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Thomas Ewing III

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Thomas Ewing III
Thomas Ewing III in 1913
Born(1862-05-21)May 21, 1862
Leavenworth, Kansas
DiedDecember 7, 1942(1942-12-07) (aged 80)
Yonkers, New York
NationalityAmerican
EducationColumbia College of New York,
B.A., 1883, M.A., 1886
Georgetown University,
LL.B., 1890, LL.D., 1914
TitleCommissioner of the
U.S. Patent Office
Term1913 to 1917
PredecessorEdward Bruce Moore
SuccessorJames T. Newton
Political partyDemocratic
SpouseAnna Phillips Cochran
ChildrenAlexandra
Thomas IV
William Francis Cochran
Sherman
Ellen Cox
Gifford Cochran
Bayard
Parent(s)Thomas Ewing, Jr. and
Ellen Ewing Cox
RelativesThomas Ewing, Sr., grandfather
George Ewing, great grandfather
Reasin Beall, great grandfather
Alexander Smith Cochran, brother-in-law
Newbold Noyes, Jr., grandson
Signature

Thomas Ewing III (21 May 1862, Leavenworth, Kansas, USA – 7 December 1942, Yonkers, New York, USA) was the 33rd Commissoner of the U.S. Patent Office, serving between 1913 and 1917. He was the son of General Thomas Ewing, Jr. and the grandson of Secretary Thomas Ewing, Sr.

Background

Thomas was born during the Civil War, on 21 May 1862, at Leavenworth, Kansas, the second son of Thomas Ewing, Jr. (1829 -–1896) and his wife Ellen Ewing Cox (1833 – 1919).[1] At that time, his father, Thomas Ewing, Jr., was the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Kansas but he resigned his position to recruit an Army infantry regiment and to fight for the Union. His son was known as Thomas Ewing, Jr. until his father died and then he graduated to Thomas Ewing, Sr. But he was actually the fifth Thomas Ewing of his line. His great-great-great grandfather was the first Thomas Ewing, who came to America from Londonderry (now Derry), Ireland, in 1718.[2] On his mother’s side, the fifth Thomas was the great grandson of a War of 1812 general and U.S. Congressman, Reasin Beall of Wooster, Ohio.[3] Ewing grew up in Washington, D.C. (1865 – 1870), and Lancaster, Ohio (1870 – 1879), while his father worked as a lawyer and an U.S. Congressman.

Education

A graduate of public schools in Lancaster, Ohio,[4] Thomas went to the College of Wooster for two years, from 1879 to 1881,[3][5] and transferred to Columbia College of New York, where he would remain for seven years, until 1888. In these seven years, he graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1883 and a Master of Arts in 1886, worked as a tutor of physics for the School of Mines from 1885 to 1888, and went to the School of Law in his last year.[6] Then he transferred again, this time to Georgetown University in Washington, D.C. In 1890, he graduated with a Bachelor of Laws from there.[6][7] By then, he had gained memberships in the Sigma Chi Fraternity and, in 1885, the Phi Beta Kappa Society.[8] He was later awarded an honorary Doctorate of Laws in 1914 by Georgetown University.[9]

Career

While he was attending classes at Georgetown, Thomas also worked as an assistant examiner at the U.S. Patent Office, from October 1888 to October 1890,[6][10] but, in 1891, he moved to New York City and became a patent attorney. For the next five years, he and his father, also a patent attorney, shared their law offices as Ewing & Ewing in Manhattan[11][12] and their home in Yonkers, New York.[13] But they had law partners. One of them was the General's son and Thomas's brother, Hampton Denman Ewing, Sr.[14] After his father was struck and killed by a cable car in 1896,[15] Thomas continued to practice law, this time with Hampton.[16] Thomas made his name as the counsel for Frank J. Sprague on the multiple-unit control of electric train operations and for Professor Michael I. Pupin on long-distance telephony.[5][17] When he was returned to the U.S. Patent Office as the 33rd Commissioner in 1913, he was the President of the Current Literature Publishing Company and on the Board of Directors of the Crocker-Wheeler Company of Ampere, New Jersey.[5][17]

Ewing was the Commissioner of Patents from 15 August 1913[10] to 15 August 1917.[18] When he began, he kept the tradition of market monopoly on the control of patents by declaring that “a man had the right to say what the resale price of his patent should be”.[19] A strong supporter of patent reform, he worked for ways of streamlining and expediting patent operations. He often complained about the case backlogs, cramped offices and low salaries of the examiners and other members of the U.S. Patent Office.[20][21][22] He tried to get a reform bill through the Congress in 1915 but it failed.[19] However, he did have the Patent Office regulations revised for “brevity, speed and efficiency”.[23] He still ran into more problems when World War I began. Many of the workers left the Patent Corps to go “Over There” to France with the Army and Navy Corps. The war also complicated the conditions for the patent applications on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean, forcing Ewing to declare that the United States would not take over the patents from the citizens of enemy nations.[24] But he drew criticism,[25] and this situation would not be resolved until 1921, when the Nolan Bill was passed by the Congress.[19] Nevertheless, in spite of the difficulties, under Ewing’s administration, two agencies were created. One of them was the Patent Office Society, formed in 1917 “to promote and foster a true appreciation of the American Patent System”.[19] The other was the National Research Council (NRC), organized in 1916 to oversee the scientific and technical services for the war effort. The NRC was asked by Ewing to assemble a committee specifically to prepare the legislation to reform the patent laws. It eventually succeeded in having the Lampert Patent Office Bill passed by the Congress – in 1922,[19] five years after the end of Ewing’s term.

Ewing was notable for another reason. He consistently ignored President Wilson’s policies of discrimination against blacks in the U.S. Civil Service.[26] Before he was appointed as the Commissioner, he had been the first Chairman of the Legal Committee for a year since 1911, when it was established by the NAACP.[27]

When Thomas resigned in 1917,[28] he was appointed as the Chairman of the Munitions Board of the War and Navy Departments for the rest of World War I.[29][30] This board encouraged the munitions and aircraft industries to pool their patents to help the technological development for the war effort.[19] When the war was over, Ewing returned to Yonkers and resumed his law practice. But he continued to lecture on patent law at Georgetown University. He had begun in 1914[31] and he would continue until 1932.[30][32] He later served as the President of the American Group of the International Association for the Protection of Industrial Property,[29] of the New York Intellectual Property Law Association from 1928 to 1929,[33] and of the American Patent Law Association in 1931.[29]

Ewing died on 7 December 1942 at his home in Yonkers after a long illness.[29][30][32]

Activities

Like his father, Thomas was a Democrat. He ran for the Mayor of Yonkers as the Democratic candidate twice, in 1897 and 1899, but he lost each time.[3][5][17] However, he did join the Yonkers School Board in 1897 and stayed until 1903.[3][5][17] Then he switched to the Yonkers Police Board for two more years, from 1905 to 1907.[5][17] He was also active in the operations of three local hospitals, the Hollywood Inn (a workingman’s club built in Yonkers by his father-in-law[34][35]), and the New York Juvenile Asylum (now Children's Village).[5]

His interests were not limited to politics. He was also a playwright, a scholar, a translator and an editor. In 1902, he wrote and published “Jonathan”, a tragedy based on the Biblical story about Jonathan’s friendship with David.[3][5][17] His metrical translations of Horace, from the Latin, also appeared in the American magazine, Poet Lore.[17] Besides being the President of a publishing company, he was also the editor and publisher of a 1928 book about his great grandfather,[2] The Military Journal of George Ewing, 1754-1824, a Soldier of Valley Forge.

Family

On 24 October 1894, in Yonkers, Thomas married Anna Phillips Cochran (1872 – 1943). She was the eldest daughter of William Francis Cochran, Sr., a carpet manufacturer, and his wife, Eva Smith,[1] and the older sister of the yachtsman Alexander Smith Cochran. Together Thomas and Anna had seven children: Alexandra,[36] Thomas IV,[37] William Francis Cochran,[38] Sherman,[39] Ellen Cox,[40] Gifford Cochran,[41] and Bayard.[5][32][42][43][44][45][46][47][48][49] The family home was “Kinross”,[50] an estate at 616 Palisade Avenue in Yonkers.[44][45][46][47][49]

When Thomas was the Commissioner, the Ewings lived across Lafayette Square from the White House at 1607 H Street, N.W., in Washington, D.C.[51] Their home was named the Slidell House after its previous resident, Senator John Slidell of Louisiana. It was once the home of Daniel S. Lamont, the Secretary of War for the second Cleveland Administration. It was also “just across the next block” from the Blair House – the former residence of Thomas’s grandfather, Thomas Ewing, Sr.[52]

References

  1. ^ a b “Weddings Past and to Come”, New-York Daily Tribune (New York City, New York, USA), Thursday, 25 October 1894, p. 11, col. 2.
  2. ^ a b Edward Hagaman Hall, ed., “Roll of Members”, Register of the Empire State Society of the Sons of the American Revolution ([New York City]: Society, 1899), pp. 153-154.
  3. ^ a b c d e “Ewing, Thomas, Jr.”, In: E[milius]. O[viatt]. Randall, ed., “Personal Sketches of the Speakers”, Ohio Centennial Anniversary Celebration at Chillicothe, May 20–21, 1903, under the Auspices of the Ohio State Archæological and Historical Society: Complete Proceedings, E. O. Randall, ed., (Columbus, Ohio: Press of Fred. J. Heer, 1903), p. 695
  4. ^ Thomas Ewing, Jr., household, Main Street, 2nd Ward, Lancaster, Fairfield Co., Ohio; In: 1880 Federal Census of the United States, Enumeration District 211, Sheet 332D, Dwelling 74, Family 74, lines 42-48, 3 June 1880.
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h i National Cyclopædia, Vol. XIV, p 101
  6. ^ a b c Prof. John K. Ross, Secretary of the University Council, compiler, “[Chapter] XII – Fellowships at Columbia College (1871-1894)”, Columbia College in the City of New York, University Bulletin, No. IX (December 1894) (New York City: Columbia College of New York, 1894), p. 80
  7. ^ Easby-Smith, Georgetown University, pp. 250-251
  8. ^ Rev. E[ben]. B[urt]. Parsons, D. D., compiler, Phi Beta Kappa Hand-book and General Address Catalogue of the United Chapters (North Adams, Massachusetts: Walden & Crawley, Printers, 1900), p. 69. Thomas and his brother, Hampton Denman Ewing, were the members of the Delta Chapter at Columbia.
  9. ^ “Georgetown U. Graduates 417”, The Washington Herald (Washington, D.C.), Wednesday, 17 Jun 1914, p. 1, col. 5
  10. ^ a b “United States. Patent Office. Change of Commissioners”, Patent and Trade Mark Review, Vol. XI, No. 11 (August 1913), p. 351.
  11. ^ Trow’s New York City Directory, Vol. CV, for the Year Ending July 1, 1892 (New York City: Trow Directory, Printing and Bookbinding Co., 1892), p. 413. The General actually had his offices two buildings away from his son’s offices but they were on the same block of Broadway. Senior was at No. 157 and Junior worked at No. 155.
  12. ^ Trow’s New York City Directory, Vol. CVII, for the Year Ending July 1, 1894 (New York City: Trow Directory, Printing and Bookbinding Co., 1894), p. 406. The General had formed by then a law partnership with his sons, Thomas and Hampton, so they could all work together. Their offices were at 120 Broadway.
  13. ^ Their address was 58 Lamartine Ave., from page 129 of the 1892 City Directory of Yonkers, New York at Ancestry.com [subscription service], U.S. City Directories, 1821-1989 (Beta) [online database and images] (Provo, Utah, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc., 2011).
  14. ^ Trow’s 1894 New York City Directory, p. 406.
  15. ^ “General Ewing’s Untimely Death”, The New York Herald (New York City, New York, USA), Wednesday, 22 January 1896, p. 14, col. 1.
  16. ^ At 41 Wall Street, also in Manhattan. Trow’s New York City Directory, Vol. CX, for the Year Ending July 1, 1897 (New York City: Trow Directory, Printing and Bookbinding Co., 1897), p. 422.
  17. ^ a b c d e f g Western Electrician, 1913, p. 109.
  18. ^ “U.S. Patent and Trademark Office”, In: “United States Government”, World Statesmen, http://worldstatesmen.org/USA_govt.html#PTO, accessed 22 Feb 2013.
  19. ^ a b c d e f Daniel F. Noble, America by Design: Science, Technology, and the Rise of Corporate Capitalism (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1977), pp. 106-107.
  20. ^ “New Building for Patent Office Will Be Urged”, The Washington Herald, Sunday, 7 September 1913, p. 2, col. 1-7.
  21. ^ Thomas Ewing [III], “The Inventor and the Patent Office”, The Independent [Weekly Magazine], Vol. 77, No. 3408 (30 March 1914), pp. 449-450.
  22. ^ “Inadequate Appropriations Handicap Patent Office”, Electrical World, Vol. 69, no. 7 (17 February 1917), pp. 330-331.
  23. ^ “Patent Office Rules Thoroughly Revised”, The Seattle Daily Times (Seattle, Washington, USA), Tuesday, 28 December 1915, p. 12, col. 3-6.
  24. ^ “Status of Patents Unchanged”, The Journal of Industrial and Engineering Chemistry, Vol. 9, No. 5 (May 1917), p. 531
  25. ^ “Patents During the War”, The American Stationer and Office Outfitter, Vol. LXXXI, No. 22 (2 June 1917), p. 21
  26. ^ August Meier and Elliott M. Rudwick, Along the Color Line: Explorations in the Black Experience (Champaign, Illinois: The University of Illinois Press, 2002), p. 160.
  27. ^ Meier and Rudwick, Along the Color Line, p. 129.
  28. ^ “Nomination Confirmed”, The Augusta Chronicle (Augusta, Georgia, USA), Tuesday, 28 August 1917, Section A, p. 6, col. 4.
  29. ^ a b c d Necrology, Thomas Ewing, 25 'Journal of the Patent Office Society, Vol. XXV, No. 1 (January 1943), p. 73.
  30. ^ a b c “Thomas Ewing, 80, Patents Expert, Dies at Yonkers”, The Times-Picayune (New Orleans, Louisiana, USA), Wednesday, 9 December 1942, p. 18, col. 2.
  31. ^ “Commissioner Ewing to Lecture”, The Evening Star (Washington, D.C., USA), Saturday, 7 November 1914, p. 21, col. 7.
  32. ^ a b c “Thomas Ewing Dies at 80: Former Federal Patent Commissioner”, The Boston Herald (Boston, Massachusetts, USA), Tuesday, 8 December 1942, p. 23, col. 4.
  33. ^ “Presidents”, NYIPLA: The New York Intellectual Property Law Association, http://www.nyipla.org/nyipla/Presidents.asp?SnID=641474670. Accessed 22 February 2013.
  34. ^ “William Francis Cochran”, Baltimore Its History and People: Volume III – Biography (New York City and Chicago: Lewis Historical Publishing Co., 1912), pp. 889-891.
  35. ^ Virtual Archives, “Hollywood Inn”, Historical Treasures of Westchester County. Retrieved 23 February 2013.
  36. ^ Alexandra Ewing (1895 – 1961) was married twice – to Newbold Noyes, Sr. (1892 – 1942), the associate editor of The Evening Star, a newspaper in Washington, D.C., and to Thomas Archibald Stone (1900 – 1965), a Canadian diplomat in the Foreign Service. She had three children, all with Mr. Noyes. One of them was Newbold Noyes, Jr., a newspaper publisher, journalist and editor. Source: John S. Howell, Jr., “Alexandra Ewing”, Howell Family Genealogy Pages. Accessed 23 February 2013.
  37. ^ Thomas Ewing IV (1897 – 1933) became the President of the Alexander Smith and Sons Carpet Company, the factory founded by his mother’s grandfather, in Yonkers, New York, but he died from pneumonia at the age of 36. Source: “Thomas Ewing, Jr., Dies in New York”, The Boston Herald (Boston, Massachusetts, USA), Thursday, 9 February 1933, p. 15, col. 2.
  38. ^ William Francis Cochran Ewing (1899 – 1965) succeeded his older brother Thomas IV in 1933 as the President of the Alexander Smith & Sons Carpet Company and served until 1953. Source: “Obituary: William Francis Cochran Ewing”, Alumni Horae, Vol. 45, No. 2 (Summer 1965), p. 136, Obituary 103. Accessed 23 February 2013.
  39. ^ Sherman Ewing (1902 – 1975) was a corporate lawyer, a playwright, and a financier and producer of Broadway plays. One of the highlights of his Broadway days was the decision to back the musical “Oklahoma!”. Source: “Obituary: Sherman Ewing”, Alumni Horae, Vol. 55, No. 2 (Summer 1975), p. 128, Obituary 1. Accessed 23 February 2013.
  40. ^ Ellen Cox Ewing (1900 – 1931), a graduate of Smith College, was the first wife of Thomas Archibald Stone (1900 – 1965), a Canadian diplomat in the Foreign Service. She married him in 1930 but she and their baby, Ellen Stone, both died a year later. Thomas then married her widowed sister, Alexandra Ewing Noyes in 1934. Source: John S. Howell, Jr., “Ellen Cox Ewing”, Howell Family Genealogy Pages. Accessed 23 February 2013.
  41. ^ Gifford Cochran Ewing (1904 – 1986) was an oceanographer who lived and worked in Woods Hole, Massachusetts, and La Jolla, California. Because of his work with the NASA, he was called the “Father of Space Oceanography” when he died. Sources: “Ocean Researcher Gifford C. Ewing Dies”, Los Angeles Times (Los Angeles, California, USA), Friday, 12 December 1986, p. 2-8; “Obituary: Gifford Cochran Ewing”, Alumni Horae, Vol. 67, No. 1 (Spring 1987), p. 40, Obituary 81. Accessed 23 February 2013.
  42. ^ Bayard Ewing (1916 – 1991) was a lawyer in Providence, Rhode Island. He served as the national chairman of the United Way (1969 – 1972) and also of the Rhode Island School of Design for 18 years (1967 – 1985). A Republican, he had one term in the State Legislature of Rhode Island. He ran for the U.S. Senate twice, in 1952 and 1958, but lost each time. Sources: “Bayard Ewing; worked in charities, GOP politics”, The Chicago Tribune (Chicago, Illinois, USA), Sunday, 3 November 1991, p. 6; “Obituary: Bayard Ewing”, Alumni Horae, Vol. 71, No. 3 (Autumn 1991), p. 175, Obituary 86. Accessed 23 February 2013.
  43. ^ Thomas Ewing III household, 122 Locust Hill Avenue, 2nd Ward, Yonkers, Westchester Co., New York; In: FamilySearch.org, 1900 United States Census, Enumeration District 125, Sheet 15A, Lines 12-19, 11 and 13 June 1900.
  44. ^ a b Thomas Ewing III household, 616 Palisade Ave, 3rd Ward, Yonkers, Westchester Co., New York; In: FamilySearch.org, “New York, State Census, 1905”, Westchester County, Yonkers, Ward 3, E.D. 02, Image 17, Sheet 31, Lines 8-28.
  45. ^ a b Thomas Ewing III household, 616 Palisade Avenue, 3rd Ward, Yonkers, Westchester Co., New York; In: 1910 Federal Census of the United States, Enumeration District 152, Sheet 19A, lines 1-18, 28 April 1910.
  46. ^ a b Thomas Ewing III household, 616 Palisade Avenue, 3rd Ward, Yonkers, Westchester Co., New York; In: 1920 Federal Census of the United States, Enumeration District 219, Sheet 04A, lines 27-48, 5 January 1920.
  47. ^ a b Thomas Ewing III household, 616 Palisade Ave, 3rd Ward, Yonkers, Westchester Co., New York; In: Ancestry.com, New York, State Census, 1925 [online database and images] (Provo, Utah, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2012), Westchester County, Yonkers, Ward 3, Assembly District 4, Enumeration District 4, Sheet 22, Lines 19-33.
  48. ^ Thomas Ewing III household, 5 East 88th Street, Mahattan, New York Co., New York; In: 1930 Federal Census of the United States, Enumeration District 31-540, Sheet 24A, lines 2-11, 22 April 1930.
  49. ^ a b Thomas Ewing III and Anna Cochran Ewing, 616 Palisade Avenue, 3rd Ward, Yonkers, Westchester Co., New York; In: FamilySearch.org, 1940 United States Census, Enumeration District 68-19, Sheet 61B, lines 61-62, 29 April 1940.
  50. ^ Caretakers, 616 Palisade Ave, 3rd Ward, Yonkers, Westchester Co., New York; In: Ancestry.com, New York, State Census, 1915 [online database and images] (Provo, Utah, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2012), Assembly District 1, Enumeration District 4, Sheet 16, Lines 25-30. “Kinross”, the name of this address, is given here. Of course, at that time, the Ewing family was in Washington, D.C.
  51. ^ Fifty Seventh Year of Boyd’s Directory of the District of Columbia 1915 (Washington, D.C.: R. L. Polk & Co., 1915), p. 461; Boyd’s Directory of the District of Columbia 1916: Vol. LVIII (Washington, D.C.: R. L. Polk & Co., 1916), p. 448; Boyd’s Directory of the District of Columbia 1917: Vol. LIX (Washington, D.C.: R. L. Polk & Co., 1917), p. 442.
  52. ^ “Society”, The Sunday Star (Washington, D.C., USA), Sunday, 12 October 1913, p. 64, col. 2.

Bibliography

  • “Thomas Ewing, Jr.” Electrical Review and Western Electrician, Vol. LXIII, No. 3 (19 July 1913), p. 109
  • “Ewing, Thomas, Jr.”, Who’s Who in New York City and State: A Biographical Dictionary of Contemporaries, 5th Biennial Edition, 1911 (New York City: W. F. Brainard, 1911), p. 312
  • “Ewing, Thomas, Jr.”, Men and Women of America: A Biographical Dictionary of Contemporaries (New York City: L. R. Hamersly Co., 1910), pp. 580-581
  • “Ewing, Thomas, Jr.”, The National Cyclopædia of American Biography, Vol. XIV (New York City: James T[erry]. White & Co., 1910), p. 101
  • James S. Easby-Smith, “EWING, Thomas Jr., A. M., LL. B., Law. Class of 1890” Georgetown University in the District of Columbia 1789-1907: Its Founders, Benefactors, Officers, Instructors and Alumni, Vol. III (New York City and Chicago: The Lewis Publishing Co., 1907), pp. 250-251.
  • Albert Nelson Marquis, ed., “Ewing, Thomas, Jr.,” Who’s Who in America: A Biographical Dictionary of Notable Living Men and Women of the United States, 1908-1909, Vol. 5 (Chicago: A[lbert]. N[elson]. Marquis & Co., 1908), p. 596
  • “Ewing, Thomas, Jr.”, In: E[milius]. O[viatt]. Randall, ed., “Personal Sketches of the Speakers”, Ohio Centennial Anniversary Celebration at Chillicothe, May 20–21, 1903, under the Auspices of the Ohio State Archæological and Historical Society: Complete Proceedings, E. O. Randall, ed., (Columbus, OH: Press of Fred. J. Heer, 1903), p. 695
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