William Alvord (January 3, 1833 – December 21, 1904) was an American merchant, banker and political leader in

San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Francis of Assisi, Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the List of Ca ...

. He was the 13rd

Mayor of San Francisco The mayor of the City and County of San Francisco is the head of the executive branch of the San Francisco city and county government. The officeholder has the duty to enforce city laws, and the power to either approve or veto bills passed by t ...

from 1871 to 1873 and served as president of the

Bank of California The Bank of California was opened in San Francisco, California, on July 4, 1864, by William Chapman Ralston and Darius Ogden Mills. It was the first commercial bank in the Western United States, the second-richest bank in the nation, and considered ...

from 1878 until his death.

Life and politics

Alvord was born in

Albany, New York Albany ( ) is the capital of the U.S. state of New York, also the seat and largest city of Albany County. Albany is on the west bank of the Hudson River, about south of its confluence with the Mohawk River, and about north of New York City ...

, the son of William and Mary Elizabeth (Whitney) Alvord. He was educated at Albany Academy. He moved to

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

in 1850 and engaged in the hardware trade. In 1853 he went to

California California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...

and established his business at Marysville, later moving to San Francisco.
The National Cyclopaedia of American Biography
', Vol. XII, p. 326. New York: James T. White & Company, 1904. This volume was published only months before Alvord's death. In San Francisco he established a wholesale hardware importing business, later forming a partnership with Richard Patrick. Alvord built up an extensive trade, but close application to business wore down his health. He finally sold his share to Patrick and went to

Europe Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a Continent#Subcontinents, subcontinent of Eurasia ...

to recover his health. Upon his return in 1871 he was nominated for

on the Republican ticket. Alvord was elected by a handsome margin, serving from December 4, 1871, to November 30, 1873. A portrait of Alvord by

Benoni Irwin Benoni Irwin (June 29, 1840 – August 26, 1896) was an American portraitist. A pupil of the National Academy of Design in New York City, USA, he trained in Paris with the famous French portraitist Emile Auguste Carolus-Duran (1838–1917). ...

, circa 1872, is in the collection of the

Smithsonian American Art Museum The Smithsonian American Art Museum (commonly known as SAAM, and formerly the National Museum of American Art) is a museum in Washington, D.C., part of the Smithsonian Institution. Together with its branch museum, the Renwick Gallery, SAAM holds o ...

. Alvord later went east to purchase machinery for the Pacific Rolling Mills, of which he was one of the projectors and later president. He also was associated with the Risdon Iron and Locomotive Works. When the

crashed in 1875 he helped to reestablish it upon a sound financial basis. Upon the retirement of

Darius Ogden Mills Darius Ogden Mills (September 25, 1825 – January 3, 1910) was a prominent American banker and philanthropist. For a time, he was California's wealthiest citizen. Early life Mills was born in North Salem, in Westchester County, New Yor ...

as president of the Bank of California in 1878, Alvord was elected his successor. Under his leadership the bank became one of the chief centers of exchange between European money markets and those of

Japan Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north ...

and

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...

. It was Alvord who, in 1887, warned

James C. Flood James Clair Flood (October 25, 1826 – February 21, 1889) was an American businessman who made a fortune thanks to the Comstock Lode in Nevada. His mining operations are recounted to this day as an outstanding example of what may be done with a ...

of signs of irregularities at the Nevada Bank of San Francisco, enabling Flood to avert the collapse of the Nevada Bank from the wheat speculation of its cashier. In civic affairs, besides serving as Mayor of San Francisco Alvord was at different times park commissioner and police commissioner. He also helped organize memorial services for

Ulysses S. Grant Ulysses S. Grant (born Hiram Ulysses Grant ; April 27, 1822July 23, 1885) was an American military officer and politician who served as the 18th president of the United States from 1869 to 1877. As Commanding General, he led the Union Ar ...

in 1885 and

William McKinley William McKinley (January 29, 1843September 14, 1901) was the 25th president of the United States, serving from 1897 until his assassination in 1901. As a politician he led a realignment that made his Republican Party largely dominant in ...

in 1901. He was president of the

American Forestry Association American Forests is a 501(c)(3) non-profit conservation organization, established in 1875, and dedicated to protecting and restoring healthy forest ecosystems. The current headquarters are in Washington, D.C. Activities The mission of American ...

in 1890-91, president of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific in 1898, and also served as president of the California Academy of Schools.

Death and legacy

Alvord remained president of the Bank of California until his death in San Francisco of

heart failure Heart failure (HF), also known as congestive heart failure (CHF), is a syndrome, a group of signs and symptoms caused by an impairment of the heart's blood pumping function. Symptoms typically include shortness of breath, excessive fatigue, a ...

due to bronchial troubles.

Homer S. King Homer (; grc, Ὅμηρος , ''Hómēros'') (born ) was a Greek poet who is credited as the author of the ''Iliad'' and the ''Odyssey'', two epic poems that are foundational works of ancient Greek literature. Homer is considered one of the ...

left

Wells Fargo & Company Wells Fargo & Company is an American multinational financial services company with corporate headquarters in San Francisco, California; operational headquarters in Manhattan; and managerial offices throughout the United States and intern ...

in January 1905 to succeed him as president of the bank. He was buried at

Cypress Lawn Memorial Park Cypress Lawn Memorial Park, established by Hamden Holmes Noble in 1892, is a rural cemetery located in Colma, California, a place known as the "City of the Silent". History Cypress Lawn Memorial Park is the final resting site for several memb ...

. His papers from circa 1874 to 1904 are preserved in the

Bancroft Library The Bancroft Library in the center of the campus of the University of California, Berkeley, is the university's primary special-collections library. It was acquired from its founder, Hubert Howe Bancroft, in 1905, with the proviso that it retai ...

at the

University of California at Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant univ ...

Notes

{{DEFAULTSORT:Alvord, William 1833 births 1904 deaths Mayors of San Francisco Politicians from Albany, New York California Republicans Businesspeople from the San Francisco Bay Area Businesspeople from Albany, New York 19th-century American businesspeople Burials at Cypress Lawn Memorial Park