William K. Pierce
I sometimes wonder how the history of the upper Beaver River might have been different had the Beaver River Club survived the multiple adversities that beset it between 1910 and 1924 [see my post of 05/03/21]. One way to get a sense of that alternate history is to consider the personal lives of the people who were drawn to that glittering wilderness retreat.
William K. Pierce was a prominent member of the Beaver River Club from about 1900 until his death in 1915. Pierce is especially interesting to me because he owned three vacation cottages at the eastern end of the club’s land. As I explained in my post of 09/05/21, this property was later acquired by Roger B. Williams, Jr. who moved Pierce’s finest cottage to nearby higher ground where it still exists intact as the Main Camp of the Rap-Shaw Club. Pierce is also interesting because of the major roles he played in the development of the city of Syracuse, NY.
William Kasson Pierce was born May 25, 1851 in Syracuse NY. His parents were Sylvester P. and Cornelia Marsh Pierce. His father grew up in Sauquoit, NY, the son of a physician. Sylvester Pierce worked as a store clerk in Rome and Utica, NY until 1839 when he moved to Syracuse, where the salt business was then booming, to establish his own store, S. P. Pierce & Sons. The company manufactured and sold crockery, fixtures, lamps and some plumbing products. The business was a success from the start. After several lean years, the family became firmly upper middle class.
William attended school in Syracuse then enrolled at Cornell University but left in 1872 without graduating. As was common for wealthy young people at the time, he spent the next two years making a grand tour of Europe. On his return he studied law at a Syracuse firm but soon gave it up and went to work for his father. In 1876, after he had acquired a general knowledge of the business, William and his father formed a partnership with William Allen Butler, William K. Pierce’s brother-in-law, under the name Pierce, Butler & Pierce. The new firm was a wholesale plumbing business selling gas, water and steam supplies and offering steam and sanitary engineering.
William K. Pierce married Eleanor Rust, daughter of Stiles M. Rust of Syracuse on June 16, 1880. They had one daughter, Rosamond Rust Pierce and two sons, William Rust Pierce and Harold Spencer Pierce. The family lived at 811 James Street, then the city’s most fashionable residential district.
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| PB&P advertising card |
As William K. Pierce’s wealth grew, he also became involved in the gas and electric utility business. In 1882 he organized the Electric Light Company in Syracuse. The new firm obtained the franchise to install the first street lights in the city as well as supply electricity to commercial businesses. In 1888, he organized the Syracuse Heat & Power Company that furnished heat and power to residents and businesses in the city.
By 1904, the company advertised in national trade journals that they specialized in heating and sanitary appliances in "cold" countries and in "hot" countries they sold baths, lavatories and water closets. In 1910, the company advertised their Pierce hot water heaters. Later that same year, due to increased business, the firm enlarged its Eastwood manufacturing plant and substantially increased its workforce. By this time, they were marketing their products nationwide and in Europe where the firm had eighteen agencies in the principal cities.
William was active in a variety of civic matters. He was a Republican presidential elector in 1904. He had served as a vestryman of Saint Paul’s Episcopal Church for many years and was a director of the National Bank of Syracuse and of the Chamber of Commerce. He had also been the president of the prestigious Century Club. Like Dr. W. Seward Webb, he was a member of the Sons of the American Revolution. By the turn of the century, the Pierce family had become a bastion of Syracuse society. Their business was one of the oldest in the city and probably its largest employer.
It’s not clear exactly how W. K. Pierce first found out about the Beaver River Club. We know that his older brother, Charles H. Pierce, was deeply familiar with the upper Beaver River area as one of the earliest members of the Rap-Shaw Club and probably had described the Beaver River Club to the family. The Pierce family’s priest at St. Paul’s, Rev. Henry R. Lockwood, was one of the founders of the Beaver River Club and may have encouraged them to join. Indeed, shortly after William and Eleanor bought two cottage lots for their family, William’s sister Emma and her husband William A. Butler, his original business partner, also bought a lot and built a cottage. The club quickly proved fashionable to other leading Syracuse businessmen of the time including Carlton A. Chase, owner of Syracuse Chilled Plow, Robert and James Dey, owners of the Dey Brothers Department Store, as well as the distinguished Syracuse lawyer, William P. Goodelle, who played a key role in crafting the “forever wild” amendment to the state constitution to protect the Adirondack Forest Preserve.
W. K. Pierce’s leadership role at the Beaver River Club was apparent as early as 1901 when he commissioned a revised map of the club property complete with member’s names on the lots. In 1902 he was elected secretary/treasurer of its board of directors. Pierce expanded his club holdings by purchasing a third lot with a large waterfront cottage in 1907. He then owned all the land on the northeast end of the club. When he built his own boathouse and dock his property became known as “Pierce’s Point.” The family usually spend much of the summer at their cottages.
After more than thirty years of phenomenal business success, W. K. Pierce’s company suffered a major setback during the national depression of 1912 – 1913. Unfortunately, the business had just expanded resulting in increased debt. The business slowed and fell behind on its financial obligations. In January 1914 its creditors forced the company into bankruptcy. As part of the reorganization, William K. and his two sons agreed to resign from management. W. K. Pierce estimated his personal worth at $1,250,000 in 1913 but by January 1914 he only had $60,665 remaining. Pierce was unaccustomed to failure and became depressed. He openly complained that he had lost a fortune in only a few years. Finally, on April 5, 1915, William K. Pierce committed suicide by shooting himself in the head. His obituary appeared in the New York Times, the Syracuse papers, the Cornell University Alumni Magazine and trade journals across the country. He was buried in Oakwood Cemetery in Syracuse. He died without a will. Much of his remaining fortune was promptly seized by the bankruptcy trustee.
Pierce’s Beaver River Club properties were purchased in late September 1915 from the bankruptcy trustee by William M. Butler and Gladys K. Smith. William M. Butler was the son of Pierce’s sister Emma, the wife of his original business partner, William A. Butler. Emma Butler owned a camp at the Beaver River Club located directly behind the clubhouse that she inherited when her husband died in 1904. It makes sense that Emma’s son would be interested in obtaining the Pierce cottages, primarily as an investment. Gladys Smith, likely a relative, may have provided some funds for the purchase, also as an investment. Their investment paid off the very next year when Roger B. Williams, Jr. purchased all three cottages. Thus, almost by chance, it happened that the most attractive Pierce cottage, dubbed “Wild-a-while” by Williams, came to be moved and saved when the reservoir expanded in 1925.
Had he lived, I’m certain that W. K. Pierce would have found a way to prevent the destruction of the Beaver River Club. He probably would have rallied the other club members to use their combined wealth and political power to try to prevent the state from expanding the reservoir. When they failed at that, as I’m sure they would have, he probably would have convinced club members to purchase land above the projected high-water line in what is now the hamlet of Stillwater. It was certainly within their means to move all the club members’ cottages and their grand clubhouse to that nearby location. The trajectory of Stillwater would have been altered, and not in a way pleasing to those who now enjoy it. But, of course, Pierce did not survive and no one else had the capacity to prevent the Beaver River Club from ultimately sinking into oblivion.
The illustrations in this post are from the collections of Frank Carey, Jim Fox and the author
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