Arthur Webster Thompson

Background

Thompson was born at Erie, Pennsylvania, in 1875. He was the son of Sheldon Elisha and Barbara LaVerne (Webster) Thompson. He grew up in Meadville, Pa.

Education

After preparing in the local schools entered Allegheny College, where he was graduated with the degree of civil engineer in 1897.

Career

For a brief period after his graduation he worked as instrument man on the Pittsburgh & Lake Erie, but within a short time, August 7, 1899, he went to the Baltimore & Ohio as chief of a party of surveys. With the Baltimore & Ohio he spent most of his extremely active life.

In a space of a little less than twenty years he headed its most important and diverse departments – engineering, operation, traffic, and commercial development. At the age of twenty-eight, he was superintendent of one of the most important divisions of the road; at thirty-five, he was its general manager; and a year later he became its vice-president in charge of operation. At the beginning of the World War he was senior vice-president, in full charge of operating, traffic, engineering, and commercial development.

The final weeks of the war brought governmental control of the entire railroad system of the United States. In the new order of things, Thompson was made federal manager in charge of a large group of roads, of which Baltimore & Ohio was the most important. He established headquarters at Pittsburgh and kept traffic moving steadily against almost insuperable odds and difficulties. His work at Pittsburgh brought him to the personal attention of numerous capitalists and industrial leaders, with the result that on February 1, 1919, he abandoned steam railroading and became the president of the Philadelphia Company, which owned and operated the street railroads and the lighting systems and other utilities of Pittsburgh. His record here maintained the high level that he had set at Baltimore; hardly a half dozen years had passed before, in 1926, he was made president of one of the outstanding utilities of the country – the United Gas Improvement Company of Philadelphia. This post he resigned, shortly before the time of his death. Personally he did not approve the "high financing" of the period.

His homes were veritable treasure houses of the many things that interested him, and he gathered about him men of every thought and shade of opinion.

He died in Pittsburgh.

Achievements

• He was a good disciplinarian, and an excellent executive.

Works

More photos

• book

  • What the Railroads of the United States Are Doing to Help Win the War.
  • Railways and the shippers: An address

Personality

He was a man of keen wit, great kindliness, and a charm that made almost everyone associated with him his friend.

Connections

He was married, June 29, 1905, to Marion Dinwiddie Gordon, daughter of Judge Robert H. Gordon, of Cumberland, Md. , who with two sons survived him.

Father:

Sheldon Elisha Thompson

Mother:

Barbara LaVerne (Webster) Thompson

Spouse:

Marion Dinwiddie Gordo