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EspañolR.J. REYNOLDS
(Redirected from Richard Joshua Reynolds)
'Richard Joshua "R.J." Reynolds' (1850-1918) was an American businessman and founder of the R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company.
Reynolds was born in 1850 in Patrick County, Virginia. The son of a tobacco farmer, he sold his share of the family business in 1874 and moved south to Winston-Salem, North Carolina, to start his own tobacco company. Reynolds was a savvy business man and a hard worker, and he quickly became one of the wealthiest citizens of Winston-Salem.
He died in 1918 of Emphysema.
Richard (R.J.) Joshua Reynolds was born on July 20, 1850, at Rock Spring Plantation in Critz, Patrick County, Virginia, to Hardin William and Nancy Jane Cox Reynolds. Little could they realize what an impact their son would have on the world. Hardin Reynolds was a successful farmer, merchant, banker, and tobacco manufacturer. R.J. worked for his father as a traveling tobacco salesman. "I was trained early in the value of work by my father...all the talent or ability a man could possess was worthless unless it was backed up by work." In 1874 R.J. sold his interest in the family tobacco business to his father and left Patrick County to start his own tobacco company. He knew he needed a railroad hub for his business plans and since there wasn't one in Patrick County, he went to the nearest one, Winston, NC. Winston and Salem were two separate towns at that time. By 1875 R.J. had established his tobacco manufacturing operation. His younger brother, William Neal, was attending Trinity College (now Duke University) and worked part-time for him. Mr. Will, as he was known, began as a leaf-hanger and quickly mastered all facets of the operation. After leaving Trinity College, he took charge of tobacco purchasing. In 1888 R.J. formed a formal partnership with Mr. Will and company bookkeeper, Henry Roan. R.J. served as President with 75 percent ownership and Mr. Will and Henry Roan split the difference. The R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company was chartered as a corporation by the State of North Carolina on February 11, 1890.
In 1905 R.J. married Mary Katharine Smith of Mt. Airy, NC. She had worked for him as his secretary. She was thirty years younger and his second cousin. R.J and Katharine had four children: Richard Joshua Reynolds, Jr. (1906-1964); Mary Katharine Reynolds Babcock (1908-1953); Nancy Susan Reynolds Bagley Verney (1910-1985); and Zachary Smith Reynolds (1911-1932). Soon after they were married, Reynolds and Katharine began planning the construction of a country home near Winston-Salem. The vision of the home quickly evolved into a grand estate and a model farm. As Reynolds was heavily involved in running his business, Mrs. Reynolds was left in charge of the project. Importantly, most of the land was bought in Mrs. Reynolds' name and thus the estate named for her, Reynolda, the feminine form of Reynolds. She hired architect Charles Barton Keen to design the bungalow style mansion as well as many of the other buildings on the property. The original estate was over 1,000 acres (4 km²). Besides the main house there was also the nearby village where many of the workers lived. Reynolda was completed in 1917 and had its own steam heat plant, telephone service, bus service, two churches, two schools, and a nine hole golf course, but R.J. did not live to enjoy his new home. On July 29, 1918, 7 months after the family moved into Reynolda, he died of pancreatic cancer. R.J. was dyslexic and had a stammer, but was very astute in business matters and when he died his company had 121 buildings, ten thousand workers, made ten million dollars a year profit, and he left a hundred million dollar estate, including Reynolda. The estate would continue to be a family home for another forty years until most of the property was given to Wake Forest University in 1951 and became a museum. Today the house as well as the gardens and nearby village is open to the public daily.
Almost a century after her father founded the R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company, Nancy Susan Reynolds Bagley Verney, his youngest daughter and last surviving child, decided to give something back to the region that gave her family its first opportunities. In 1969 she deeded Virginia Tech 710 acres of Rock Spring Plantation. In 1980 she deeded them another 7 acres where the family home and continuing education center stand. She created an endowment of $1.7 million to provide cultural programming to the surrounding community, to run a forestry research center on the site, and to fund a scholarship program for Patrick County high school students. She financed this transaction in part by selling Quarry Farm, her Greenwich, CT, home where stone for the Statue of Liberty was mined, to Diana Ross of the former Surpremes. Now called The Reynolds Homestead, it is a State and National Historic Landmark listed in the National Registry of American Homes. As a Continuing Education Center of Virginia Tech it offers a wide variety of programs and classes for all ages and interests, all are open to the public and many are free. It is open for tours, April through October, Monday through Saturday.
The house was authentically restored in 1970 and is a historical attraction of Piedmont Virginia. Descendents of Hardin and Nancy Reynolds brought together many original heirlooms passed down through the years, including the bed their 16 children were born in. Only 8 of their children lived to adulthood. The estate is filled with possessions which tell the story of life in the nineteenth century. The Homestead includes the historic house, grounds, two cemeteries, and as was the custom of that time a separate 3-story brick kitchen, a brick milk house, a spring house, and a log granary.
R.J. Reynolds and his family played a large part in the public life and history of the City of Winston-Salem. In 1884 he served as a city commissioner. Reynolds was politically progressive especially for his time. He established progressive working conditions in his factory, with shorter hours and higher pay. He also signed a petition for a property tax to pay for public schools and voted to approve an income tax. After his death, Katharine Reynolds continued his philanthropic activities. She gave money to establish The Richard J. Reynolds High School and the R.J. Reynolds Memorial Auditorium (both are listed on the National Register of Historic Places). Construction of the school and auditorium was begun in 1919 under the direction of architect Charles Barton Keen and finished in 1924 (the school opened in an uncompleted building in 1923 after the destruction by fire of the old Winston High School). Besides the Auditorium and school, another memorial to Reynolds, an equine statue, sits on Winston-Salem City Hall Grounds in downtown Winston-Salem. A memorial to Mrs. Reynolds a twenty-some foot tall obelisk, sits on the grounds of the Richard J. Reynolds High School and R.J. Reynolds Memorial Auditorium.
In 1919, his nephew, Richard S. Reynolds, Sr., founded the U.S. Foil Company, in Louisville, Kentucky, supplying tin-lead wrappers to cigarette and candy companies. In 1924 he bought the enterprise that made Eskimo Pies, which were wrapped in foil, and four years later he purchased Robertshaw Thermostat, Fulton Sylphon, and part of Beechnut Foil, adding the companies to U.S. Foil to form Reynolds Metals. After realizing the limitations of the tin and lead used in his company's products, in 1926 he added aluminum to the line. Although the company began using aluminum foil as a packaging material for the first time in 1926, in 1947 they introduced their most famous creation, Reynolds Wrap. Sold all over the world it transformed food storage. Reynolds Metals was the second largest aluminum company in the United States and the third largest in the world. The Richmond, Virginia-based company was acquired by ALCOA in 2000.
Descendents of Hardin William Reynolds have influenced the economic and cultural growth of the U.S., particularly in the South, through their business successes and philanthropy.
Mayer, Barbara. Reynolda: A History of an American Country House 1997. Reynolda Museum of American Art. U.S.A
'Richard Joshua "R.J." Reynolds' (1850-1918) was an American businessman and founder of the R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company.
Reynolds was born in 1850 in Patrick County, Virginia. The son of a tobacco farmer, he sold his share of the family business in 1874 and moved south to Winston-Salem, North Carolina, to start his own tobacco company. Reynolds was a savvy business man and a hard worker, and he quickly became one of the wealthiest citizens of Winston-Salem.
He died in 1918 of Emphysema.
| Contents |
| Reynolds |
| Lasting Influence |
| Sources |
Reynolds
Richard (R.J.) Joshua Reynolds was born on July 20, 1850, at Rock Spring Plantation in Critz, Patrick County, Virginia, to Hardin William and Nancy Jane Cox Reynolds. Little could they realize what an impact their son would have on the world. Hardin Reynolds was a successful farmer, merchant, banker, and tobacco manufacturer. R.J. worked for his father as a traveling tobacco salesman. "I was trained early in the value of work by my father...all the talent or ability a man could possess was worthless unless it was backed up by work." In 1874 R.J. sold his interest in the family tobacco business to his father and left Patrick County to start his own tobacco company. He knew he needed a railroad hub for his business plans and since there wasn't one in Patrick County, he went to the nearest one, Winston, NC. Winston and Salem were two separate towns at that time. By 1875 R.J. had established his tobacco manufacturing operation. His younger brother, William Neal, was attending Trinity College (now Duke University) and worked part-time for him. Mr. Will, as he was known, began as a leaf-hanger and quickly mastered all facets of the operation. After leaving Trinity College, he took charge of tobacco purchasing. In 1888 R.J. formed a formal partnership with Mr. Will and company bookkeeper, Henry Roan. R.J. served as President with 75 percent ownership and Mr. Will and Henry Roan split the difference. The R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company was chartered as a corporation by the State of North Carolina on February 11, 1890.
In 1905 R.J. married Mary Katharine Smith of Mt. Airy, NC. She had worked for him as his secretary. She was thirty years younger and his second cousin. R.J and Katharine had four children: Richard Joshua Reynolds, Jr. (1906-1964); Mary Katharine Reynolds Babcock (1908-1953); Nancy Susan Reynolds Bagley Verney (1910-1985); and Zachary Smith Reynolds (1911-1932). Soon after they were married, Reynolds and Katharine began planning the construction of a country home near Winston-Salem. The vision of the home quickly evolved into a grand estate and a model farm. As Reynolds was heavily involved in running his business, Mrs. Reynolds was left in charge of the project. Importantly, most of the land was bought in Mrs. Reynolds' name and thus the estate named for her, Reynolda, the feminine form of Reynolds. She hired architect Charles Barton Keen to design the bungalow style mansion as well as many of the other buildings on the property. The original estate was over 1,000 acres (4 km²). Besides the main house there was also the nearby village where many of the workers lived. Reynolda was completed in 1917 and had its own steam heat plant, telephone service, bus service, two churches, two schools, and a nine hole golf course, but R.J. did not live to enjoy his new home. On July 29, 1918, 7 months after the family moved into Reynolda, he died of pancreatic cancer. R.J. was dyslexic and had a stammer, but was very astute in business matters and when he died his company had 121 buildings, ten thousand workers, made ten million dollars a year profit, and he left a hundred million dollar estate, including Reynolda. The estate would continue to be a family home for another forty years until most of the property was given to Wake Forest University in 1951 and became a museum. Today the house as well as the gardens and nearby village is open to the public daily.
Almost a century after her father founded the R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company, Nancy Susan Reynolds Bagley Verney, his youngest daughter and last surviving child, decided to give something back to the region that gave her family its first opportunities. In 1969 she deeded Virginia Tech 710 acres of Rock Spring Plantation. In 1980 she deeded them another 7 acres where the family home and continuing education center stand. She created an endowment of $1.7 million to provide cultural programming to the surrounding community, to run a forestry research center on the site, and to fund a scholarship program for Patrick County high school students. She financed this transaction in part by selling Quarry Farm, her Greenwich, CT, home where stone for the Statue of Liberty was mined, to Diana Ross of the former Surpremes. Now called The Reynolds Homestead, it is a State and National Historic Landmark listed in the National Registry of American Homes. As a Continuing Education Center of Virginia Tech it offers a wide variety of programs and classes for all ages and interests, all are open to the public and many are free. It is open for tours, April through October, Monday through Saturday.
The house was authentically restored in 1970 and is a historical attraction of Piedmont Virginia. Descendents of Hardin and Nancy Reynolds brought together many original heirlooms passed down through the years, including the bed their 16 children were born in. Only 8 of their children lived to adulthood. The estate is filled with possessions which tell the story of life in the nineteenth century. The Homestead includes the historic house, grounds, two cemeteries, and as was the custom of that time a separate 3-story brick kitchen, a brick milk house, a spring house, and a log granary.
Lasting Influence
R.J. Reynolds and his family played a large part in the public life and history of the City of Winston-Salem. In 1884 he served as a city commissioner. Reynolds was politically progressive especially for his time. He established progressive working conditions in his factory, with shorter hours and higher pay. He also signed a petition for a property tax to pay for public schools and voted to approve an income tax. After his death, Katharine Reynolds continued his philanthropic activities. She gave money to establish The Richard J. Reynolds High School and the R.J. Reynolds Memorial Auditorium (both are listed on the National Register of Historic Places). Construction of the school and auditorium was begun in 1919 under the direction of architect Charles Barton Keen and finished in 1924 (the school opened in an uncompleted building in 1923 after the destruction by fire of the old Winston High School). Besides the Auditorium and school, another memorial to Reynolds, an equine statue, sits on Winston-Salem City Hall Grounds in downtown Winston-Salem. A memorial to Mrs. Reynolds a twenty-some foot tall obelisk, sits on the grounds of the Richard J. Reynolds High School and R.J. Reynolds Memorial Auditorium.
In 1919, his nephew, Richard S. Reynolds, Sr., founded the U.S. Foil Company, in Louisville, Kentucky, supplying tin-lead wrappers to cigarette and candy companies. In 1924 he bought the enterprise that made Eskimo Pies, which were wrapped in foil, and four years later he purchased Robertshaw Thermostat, Fulton Sylphon, and part of Beechnut Foil, adding the companies to U.S. Foil to form Reynolds Metals. After realizing the limitations of the tin and lead used in his company's products, in 1926 he added aluminum to the line. Although the company began using aluminum foil as a packaging material for the first time in 1926, in 1947 they introduced their most famous creation, Reynolds Wrap. Sold all over the world it transformed food storage. Reynolds Metals was the second largest aluminum company in the United States and the third largest in the world. The Richmond, Virginia-based company was acquired by ALCOA in 2000.
Descendents of Hardin William Reynolds have influenced the economic and cultural growth of the U.S., particularly in the South, through their business successes and philanthropy.
Sources
Mayer, Barbara. Reynolda: A History of an American Country House 1997. Reynolda Museum of American Art. U.S.A
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