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Rufus C. Dawes | |
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Born | Rufus Cutler Dawes July 30, 1867 |
Died | January 8, 1940 72) Chicago, Illinois | (aged
Burial place | Oak Grove Cemetery, Marietta, Ohio |
Alma mater | Marietta College |
Occupation(s) | Oil and Banking |
Years active | 1918–1940 |
Known for | |
Spouse | Helen B. Palmer (married 1893) |
Children |
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Rufus Cutler Dawes (July 30, 1867 – January 8, 1940) was an American businessman in oil and banking from a prominent Ohio family. He and his three brothers all became nationally known. In the 1920s he served as an expert on the commissions to prepare the Dawes Plan and the Young Plan to manage German reparations to the Allies after World War I.
He had most of his career in Chicago, where he was involved in civic organizations. He served as president of the Commercial Club of Chicago, and from 1934-1940, as head of the World's Fair organization and the Museum of Science & Industry (MSI).
Dawes was born in Marietta, Ohio, to Brigadier General Rufus R. Dawes and Mary Beman (Gates) Dawes. [1] He was a younger brother of Charles G. Dawes and great-great-grandson of Revolutionary War figure William Dawes. His two younger brothers, Beman Gates Dawes and Henry May Dawes, also achieved national reputations. His middle name of Cutler is in honor of his paternal grandmother, Sarah Cutler's family (She was a daughter of Ephraim Cutler who was the son of Manasseh Cutler.) [2] Cutler was also the name of Lysander Cutler, one of Rufus Dawes's American Civil War colleagues in the Iron Brigade.
Dawes graduated from Marietta College with an A.B. in 1886 and A.M. in 1889. [1]
He married Helen B. Palmer on June 3, 1893. [3]
Dawes became active with his brothers in many gas and lighting utilities. He was selected as president of the Union Gas & Electric Company, Metropolitan Gas & Electric Company, and Dawes Brothers, Inc.
He became involved in public service in 1918, when he was appointed to serve on the Illinois State Pension Laws Commission (1918–1919). In 1920, he was selected as a delegate to the Illinois constitutional convention. [1]
His brother Charles appointed him to serve on the experts commission preparing the Dawes Plan in 1924, to settle an international crisis in Europe and develop a staggered plan for Germany to pay its reparations. Because of his contribution, Dawes was also asked to work as assistant to Owen D. Young, who developed the succeeding Young Plan in 1929.
Dawes was a member of the Commercial Club of Chicago, serving as president in 1925–26. [4] He was president of A Century of Progress Corporation from 1927 until his death in 1940.
From 1934 until his death, Dawes was concurrently president of the World's Fair organization and the Museum of Science & Industry (MSI). Dawes was the third president of the MSI, after Sewell Avery and William Rufus Abbott. Previously, he had been an active member of the Board of Trustees, helping to brief Waldemar Kaempffert when the latter became the first Executive Director of the Museum of Science & Industry in 1928. (Kaempffert was the New York Times science editor and served again after his time at the museum.)
Dawes was an hereditary companion of the Military Order of the Loyal Legion of the United States.
Rufus C. Dawes died in Chicago on January 8, 1940. [5]
The Museum of Science and Industry (MSI) is a science museum located in Chicago, Illinois, in Jackson Park, in the Hyde Park neighborhood between Lake Michigan and The University of Chicago. It is housed in the former Palace of Fine Arts from the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition. Initially endowed by Julius Rosenwald, the Sears, Roebuck and Company president and philanthropist, it was supported by the Commercial Club of Chicago and opened in 1933 during the Century of Progress Exposition.
Charles Gates Dawes was an American banker, general, diplomat, musician, composer, and Republican politician who was the 30th vice president of the United States from 1925 to 1929 under Calvin Coolidge. He was a co-recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize in 1925 for his work on the Dawes Plan for World War I reparations.
Marietta is a city in, and the county seat of, Washington County, Ohio, United States. It is located in southeastern Ohio at the confluence of the Muskingum and Ohio Rivers, 11 miles (18 km) northeast of Parkersburg, West Virginia. As of the 2020 census, Marietta has a population of 13,385 people. It is the principal city of the Marietta micropolitan area, which includes all of Washington County, and is the second-largest city in the Parkersburg–Marietta–Vienna combined statistical area.
Brigadier-General Rufus Putnam was an American military officer who fought during the French and Indian War and the American Revolutionary War. As an organizer of the Ohio Company of Associates, he was instrumental in the initial colonization of the Northwest Territory in present-day Ohio following the war. He was known as "Father of the Northwest Territory".
Manasseh Cutler was an American Congregational clergyman involved in the American Revolutionary War. He was influential in the passage of the Northwest Ordinance of 1787 and wrote the section prohibiting slavery in the Northwest Territory. Cutler was also a member of the United States House of Representatives. Cutler is "rightly entitled to be called 'The Father of Ohio University.'"
Waldemar Bernhard Kaempffert was an American science writer and museum director.
Solon Spencer Beman was an American architect based in Chicago, Illinois and best known as the architect of the planned Pullman community and adjacent Pullman Company factory complex, as well as Chicago's renowned Fine Arts Building. Several of his other largest commissions, including the Pullman Office Building, Pabst Building, and Grand Central Station in Chicago, have since been demolished. Beman designed numerous Christian Science churches and influenced the design of countless more.
Rufus R. Dawes was a military officer in the Union Army during the American Civil War. He used the middle initial "R" but had no middle name. He was noted for his service in the famed Iron Brigade, particularly during the Battle of Gettysburg. He was a post-war businessman, Congressman, and author, and the father of four nationally known sons, one of whom, Charles G. Dawes, won the Nobel Peace Prize and served as Vice President of the United States, and of two daughters. He was himself a great-grandson of William Dawes, who alerted colonial minutemen of the approach of the British Army prior to the Battles of Lexington and Concord at the outset of the American Revolution, and a maternal great-grandson of the Rev. Manasseh Cutler, who was instrumental in adoption of the Northwest ordinance of 1787, led the formation of the Ohio Company of Associates, and became "Father of Ohio University".
Beman Gates Dawes was a politician and oil executive who served two terms as a Republican Congressman from Ohio from 1905 to 1909.
The Commercial Club of Chicago is a nonprofit 501(c)(4) social welfare organization founded in 1877 with a mission to promote the social and economic vitality of the metropolitan area of Chicago.
Pullman National Historical Park is a historic district located in Chicago and was the first model, planned industrial community in the United States. The district had its origins in the manufacturing plans and organization of the Pullman Company and became one of the most well-known company towns in the United States, as well as the scene of the violent 1894 Pullman strike. It was built for George Pullman as a place to produce the famous Pullman sleeping cars.
The Charles Gates Dawes House is a historic house museum at 225 Greenwood Street in Evanston, Illinois. Built in 1894, this Chateauesque lakefront mansion was from 1909 until his death the home of Charles Gates Dawes (1865–1951) and his family. Dawes earned the 1925 Nobel Peace Prize for his plan to alleviate the crushing burden of war reparations Germany was required to pay after World War I. Dawes served as U.S. Vice President under Calvin Coolidge, a general during World War I, and as United States Ambassador to Great Britain. Dawes was a descendant of William Dawes, who along with Paul Revere, rode to alarm the colonists that the British regulars were coming on the night before the Revolutionary War began. The house, a National Historic Landmark, is now owned by the Evanston History Center, which offers tours.
Desirée Glapion Rogers is an American corporate executive, former White House Social Secretary for President Barack Obama's office and former chief executive officer of Johnson Publishing Company (JPC). As of 2019, Rogers is the CEO of Black Opal, a cosmetics company.
Henry May Dawes was an American businessman and banker from a prominent Ohio family. He served as a United States Comptroller of the Currency from 1923 to 1924 and also worked as an executive in the oil industry.
Sir Andrew McFadyean (1887–1974) was a British diplomat, economist, Treasury official, businessman, Liberal politician, publicist and philosopher. He was born at Leith in Scotland on 23 April 1887 and died at St Mary's Hospital, Paddington, London on 2 October 1974.
Anselm Tupper (1763–1808) was an officer of the Continental Army during the American Revolutionary War, a pioneer to the Ohio Country, and one of the founders of Marietta, Ohio, the first permanent American settlement in the Northwest Territory. The eldest son of Benjamin Tupper, Anselm enlisted in the fight for independence during 1775, while only eleven years old, achieving the rank of lieutenant before his seventeenth birthday. After the war, he was a pioneer and surveyor in the Northwest Territory, and became major of the militia at Marietta during the Northwest Indian War. Tupper was the first school teacher at Marietta, and was a classical scholar and poet. He was unmarried, and was known as a favorite in society.
Ephraim Cutler Dawes was a major in the 53rd Ohio Infantry and brevet lieutenant-colonel, United States Volunteers, during the American Civil War. Dawes was present at the Battle of Shiloh and Battle of Vicksburg, among others, serving under Ulysses S. Grant and William T. Sherman. One of his notable acts occurred during battle, where Dawes disobeyed and cursed an officer who had become scared and disoriented. While serving with Sherman during his march to Atlanta Dawes was seriously wounded in his lower jaw in what would be his last battle, subsequently being honorably discharged in 1864.
Major Lenox Riley Lohr (1891-1968) was a contributor to the development of Chicago's lake front; organizer of exhibitions including the Century of Progress and Chicago Railroad Fairs; longtime president of Chicago's Museum of Science and Industry and promoter of civic and charitable causes.
Sarah Jane Dawes Shedd was an American missionary teacher, serving Assyrian Christians at Urmia in Persia.
SS Rufus C. Dawes was a Liberty ship built in the United States during World War II. She was named after Rufus C. Dawes, an American businessman in oil and banking from Ohio. In the 1920s he served as an expert on the commissions to prepare the Dawes Plan and the Young Plan to manage German reparations to the Allies after World War I.