E. H. Harriman
Encyclopedia
Edward Henry Harriman (February 20, 1848 – September 9, 1909) was an American railroad executive.
, the son of Orlando Harriman, an Episcopal clergyman, and Cornelia Neilson. His great-grandfather, William Harriman, emigrated from England
in 1795 and engaged successfully in trading and commercial pursuits.
As a young boy, Harriman spent a summer working at the Greenwood Iron Furnace in the area owned by the Robert Parker Parrott
family that would become Harriman State Park. He quit school at age 14 to take a job as an errand boy on Wall Street
in New York City
. His uncle Oliver Harriman had earlier established a career there. His rise from that humble station was meteoric. By age 22, he was a member of the New York Stock Exchange
. And, by age 33, he focused his energies on acquiring rail lines.
). Over the next several years he purchased an additional 20000 acres (80.9 km²) almost forty different parcels of land, and built forty miles of bridle paths to connect them all. His master 100000 sq ft (9,290.3 m²) home (Arden House) which sat high above the Palisades Parkway, was completed only seven months before he died. In the early 1900s, his sons W. Averell Harriman
and E. Roland Harriman
hired landscape architect Arthur P. Kroll to work closely with the head gardener and landscape those many acres. It was from this estate that his widow would donate ten thousand acres (40 km²) to New York state to start Harriman State Park in 1910.
Harriman was nearly fifty years old when in 1897 he became a director of the Union Pacific Railroad
. By May 1898 he was chairman of the executive committee, and from that time until his death his word was law on the Union Pacific system. In 1903 he assumed the office of president of the company. From 1901 to 1909, Harriman was also the President of the Southern Pacific
railroad. The vision of a unified UP/SP railroad was planted with Harriman. (The UP and SP were reunited on Sept. 11, 1996 when the ICC approved their merger.)
At the time of his death Harriman controlled the Union Pacific
, the Southern Pacific
, the Saint Joseph and Grand Island
, the Illinois Central
, the Central of Georgia
, the Pacific Mail Steamship Company
, and the Wells Fargo Express Company
. Estimates of his estate ranged from $70 million to $100 million. It was left entirely to his wife.
and fauna
of the Alaska
coastline from its lush southern panhandle to Prince William Sound
. Among the scholars who joined him were John Burroughs
, John Muir
, George Bird Grinnell
, Louis Agassiz Fuertes
, Edward Curtis, Trevor Kincaid, G. K. Gilbert, Albert Fisher
, Robert Ridgway, Charles Keeler
, Frederick Coville, Frederick Dellenbaugh
, William Emerson Ritter
and Clinton Hart Merriam
. They made the trip on a luxuriously refitted 250 feet (76.2 m) steamer, George W. Elder.
after his two-month visit to Japan in 1905. The New York Times reported that he brought to America a troupe of six Japanese jiu-jitsu wrestlers, two of whom were prominent judokas, Tsunejiro Tomita
and Mitsuyo Maeda
. Among many performances, the troupe gave an exhibition that drew six hundred spectators in the Columbia University
gymnasium on February 7, 1905.
, the daughter of William J. Averell, a banker of Ogdensburg, New York
, who was president of the Ogdensburg and Lake Champlain Railroad Company. This relationship aroused his interest in up-state transportation and two years later his career as a rebuilder of bankrupt railroads began with a small broken-down railroad called the Lake Ontario Southern which he renamed the Sodus Bay & Southern, reorganized, and sold with considerable profit to the Pennsylvania Railroad
.
Upon Harriman's death in 1909, naturalist John Muir
, who had joined him on his 1899 Alaska expedition, wrote in his eulogy of Harriman, "In almost every way, he was a man to admire."
in Omaha, Nebraska
is named for Edward H. Harriman. In 1913, his widow created the E. H. Harriman Award to recognize outstanding achievements in railway safety. The award has been presented on an annual basis since then.
His estate, Arden
, was designated a National Historic Landmark
in 1966.
Harriman is mentioned in the movie Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid
, as the commercial baron whose agents become the title characters' nemeses
. In the film's second train robbery, a railroad employee ascribes his refusal to cooperate with the robbery to his obligations to Harriman personally, and one of Butch and Sundance's intimates describes Harriman's hiring of famed outlaw-hunters to track down the gang's leaders.
In the movie The Wild Bunch
, a railroad official named as "Harrigan" takes the same strategy.
Harriman was also featured in the computer game Railroad Tycoon II
, as a computer AI
character.
Two post offices in Oregon were named for Harriman, including the one at Rocky Point
, where he maintained a summer camp for several years.
Financial and business publisher Harriman House is named after Harriman.
Harriman was a notable philanthropist, and founder of the Tompkins’ Square Boys’ Club, now known as The Boys’ Club of New York. The original club, founded in 1876 and located in the rented basement of the Wilson School in Manhattan
’s Lower East Side
, began with three boys. Harriman’s idea for the club was to provide a place “for the boys, so as to get them off the streets and teach them better manners.” The club was the “first organization of its kind in the United States, if not in the world.” In 1887, eleven years after its founding, the club was incorporated as “The Boys’ Club of Tompkins Square.” By 1901, the club had outgrown its space in the basement of the Wilson School, and Harriman purchased several lots on 10th and Avenue A, and a five-story clubhouse was completed in 1901. By 1907, average nightly admissions to the club averaged over one thousand.
Early years
Harriman was born in Hempstead, New YorkHempstead (village), New York
Hempstead is a village located in the town of Hempstead, Nassau County, New York, United States. The population was 53,891 at the 2010 census.Hofstra University is located on the border between Hempstead and Uniondale.-Foundation:...
, the son of Orlando Harriman, an Episcopal clergyman, and Cornelia Neilson. His great-grandfather, William Harriman, emigrated from England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
in 1795 and engaged successfully in trading and commercial pursuits.
As a young boy, Harriman spent a summer working at the Greenwood Iron Furnace in the area owned by the Robert Parker Parrott
Robert Parker Parrott
Robert Parker Parrott was an American soldier and inventor of military ordnance.-Biography:Born in Lee, New Hampshire, he was the son of John Fabyan Parrott. He graduated with honors from the United States Military Academy, third in the Class of 1824. Parrott was assigned to the Third Regiment of...
family that would become Harriman State Park. He quit school at age 14 to take a job as an errand boy on Wall Street
Wall Street
Wall Street refers to the financial district of New York City, named after and centered on the eight-block-long street running from Broadway to South Street on the East River in Lower Manhattan. Over time, the term has become a metonym for the financial markets of the United States as a whole, or...
in New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
. His uncle Oliver Harriman had earlier established a career there. His rise from that humble station was meteoric. By age 22, he was a member of the New York Stock Exchange
New York Stock Exchange
The New York Stock Exchange is a stock exchange located at 11 Wall Street in Lower Manhattan, New York City, USA. It is by far the world's largest stock exchange by market capitalization of its listed companies at 13.39 trillion as of Dec 2010...
. And, by age 33, he focused his energies on acquiring rail lines.
Career
In 1885 Harriman learned that the 7863 acres (31.8 km²) Parrott family estate was for sale. He bought it for $52,500 and named it Arden (now a hamlet in Tuxedo, New YorkTuxedo, New York
Tuxedo is a town located in Orange County, New York. As of the 2000 census, the town had a total population of 3,334. The town is in the southeastern part of the county. NY Route 17 and the New York State Thruway pass through the town...
). Over the next several years he purchased an additional 20000 acres (80.9 km²) almost forty different parcels of land, and built forty miles of bridle paths to connect them all. His master 100000 sq ft (9,290.3 m²) home (Arden House) which sat high above the Palisades Parkway, was completed only seven months before he died. In the early 1900s, his sons W. Averell Harriman
W. Averell Harriman
William Averell Harriman was an American Democratic Party politician, businessman, and diplomat. He was the son of railroad baron E. H. Harriman. He served as Secretary of Commerce under President Harry S. Truman and later as the 48th Governor of New York...
and E. Roland Harriman
E. Roland Harriman
E. Roland Harriman was a financier and philanthropist...
hired landscape architect Arthur P. Kroll to work closely with the head gardener and landscape those many acres. It was from this estate that his widow would donate ten thousand acres (40 km²) to New York state to start Harriman State Park in 1910.
Harriman was nearly fifty years old when in 1897 he became a director of the Union Pacific Railroad
Union Pacific Railroad
The Union Pacific Railroad , headquartered in Omaha, Nebraska, is the largest railroad network in the United States. James R. Young is president, CEO and Chairman....
. By May 1898 he was chairman of the executive committee, and from that time until his death his word was law on the Union Pacific system. In 1903 he assumed the office of president of the company. From 1901 to 1909, Harriman was also the President of the Southern Pacific
Southern Pacific Railroad
The Southern Pacific Transportation Company , earlier Southern Pacific Railroad and Southern Pacific Company, and usually simply called the Southern Pacific or Espee, was an American railroad....
railroad. The vision of a unified UP/SP railroad was planted with Harriman. (The UP and SP were reunited on Sept. 11, 1996 when the ICC approved their merger.)
At the time of his death Harriman controlled the Union Pacific
Union Pacific Railroad
The Union Pacific Railroad , headquartered in Omaha, Nebraska, is the largest railroad network in the United States. James R. Young is president, CEO and Chairman....
, the Southern Pacific
Southern Pacific Railroad
The Southern Pacific Transportation Company , earlier Southern Pacific Railroad and Southern Pacific Company, and usually simply called the Southern Pacific or Espee, was an American railroad....
, the Saint Joseph and Grand Island
St. Joseph and Grand Island Railroad
The St. Joseph and Grand Island Railroad was created in about 1879 when the St. Joseph and Western Railroad built a line from Hastings, NE to Grand Island, NE. Upon completion of the line, the SJ&W was reorganized into the SJ&GI. Doniphan, NE was plotted in 1879 at about the halfway point between...
, the Illinois Central
Illinois Central Railroad
The Illinois Central Railroad , sometimes called the Main Line of Mid-America, is a railroad in the central United States, with its primary routes connecting Chicago, Illinois with New Orleans, Louisiana and Birmingham, Alabama. A line also connected Chicago with Sioux City, Iowa...
, the Central of Georgia
Central of Georgia Railroad
The Central of Georgia Railway started as the Central Rail Road and Canal Company in 1833. As a way to better attract investment capital, the railroad changed its name to Central Rail Road and Banking Company of Georgia. This railroad was constructed to join the Macon and Western Railroad at...
, the Pacific Mail Steamship Company
Pacific Mail Steamship Company
The Pacific Mail Steamship Company was founded April 18, 1848 as a joint stock company under the laws of the State of New York by a group of New York City merchants, William H. Aspinwall, Edwin Bartlett, Henry Chauncey, Mr. Alsop, G.G. Howland and S.S. Howland...
, and the Wells Fargo Express Company
Wells Fargo
Wells Fargo & Company is an American multinational diversified financial services company with operations around the world. Wells Fargo is the fourth largest bank in the U.S. by assets and the largest bank by market capitalization. Wells Fargo is the second largest bank in deposits, home...
. Estimates of his estate ranged from $70 million to $100 million. It was left entirely to his wife.
The Harriman Alaska Expedition
In 1899, Harriman financed and accompanied a scientific expedition to catalog the floraFlora
Flora is the plant life occurring in a particular region or time, generally the naturally occurring or indigenous—native plant life. The corresponding term for animals is fauna.-Etymology:...
and fauna
Fauna
Fauna or faunæ is all of the animal life of any particular region or time. The corresponding term for plants is flora.Zoologists and paleontologists use fauna to refer to a typical collection of animals found in a specific time or place, e.g. the "Sonoran Desert fauna" or the "Burgess shale fauna"...
of the Alaska
Alaska
Alaska is the largest state in the United States by area. It is situated in the northwest extremity of the North American continent, with Canada to the east, the Arctic Ocean to the north, and the Pacific Ocean to the west and south, with Russia further west across the Bering Strait...
coastline from its lush southern panhandle to Prince William Sound
Prince William Sound
Prince William Sound is a sound off the Gulf of Alaska on the south coast of the U.S. state of Alaska. It is located on the east side of the Kenai Peninsula. Its largest port is Valdez, at the southern terminus of the Trans-Alaska Pipeline System...
. Among the scholars who joined him were John Burroughs
John Burroughs
John Burroughs was an American naturalist and essayist important in the evolution of the U.S. conservation movement. According to biographers at the American Memory project at the Library of Congress,...
, John Muir
John Muir
John Muir was a Scottish-born American naturalist, author, and early advocate of preservation of wilderness in the United States. His letters, essays, and books telling of his adventures in nature, especially in the Sierra Nevada mountains of California, have been read by millions...
, George Bird Grinnell
George Bird Grinnell
George Bird Grinnell was an American anthropologist, historian, naturalist, and writer. Grinnell was born in Brooklyn, New York, and graduated from Yale University with a B.A. in 1870 and a Ph.D. in 1880. Originally specializing in zoology, he became a prominent early conservationist and student...
, Louis Agassiz Fuertes
Louis Agassiz Fuertes
Louis Agassiz Fuertes was an American ornithologist, illustrator and artist.-Biography:Fuertes was the son of Estevan and Mary Stone Perry Fuertes....
, Edward Curtis, Trevor Kincaid, G. K. Gilbert, Albert Fisher
Albert Fisher
Albert Fisher wasa pioneer in the burgeoning auto industry in Detroit. He was the uncle of the seven Fisher brothers, founders of Fisher Body. Albert Fisher built some of the first bodies for many automobiles and trucks. He built the first touring car body for Henry Ford...
, Robert Ridgway, Charles Keeler
Charles Keeler
Charles Augustus Keeler was an American author, poet, naturalist and advocate for the arts, particularly architecture.Keeler was born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and moved with his family to Berkeley in 1887...
, Frederick Coville, Frederick Dellenbaugh
Frederick Samuel Dellenbaugh
Frederick Samuel Dellenbaugh was an American explorer.-Biography:He was born in McConnelsville, Ohio and was educated in the United States and in Europe...
, William Emerson Ritter
William Emerson Ritter
William Emerson Ritter, Ph.D. was an American biologist. Ritter initiated and shaped the Marine Biological Association of San Diego and the American Society for the Dissemination of Science...
and Clinton Hart Merriam
Clinton Hart Merriam
Clinton Hart Merriam was an American zoologist, ornithologist, entomologist and ethnographer.Known as "Hart" to his friends, Dr. Clinton Hart Merriam was born in New York City in 1855. His father, Clinton Levi Merriam, was a U.S. congressman. He studied biology and anatomy at Yale University and...
. They made the trip on a luxuriously refitted 250 feet (76.2 m) steamer, George W. Elder.
Interest in Jiu-Jitsu
Harriman became interested in jiu-jitsuJujutsu
Jujutsu , also known as jujitsu, ju-jitsu, or Japanese jiu-jitsu, is a Japanese martial art and a method of close combat for defeating an armed and armored opponent in which one uses no weapon, or only a short weapon....
after his two-month visit to Japan in 1905. The New York Times reported that he brought to America a troupe of six Japanese jiu-jitsu wrestlers, two of whom were prominent judokas, Tsunejiro Tomita
Tsunejiro Tomita
, born , was the earliest disciple of judo. His name appears in the first line of the enrollment book of the Kōdōkan. Tomita, together with Saigō Shirō, became first in history of judo to be awarded black belt grade by the founder of judo Kanō Jigorō, who established the ranking system...
and Mitsuyo Maeda
Mitsuyo Maeda
,a Brazilian naturalized as Otávio Maeda,was a Japanese judōka and prizefighter in no holds barred competitions. He was also known as Count Combat or Conde Koma in Spanish and Brazilian Portuguese, a nickname he picked up in Spain in 1908...
. Among many performances, the troupe gave an exhibition that drew six hundred spectators in the Columbia University
Columbia University
Columbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...
gymnasium on February 7, 1905.
Personal life
In 1879 he married Mary Williamson AverellMary Williamson Averell
Mary Williamson Averell was born in New York City into a prominent New York family. The only daughter, she was tutored at home and completed her education at a finishing school with the “…expectation that one day she would become a fine wife and mother for some young man of equal or greater social...
, the daughter of William J. Averell, a banker of Ogdensburg, New York
Ogdensburg, New York
Ogdensburg is a city in St. Lawrence County, New York, United States. The population was 11,128 at the 2010 census. In the late 18th century, European-American settlers named the community after American land owner and developer Samuel Ogden....
, who was president of the Ogdensburg and Lake Champlain Railroad Company. This relationship aroused his interest in up-state transportation and two years later his career as a rebuilder of bankrupt railroads began with a small broken-down railroad called the Lake Ontario Southern which he renamed the Sodus Bay & Southern, reorganized, and sold with considerable profit to the Pennsylvania Railroad
Pennsylvania Railroad
The Pennsylvania Railroad was an American Class I railroad, founded in 1846. Commonly referred to as the "Pennsy", the PRR was headquartered in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania....
.
Upon Harriman's death in 1909, naturalist John Muir
John Muir
John Muir was a Scottish-born American naturalist, author, and early advocate of preservation of wilderness in the United States. His letters, essays, and books telling of his adventures in nature, especially in the Sierra Nevada mountains of California, have been read by millions...
, who had joined him on his 1899 Alaska expedition, wrote in his eulogy of Harriman, "In almost every way, he was a man to admire."
Legacy
The Union Pacific Harriman Dispatch CenterUnion Pacific Harriman Dispatch Center
The Union Pacific Harriman Dispatch Center is located at 850 Jones Street in downtown Omaha, Nebraska. Called "the Bunker" by some, the Harriman is Union Pacific's rail traffic control headquarters, where the movement of more than 850 trains and nearly 36,000 miles of track across the country is...
in Omaha, Nebraska
Omaha, Nebraska
Omaha is the largest city in the state of Nebraska, United States, and is the county seat of Douglas County. It is located in the Midwestern United States on the Missouri River, about 20 miles north of the mouth of the Platte River...
is named for Edward H. Harriman. In 1913, his widow created the E. H. Harriman Award to recognize outstanding achievements in railway safety. The award has been presented on an annual basis since then.
His estate, Arden
Arden (estate)
Arden was the estate owned by railroad magnate Edward Henry Harriman and Mary Averell Harriman outside Harriman, New York. By the early nineteen hundreds the family owned in the area, half of it comprising the Arden Estate...
, was designated a National Historic Landmark
National Historic Landmark
A National Historic Landmark is a building, site, structure, object, or district, that is officially recognized by the United States government for its historical significance...
in 1966.
Harriman is mentioned in the movie Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid
Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid
Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid is a 1969 American Western film directed by George Roy Hill and written by William Goldman...
, as the commercial baron whose agents become the title characters' nemeses
Archenemy
An archenemy, archfoe, archvillain or archnemesis is the principal enemy of a character in a work of fiction, often described as the hero's worst enemy .- Etymology :The word archenemy or arch-enemy originated...
. In the film's second train robbery, a railroad employee ascribes his refusal to cooperate with the robbery to his obligations to Harriman personally, and one of Butch and Sundance's intimates describes Harriman's hiring of famed outlaw-hunters to track down the gang's leaders.
In the movie The Wild Bunch
The Wild Bunch
The Wild Bunch is a 1969 American Western film directed by Sam Peckinpah about an aging outlaw gang on the Texas-Mexico border, trying to exist in the changing "modern" world of 1913...
, a railroad official named as "Harrigan" takes the same strategy.
Harriman was also featured in the computer game Railroad Tycoon II
Railroad Tycoon II
Railroad Tycoon II is a game for the PC, Macintosh, PlayStation and Dreamcast in the Railroad Tycoon series. The Dreamcast version is a Gold Edition with improved graphics and gameplay...
, as a computer AI
Artificial intelligence
Artificial intelligence is the intelligence of machines and the branch of computer science that aims to create it. AI textbooks define the field as "the study and design of intelligent agents" where an intelligent agent is a system that perceives its environment and takes actions that maximize its...
character.
Two post offices in Oregon were named for Harriman, including the one at Rocky Point
Rocky Point, Oregon
Rocky Point is an unincorporated community in Klamath County, Oregon, United States. It is located on Pelican Bay on the west shore of Upper Klamath Lake, about 29 miles northwest of Klamath Falls and about three miles north of Oregon Route 140 on Forest Highway 34...
, where he maintained a summer camp for several years.
Financial and business publisher Harriman House is named after Harriman.
Harriman was a notable philanthropist, and founder of the Tompkins’ Square Boys’ Club, now known as The Boys’ Club of New York. The original club, founded in 1876 and located in the rented basement of the Wilson School in Manhattan
Manhattan
Manhattan is the oldest and the most densely populated of the five boroughs of New York City. Located primarily on the island of Manhattan at the mouth of the Hudson River, the boundaries of the borough are identical to those of New York County, an original county of the state of New York...
’s Lower East Side
Lower East Side
The Lower East Side, LES, is a neighborhood in the southeastern part of the New York City borough of Manhattan. It is roughly bounded by Allen Street, East Houston Street, Essex Street, Canal Street, Eldridge Street, East Broadway, and Grand Street....
, began with three boys. Harriman’s idea for the club was to provide a place “for the boys, so as to get them off the streets and teach them better manners.” The club was the “first organization of its kind in the United States, if not in the world.” In 1887, eleven years after its founding, the club was incorporated as “The Boys’ Club of Tompkins Square.” By 1901, the club had outgrown its space in the basement of the Wilson School, and Harriman purchased several lots on 10th and Avenue A, and a five-story clubhouse was completed in 1901. By 1907, average nightly admissions to the club averaged over one thousand.
External links
- University of Washington Libraries Digital Collections – Harriman Alaska Expedition of 1899 254 photographs from 1899 of Edward Harriman's scientific expedition to Alaska, including images of Alaskan Native Americans and their villages, scenic views of the coastline, glaciers and Alaskan towns.