Charles Knox

Charles Knox (* 1817 in Ramelton , Ireland , † April 19, 1895 in New York ) was an American entrepreneur .

Life

Charles Knox was 13 years old when he and his younger sister Margaret had to leave Ireland because of the famine and relocated to New York. Parents Charles Sr. , a coppersmith, and his mother Margaret (née Black) had emigrated to New York with their eight oldest children two years earlier.

Charles and his 10 year old sister boarded a small sailing ship in Londonderry , Northern Ireland. Near the end of the crossing, the ship got caught in a storm in the Atlantic and went off course, was badly damaged and stranded near Wilmington , Delaware about 118 miles from its destination. The captain asked the children how they were going to get to New York. He intended to keep Margaret in the galley and Charles as the cabin boy. "We're going," said Charles, and they did. The trip to New York on foot took two weeks. They did chores for their food and slept in barns along the way.

When he arrived in New York with the family, Charles first worked as an errand boy in a bookstore before he got an apprenticeship at Leary & Co., the famous hat maker in the USA at the time. His first wage was $ 25 for the entire year. Knox was so good at his job that after a year at Leary & Co, he got a $ 250 bonus and his wages were raised to $ 10 a week.

Advertisement with Olga Petrova to appeal to women too (1915).

Company formation

In 1838, at the age of 21, Charles Knox founded his first hat shop in Lower Manhattan , metropolitan New York City, and began selling the prosperous and well-known beaver hats from Leary & Co, which were very popular in the lead-up to the American Civil War . That same year, Charles married Hannah Maria Hyslop , part of an old Virginia family. They had two children, Mary Ann and Edward.

His Knox Hatters company developed rapidly. He was able to expand his shop on Fulton Street with larger premises on Broadway. Eventually, Knox started his own hat factory and acquired corporate headquarters and a shop on Fifth Avenue . The company was called The Knox Hat Company of New York and the advertisement said "Charles Knox Hatter Since 1838" .

The shop has been described as one of the most elegant establishments of its kind in the country. By the middle of the century, Knox hats were sold across America and made in the Knox Brooklyn factory. It became the largest hat factory in the world. It was the golden age of hats and Knox had many famous Americans among its customers. 23 US presidents alone wore Knox hats, including Abraham Lincoln , whose famous "stovepipe" hat (Knox Stovepipe) was designed and manufactured by the man from Ireland. Lincoln was famous for storing important papers in his "Knox Stovepipe". Knox built his reputation through the quality of his hats and was a genius at promoting and promoting his business. He raised large sums of money to advertise in the newspapers. His hats and models became known worldwide. In 1878, at the age of 61, Charles Knox passed management of his company to his only son, Colonel Edward M. Knox, a hero who had fought in the Gettysburg Civil War .

By the time he retired, Knox had created a successful business and amassed a fortune. Charles Knox was one of New York's largest real estate owners, owning 28 private homes, three hotels and a 33-acre farm in the Bronx. His wife died in 1888, a few weeks before their golden wedding anniversary.

Charles died at the age of 77 and was buried in Woodlawn Cemetery in 1895 . The company was continued by his son Edward and the family.

End of the Knox Hatter brand

The 1928 balance sheet describes 62 retail stores and over 2,500 agencies across America. Net sales in 1928 were reported to be more than $ 8 million. The Knox brand existed until the Great Depression in 1932. Average wages in the USA fell by around 60% and hardly anyone could buy more Knox hats. The Cavanagh, Dunlap Hats and other smaller companies were merged with Knox and the life's work of Charles Knox expired.

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1. ↑ Charles Knox Biography ( Memento of the original from March 28, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. on rameltontidytowns.com (English)  

Web links

• Charles Knox biography on familytreemaker.genealogy.com, accessed March 27, 2014
• The Knox Hatters, Family Genealogical and Biographical Sketch, published by Whittet & Shepperson, Richmond, Virginia, pp. 238-240.