July 22, 1888: Birth of Duluthian A. G. Thomson

On this day in Duluth in 1888, Adam Gentles Thomson was born to Helen and Alexander D. Thomson, an important figure in Duluth’s grain trade and wholesale industry. Adam Thomson—known in newspapers as A. G. Thomson—attended Duluth public schools before heading east to boarding school at the Hill School in Pottstown, Pennsylvania. In 1911 he was graduated from the Sheffield Scientific School at Yale University and went to work for his father in the grain trade. When his father passed away in 1921, he assumed the presidency of A. D. Thomson & Co., grain traders, and became the chairman of Kelley-How Thomson, hardware wholesalers. A. D. Thomson closed up shop in 1937, but Thomson remained a member of the Board of Trade until 1949, maintaining an office in the Alworth Building. He also oversaw operation of the family’s T.O. Ranch in Raton, New Mexico, a cattle ranch that had grown to over 400,000 acres. A. G. Thomson served as a director of Duluth’s First National Bank and American National Bank and was also a large stockholder in the Great Northern Railroad, the American Steam Barge Company, and a number of mining and railroad ventures; many of these holding were no doubt passed down to him by his father. Thomson’s home at 2617 East Third Street is now the A. G. Thomson House Bed & Breakfast. There’s much more to the life of A. G. Thomson, including the time he was trapped in a hotel fire while awaiting his graduation ceremony from Yale and the outrageously expensive pearl necklace A. D. gave to A. G.’s bride following the announcement of their engagement, and you can read it all here.

A. G. and Clara Thomson on horseback outside their home, date unknown. (Image: Ancestry.com)homson