Thomas L. Hisgen
Thomas Louis Hisgen (November 26, 1858 – August 27, 1925) was an American petroleum producer and politician.
He refused to sell his firm to the
Biography
He was born November 26, 1858, in Petersburg, Indiana, to William Hisgen and Margaret Catherine McNally. His father was a German immigrant who had first lived in Albany, New York, before coming west to Indiana in 1857.[1] His mother was from Canada.
He was educated in a small country school and was forced by economic circumstances to go to work at an early age to help provide financial support for his parents and siblings.[1] Most of his education Hisgen obtained on his own through a steady reading of books.[1]
In 1875, when Hisgen was 16, he and his family returned from Indiana to New York, where he and two brothers worked as clerks in a clothing store.[1] His father, who had some basic knowledge of chemistry, had long worked at creating a new and improved axle grease compound which could be patented and marketed.[1] This invention by his father became the basis of a family industry when Thomas Hisgen — together with three of his brothers — established the Four Brothers Axle Grease Company in Albany in 1888.[1]
He died on August 27, 1925, in
Footnotes
- ^ a b c d e f Mark H. Salt (ed.), Candidates and the Issues: An Official Hand-Book for Every American Citizen: Policies and Platforms of All Parties, with Portraits and Biographies of the Leaders Including the Lives of the Presidential Candidates: An Official History of the Campaign of 1908... n.c.: Charles B. Ayer, 1908; pp. 158–159.
- New York Times. August 29, 1925.
- New York Times. August 30, 1925.
Further reading
- Darcy Richardson, Others: Third Parties During the Populist Period. Bloomington, IN: iUniverse, 2007.
- "Hisgen and Graves New Party Ticket: The Independence Convention Makes Its Choice in Early Morning," New York Times, July 29, 1908.
- "The Story of Hisgen and the Octopus," Current Literature, vol. 45, no. 3 (Sept. 1908), pp. 270–272.
- HISGEN WINS BIG CROWD BY STOTY OF OIL TRUST FIGHT, Chicago Examiner Vol. 6 no. 260, 1908-10-20