Background
He was born on July 10, 1855 in Staten Island, New York, United States, was a son of Joseph Seligman and Babette (Steinhardt) Seligman.
He was born on July 10, 1855 in Staten Island, New York, United States, was a son of Joseph Seligman and Babette (Steinhardt) Seligman.
As a small boy he was tutored by Horatio Alger, Jr. ; later he attended Columbia Grammar School and Columbia College, where he was active in the college crew. He graduated with honor in 1876, and became a loyal member of the Alumni Association.
His business career began in the New Orleans branch of the international banking house of J. & W. Seligman & Company, which his father had founded. He was transferred to the New York office in 1878, two years before his father died.
On the death of his uncle, Jesse Seligman, in 1894, he became the head of the house. During his membership the firm maintained United States government connections and was particularly interested in the flotation of loans for Venezuela and the financial rehabilitation of that country, and in loans for other countries of Central and South America and the Orient.
He was very active in municipal political reform movements, particularly in the Citizens' Union (of which he was treasurer for years), interested himself greatly in civil service reform, and was vice-president of the New York Chamber of Commerce and chairman of its committee on taxation.
For years he served as treasurer of the City and Suburban Homes Company, which became the principal model tenementhouse enterprise of the city. He also served as a member of the Committee of Fourteen and later of the Committee of Seven, which sought to remedy the social evil, and was head of the Civic Forum and vice-president of the People's Institute. He was a vice-president of the United Hebrew Charities, an officer of St. John's Guild, and a trustee of Temple Emanu-El. The public became so accustomed to seeing him figure as treasurer of enterprises involving the raising of funds for important civic and charitable purposes that the absence of his name in such connection in any particular instance became a cause for comment. Governor Morton appointed him a trustee of the Manhattan Hospital for the Insane and Governor Theodore Roosevelt reappointed him.
His death, in New York, resulted from a fractured skull, sustained in a fall from his horse.
Being the head of J. & W. Seligman & Company, Isaac Newton Seligman had charge of the reorganization of several important American railroads, including the Pere Marquette, and of the American Steel & Wire Company and the Cramp Steamship Company. He was one of the founders of the Child Labor Association and was famous as a reformer of municipal government in New York. He was a trustee of nineteen important commercial, financial, and other institutions and societies, including the Munich Life Assurance Company, St. John's Guild, and the McKinley Memorial Association. He also was a founder of the Institute of Musical Art. He made charitable gifts of $100, 000.
On November 18, 1883, he married Guta Loeb, a daughter of Solomon Loeb of the banking firm of Kuhn, Loeb & Company. Four children were born of this marriage: two daughters who died young and a son and a daughter who survived their father.
