William Wallace Spence

William Wallace Spence (born 1815 - died 1915) was a Baltimore Financier. He was a founding partner of Spence & Reid, which manufactured clipper ships, established an import/export firm at Pratt Street’s Old Bowley’s Wharf, and founded The Mercantile Trust and Deposit Company.

Business

Born in Scotland in 1815, William Wallace Spence immigrated to the United States at the age of eighteen with only one-hundred dollars in his pocket.[1] He was employed as a shipping clerk in New York and then came to Baltimore to enter into a business partnership with Andrew Reid, forming the corporation Spence & Reid, which manufactured clipper ships[1] Spence also set up an import/export firm at Pratt Street’s Old Bowley’s Wharf. Later, he founded the Mercantile Trust and Deposit Company and became an officer of The Eutaw Savings Bank.[2]

Civic activity

Spence was a pillar in the Baltimore community. He was the president of the Municipal Art Society,[3] active in the formation of the First Presbyterian Church,[1] and a prominent contributor to Johns Hopkins University and Hospital.[4] He is best known for erecting a thirteen-foot, iron statue of William Wallace, the Scottish martyr, in 1893 in Druid Hill Park[5] and donating a copy of Danish sculptor Bertel Thorvaldsen’s Christus Consolator to Johns Hopkins Hospital in 1896.[6]

gollark: BRB HMU IMO PXE DM CB BSA MP3
gollark: HMU?
gollark: Um. Wow.
gollark: I will happily trade many rares I get for reds in large quantities.
gollark: Yes, I like balloons.

References
  1. “W.W. Spence Dies at 100; Baltimore Financier Celebrated Birthday on October 18; His Career” 4 Nov. 1915 The New York Times, 7
  2. ”Druid Hill Park’s Scottish Sentinel to be Rededicated: Statue of Wallace Nears Age 100” 20 Aug. 1993 The New York Times
  3. “Society in Baltimore. The Art Loan Exhibition a Success-a Series of Matinees Francaise for the Lenten Season” 9 Mar. 1902 The New York Times 10
  4. ”W.W. Spence Chair in Semitic Languages”
  5. David R. Ross, On the Trail of William Wallace (Glasgow: Bell & Bain Ltd., 1999), 136
  6. Nancy McCall, “The Statue of the Christus Consolator at The Johns Hopkins Hospital: Its acquisition and Historic Origins” The Johns Hopkins Medical Journal (151) 1982 (11-19)

External references
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.