June 1. 1915. 



THE INDIA RUBBER WORLD 



501 



The Obituary Record. 



JOHN D. VERMEULE. 



WHEN John I). Vermeule, for thirty two years president 

 Hi Goodyear's India Rubber Glove Manufacturing Co., 

 passed away, May 18, a career without parallel in length 

 of active association with the rubber trade came to a close. He 

 was connected with rubber manufacture for 72 years, actively 

 -■> with the exception ol the last four or five years, and holding 

 during the whole of that time a position of the first importance. 

 Mr. Vermeule was born in Plainfield, New Jersey, September 

 22, 1822. He came 

 trout the best stock 

 of Holland, the first 

 of his ancestors to 

 come to America be- 

 ing \ilriau Vermeule, 

 u It o took up his 

 abode in Harlem in 

 Id'. 1 ' lli- was town 

 clerk and also offici- 

 ated as lecturer in 

 the Dutch Reformed 

 Church. ( me of his 

 sons and four of his 

 grandsons fought in 

 the war of the revo- 

 lution, and one of 

 these grandsons was 

 the grandfather of 

 John 1), Vermeule; 

 trout which it will he 

 percevied that h e 

 c a in e logically by 

 those sturdy Dutch traits of industry, 

 which were such conspicuous traits in 

 He remained at school until he was 



Jolt \ 1 ). \ ERMEULE. 



honesty and self-reliance, 

 his character. 

 18 and then embarked i m 

 a commercial career as clerk in a Nfew Brunswick store, hour 

 years later, in 1X44. Goodyear's India Rubber Glove Manufac- 

 turing Co. was organized, and Mr. Vermeule, then hut 22. joined 

 the new rubber company. He occupied an important position 

 from the start and in time became the company's largest stock- 

 holder. In 1877 he was elected its treasurer, and in 1882 its 

 president, an office which he held continuously until last August, 

 when he relinquished it to younger hands. He continued, how- 

 ever, as a directoi in that company, and also as a director in 



G lyear's Metallic Rubber Shoe ( o., and retained his place in 



the directorate ^<i the United States Rubber Co., a member of 

 whose hoard he had been since the formation of that corpora- 

 tion in 1893. 



ft is hardly necessary to refer to the great success of the 

 Glove company under Mr. Vermeule's long management. It 

 achieved, many years ago, a reputation of winch any company 

 might well be proud This was due not only to Mi Vermeule's 

 executive ability and personal standing, but to the line judg- 

 ment with which he selected his assistants; among them, for 

 instance, being the late Clinton Van Vliet, so many years his 

 selling agent, and I''. 1'". Schaffer, long his factory superintendent 

 and now president of the company. 



Mr. Vermeule had many large interests outside of rubber. He 

 was for some years president of the Holland Trust Co., vice- 

 president of the American Savings & Loan Association and di- 

 rector in the Chatham and Phoenix National Banks. The enter- 

 prise, however, in which, he was most deeply interested outside 

 of rubber manufacture was the York Cliffs Improvement Co., 

 •which acquired a valuable tract of land at York Cliff's. Maine. 



Mr. Vermeule was president of tins company, and it was chiefly 

 due to his energy that the property was di el ed into a popular 

 summer resort. In addition to building a fine hotel he erected 



a summer residence for himself which was one of the most at- 

 tractive spots along the Maine coast, 



He was one of the patrons of thi Metropolitan Museum of 

 Art in .Yew York and had a personal collection oi particularly 

 hue paintings, and also a notable library. He married, in 1846, 

 Miss Mary C. Kelley, daughter of a prominent Philadelphia 

 merchant. She died some years ag", and during the last years 

 of his life he lived with a niece in Staten Island. This niece. 



Mrs. J. B, Austin, ami her brother, Edward Vermeule, of Plain- 

 field, Yew Jersey, are his nearest surviving relatives. 



JOHN P. RIDER. 



To have been actively and prominently associated with an 

 important and successful industrial corporation continuouslj for 



5.' years is an unusual record, hut this distinction 1 ud. uil 

 John I'. Riiler, formerly president of the New York Rubber < 0., 

 who passed away, in his 81s1 year, at his home in Beacon, New 

 'i ork, May 15. 



Mr. Kider was horn at Khineheck — only a few miles away 

 from Beacon and iii the same county — January 28. 1835. He 

 graduated from the local si 1 Is, and at the age of 16 was hard 



at work in a store belonging to an uncle iii a neighboring town. 



Twi years later he returned to Khineheck to assist his father, 

 \vlio had just been appointed postmaster in that village. It 

 shows what a long period this active life covered when the fact 

 is recalled that this postal appointment was made by President 



Pierce, \fter distributing letters for his neighbors for a couple 



oi vcars he went, at the age of 10, cown to the city of Yew 

 York, which opened up a larger field of possibilities than his 

 native village afforded. Mere he became connected with a whole- 

 sale house, and 

 some eight year 

 later, in 1863, left 

 that to accept a 

 position with tin 

 Yew York Rubbet 



Co., an association 

 lie w as destined to 

 continue for over 

 half a century. 



In the following 

 ve.ii he wa- made 

 secretary of the 

 company, and idled 

 that position until 

 1883, w hen he w as 

 elected vice-presi- 

 dent. That posi- 

 tion he Idled fur 

 23 v ears, w hen. i in 

 the death of the 

 company's presi 

 dent, in 1906, In 

 w a s m a d e the 

 chief executive of 

 the corporation, remaining its president until 1911, when, lie 

 cause of advancing years ami a desire to lighten his business 

 burden, he resigned. The company, however, iyas not dis] 

 in lose his services altogether, and he was made chairman "' 

 the In iard of trustees 



\- throwing some light on the opinion entertained of him by 



John P. Rider. 



