T._S._Lippy
T. S. Lippy
American gold prospector (c. 1860–1931)
Thomas Sergent Lippy (December 2, 1860 – September 13, 1931[1]), know variously as T. S. Lippy, Thomas Lippy or Tom S. Lippy, was an American millionaire and philanthropist who became wealthy as a prospector in the Klondike Gold Rush.[2]
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Lippy was the athletic director of or an instructor at the Seattle YMCA, before he and his wife Salome headed north in search of gold in 1896[3] or 1897 after an injury forced him to leave his YMCA job.[4] Some Scotsmen from Nanaimo had staked claims Fourteen to Seventeen on Eldorado Creek in the Klondike region of Canada.[5] They decided to abandon Sixteen and Seventeen in order to concentrate on some other claims. Lippy had a claim further up the creek, but restaked Sixteen because his wife wanted a cabin, and there was timber there.[5] Sixteen proved to be one of the richest claims of the gold rush.
Salome Lippy was the first white woman in the area, until she was joined by Ethel Berry.[6][7] Clarence and Ethel Berry, who also became rich, were neighbors of the Lippys,[8] living a mile away.[7]
On July 25, 1898, the Lippys arrived in San Francisco aboard the Excelsior, the first ship to reach the lower United States from the Klondike with now-wealthy prospectors; the Lippys brought with them gold valued, according to the Chicago Tribune, at "not less than $200,000."[9] He sold his holdings in 1903.[10] That same year he became an investor in The Seattle Automobile Company, the first car dealership in the city.[11]
He and his wife went on a worldwide tour, before building a lavishly decorated 15-room house in Seattle.[10] He gave generously to the YMCA, the First United Methodist Church[12] and the Anti-Saloon League, and donated the land for a five-story addition to Seattle General Hospital.[10] He also established a free hospital for miners in Dawson City,[13] and sent "a library of 1000 volumes" to Skagway, Alaska.[14]
He won the 1907 Pacific Northwest Amateur golf tournament[15] and was the Port Commissioner of the Port of Seattle from 1918 to 1921.[10]
Unfortunately, his business investments, "a mattress-and-upholstery company, a brick company, a trust-and-savings bank, and the Lippy Building", all failed, and he died bankrupt in 1931 at the age of 71.[10][16] However, his widow was provided with $50 a month from a hospital land agreement.[10][15] Salome Lippy died in 1938.