Additional information on Augustus^8 Stout Van Wickle
Augustus^8 Stout Van Wickle (Simon^7, Nicholas^6, Simon^5, Nicasius^4, Simon^3, Evert^2, Jentie^1
Jeppes), b. 4 January
1856, New Brunswick, Middlesex, NJ
Obituary (10 June 1898) Providence Newpaper
Accidentally shot. Augustus S. Van Wickle met death at Clay Pigeon Shoot. News came as a shock to the people of Bristol
He was a prominent summer resident there and was expected soo for the season--Interested in sports, a Yachtsman, Golfer, and Hunter.
Yesterday word came to Bristol that Augustus S. Van Wickle was killed accidentally Wednesday near his home in Hazelton, PA while participating
in a clay pigeon shoot. The announcement of the sad accident was a shock to the people of Bristol where he had spent his summers for the past four
years. Mr. Van Wickle was well known in this State and was universally respected. He had a very polished manner and was well liked by everyone
who met him.
Mr. Van Wickle leaned over his gun with the barrel pointing to his body. In some manner the trigger was touched setting the weapon off. The full
charge entered Mr. Van Wickle's body, and shortly after being conveyed to his home he died.
Mr. Van Wickle was one of the most prominent coal operators of the Lehigh region, and was President of the Van Wickle Coal Company, which
controls several collieries. He was also President of the Hazleton National Bank and was prominently identified with recreative amateur sport in
Hazelton and at Bristol, his summer home. He was a graduate of Brown University and was married to Miss Bessie Pardee, daughter of the late
millionaire coal operator Ario Pardee.
His death is regarded as a serious blow to Bristol. He first came there about four years ago and purchased a large tract of land known as the Gardner
place, on Ferry Road and Bristol Harbor. He build a magnificent villa called Blithewold where he and his family resided during the summer season.
He expended many thousands of dollars in the building and improving the place and today
Blithewold is the finest summer residence in Bristol county. His very pleasant and magnetic manner attracted many people and he gave many elaborate fetes and levees at Blithewold during the summer
season.
Mr. Van Wickle was much interested in out of door sports and was a trained athlete. He was prominent in organizing the Bristol Golf Club and was
its President. He erected the handsome new golf club building near Blithewold two years ago and presented it to
the club. He also gave part of his land at Ferry hill and leased another tract for a golf course. He was an expert golfer, making some remarkable scores in his golf playing, both in
Bristol and at Newport, which he visited nearly every day in his steam yacht. He
was Commodore of the Neptune Yacht Club of Bristol and was much interested in yachting matters. He was also a member of the
New York Yacht Club. He owned a steam yacht, the Marjorie, which is now being overhauled at the boat shop of Saunders & West at
Bristol. He also owned a number of small sailing yachts, among them the crack 30-footer
Esperanza.
(Boat in photo is the steam ship, Marjorie built by the Herreshoff Boat-Building Company in Bristol, R.I.
The
70 foot steam yacht was impulsively purchased from the Herreshoff Co. by Augustus Van Wickle in 1895--a boat which led Mr. Van Wickle to purchase
Blithewold on Narragansett Bay to have a place for this and his other yachts.)
He was preparing to leave Hazelton, PA for Bristol, and his horses and baggage were to be shipped Saturday. He was to follow with his family soon
afterwards. He purchased quite a tract of land at Pappoosesquaw some years ago. There he kept game, and usually followed the sport of hunting in
the fall.
He graduated from Brown University about 22 years ago. He was about 45 years of age, and leaves a wife and children. Wednesday afternoon
Samuel Norris of Bristol was in receipt of a telegraph dispatch from him.
Obituary -- Historical Catalogue, 1900 -- Brown University (copy mailed to me from M. Mitchell, Special Collections, John Hay Library, Brown
University--6 March 2002) 1876
Augustus Stout Van Wickle of the class of 1876 died at Hazleton, PA on the 8th of June, 1898, aged 42 years, 5 months, and 4 days. He was the son
of Simon and Anna Randolph (Stout) Van Wickle and was born at New Brunswick, NJ on the 4th of January 1856. His ancestry was Dutch on the
one side and English on the other. His mother was a descendent of the famous Randolph family of New jersey and Virginia. His great-grandfather,
Nathaniel Fitz Randolph, gave a plot of land (on which Nassau Hall was built) and a sum of money to the College of New Jersey, when it was
established; and this inducement placed it in Princeton, instead of in New Brunswick, which place the founders had under
consideration.
Mr. Van Wickle was prepared for college at the Peddle Institute, Hightstown, NJ and entered Brown University at the beginning of the Sophomore
year in 1873. He maintained a creditable standing and was graduated with the degree of Bachelor of Arts.
In the autumn after graduation he went to Ebervale, PA as shipping clerk for the Ebervale Coal Co. of which his father was
president. A year later he entered his father's office in New York city, where he remained through the winter. In the spring of 1876
he was made superintendent of the mines of the Ebervale Coal Co., and removed to Hazleton, PA. He lived at Hazelton until the
spring of 1881 when he went to Cleveland, Ohio to take charge of mineral interests in Ohio. In the spring of 1886 he became
President of the Ebervale Coal Co., and a member of the old firm of Van Wickle, Stout and Co., and left Cleveland, becoming a
resident of Morristown, NJ. In the summer of 1888 his father died and the firm name of the
New York branch of the business was changed to A.S.Van Wickle and Co. In about a year Mr. Van Wickle
became the sole owner of the mines which had been operated by the Stout Coal Co. at Milnesville, four miles north of Hazelton, and
a few years later he bought the large coal property of Coleraine four miles south of Hazleton. From 1892 he conducted a banking
business in New York City. In the spring of 1892 he removed to Hazleton to be near the mines.In the autumn of 1894 he bought
and laid out Blithewold, his country home in Bristol, R.I. where he spent six months
in the year until his death. One of the happy features of his life here was the satisfaction it gave him to be
where he could easily renew college associations. He was the President of the Phoenix Powder Manufacturing Company of New
York. He was a trustee of the Peddle Institute of Hightstown, NJ of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York and of the
American Museum of Natural History. He was a member of several clubs. he took keep interest in yachting and in athletic sports. His
death was the result of the accidental discharge of a gun which he was using in a
clay pigeon shooting contest.
Though Mr. Van Wickle held no public office his influence in business circles, in politics, and in public affairs was great and widely felt, and his
advice and opinion were constantly sought. By his skill, sound judgment, sagacity and courage, he increased the inheritance received from his father
to a large fortune. He added to his own enjoyment of the fruits of his prosperity by sharing them with others. His kindly nature and active sympathy
made him foremost in every good work and his private charities were many and unostentatious. He had only to know of trouble and care to try to
relieve them.
All his employees loved him and their expressions of grief at his death were most touching. He remembered them generously at Thanksgiving and
Christmas, not only heads of families but children as well. Most of all, his accessibility made him dear to them. In going round the mines he was as
ready to stop and talk with the skilled miner or the superintendent, yet he never lost his personal dignity. As a man of the people well expressed it, he
did not lower himself to their level, but he raised them to his. He built near his home at Hazelton a casino for his own use and for the use of his
friends, that during the winter he might play tennis, bowl and enjoy the athletic sports in which he delighted. But, as in the other pleasures, he felt
that he could not keep the enjoyment of this to himself, and for three evenings in the week he gave the use of the casino to those of his townsmen
who would enjoy and appreciate it, adding much apparatus for athletics and a reading room, in which were the current newspapers and
periodicals. He especially intended it for young men living in boarding houses and hotels, who had otherwise no helpful or even harmless place in which to
spend their evenings. In Hazleton is a beautiful soldier's monument but it was entirely surrounded by waste land. This Mr. Van Wickle converted
into a beautiful little park and he kept it in perfect order, providing for its maintenance in his will. He gave to the Bristol Golf Club the use of 20
acres of land, as well as the club house which he erected for their convenience. To Brown University he bequeathed $45,000, the same sum to
Princeton University and $30,000 to Lafayette College. A part of the bequest to Lafayette College will be used for a memorial window in his honor
in the new library; and for the decoration of this window the friends of Mr. Van Wickle, in
recognition of the gracious beauty of his life, have chosen a design illustrating an incident in the life of Sir Philip Sydney.
He was a member of the Baptist Church until 1893, when, as there was no church of that denomination at Hazleton, he united with the Presbyterian
Church, with which his wife's family was identified. He was a true Christian never influenced by those of other views and ways to swerve from what
he thought right. By the silent preaching of his own uprightness he unostentatiously influenced those about him to lead better lives. Yet he walked
humbly before his God, and was full of pity for those whose temptations to wrong doing he felt were greater than his own.
He married in 1882, Bessie Pardee, daughter of Arlo Pardee, Esq. of Hazleton, PA, who, with his two daughters, Marjorie Randolph and Augustine,
survives him.
From Encyclopedia Brunoniana by Martha Mitchell, Brown University Library, Providence, R.I. 1993
Van Wickle Hall was built in 1902 and was originally called the Administration Building. Its cornerstone was laid on June 18, 1901, the same day that the Van Wickle Gates were dedicated by Marjorie R. Van Wickle, daughter of Augustus Stout Van Wickle (Class of 1876), donor of the building. Van Wickle Hall was of red brick with sandstone trimmings and a wooden cupola and railing around the roof. The first floor had an octagonal hall flanked by the president's and dean's suites and rooms for the faculty and registrar. On the second floor were libraries and committee rooms. When University Hall became the administration building in 1940, the buildingwas turned over to the Department of English and renamed Van Wickle Hall. It was razed for the building of the John D. Rockefeller, Jr. Library.
Drawing of Blithewold as it appeared at the time of Mr. Van Wickle's untimely death in 1898. The house was struck by fire in 1906 but most of the furnishing were saved. By 1908 a second, greater mansion had been erected on the site. Click to see photos of Blithewold and the surrounding gardens and read a more detailed commentary.
Source:
Information mailed to me from the Special Collections of John Hay Library, Brown University -- by Martha Mitchell, 6 March 2002