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Henry Seton was a wonderful man for me to get to know. He represented one of the upper strata of genteel New England society, coming from a monied family. He had sufficient money that he was not obligated to work for income. He “clipped coupons”, something I had never heard of. I asked dad what that meant and it wasn’t really clear to dad, either, what it meant, but later I learned that it referred to certain types of stocks, that were issued with sheets of coupons. The owner clipped a coupon and exchanged it for income that month, at a guaranteed rate. that was the best feature of this type of stock, the payout was guaranteed and payable before dividends were allocated to other classes of stocks and bonds. So Henry clipped bonds and did right well.
A measure of the size of his income was that he gave in to his 18 year old daughter’s request for a car for her 19th birthday. That sounds reasonable, and not much different than other families with money. Howver, in this case, he bought he a red, convertible, Rolls Royce Silver Cloud - something in that class.
The other measure I was familiar of their wealth was the fact that owned and lived in the home of Ralph Waldo Emerson, on a hill overlooking Walden Pond out in Concord. I won’t take the time here on this website to go into detail about the dinners we had at their home but they are some of the most memorable of all. You will find the story in greater detail at Volume 9 Boston of <uphillbothways.org>
Anyway, in the photo, Dick is on the left, I am next, mom is next, Mrs. seton is next, the young man I don’t know, one of the two young women is the daughter and I don’t know the other and Mr. Seton hold the right end of the line. That is Ralph Waldo Emerson’s home. Cool, huh.
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