Henry Clay Folger
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Henry Clay Folger (1857-1930) was president of Standard Oil Company, a collector of Shakespeareana, and founder of the Folger Shakespeare Library.
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Biography
Early life
Henry Clay Folger was born in New York City on June 18, 1857 to Henry C. and Eliza J. (Clark) Folger. He was a first cousin six times removed of Benjamin Franklin and a nephew of James Athearn Folger, the founder of Folger's Coffee.
He prepared at Adelphi Academy, Brooklyn, New York, then attended Amherst College, graduating Phi Beta Kappa in 1879. After Amherst, he attended Columbia Law School from 1879 to 1881, and was admitted to the bar in 1881.
Career
Beginning in 1881 he worked for Standard Oil Company, which was owned by Charles Pratt, the father of his Adelphi and Amherst classmate Charles Milliard Pratt. He was successively the manager, the director, and the president of Standard Oil until his retirement in 1923.
Family
Folger married Emily Clara Jordan in 1885, whom he had met through the Pratts.
Other
Folger was a trustee of the Hamilton Trust Company, Brooklyn, New York; and a director of Seaboard National Bank in New York. He was an avid collector of Shakespeareana. He donated the Folger prizes to his alma mater, Amherst College. In 1914 he was an awarded an honorary Doctor of Letters degree from Amherst. He founded the Folger Shakespeare Library.
He died on June 11, 1930.
Writings
Folger wrote Petroleum, its Production and Products and many articles on Shakespeare and Shakespeareana.
External References
- Relation to Benjamin Franklin (http://wc.rootsweb.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi?op=DESC&db=glencoe&id=I16133)