Thomas Mellon Evans
| Thomas Mellon Evans | |
|---|---|
| Born | September 8, 1910 Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania |
| Died |
July 17, 1997 (aged 86) Manhattan, New York |
| Residence | Manhattan, New York, Gainesville, Virginia |
| Education |
Shady Side Academy, Yale University |
| Occupation | Financier, racehorse owner/breeder |
| Political party | Republican |
| Board member of | Evans & Company, Evans Broadcasting Corp., H.K. Porter, Inc., Crane Co., National Museum of Racing |
| Spouse(s) | 1) Elizabeth Jane Parker (divorced 1953) 2) Josephine Schlotman Mitchell (1953-1977) 3) Betty Blackmond Barton Ready Loomis (married 1977) |
| Children | 1) Thomas, Jr. 2) Edward P. Evans 3) Robert S. Evans |
| Awards | New York Turf Writers Association Outstanding Breeder Award (1981) Virginia Thoroughbred Association Hall of Fame (1993) |
Thomas Mellon Evans (September 8, 1910 – July 17, 1997) was a financier who was one of the early corporate raiders in American business as well as a philanthropist and a prominent Thoroughbred racehorse owner and breeder who won the 1981 Kentucky Derby and Preakness Stakes.
Born James Evans in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, to Thomas Mellon Evans and Martha Jarnagin, his mother had his name changed to honor his recently deceased father in 1913. Evans's great-grandmother Elinor was the sister of Thomas Mellon, the father of the wealthy financier, Andrew W. Mellon. Orphaned as a young boy, Thomas was sent to stay with his mother's relatives in Tennessee before returning to Pittsburgh to live with his mother's sister. She and her husband were affluent enough to provide Thomas with a quality education and he graduated from the Shady Side Academy private school in 1927 and Yale University in 1931.
For a few years after finishing university, Thomas Evans held a clerical job at Gulf Oil, owned at the time by the Mellon family. Ambitious, he saved as much money as he could from his salary and together with a small inheritance, set out on his own. In 1939, he was able to purchase the bankrupt H.K. Porter, Inc., a manufacturer of light-duty railroad locomotives that he would diversify into the steel, hardware, and construction material business before converting the company into a holding corporation that would, during Evans time, take over more than eighty U.S. companies.
Among his major acquisitions was the 1959 takeover of Crane Co. of Chicago, then a large valve and plumbing fixture manufacturer. In April 1959 Evans was appointed Chairman of the Board and Chief executive officer of the company. As of the end of 2011, his son Robert is Chairman of the Board of Crane Co. and remains the largest individual shareholder in the company.
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