More In Depth About Everett |
||
Everett was born in 1852 to a physician father and a mother whose cousin was Hannabel Hamlin, President Lincoln's vice president. His father died and Everett's mother remarried Henry Putnam, Sr and she moved to Bennington, Vermont. Everett was an avid boxer in his youth along with his half-brother, Henry Putnam, Jr. Everett dabbled in banking after discovering that college did not suit him but declared the whole enterprise boring. He decided to work for his stepfather as a bottle salesman even though the two men rarely saw eye to eye. Everett soon bought a part interest in a bottle factory in his home state of Ohio. He worked 12-16 hour shifts, seven days a week. He met the refined Amy King and the next year they were wed. Nine months later, their first daughter, Mary, was born. Better machinery for bottle-making was invented about this time but Everett did not want to butt out the common laborer. Two more daughters, Amy and Ann were born about this time but it is said the first daughter was Everett's favorite. Everett sold the highest quality bottles at the lowest price possible. His daughter Mary married an Italian count she had met while in Europe and moved to Florence, Italy. Everett received daily letters from her and this is reputed to have pleased him greatly. After the construction of his great granite mausoleum at Park Lawn cemetery, Everett bribed the town officials against suing him for destruction of the roads.
|
Everett designed the famous Coca-Cola bottle. The mansion changed from being a summer home to a permanent residence. Daughter Amy married a poor man but Everett is said to have approved regardless. While traveling in Europe, his wife Amy found an orphaned Belgian boy and knowing that she was past child-bearing age, offered to adopt the boy as Everett's son and heir. Everett emphatically denied the adoption but soon regretted it because less than a month later, his beloved Amy died. She had been described by Bennington residents as beautiful and friendly. Everett started an all-boys school for the sons of military veterans but he soon went into debt and was forced to close the school; the building later burned down and was never rebuilt. Everett remarried Grace Burnap, a woman the exact opposite of his refined and beloved Amy. He wed her after she threatened him with a scandal because she had been a personal guest at his hotels several times. He did require her to sign a pre-nuptial agreement. Some say Grace was Amy's nurse but other sources disagree. Grace gave Everett two more daughters but she and the first three daughters never got along. Grace wasn't well-loved by the residents of Bennington, either. Everett consistently chose his new wife and daughters over the first children over the next decade or so. In letters to various attorneys, he wanted to be sure Grace and her children received everything he left to them in his final will. But it has been said that he only did this so Grace would stop nagging him about it. Before his death from surgery for prostate cancer in 1926, Everett was described as a man who cared deeply about his workers and would even provide private hospital rooms for them. But he also tried to drown himself in the pond several times and was deeply in debt. After his death, the stock market crashed and Grace lost most of what she had received.
|
|
