Background
The son of Joseph Wesley Harper, Junior. (1839–1896) and Abigail Payson Sleeper (1829–1866), Henry graduated ftom Columbia University.
- Photos
- Works
- Photos
- Works
Henry Sleeper Harper
Edit Profile
Education
Columbia University.
Career
He was an "incorporator of Harper & Brothers when the firm became a corporation in 1896." Harper is remembered for his work to save the Adirondack forests from logging, and for the fact that his Pekingese was one of three dogs to survive the sinking of the Titanic. Henry was a director of the Harper & Brothers Publishing House. Henry"s grandfather had founded the firm Harper & Brothers, which gave way in 1900 to the publishing house.
Accompanying the Harpers was Hammad Hassu (an Egyptian dragoman, or interpreter, whom Henry had hired in Egypt as a joke) and Henry"s prized Pekinese dog, "Sun Yat Senator".
On the night of the sinking, Henry and Myra were having dinner. They were then told to go back to their cabin, get dressed warmly, put on their lifebelts, and go up to the boat deck.
Henry put on an overcoat over his dinner tuxedo, and Myra put on a black fur coat over her sparkly dinner dress. She grabbed a pair of gloves, a fur muff, and her mother"s pearl necklace that had been given her.
Then, the wealthy couple boarded Lifeboat 3 along with Henry"s dragoman and Sun Yat Senator.
All four survived the sinking. Foreign the documentary Ghosts of the Abyss (2001), James Cameron sent a robot into the Harper"s cabin and found Henry"s bowler hat sitting on top of the remains of the wardrobe.
