Thomas Lincoln Chadbourne was an American lawyer who played a key role in the establishment of multinational corporations during the 1920s and undertook efforts to restore commodity prices, particularly in the sugar industry, after their collapses during the Great Depression.
24 Facts About Thomas Chadbourne
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At the time of his death, Thomas Chadbourne served as board chairman of the International Mining Corporation and was a director of some 20 corporations.
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Thomas Chadbourne had amassed a fortune and was regarded by some contemporaries as a "radical capitalist" for his views on profit sharing and recognition of collective bargaining rights.
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Thomas Chadbourne described the event as a graphic and horrific experience.
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At age 19, Thomas Chadbourne was turned out of the house by his parents.
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Thomas Chadbourne's father left him at the train station bound for Chicago with $150 and the advice that he was "not fitted for a profession or any other work in life that calls for mental effort" and should go into manual labor.
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Thomas Chadbourne took a series of night jobs, including one as a police officer, before he was hired by Judge Russell Wing at the law firm Wing and Carter.
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Thomas Chadbourne married his first wife, Emily Crane Thomas Chadbourne November 1896.
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Thomas Chadbourne then married his second wife, composer Grace Chadbourne, in November 1906.
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Thomas Chadbourne regarded Grace as the love of his life and the two traveled extensively.
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Thomas Chadbourne took a third wife, Marjorie Curtis Chadbourne, on January 15,1921.
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Thomas Chadbourne represented some of the largest firms in the world in a period of globalization during the 1920s during which multi-national corporations began to be established in significant numbers.
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Thomas Chadbourne planned additional negotiations with countries that consumed but produced little to no sugar in an attempt to stop them from entering the market, including the United Kingdom, France, Yugoslavia, Argentina, and Japan.
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However, despite successfully limiting production among signatories, Thomas Chadbourne was unable to effect a return to pre-Depression prices because US producers increased cultivation and continued to flood the market.
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Thomas Chadbourne argued for the creation of a "silver reserve system" wherein all countries would agree to hold a reserve stock of silver and to produce coinage using a consistent portion of silver.
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The plan was conceived in response to silver devaluation, which Thomas Chadbourne attributed to countries "dumping" large amounts of silver on the world market, by reducing the amount of silver they used in coins.
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Thomas Chadbourne estimated that half of the world's population held its wealth in silver.
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Thomas Chadbourne hoped to change the trend whereby silver had become a commodity, rather than a store of value.
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Thomas Chadbourne was an early champion of both collective bargaining rights and profit-sharing for workers.
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Thomas Chadbourne donated $30,000 to Smith's campaign officially and allegedly provided over $400,000 of cash and stock options to Smith secretly.
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Thomas Chadbourne carried on a correspondence with President Woodrow Wilson over the course of 1917 to 1921, much of which is reprinted in Thomas Chadbourne's autobiography.
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Thomas Chadbourne sat on the War Trade Board from which he resigned, despite urgings from the president to stay, to attend his ailing wife.
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Thomas Chadbourne is listed as a top contributor to the "Graphic Founders Fund," which gave financial support to the monthly publication Survey Graphic, an offshoot of The Survey magazine.
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Thomas Chadbourne died June 15,1938 in Manhattan after he suffered a heart attack on his yacht.