitalization of its liste ...

. He was a graduate of Williston Seminary in Easthampton, Massachusetts,

Yale University Yale University is a private research university in New Haven, Connecticut. Established in 1701 as the Collegiate School, it is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and among the most prestigious in the w ...

in 1876, and

Columbia Law School Columbia Law School (Columbia Law or CLS) is the law school of Columbia University, a private Ivy League university in New York City. Columbia Law is widely regarded as one of the most prestigious law schools in the world and has always ranked i ...

in 1878.

Career

After being

admitted to the bar An admission to practice law is acquired when a lawyer receives a license to practice law. In jurisdictions with two types of lawyer, as with barristers and solicitors, barristers must gain admission to the bar whereas for solicitors there are dist ...

in 1878, he began practicing law with his father, brother, and uncle in New York. When that firm was dissolved in 1893, DeForest and his brother founded the firm known as DeForest Brothers. From 1925 to 1928, he was chair of the

executive committee A committee or commission is a body of one or more persons subordinate to a deliberative assembly. A committee is not itself considered to be a form of assembly. Usually, the assembly sends matters into a committee as a way to explore them more ...

of the

Southern Pacific Railroad The Southern Pacific (or Espee from the railroad initials- SP) was an American Class I railroad network that existed from 1865 to 1996 and operated largely in the Western United States. The system was operated by various companies under the ...

, and chairman of its board of directors from 1929 to 1932. He assisted

E.H. Harriman Edward Henry Harriman (February 20, 1848 – September 9, 1909) was an American financier and railroad executive. Early life Harriman was born on February 20, 1848, in Hempstead, New York, the son of Orlando Harriman Sr., an Episcopal clergym ...

in the recapitalization of the

Wells Fargo Express Company Wells Fargo & Company is an American multinational financial services company with corporate headquarters in San Francisco, California; operational headquarters in Manhattan; and managerial offices throughout the United States and int ...

, and was a longtime director of the Equitable Life Assurance Company. With

Elihu Root Elihu Root (; February 15, 1845February 7, 1937) was an American lawyer, Republican politician, and statesman who served as Secretary of State and Secretary of War in the early twentieth century. He also served as United States Senator from ...

, he was the trustee of the majority of the Equitable's capital stock. He also served as president of the

New York Botanical Garden The New York Botanical Garden (NYBG) is a botanical garden at Bronx Park in the Bronx, New York City. Established in 1891, it is located on a site that contains a landscape with over one million living plants; the Enid A. Haupt Conservatory, ...

from January 1928 to November 1937.

Personal life

On August 22, 1898, DeForest was married to Julia Gilman Noyes (1875–1967) in

St. Paul, Minnesota Saint Paul (abbreviated St. Paul) is the capital of the U.S. state of Minnesota and the county seat of Ramsey County. Situated on high bluffs overlooking a bend in the Mississippi River, Saint Paul is a regional business hub and the center o ...

. Julia was the daughter of

Emily Hoffman Emily Key Hoffman, known upon her marriage as Mrs. F. Y. Dalziel, (1876 – September 12, 1927) was an American socialite, heiress, dancer, and Big-game hunting, big-game hunter. A prominent debutante of the Gilded Age, she was a leading figure in ...

(née Gilman) Noyes and Charles Phelps Noyes, a millionaire druggist. Together, they resided at 63 East 79th Street in New York, Nethermuir in

Cold Spring Harbor Cold Spring Harbor is a hamlet and census-designated place (CDP) in the Town of Huntington, in Suffolk County, on the North Shore of Long Island in New York. As of the 2010 United States census, the CDP population was 5,070. History Cold Spri ...

(the former home of Chinese merchant Oliver Kimball Gordon), and were the parents of: * Julia Mary DeForest (1899–1988), who married Beverley Duer (1893–1961). * Henry Wheeler DeForest Jr. (1901–1913), who died of a

brain tumor A brain tumor occurs when abnormal cells form within the brain. There are two main types of tumors: malignant tumors and benign (non-cancerous) tumors. These can be further classified as primary tumors, which start within the brain, and seco ...

in 1913. * Charles Noyes DeForest (1905–1929), a Yale graduate who died in Palermo, Italy during a trip around the world. * Alice Delano DeForest (1908–1988), who married Francis Minturn Sedgwick (1904–1967), son of

Henry Dwight Sedgwick Henry Dwight Sedgwick III (September 24, 1861 – January 5, 1957) was an American lawyer and author. Early life Sedgwick was born in Stockbridge, Massachusetts, the second of five children born to Henry Dwight Sedgwick II (1824–1903 ...

, in 1929. DeForest died at his county home, Nethermuir, in Cold Spring Harbor on 1938. He was buried at Memorial Cemetery of Saint John's Church in

Laurel Hollow, New York Laurel Hollow is a village in the Town of Oyster Bay in Nassau County, on the North Shore of Long Island, in New York, United States. The population was 1,952 at the 2010 census. According to Bloomberg BusinessWeek, Laurel Hollow was the eighth ...

Long Island Long Island is a densely populated island in the southeastern region of the U.S. state of New York, part of the New York metropolitan area. With over 8 million people, Long Island is the most populous island in the United States and the 18 ...

Descendants

Through his daughter Alice, he is the grandfather of

Andy Warhol Andy Warhol (; born Andrew Warhola Jr.; August 6, 1928 – February 22, 1987) was an American visual artist, film director, and producer who was a leading figure in the visual art movement known as pop art. His works explore the relationsh ...

muse

Edie Sedgwick Edith Minturn Sedgwick Post (April 20, 1943 – November 16, 1971) was an American actress and fashion model, known for being one of Andy Warhol's superstars.Watson, Steven (2003), "Factory Made: Warhol and the Sixties" Pantheon Books, pp. 210& ...

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Deforest, Henry 1855 births 1938 deaths Williston Northampton School alumni Yale University alumni Columbia Law School alumni 20th-century American railroad executives Southern Pacific Railroad people 19th-century American businesspeople