This blogger recently caught up with Brewer “Buck” Thompson (born 1931), patriarch of the J.R. Thompson (1873-1927) side of the family, for a series of short interviews. In the family tradition, Buck, at 13, left for Exeter, where his father and grandfather also received their education. He later attended Stanford and spent two years in […]
The Inside Story of the Cumberland-Ely Deal: How William Boyce Thompson Outflanked the Guggenheims
I was recently sitting comfortably in a reading room of the Library of Congress, going through some papers left behind by Hermann Hagedorn, William Boyce Thompson’s biographer. I was minding my own business, trying to speed-read interviews related to the Magnate’s acquisition of a mining venture in Ely, Nevada, dreaming of my next cup of […]
Legendary Frontiersman William Thompson Lost Everything–Several Times
In 1859, William Thompson won an important commission to build a government fort and houses in Yankton, then the extreme frontier of the Northwest Territory. Unfortunately, before the young frontiersman could get paid for his work tragedy struck: Indians burned the buildings. The situation left the 21-year-old penniless. It wouldn’t be the first time. An unusual number of financial tragedies befell the hard-working William Thompson […]