Richard Thornton Wilson Jr.


Richard Thornton Wilson Jr. was an American banker and businessman who was a prominent figure in Thoroughbred horse racing in the early decades of the 20th Century.

Early life

Wilson was born in New York City, one of five surviving children of Richard Thornton Wilson Sr. and Melissa Clementine Johnston. His father was a multimillionaire investment banker originally from Loudon, Tennessee, who served on the staff of Lucius B. Northrop, the commissary-general of the Confederate States of America.
Because of Wilson's and his siblings' many advantageous marriages, the Wilsons were known in New York and Newport society as the "marrying Wilsons". His sister Grace Graham Wilson married Cornelius "Neily" Vanderbilt III of the Vanderbilt family. His older brother, Marshall Orme Wilson, married Caroline Schermerhorn "Carrie" Astor of the Astor family. Wilson's other two sisters, Belle Wilson, was married to the Honourable Sir Michael Henry Herbert, the British Ambassador to the United States during Theodore Roosevelt's administration and the brother of the Earl of Pembroke, and Mary Wilson, who was married to New York real estate heir, Ogden Goelet, and were the parents of Wilson's niece, Mary Goelet, who married the Duke of Roxburghe.

Career

Wilson prepared at private schools and graduated from Columbia University in 1887.
After graduating from Columbia, Wilson followed in his father's footsteps and joined R. T. Wilson & Co., which his father founded in New York City after his move north following the U.S. Civil War. He eventually succeeded his father as head of the R. T. Wilson & Co.
Wilson was a member of many prominent clubs, including the Union Club, the Knickerbocker Club, the Brook Club, the Turf and Field Club, the Racquet and Tennis Club, the South Side Sportsmen Club, and was a member of the Sons of the American Revolution.

Thoroughbred racing

In 1896, Richard Wilson Jr. and Harry Payne Whitney teamed up with a group of investors to purchase Saratoga Race Course which had fallen into the hands of an undesirable New Jersey brothelkeeper, Gottfried Waldbaum. Wilson then served as president of the Saratoga Racing Association which operated the facility.
In 1896, Wilson hired Thomas J. Healey to manage his racing stable. Together for three decades, they would win a number of the most important East Coast races including the Travers Stakes three times, the Preakness Stakes, and the Belmont Stakes. In 1916, he bought Kirklevington Nursery in Lexington, Kentucky which contained over 500 acres of bluegrass land was considered "one of the most up-to-date nurseries in the district." Among Wilson's successful racehorses were:
On March 11, 1902, he married Marion Steedman Mason, daughter of Dr. Amos Lawrence Mason, a cousin of Bishop of Massachusetts William Lawrence, and Louisa Blake Steedman. Her grandparents included Rear Admiral Charles Steedman of Charleston, South Carolina, captain of the USS Ticonderoga, and Rev. Charles Mason, himself the son of U.S. Senator from New Hampshire Jeremiah Mason.
In 1902, Wilson purchased an estate at Palmetto Bluff in South Carolina from John Holbrook Estill where in 1916 he built a mansion and maintained a stable and a blacksmith shop. The home burned down in 1926 and the property was sold. They also had homes at 300 Park Avenue in New York City, "Shady Lawn" in Newport, Rhode Island, and "Indian House" in Middletown, Rhode Island. Together, they had two daughters:
Wilson died at his home in New York City, on December 29, 1929. Wilson, who was an Episcopalian, had his funeral service held at St. Bartholomew's Episcopal Church, New York. He was interred in the family mausoleum at Woodlawn Cemetery in The Bronx. His estate was estimated at $10,000,000 at his death. His widow lived for another 17 and a half years until July 5, 1947 when she died at the Newport Hospital following a heart attack at her residence in Middletown, Rhode Island.