William Marsh Rice (March 14, 1816 - September 23, 1900) was an American businessman who left his fortune to establish Rice University in Houston, Texas.
Video William Marsh Rice
Biography
Rice was born in Springfield, Massachusetts, the third of ten children of David and Patty (nÃÆ' Â © e Hall) Rice. His first job was as a clerk in Springfield, at the age of 15. At the age of 22, he has bought the shop from its owner. In 1838, Rice went to Texas to look for new business opportunities. Unfortunately, all the merchandise from his shop was lost at sea, and Rice was forced to start a new life in Houston as a scribe. He immediately set up a Rice and Nichols general store with his business partner Ebenezer Nichols. This business is the foundation for what later became William M. Rice and Company.
Rice makes its fortune by investing in land, real estate, timber, railroads, cotton, and other prospects in Texas and Louisiana. In 1860, his total wealth, including fifteen slaves, was worth $ 750,000. He invested in a business company in Houston; in 1895 he was listed in the city directory as "Capitalist." The owner of Capitol Hotel and Capitol Hotel Annex Building, President of Houston Brick Works Company. " Rice is a member of the Independent Order of the Odd Fellows.
Rice married Margaret Bremond, daughter of Paul Bremond (Houston and Texas Central Railway) and Harriet Martha Sprouls, in 1850 in Houston, Texas. The 1860 Census put William and Margaret Rice in the 2nd Neighborhood of Houston. Employees are also identified in the same census report; thus the location is likely to be Rice's merchant business. Margaret is 16 years younger than Rice. He died, at the age of 31, in 1863 in Houston, Texas. Rice is also reported to have lived in Matamoros, Mexico in 1863. Whether or not any connection with the time of Margaret's death to live in Matamoros is unclear. In 1865, he was reportedly living in Houston.
He lived in Houston until about 1865, when he moved to New York (but had no home there). He built a house on an area of ​​160 acres (0.65 km 2 ) in Dunellen, New Jersey, and moved there in 1872. He became a New York resident again in 1882.
Rice married Julia E. Brown (nee Elizabeth Baldwin) on June 26, 1867. Baldwin is the sister of Charlotte Rice, the wife of William Rice's brother, Frederick. The marriage was "stormy", and during the 1890s, he consulted with lawyers about the possibility of divorce. He died "desperate mad" in Waukesha, Wisconsin, on July 24, 1896.
On January 28, 1882, William Rice composed a will, instructing the executors to pay to the guardians, Governors and Judges, funds from his land for the establishment of the "Institute of William M Rice Orphans." The following year, he started spending more time in Houston, reuniting with old acquaintances. After the meeting of 1886 or 1887 with C. Lombardi, Rice decided that the benefits of his wealth should be enjoyed by the children in the city where he made his fortune. In 1891, Rice decided that she would not establish the Orphan Institute at Dunellen's plantation, but instead would find the William M. Rice Institute for the Advancement of Literature, Science and Art in Houston, Texas. The Institute Charter was signed by all original guardians, except for Rice, on May 18, 1891, and certified by the State of Texas the following day.
In 1893, Rice made a new will, naming it as the executor of James A. Baker Sr (the lawyer who often worked for Rice), William M. Rice Jr. (his nephew), and John D. Bartine. The real value of rice at the time was estimated at about $ 4 million. The new will instructs the executors to divide the property into two equal parts, which will be inherited to the Rice Institute, the other divided into shares and distributed to his wife Elizabeth Baldwin Rice and other legates. After his death in 1896, a new will was drafted on September 26, giving inheritance to some of Rice's relatives and leaving the rest of the estate to the Rice Institute. The next four years saw much litigation by Elizabeth Rice's wishes. The executioner was O. T. Holt, assisted by Albert T. Patrick, a former lawyer in Houston, but worked in New York at the time. Under a false identity, Patrick interviewed Rice, who would not see her because of her professional relationship with Elizabeth Rice. Patrick was trying to set up a Rice residence in Texas, and not in New York, which would have a more favorable will for Mrs. Rice. Despite revealing his identity in 1900, to Rice's anger, the two men continued to make transactions.
Planning to take over Rice's estate and become his heir, Patrick prepares a fake will, forging Rice's signature on it. A fake document named William Rice Jr. and James Baker Jr. as executor, but replaces John Bartine's name with Patrick. He made inheritance to a number of relatives and friends of Rice and his own, hoping to involve as many interested parties as possible. In the words of James A. Baker Sr.:
...Father. William M. Rice, Jr., William Marsh Rice's nephew, and one of Mr.'s lawyers. Rice (Captain Baker) was crowned as the executor of not only the first, or the original desires of Mr. Rice, but in second or so called Patrick will; that each of them receives a greater benefit under the latter then will [ sic ] under the first; and while he, Patrick, was crowned the guardian of the residue under a second will, he was actually a wali, to take over the estate and to take care of it in carrying out a number of secret beliefs verbally declared by Mr. Rice.
William Rice lives alone in his apartment at 500 Madison Avenue, New York. His waitress, Charles F. Jones, has been working for him for several years.
On September 24, 1900, James Baker received a telegram from the valet, Charles Jones, stating:
Mr. Rice died last night under the care of a doctor. Certificate of elderly death, extreme anxiety. Cemetery tomorrow morning at nine o'clock. Interment in Waukesha next to his wife. Wire when you come.
Despite the contents of this telegram, a second communique, from bankers Rice warned that multi millionaires had died in strange circumstances, and that his body was cremated.
The court action later proves that Jones and Patrick conspired to kill Rice on September 23. The will is proved false. Patrick was sentenced to death, spent four years in a dead prison at Sing Sing Prison before his sentence was commuted by Governor Frank Higgins in 1906. He received the full pardon from Governor John A. Dix six years later. Patrick died in Tulsa, Oklahoma on February 11, 1940, aged 74 years. Charles Jones was granted freedom, and remained in exile until November 16, 1954. On that date, at the age of 79, he committed suicide in Baytown, Texas, where he lived..
Rice's body was finally cremated, and her ashes jar was kept in the vault of the Superintendent's business office until it was kept under a monument erected in her memory on the Institute's campus. In 1930 John Angel completed the Memorial Founder at Rice University - describing William Marsh Rice - according to specification by architect Ralph Adams Cram.
Maps William Marsh Rice
Death
Rice was the victim of one of the most sensational crimes of the early 1900s. On September 23, 1900, Rice was found dead by her maid, Charles F. Jones. He is considered dead in his sleep. Shortly thereafter, a bank cashier spotted a suspiciously large check with Rice's late signature and made Rice's lawyer in New York City, Albert T. Patrick, but Albert was misspelled as "Abert". Immediately, Patrick made the announcement that Rice had changed his will just before his death, leaving most of his wealth to Patrick rather than to his Institute. Subsequent investigations led by New York District Prosecutors led to the arrest of Patrick and Rice's butler and waitress Charles F. Jones, who had been convinced to give chloroform to Rice while she slept.
Legacy
Rice left most of her land to set up a free higher education institute in Houston, Texas. Opening 1912 as the William Marsh Rice Institute for Advancement of Letters, Science and Art, now known as Rice University. In his will, Rice mandated that the university to bear his name was for "white people only." This request was eventually rejected, and Raymond L. Johnson - the first black student of Rice University - was accepted in 1969.
The Rice School in Houston is also named William Marsh Rice.
References
External links
- William Marsh's Grass Collection, Houston Metropolitan Research Center, Houston Public Library
- William Marsh Rice in Discovering the Mausoleum
- A guide to business and real estate books William Marsh Rice, 1855-1965 (Woodson Research Center, Fondren Library, Rice University, Houston, TX, USA)
- A guide to the family collection of William M. Rice, 1880-1941 (Woodson Research Center, Fondren Library, Rice University, Houston, TX, USA)
Source of the article : Wikipedia
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