Thomas Alexander Sperry (July 6, 1864 – September 2, 1913) was the co-founder and the "S" of

S&H Green Stamps S&H Green Stamps was a line of trading stamps popular in the United States from 1896 until the late 1980s. They were distributed as part of a rewards program operated by the Sperry & Hutchinson company (S&H), founded in 1896 by Thomas Sperry a ...

, together with Shelley Byron Hutchinson of

Ypsilanti, Michigan Ypsilanti (), commonly shortened to Ypsi, is a city in Washtenaw County in the U.S. state of Michigan. As of the 2020 census, the city's population was 20,648. The city is bounded to the north by Superior Township and on the west, south, an ...

Biography

Thomas Alexander Sperry was born in

Knoxville, Tennessee Knoxville is a city in and the county seat of Knox County in the U.S. state of Tennessee. As of the 2020 United States census, Knoxville's population was 190,740, making it the largest city in the East Tennessee Grand Division and the state' ...

, on July 6, 1864. He married Kate Major on January 1, 1891. Sperry's son, also named Thomas, was born in

Cranford, New Jersey Cranford is a township in Union County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey, located southwest of Manhattan. As of the 2020 United States census, the township's population was 23,847, an increase of 1,222 (+5.4%) from the 2010 census count ...

, in 1898. He was involved with

real estate Real estate is property consisting of land and the buildings on it, along with its natural resources such as crops, minerals or water; immovable property of this nature; an interest vested in this (also) an item of real property, (more general ...

businesses and died in Palm Beach, Florida, in 1973. Sperry Sr.'s home in Cranford was destroyed by a fire in 1912, with the fire causing an estimated $150,000 in damages, including the loss of a number of paintings — many from the Charles W. Morse gallery. Sperry's horse trainer and chauffeur were able to rescue several paintings from the house's music room before they were stopped by flames, including an oil painting of Sperry's son on the horse on which he had won a ribbon the previous day at the Plainfield Horse Show. After a firefighter threw down a painting of Sperry's wife in her wedding gown, Mrs. Sperry was quoted as calling out "Don't save that! Save something worth while." Sperry died in New York City at the age of 49 years on September 2, 1913, of

ptomaine poisoning Foodborne illness (also foodborne disease and food poisoning) is any illness resulting from the spoilage of contaminated food by pathogenic bacteria, viruses, or parasites that contaminate food, as well as prions (the agents of mad cow disease ...

contracted during the return voyage after a two-month trip to Europe. Sperry was brought ashore in a stretcher and his condition was too bad to travel to his home in Cranford. His daughter, Katherine Sperry, married Walter Beinecke in 1917. His niece, Carrie Sperry, had married Walter's brother, Frederick Beinecke, in 1912. Their son is

William Sperry Beinecke William Sperry Beinecke (May 22, 1914 – April 8, 2018) was an American philanthropist and businessman. Career and philanthropy Beinecke studied at Westminster School, Pingry School, graduated from Yale University in 1936 and Columbia Law Sc ...

. The family donated land in Cranford to the

Rahway River Parkway The Rahway River Parkway is a greenway of parkland along the banks the main stem Rahway River and its tributaries in Union County, New Jersey, United States. Created in the 1920s, it was one of the inaugural projects of the newly-created Union ...

along the

Rahway River The Rahway River is a river in Essex County, New Jersey, Essex, Middlesex County, New Jersey, Middlesex, and Union County, New Jersey, Union Counties, New Jersey, United States, The Rahway, along with the Elizabeth River (New Jersey), Elizabeth ...

Business

Together with Hutchinson, Sperry founded the Sperry and Hutchinson Company in 1896. Sperry and Hutchinson started their business in

Michigan Michigan () is a U.S. state, state in the Great Lakes region, Great Lakes region of the Upper Midwest, upper Midwestern United States. With a population of nearly 10.12 million and an area of nearly , Michigan is the List of U.S. states and ...

and became what ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...

'' described as "the first independent trading stamp company to distribute stamps and books to merchants". The stamps gained popularity during the early 1900s as the S&H program offered incentives to shoppers, rewarding them for making timely payments in cash, helping to maintain customer loyalty to participating merchants. S&H Green Stamps had peak popularity during the 1960s; a significant percentage of supermarkets and gasoline stations gave the stamps to customers with their purchases. The firm had 800 redemption centers nationwide where stamps were traded for products. For a period in the 1960s, the firm was printing more stamps annually than the

United States Postal Service The United States Postal Service (USPS), also known as the Post Office, U.S. Mail, or Postal Service, is an independent agency of the executive branch of the United States federal government responsible for providing postal service in the U ...

Conflict

In 1921, Hutchinson sued the estate of Thomas A. Sperry in court in

Trenton, New Jersey Trenton is the capital city of the U.S. state of New Jersey and the county seat of Mercer County. It was the capital of the United States from November 1 to December 24, 1784.William Miller Sperry William Miller Sperry (1858–1927) is the namesake of the William Miller Sperry Observatory in Cranford, New Jersey. According to his sworn passport application, he was born on September 14, 1858, in Bristol, Tennessee. He moved to Cranford in 1898 ...

, brother of the founder, to gain control of the firm. Hutchinson alleged that he had been cheated out of $5 million as a result of secret dividends that diverted company funds to Sperry.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Sperry, Thomas 1864 births 1913 deaths Infectious disease deaths in New Jersey People from Cranford, New Jersey Deaths from food poisoning 19th-century American businesspeople