Background
Joseph Gill was born in Yorkshire, England, in 1841 to Mark and Amelia Gill.
Joseph Gill was born in Yorkshire, England, in 1841 to Mark and Amelia Gill.
Willamette University.
Later he entered the business and became the owner of the now-defunct J. K. Gill Company that operated in the Pacific Northwest as a book and office supply store. The family first settled in Massachusetts where he received his education in the schools of Worcester before enrolling at Wilbraham Wesleyan Academy in Wilbraham at the age of eighteen. In 1864, he sailed to where he enrolled at Willamette University in Salem in an effort to improve his eyesight by moving west.
Gill also taught at Willamette’s preparatory department while he attended the college.
In 1865, he returned to Wesleyan Academy where he graduated in June 1866. She was the daughter of William H. and Chloe Willson, and Gill took over operating the bookstore formerly owned by Willson at 356 State Street.
After a short time he purchased the business, but sold it in 1870. Gill then moved to Portland where he opened a new bookstore with George A. Steel that same year.
In 1884, he founded the Columbia River Paper company with William Lewthwaite and Henry Pittock, with Gill serving as president
He also helped found Merchants National Bank and served on the boards of several local insurance companies. In Portland Gill lived in a mansion on the affluent northwest Nineteenth Street. A Methodist, he was the president of his church’s trustee’s board.
In the 1890s he climbed Mount Hood.
The flagship Portland store of Gill’s book business moved into a new ten-story building in 1921. Joseph Kaye Gill died on October 1, 1931, at the age of 90.
The company would grow to 63 stores in 1990 located in California, Ohio, Washington, and before a long decline due to increased competition from stores such as Office Depot. In January 1999, the final seven stores of the office supply, book, stationery, and art supply retailer were closed.
In civic affairs he was Republican and member of the Club Commercial Society.