224 



THE INDIA RUBBER WORLD 



[April i, 1904. 



DEATH OF WILLIAM R. GRACE. 



WILLIAM R. GRACE, founder and head of the house 

 of W. R. Grace & Co., of New York, Lima, and 

 Valparaiso, died at his residence in the first named 

 city on March 21, never having rallied from an at- 

 tack of pneumonia he suffered last December. Mr. Grace had 

 been prominent commercially and politically in New York for 

 forty years. In addition to building up the business which 

 made him a very wealthy man, he twice filled the office of 

 mayor of New York, while his activity in political affairs gave 

 him an influence even in the national campaigns of the Demo- 

 cratic party, with which he was affiliated. He first arrived in 

 New York in 1846, a runaway lad of 14, though his family, in 

 County Cork, Ireland, were people of position and substance, 

 and began life here as an errand boy in a small shop. His first 

 career in New York was brief and uneventful, but later he re- 

 turned to the city and established an 

 important business which resulted in 

 his leaving a fortune estimated at many 

 of dollars. He was, at one time, the 

 most extensive importer of India-rub- 

 ber into the United States. 



About 1850 Mr. Grace visited the west 

 coast of South America where, at 

 Callao, Peru, he found employment 

 with the firm of John Bryce & Co., ship 

 chandlers, afterwards becoming a part- 

 ner in the firm, which still later be- 

 came Grace & Co. with branches at 

 Lima and Valparaiso. This firm did 

 a general shipping and trading busi- 

 ness and was enormously successful. 

 It was in 1865 that Mr. Grace returned 

 to New York and founded the house 

 that bears his name. Branch houses 

 were established in San Francisco and 

 Brazil, in addition to the establishments 

 already successful on the west coast 

 of South America. 



From the beginning, the importation 

 of rubber was one of the most important items in the business 

 of the new firm, and this grew, as the rubber business developed, 

 and as Mr. Grace reached further and further into South 

 America. From the early seventies until 1886, when W. R. 

 Grace & Co. began to draw out of the rubber business, by far 

 the greater portion of the crude rubber coming into New York 

 came to that firm. It is estimated by a surviving member of 

 the firm that at least 75 percent, of the South American rubber 

 imported between 1880 and 1886 was consigned to W. R. Grace 

 & Co. " We frequently imported," said this informant, " from 

 $8,000,000 to $10,000,000 worth of rubber per year, and I re- 

 member that in 1885 we received $844,000 worth of rubber from 

 Pard on one ship." 



The rubber business of the concern became so important 

 that in 1882 Mr. Grace sent Richard F. Sears — a man who had 

 begun with the firm as an office boy and worked himself up to 

 an important position — to Pard, who there established a branch 

 house under the name of R. F. Sears & Co. This house did a 

 large business and it was followed in 1883 by a similar branch 

 at Manaos, the necessity of being represented further up the 

 river having been made apparent. For this purpose J. Alvin 



THE LATE WILLIAM R. GRACE 



Scott, another employe of the New York office, was sent out 

 and the new firm was called Scott & Co. In a year or two, 

 when it became necessary for Mr. Scott to leave the climate of 

 the upper Amazon, the name of this branch was changed to the 

 Manaos Trading Co. 



About this time much of the South American business of W. 

 R. Grace & Co. and almost all of its rubber business was under 

 the immediate direction of Charles R. Flint, who was then a 

 member of the firm, having an interest in all of its South 

 American branches. Mr. Flint's connection with the firm was 

 interesting. He entered the office in a minor capacity in 1871, 

 and speedily rose to the position of bookkeeper. While in this 

 position he did something one day which displeased Mr. Grace, 

 and was discharged. Through the persuasion of Mrs. Grace, 

 who knew Mrs. Flint, and the influence of young Flint's father, 

 who was a friend of Mr. Grace, he was 

 taken back as bookkeeper. Later he 

 became a buyer and an assistant man- 

 ager, and then investing some money 

 in the firm became a partner and ac- 

 quired an interest in the Chilean and 

 Peruvian branches. After 1880 these 

 branches prospered exceedingly, and 

 when Mr. Flint drew out of the firm, 

 in 1886, he was a rich man. In fact, he 

 received for his interest $1,000,000. 



Mr. Flint's withdrawal and the es- 

 tablishment of the firm of Flint & Co. 

 was practically the ending of the prom- 

 inence of Mr. Grace in the rubber busi- 

 ness. Mr. Flint withdrew for the pur- 

 pose of taking over the rubber business 

 of the firm, and while W. R. Grace & 

 Co. continued to import in considerable 

 quantities up to 1888, it taking that long 

 to get their business transferred, it has 

 been almost entirely out of the trade 

 ever since. With the firm of Flint & 

 Co., Mr. Grace never had any connec- 

 tion, nor had he any other connection with the rubber business 

 after the transfer was made. 



The withdrawal of the firm from the rubber business necessi- 

 tated the liquidation of the firms of R. F. Sears & Co., at Para, 

 and the Manaos Trading Co., at Manaos, as branches of the 

 firm of W. R. Grace & Co., and this was done as soon as their 

 business could be transferred to the representatives of the firm 

 of Flint & Co. 



During his enormous transactions in the rubber trade, Mr. 

 Grace was almost universally successful, and an important part 

 of his fortune was due to it. He early recognized the growing 

 importance of rubber to the industrial world, and he did every- 

 thing in his power at all times to stimulate the South Ameri- 

 cans to extend their gathering operations. He recognized 

 further that the more rubber that was gathered and marketed 

 in the United States the greater would be the demands and 

 ability to pay of the South Americans for our goods. Mr. 

 Grace could be correctly classed as the first great promoter and 

 encourager of the rubber importing business in the United 

 States. His houses will be continued for the present by his 

 brothers and sons. 



