James Staats Forbes
James Staats Forbes (born March 7, 1823 in Aberdeen , † April 7, 1904 in Chelsea ) was a British manager and art collector. He ran several railway companies including the London, Chatham and Dover Railway and the District Railway in London .
biography
He was the eldest of six children of the father of the same name and of Anne Walker. Forbes went to school in Woolwich and was hired as a draftsman in 1840 in the office of Isambard Kingdom Brunel , then chief engineer of the Great Western Railway (GWR) . In 1841 he began working as an office worker at GWR and quickly rose to the position of freight manager at Paddington Station . In 1851 he married Ann Bennett and the couple had two sons and two daughters.
In 1857 Forbes went to the Netherlands to the Dutch-managed Dutch company Rhijnspoorweg-Maatschappij , of which he soon became managing director. He managed to bring the company, which was on the verge of bankruptcy, back on the road to success. The GWR offered him the same position twice, but instead he chose the London, Chatham and Dover Railway (LC&DR), which was then in bankruptcy . At first he was managing director, from 1873 also chairman of the board. He held these positions until 1899, when the LC&DR merged with the South Eastern Railway of its longtime rival Edward Watkin .
In October 1870 Forbes joined the board of directors of the District Railway , which at the time was also on the verge of bankruptcy. From 1872 to 1901 he was chairman of the board. For over two decades he fought fierce competition with the Metropolitan Railway , which was under Watkins' control. Forbes has also been involved in several other companies: Chairman of the Edison and Swan Electric Light Company , President of the National Telephone Company , Director of Lion Fire Insurance Company and the Hull and Barnsley Railway , Chairman of the Whitechapel and Bow Railway, and Financial Advisor to Didcot, Newbury and Southampton Railway . In 1873 he stood as a candidate for the Liberal Party in a by-election for the Lower House constituency of Dover , but was not elected.
James Staats Forbes was the uncle of the painter Stanhope Forbes and the father of the zoologist William Alexander Forbes .
Art collection
Forbes was an avid art lover and built up an extensive collection, particularly of Dutch painters from the 19th century Hague School and the Barbizon School . These included works by Théophile de Bock , Johannes Bosboom , Hein Kever , Jacob Maris , Willem Maris , Anton Mauve , Albert Neuhuys and Johan Hendrik Weissenbruch , and by Jean-Baptiste Camille Corot , Charles-François Daubigny , Narcisso Virgilio Díaz de la Peña and Jean-François Millet . He also owned several paintings by James McNeill Whistler .
After his death, the executors decided not to sell the collection in one piece, as this would have depressed market prices. Instead, they split up the collection. Four hundred selected works were exhibited in the Grafton Galleries in London in 1905. A large part of it passed into the possession of Abraham Preyer; the transaction was one of the largest in the world at the time.
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| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Forbes, James Staats |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | British manager and art collector |
| DATE OF BIRTH | March 7, 1823 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Aberdeen |
| DATE OF DEATH | April 7, 1904 |
| Place of death | Chelsea (London) |