NATHAN BEACH STONE, LL. B., M. S. A.
Nathan Beach Stone, president of the Stone
Business College, is stamping his intensely practical ideas upon the educational
system of the state. Such careers are too near us now for their significance
to be appraised at its true value, but the future will be able to trace
the tremendous effect of their labors upon the society and the institutions
of their times. Mr. Stone brings to his work a habit of study and research
that enables him quickly to recognize the needs of the hour in the training
of the young and he has displayed a spirit of marked initiative in planning
the work of the school.
A native of Connecticut, he was born in Cheshire,
July 9, 1882, a son of Rienzi H. Stone, who was born at West Cornwall,
Litchfield county, Connecticut, and was a representative of one of the
old families of the state, of English lineage, founded on this side the
Atlantic by Dr. Samuel Stone, of Hereford, England, who came to the new
world in the early part of the seventeenth century. He established his
home at Hartford Connecticut, while his two sons, John and William, became
residents of Guilford in 1639 and were members of Governor Leete's colony.
There both devoted their lives to agricultural pursuits and John Stone
became the first constable of his town. History shows that several of his
descendants took part in the Revolutionary war and one of them captured
several British soldiers. Later descendants have been more or less prominent
and active in state and national affairs and the Stone family, moreover,
is connected with many of the other notable families of the state. Rienzi
H. Stone devoted years of his active business career to agricultural pursuits,
but is now living retired at Wallingford, Connecticut. He was elected from
Cheshire to represent his district in the state legislature and in other
ways has left the impress of his individuality upon the upbuilding and
further development of the state. He married Esther Lucy Beach, who was
born in Wallingford, a daughter of Nathan Beach and a direct descendant
of Jason Beach, who was of English birth and settled at Milford in 1638.
Mr. and Mrs. Rienzi Stone became the parents of two sons and a daughter:
Carrie Lucy, the wife of Clinton Peck, of West Cheshire, Connecticut; Walter
Howard, who is connected with the Oakville Pin Company of Oakville, Connecticut:
and Nathan Beach.
The early educational opportunities accorded
Nathan Beach Stone were those offered by the public schools and the high
school of his native town. He later received instruction in the Yale Business
College, from which he was graduated with the class of 1901, while in the
Yale Law School he won his LL. B. degree in 1911. His first position was
that of office manager with the Cutaway Harrow Company of Higganum, Connecticut,
exporters of farm implements, with whom he remained for a year. For a time
he was connected with the circulation department of the Pacific Monthly
Magazine at Portland, Oregon, and later became associated with the Pike
Manufacturing Company in a secretarial position. He purchased the Yale
Business College and has since been at the head of that educational institution,
which is now conducted under the name of the Stone Business College. The
school has an annual enrollment of five hundred students, and is the largest
as well as the oldest business college of the state, having been established
in 1864. He was one of the founders of a school of law, and afterwards
organized a school of auditing and accounting, conducted in connection
with the Stone Business College. Instruction is also given in business
law. The school is situated at No. 116 Church street, occupying two floors
of the Glebe building and covering approximately twelve thousand square
feet. It is equipped with all modern facilities for teaching and has graduated
many men who today rank high in public and business life, including mayors,
senators and others.
On the 26th of April, 1907, in New York city,
Mr. Stone was married to Miss Katharine Jane Littell, a native of Winfield,
Kansas, and a daughter of the late Stephen Littell, of an old family of
Albany, New York. Her mother, who bore the maiden name of Evelyn Grey,
was a direct descendant of the Greys and Wallaces, prominent in Scotch
history. Two children have been born to Mr. and Mrs. Stone: Nathan B.,
born in New Haven, April 22, 1910; and Littell Rogers, born July 29, 1911.
Mrs. Stone is a member of the New Haven Bird
Club of the Woman's Club and is also active in church and charitable work.
Mr. Stone also takes a helpful interest in religious and benevolent activities
and is foremost in support of those interests which are a matter of civic
virtue and civic pride. He is a director of the Chamber of Commerce and
has been president of the New Haven Publicity Club, of the John and William
Stone Association and the Commercial Business Educators' Association. He
belongs to Hiram Lodge, No. 1, F. & A. M., of New Haven and he gives
his political allegiance to the republican party, while both he and his
wife hold membership in the Plymouth Congregational church. They are highly
esteemed in those social circles where intelligence and true worth are
accepted as the passports into good society. Mr. Stone had the honor of
being chosen one of thirty-five out of New Haven's 175,000 population to
serve on the citizen's commmittee having in charge the Yale Bi-centennial
celebration.
Modern History of New Haven
and
Eastern New Haven County
Illustrated
Volume II
New York – Chicago
The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company
1918
pgs 405 - 406
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