--- aliases: - Knight Woolley born: 1895-05-01 category: Business & Finance created: 2026-10-26 died: 1984 location: New York, New York relations: - fn: 1 role: member of the class of 1917 (The Order '17) start: 1917 type: member_of with: '[[Skull and Bones]]' - end: 1920 fn: 8 role: as recorded by Sutton start: 1919 type: employed_by with: '[[Guaranty Trust Company]]' - end: 1931-01-01 fn: 12 role: general manager from the firm's founding, then partner from January 1, 1929 start: 1927-03-17 type: employed_by with: '[[Harriman Brothers & Co.]]' - fn: 21 role: partner of the merged firm; managing partner of Harriman Brothers & Co. at the time of the 1930 merger; listed as a partner in 1943, 1956 and 1961 start: 1931-01-01 type: employed_by with: '[[Brown Brothers Harriman]]' - fn: 12 role: partners of the merged Brown Brothers Harriman start: 1931-01-01 type: partner_of with: '[[Prescott Bush]]' - fn: 12 role: partners of the merged Brown Brothers Harriman start: 1931-01-01 type: partner_of with: '[[E. Roland Harriman]]' - fn: 12 role: partners of the merged Brown Brothers Harriman start: 1931-01-01 type: partner_of with: '[[Robert A. Lovett]]' - fn: 12 role: partners of the merged Brown Brothers Harriman; classmate at Yale start: 1931-01-01 type: partner_of with: '[[Ellery Sedgwick James]]' - fn: 31 role: listed among the directors for 1932 in Sutton's accounts start: 1932 type: director_of with: '[[Union Banking Corporation]]' - fn: 24 role: director (reported as director of the Caledonian-American in 1942); later chair of the Finance Committee start: 1930 type: director_of with: '[[Caledonian Insurance Company]]' - fn: 25 role: director, as reported in the Securities and Exchange Commission summary of May 1943 purchases start: 1943 type: director_of with: '[[American-Hawaiian Steamship Company]]' - fn: 27 role: named as a director in a brief in United States v. Pullman Co. start: 1946 type: director_of with: '[[Southern Railway]]' - fn: 29 role: representative of the private banks on the bank's Foreign Exchange Committee, formed in August 1939 start: 1939 type: member_of with: '[[Federal Reserve Bank of New York]]' - fn: 39 role: listed in a November 1951 table of corporate officers who were Council members start: 1951-11-01 type: member_of with: '[[Council on Foreign Relations]]' summary: Knight Woolley, Yale 1917 and Skull and Bones member, general manager of Harriman Brothers & Co. and partner of Brown Brothers Harriman, named in Union Banking Corporation and 1933 Silesian Steel correspondence. tags: - Person - BrownBrothersHarriman - HarrimanBrothers - SkullAndBones - YaleClassOf1917 - BankersAcceptances - UnionBankingCorporation - HollandAmericanTrading - ThyssenFamily - AlienPropertyCustodian - ConsolidatedSilesianSteel - CouncilOnForeignRelations - AmericanHawaiianSteamship - SouthernRailway updated: 2026-10-26 --- Knight Woolley (May 1, 1895, Brooklyn, New York, to 1984) was a member of the [Yale University](/organizations/yale-university/) class of 1917 and of [Skull and Bones](/organizations/skull-and-bones/). Before 1927 he had worked in the foreign department of the American Exchange National Bank. In that year he organized the private bank that [W. Averell Harriman](/people/w-averell-harriman/) and [E. Roland Harriman](/people/e-roland-harriman/) set up as a partnership, and he was a partner of [Brown Brothers Harriman](/organizations/brown-brothers-harriman/) from the 1931 merger into the 1960s.[^1][^2] The record also places him as a director of the [Union Banking Corporation](/organizations/union-banking-corporation/) of New York, as the author of a January 1941 letter to the New York state superintendent of banks about that bank, as the author of a January 1933 letter about the Consolidated Silesian Steel Company that the [Guardian](/organizations/the-guardian/) quoted in 2004, and as one of the registered holders of shares in the Holland-American Trading Corporation, seized in 1942. ### Andover, Yale and Skull and Bones Woolley prepared at Phillips Academy, Andover, where he was class historian at the 1913 commencement, business manager of the school yearbook, the Pot Pourri, and an undergraduate treasurer.[^3][^4][^5] The class history of 1917 at Yale prints his biographical entry. It gives his birth in Brooklyn on May 1, 1895, and his preparation at the Brooklyn Polytechnic Preparatory School and Phillips Academy. It records that he was on the class crews, held the John Eliot Scholarship, was assignment editor of the Yale Daily News, and that "He belongs to Psi Upsilon and Skull and Bones." The entry closes with the note that Woolley "intends to go into business."[^1] A passage on the class's 1917 military training places him on guard at the sick-stables when an inspection party arrived.[^6] The class history's entries for [Prescott Bush](/people/prescott-bush/), E. Roland Harriman, Woolley and [Neil Mallon](/people/neil-mallon/) each state the same membership.[^7] [Antony C. Sutton](/people/antony-c-sutton/)'s catalogue of members by class year lists Woolley under the class of 1917 ("The Order '17"), and his list of the Brown Brothers, Harriman partners names him in the same class.[^8] Kris Millegan wrote that the office Bush joined under George Herbert Walker employed "many of his classmates from his Yale class of 1917, including Roland Harriman and Knight Woolley," and that "The three had been close friends at Yale and were all members of Skull and Bones."[^9] Sutton's account of the 1917 members involved in the [Guaranty Trust Company](/organizations/morgan-guaranty-trust/) and Harriman business begins with "the following five members in the class of '17 (only fifteen were initiated)." It names Woolley first, with the dates "Guaranty Trust from 1919-1920, Harriman Company from 1927-1931, then Brown Brothers, Harriman from 1933," and names Frank P. Shepard alongside him, a vice president of Guaranty Trust from 1920 to 1934.[^8] ### Harriman Brothers and the acceptance business On March 17, 1927, the Harrimans set up a partnership bank. It was first called W. A. Harriman & Co., without the "Inc.," and soon renamed Harriman Brothers & Co. John A. Kouwenhoven's 1968 firm history names Woolley as the man the Harrimans hired to run it. He came from the foreign department of the American Exchange National Bank, which was then in the process of merging into the Irving Trust Company. He brought several former colleagues with him, three of them specialists in foreign exchange, among them Harold D. Pennington, who later managed the firm's operations and sat on the board of the Union Banking Corporation. Kouwenhoven also describes Woolley as already an authority on bankers' acceptances, citing his *A B C of Bankers Acceptances*, first published by the American Acceptance Council in 1924. The bank began with four employees in a single room, with capital from the Harrimans and from M. Samuel & Co., and Averell Harriman's instruction to Woolley was "Here's four million. Go ahead and run the bank." Within less than four years the firm had moved twice and had seventy employees.[^10] Rudy Abramson wrote in his biography of Averell Harriman that the bank started with employees in a single room at 39 Broadway.[^11] The founding date appears in several forms. Kouwenhoven's text gives March 17, 1927. His partner table comments that Woolley "Had been general manager of Harriman Bros. & Co. from its founding in 1926 until he became a partner," and gives January 1, 1929 as the date he became a partner of Harriman Brothers & Co. and January 1, 1931 as the date of his partnership in the merged firm.[^12] *The Bankers Magazine* of January 1931 wrote that "Harriman Brothers & Co., a co partnership, was formed on February 1, 1927, to further the Harriman interests," that its partners included W. A. Harriman, E. Roland Harriman, Woolley and Prescott S. Bush, and that the directors of the affiliated W. A. Harriman & Co., Inc. included the same four with others. It added that forty-nine foreign banks represented the firm as correspondents, that the firm was a member of the New York Stock Exchange and an associate member of the New York Curb Market, and that it transacted no margin account business.[^13] Garry Wills gave 1926 and wrote that the Harrimans "put a classmate in as president," identifying Woolley.[^14] A notice of new partnerships in *The New York Times* of May 5, 1929 lists Harriman Brothers & Co., May 1, 1929, 39 Broadway, with the partners W. A. Harriman, E. Roland Harriman, George H. Walker, Dale M. Parker and Knight Woolley.[^15] By the time of the merger, the Harriman banking partnership was doing a profitable business in acceptances and foreign exchange, held a seat on the New York Stock Exchange, and carried on a brokerage business, though none on margin account.[^10] The partners' minute book for 1927 records that Woolley, as general manager, had received through Ellery Sedgwick James and accepted "the offer of a $250,000 participation" in an acceptance credit for a Berlin metal firm, along with [Brown Brothers & Co.](/organizations/brown-brothers-harriman/) and two other banks.[^16] In June 1930 the exchange received a proposal to transfer the membership of William H. Bixby to Woolley, identified as a partner in Harriman Bros. & Co.[^17] ### The 1930 merger and the managing partnership [Time](/organizations/time/) reported on December 22, 1930 that the two houses had merged "last week," counting 16 partners in the new firm of Brown Bros., Harriman & Co., eleven of them Yale graduates. The same report named Ellery Sedgwick James as a classmate of E. Roland Harriman, Prescott Bush and Woolley.[^18] Kouwenhoven places the origin of the merger on a train to a Yale reunion in the spring of 1930, when "Ellery James, Knight Woolley, and Prescott Bush" had taken a drawing room in a parlor car and someone suggested that the two firms should merge. Kouwenhoven called the story "now current in various versions, as all good legends are," and recorded Thatcher M. Brown's recollection that James first suggested talking with the Harrimans.[^16] Abramson also set the card game in a New Haven Railroad parlor car with James, Bush and Woolley.[^11] Zachary Karabell, writing in *Financial History*, placed a railcar trip on the same line in the fall of 1930 and wrote: "Roland wasn't on the train that day, but Ellery James and Knight Woolley were." Karabell described Woolley as "rarely without a bespoke double-breasted suit" and as "managing partner of another one of the Harriman firms."[^19] Kouwenhoven's photograph caption identifies Woolley as the man "who had organized the Harrimans' private bank in 1927," and as "managing partner of Harriman Brothers & Co. at the time when the merger with Brown Brothers & Co. was arranged in the final months of 1930." The caption shows him as a Brown Brothers Harriman partner on a business trip to Vienna in the summer of 1933.[^10] Wills wrote that Bush "quickly became, with Knight Woolley, the principal expert on what projects to back" at the firm, and quoted Bush's oral-history interviews: "We [he and Woolley] were running the business, the day-to-day business, all the administrative decisions and the executive decisions. We were the ones that did it."[^14] Sutton's list of partners in the mid-1970s, which he gave as twenty-six partners, of whom nine were members of the order, includes Woolley for the class of 1917.[^8] ### Partnership and directorships, 1931 to 1967 The New-York Historical Society finding aid for the Brown Brothers Harriman records lists clippings for the merger, including a clipping titled "Knight Woolley elected director" dated between December 12, 1930 and January 23, 1931, photographs of Woolley with W. Averell Harriman dated 1933, and photographs of Woolley with the Union Pacific Railroad board and the Business Advisory Council between 1936 and 1939.[^2] A Brown Brothers Harriman advertisement of October 1943, marking the firm's 125th anniversary, lists the partners as Moreau D. Brown, Thatcher M. Brown, Prescott S. Bush, Louis Curtis, E. R. Harriman, W. A. Harriman (then newly named ambassador to Russia), Ray Morris and Woolley.[^20] A Brown Brothers Harriman notice in *The Economist* of July 22, 1961 lists "Knight Woolley" among the partners, with Prescott S. Bush, Robert A. Lovett, Thomas McCance and others; the firm's notices in *Trusts and Estates* for July 1956 and January 1961 list him in the same way.[^21][^22] Photographs dated July 1964 in the finding aid show the senior partners Harriman, Lovett, Bush and Woolley in a newly built room at 59 Wall Street, and a photograph caption dated July 28, 1964 shows them in a post-luncheon discussion; a photograph of Woolley, Harriman and Kouwenhoven at the Harriman estate is dated May 19, 1967.[^2][^23] The finding aid also records that Woolley "was a director of Caledonian Insurance Company beginning in the 1930s," and that he later chaired its Finance Committee, to which the bank acted as investment advisor.[^2] An October 1942 survey of insurance directorships held by private bankers wrote that "Knight Woolley is a director of the Caledonian-American," counted thirty insurance companies with board or trustee members who were partners in the bank, and described W. A. Harriman of the same firm as then in London as President Roosevelt's personal representative and Lend-Lease co-ordinator.[^24] A Securities and Exchange Commission summary of insider transactions reported in the *Chicago Daily Tribune* of July 17, 1943 lists a May purchase of 700 shares of American-Hawaiian Steamship Company by "Knight Woolley, director."[^25] The *Daily Worker* wrote on October 5, 1946 that W. Averell Harriman exerted influence over Pacific shipping lines, including the American-Hawaiian Steamship Co. as one of the Pacific's "Big Three," "through Attorney Knight Woolley, his man Friday, who represents Harriman's interests on the American-Hawaiian board," and added that Woolley was a partner of the Harriman bank.[^26] A brief in *United States v. Pullman Co.* (Supreme Court, October term 1946, appeal of the United States) lists "Guy Cary and Knight Woolley, directors of the Southern Railway Co." among the members of the board of the Air Reduction Co.[^27] ### Federal Reserve Bank of New York and Guaranty Trust Sutton wrote in 1983 that Woolley "was also a director of the Federal Reserve Bank," and that "Guaranty Trust was represented by Knight Woolley."[^28] The twenty-fifth annual report of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, for 1939, states that the bank organized a general committee of New York money-market interests in August 1939, and a foreign exchange committee of five commercial-bank representatives, two representatives of private banks and investment houses, and one each for foreign banks and for Stock Exchange firms. It names "Mr. Knight Woolley, Brown Brothers Harriman & Co." among the members of the foreign exchange committee, "representing private banks and investment houses," with R. F. Loree of Guaranty Trust as chairman.[^29] The bank's Circular No. 1015 of January 8, 1931 announced that the Federal Reserve Board had reappointed Clarence M. Woolley of Greenwich, Connecticut, chairman of American Radiator and Standard Sanitary Corporation, as a Class C director for the three years from January 1, 1931.[^30] *The Bankers Magazine* of January 1931 listed Guaranty Trust Company of New York among the corporations of which W. A. Harriman was a director.[^13] ### Union Banking Corporation Sutton's 1976 chapter notes give the 1932 directors of the Union Banking Corporation as taken from the 1932 edition of the Bankers Directory and from Poor's Directory of Directors, and state that "J.L. Guinter and Knight Woolley were also directors."[^31] In his 1983 book on Skull and Bones, Sutton lists eight directors for 1932, among them Woolley.[^28] On January 14, 1941, Woolley wrote to William R. White, superintendent of banks for the State of New York, about the Union Banking Corporation, which he described as "a state institution under your supervision." The letter names four directors, "E. R. Harriman, Ray Morris, Prescott S. Bush and our manager, H. D. Pennington," as "my partners," and writes on their behalf. It describes the corporation as "in effect a New York office, or agency, of the Bank voor Handel en Scheepvaart, in Rotterdam," and says: "Should the United States enter the war, they feel they might be under some embarrassment because of their connection with the bank, even though we have no financial interest in the Union Banking Corporation, nor do we participate in its earnings." Woolley asked White for "a frank expression from you as to the action" the directors should take.[^32] The letter also describes the bank's operations. Its only depositor was the Bank voor Handel en Scheepvaart, its activity was limited to occasional payments and a few purchases and sales of securities, and its accounts were frozen under the presidential proclamation of May 10, 1940. The company's accounts were kept at the Chase National Bank, the National City Bank, the Guaranty Trust Company and the Harriman firm itself. Morris or Pennington had to sign checks jointly with the company's president, Cornelius Lievense, or with an assistant, and a representative of the firm had to be present whenever the company's safe deposit box at the Chase Bank was opened.[^32] A report of the corporation issued on January 1, 1941 and reprinted in the same source lists as directors Lievense, E. Roland Harriman, Pennington, Bush, J. Kouwenhoven, Ray Morris and J. G. Groeninger.[^32] The letter gives the origin of the directorships as a meeting in Europe in 1925 between W. A. Harriman and Fritz Thyssen, after which "various members of the Harriman organizations" served on the board. It states that the directors act "merely as a matter of business courtesy."[^32] White replied on May 13, 1941 that the department "would not feel free to object" if the directors resigned, but that "the department would be gratified if these gentlemen could find it possible to remain on the board during this period of uncertainty."[^33] A memorandum of the Treasury Department dated August 18, 1941 also concerns the company.[^34] In the 1942 vesting orders, Woolley's name appears on the Holland-American Trading Corporation and not on the Union Banking Corporation. Vesting Order 248, executed October 20, 1942 and published in the Federal Register of November 7, 1942, vests the 4,000 shares of the Union Banking Corporation held for the Bank voor Handel en Scheepvaart. Its registered owners are E. Roland Harriman with 3,991 shares, Cornelius Lievense with 4, and Harold D. Pennington, Ray Morris, Prescott S. Bush, H. J. Kouwenhoven and Johann G. Groeninger with one share each. Woolley is not among them.[^35] Vesting Order 261 covers the Holland-American Trading Corporation. It was executed on October 28, 1942 by Leo T. Crowley, Alien Property Custodian, filed December 18, 1942, and published in the *Federal Register* of December 19, 1942. It vests 500 shares, registered to E. Roland Harriman (491), Cornelius Lievense (4), and one share each to H. D. Pennington, Ray Morris, Knight Woolley, H. J. Kouwenhoven and J. G. Groeninger. The shares "are held for the benefit of Bank voor Handel en Scheepvaart, N. V., Rotterdam, The Netherlands, which bank is owned or controlled by members of the Thyssen family".[^36] The Guardian described the Holland-American and Seamless Steel Equipment Corporation seizures as affiliates against which "further seizures were made" after the Union Banking Corporation seizure.[^37] ### Sutton's characterization Sutton wrote that "Averell Harriman, his brother Roland Harriman, and members E.S. James and Knight Woolley, through the Union Bank (in which they held a major interest) were prime financial backers of Hitler."[^28] The sentence is Sutton's. ### The Consolidated Silesian Steel letter The Guardian reported in September 2004 that a letter of January 1933 from Woolley to W. Averell Harriman concerned the Consolidated Silesian Steel Company (CSSC), a Silesian steel and mining company, after Polish moves to nationalize the plant. The newspaper quotes the letter: "The Consolidated Silesian Steel Company situation has become increasingly complicated, and I have accordingly brought in [Sullivan and Cromwell](/organizations/sullivan-cromwell/), in order to be sure that our interests are protected." The letter continues: "After studying the situation Foster Dulles is insisting that their man in Berlin get into the picture and obtain the information which the directors here should have. You will recall that Foster is a director and he is particularly anxious to be certain that there is no liability attaching to the American directors." The Guardian cited National Archives files as the source of the letter and described Woolley as Bush's friend and fellow "bonesman."[^38] ### Council on Foreign Relations and the Luce correspondence A table of corporations whose officers were members of the [Council on Foreign Relations](/organizations/council-on-foreign-relations/), dated November 1951, lists Brown Brothers Harriman with E. Roland Harriman, Ray Morris, Knight Woolley and Thomas McCance among its officers who were Council members.[^39] A list of membership proposals sent to [Allen Dulles](/people/allen-dulles/) with the agenda for the Council's board meeting of December 17, 1951 names Woolley as the proposer of Grinnell Morris, vice president of the Central Hanover Bank.[^40] The New-York Historical Society holds the papers of [Henry Luce](/people/henry-luce/) (MS 3014). Its finding aid lists a correspondence file headed "Woolley, Knight (Mr. and Mrs.)," dated 1936 to 1957.[^41] ### The Hopkins telegram of July 9, 1941 A telegram of July 9, 1941 from the Acting Secretary of State to Ambassador John G. Winant in London, number 2483, carried a message from Harry Hopkins about British exports of consumer goods and "the next lend lease bill," and ends "Have seen Woolley." The telegram gives no first name or post for Woolley. The records found do not establish whether the Woolley named is Knight Woolley, whose partner W. Averell Harriman was then in London as Roosevelt's Lend-Lease representative.[^24][^42] ### The Boys' Club and memoir A letterhead of the Boys' Club of New York in the correspondence of the Medallic Art Company, kept by the American Numismatic Society, lists Knight Woolley as assistant secretary, with E. Roland Harriman as vice president and Robert A. Lovett as assistant secretary.[^43] Woolley privately printed a memoir in 1975, titled *In Retrospect: A Very Personal Memoir*.[^44] ### Papers and dates The New-York Historical Society holds the records of Brown Brothers Harriman (MS 78). Its people files include a folder headed "Knight Woolley (1895 - [1984]), 1923-1967," and the Tax Department scrapbooks include a folder on the partners from H to W for 1941 to 1964. The finding aid dates his life 1895 to 1984.[^2] [^1]: *History of the Class of Nineteen Hundred and Seventeen, Yale College*, vol. 1 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1917), entry for Knight Woolley, pp. 343 to 344, https://archive.org/details/historyofclassof00murr [^2]: Brown Brothers Harriman Records, MS 78, New-York Historical Society, finding aid: People Files (Box 77, Folder 7, "Knight Woolley (1895 - [1984]), 1923-1967"); clippings (December 12, 1930 to January 23, 1931); photographs (1933; 1936 to 1939; July 1964; May 19, 1967); Tax Department scrapbook ("Partners H-W. Newquist - Woolley, 1941-1964"); historical note on Caledonian Insurance Company. https://findingaids.library.nyu.edu/nyhs/ms78_brown_brothers_harriman/ [^3]: "Andover Townsman," June 13, 1913, report of the commencement exercises of Phillips Academy, naming "the class historian, Knight Woolley." https://archive.org/details/andover_townsman_1913-06-13 [^4]: *Pot Pourri* (Phillips Academy, Andover, 1913), staff list and class biographies naming Knight Woolley business manager. https://archive.org/details/potpourri00unse_20 [^5]: *Phillips Bulletin*, vol. 8, list of student offices naming Knight Woolley, Brooklyn, New York, undergraduate treasurer. https://archive.org/details/phillipsbulletin08phil [^6]: *History of the Class of Nineteen Hundred and Seventeen*, vol. 1 (1917), narrative of the class's 1917 military training, p. 405, https://archive.org/details/historyofclassof00murr [^7]: *History of the Class of Nineteen Hundred and Seventeen*, vol. 1 (1917), entries for Prescott Sheldon Bush (pp. 105 to 106), Edward Roland Noel Harriman, Knight Woolley (pp. 343 to 344) and Henry Neil Mallon, https://archive.org/details/historyofclassof00murr [^8]: Antony C. Sutton, *America's Secret Establishment: An Introduction to the Order of Skull & Bones* (Trine Day, 2002; first published 1983), membership catalogue by class year, the section on Brown Brothers, Harriman listing the partners who were members of the order, and the section on the Union Bank and the class of 1917 (the "five members in the class of '17" passage, with the dates for Woolley and Shepard). The dating and the counts are Sutton's. https://archive.org/details/americas_secret_establishment-skull_and_bones [^9]: Kris Millegan, *Fleshing Out Skull & Bones: Investigations into America's Most Powerful Secret Society* (Trine Day, 2003), chapter on Prescott Bush and Harriman & Co. https://archive.org/details/fleshing_out_skull_and_bones [^10]: John A. Kouwenhoven, *Partners in Banking: An Historical Portrait of a Great Private Bank, Brown Brothers Harriman & Co., 1818-1968* (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1968), pp. 13 to 15, on the 1927 founding, Woolley's appointment as general manager, the former American Exchange colleagues, the 1924 *A B C of Bankers Acceptances*, the four-million instruction, the staff of seventy, the 1930 position, and the photograph caption of Woolley ("Courtesy of Miss Julie Brennan"). https://archive.org/details/partnersinbankinganhistoricalportraitofagreatprivateb [^11]: Rudy Abramson, *Spanning the Century: The Life of W. Averell Harriman, 1891-1986* (New York: William Morrow, 1992), chapters on the Harriman banks and the merger. https://archive.org/details/spanningcenturyl00abra [^12]: Kouwenhoven, *Partners in Banking* (1968), partner table, pp. 231 to 235, entry for Knight Woolley (became partner of Harriman Bros. & Co. January 1, 1929; of Brown Brothers Harriman & Co. January 1, 1931; comment: "Had been general manager of Harriman Bros. & Co. from its founding in 1926 until he became a partner. Resident in New York."). https://archive.org/details/partnersinbankinganhistoricalportraitofagreatprivateb [^13]: *The Bankers Magazine*, vol. 122, no. 1 (January 1931), listing the partners of Harriman Brothers & Co., the directors of W. A. Harriman & Co., Inc., and the corporations of which W. A. Harriman was a director. https://archive.org/details/sim_bankers-magazine_1931-01_122_1 [^14]: Garry Wills, "Father Knows Best," *The New York Review of Books*, November 5, 1992, on Harriman Brothers & Co. "not founded until 1926," the classmate "put in as president (Knight Woolley)," Bush and Woolley as the firm's principal experts, and the oral-history quotation. https://www.nybooks.com/articles/1992/11/05/father-knows-best/ [^15]: Notices of new partnerships, *The New York Times*, May 5, 1929, financial pages. https://archive.org/details/sim_new-york-times_1929-05-05_78_26034_0 [^16]: Kouwenhoven, *Partners in Banking* (1968), pp. 16 to 17, minute book entry of 1927 quoting the partners' records on the $250,000 participation, the account of the card game on the train to a Yale reunion in the spring of 1930, and the recollection of Thatcher M. Brown. https://archive.org/details/partnersinbankinganhistoricalportraitofagreatprivateb [^17]: Stock Exchange membership notices, *The New York Times*, June 13, 1930, financial pages, proposal to transfer the membership of William H. Bixby to Knight Woolley, "a partner in Harriman Bros. & Co." https://archive.org/details/per_new-york-times-magazine_the-new-york-times_1930-06-13_79_26438 [^18]: "Business: Brown-Harriman," *Time*, December 22, 1930, https://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,740853,00.html [^19]: Zachary Karabell, "Inside Money: Brown Brothers Harriman and the American Way of Power," *Financial History* 138 (Summer 2021), Museum of American Finance, pp. 14 to 17 (passages at pp. 15 to 17). https://archive.org/details/financialhistory138 [^20]: Brown Brothers Harriman & Co. advertisement on the firm's 125th anniversary, *The Commercial and Financial Chronicle*, October 14, 1943. https://archive.org/details/sim_commercial-and-financial-chronicle_1943-10-14_158_4220 [^21]: Brown Brothers Harriman & Co. statement of condition with list of partners and limited partners, *The Economist*, July 22, 1961. https://archive.org/details/sim_economist_1961-07-22_200_6152 [^22]: Brown Brothers Harriman & Co. notices listing partners and limited partners, *Trusts and Estates*, vol. 95, no. 7 (July 1956) and vol. 100, no. 1 (January 1961). https://archive.org/details/sim_trusts-estates_1956-07_95_7 and https://archive.org/details/sim_trusts-estates_1961-01_100_1 [^23]: Kouwenhoven, *Partners in Banking* (1968), photograph caption dated July 28, 1964, "The senior partners in a post-luncheon discussion." https://archive.org/details/partnersinbankinganhistoricalportraitofagreatprivateb [^24]: "Brown Brothers Harriman & Co.," *The Insurance Eastern Underwriter*, October 9, 1942, on partners of the bank who were insurance company directors. https://archive.org/details/sim_insurance-eastern-underwriter_1942-10-09_43_41 [^25]: Summary of Securities and Exchange Commission insider transactions, *Chicago Daily Tribune*, July 17, 1943. https://archive.org/details/per_chicago-daily-tribune_1943-07-17_102_170 [^26]: *Daily Worker*, October 5, 1946, vol. 23, no. 239, article on West Coast shipping boards. https://archive.org/details/per_daily-worker_daily-worker_1946-10-05_23_239 [^27]: *United States v. Pullman Co.*, 331 U.S. 865 (1947), No. 253, Supreme Court of the United States, October term 1946, printed record, passage on interlocking directorates of the directors of the Pullman Company. https://archive.org/details/micro_IA40385610_0183 [^28]: Sutton, *America's Secret Establishment* (1983), section on the Union Banking Corporation (eight directors for 1932), the passage on Guaranty Trust, and the passage on Averell Harriman, Roland Harriman, E.S. James and Knight Woolley and the Union Bank. The lists and characterizations are Sutton's. https://archive.org/details/americas_secret_establishment-skull_and_bones [^29]: Federal Reserve Bank of New York, *Twenty-Fifth Annual Report* (for the year 1939), pp. 16 to 17 and note 2 on the foreign exchange committee. https://archive.org/details/sim_federal-reserve-bank-of-new-york-annual-report_1939-12-31 [^30]: Federal Reserve Bank of New York, Circular No. 1015, "Appointment of Directors," January 8, 1931. https://fraser.stlouisfed.org/files/docs/historical/ny%20circulars/1931_01015.pdf [^31]: Antony C. Sutton, *Wall Street and the Rise of Hitler* (1976), notes to the chapter on the Union Bank, note 15, citing Bankers Directory, 1932 edition, p. 2557, and Poor's Directory of Directors: "J.L. Guinter and Knight Woolley were also directors." [^32]: Knight Woolley to William R. White, January 14, 1941, as reprinted with a newspaper account of the Union Banking Corporation, a report of the corporation issued January 1, 1941, and a narrative of the directorship, in Millegan, *Fleshing Out Skull & Bones* (2003), pp. 214 to 217 and 222 to 223. https://archive.org/details/fleshing_out_skull_and_bones [^33]: William R. White to Knight Woolley, May 13, 1941, reprinted in Millegan, *Fleshing Out Skull & Bones* (2003), pp. 216 to 217. https://archive.org/details/fleshing_out_skull_and_bones [^34]: Treasury Department memorandum, Mr. May to Mr. J. W. Pehle, August 18, 1941, "Re: Union Banking Corporation," ref. 9-151, with handwritten notation by J. W. Pehle, declassified by NARA (authority NND 960103). [^35]: Office of the Alien Property Custodian, Vesting Order Number 248, "All of the Capital Stock of Union Banking Corporation and Certain Indebtedness Owing by It," executed October 20, 1942, F.R. Doc. 42-11568, 7 *Federal Register* 9097 to 9098 (November 7, 1942), registered-owners table. https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/FR-1942-11-07/pdf/FR-1942-11-07.pdf [^36]: Office of the Alien Property Custodian, Vesting Order Number 261, "All of the Capital Stock of Holland-American Trading Corporation," executed October 28, 1942, signed Leo T. Crowley, F.R. Doc. 42-13532, filed December 18, 1942, *Federal Register*, vol. 7, no. 248 (December 19, 1942), p. 10627, holder table of 500 shares. https://archive.org/details/sim_federal-register-find_1942-12-19_7_248 [^37]: Ben Aris and Duncan Campbell, "How Bush's grandfather helped Hitler's rise to power," *The Guardian*, September 25, 2004, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2004/sep/25/usa.secondworldwar [^38]: Aris and Campbell, *The Guardian*, September 25, 2004, quoting the January 1933 letter from Knight Woolley to Averill Harriman and citing National Archives files. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2004/sep/25/usa.secondworldwar [^39]: Council on Foreign Relations, Receipts (1946-1951), Research Budget, with Contributions of Corporations, Individual Contributions to the 25th Anniversary Fund and Corporations with Officers who are members of the Council on Foreign Relations, November 1951, CIA CREST document CIA-RDP80R01731R001100170005-1. https://archive.org/details/cia-readingroom-document-cia-rdp80r01731r001100170005-1 [^40]: Walter H. Mallory, Council on Foreign Relations, to Allen W. Dulles, December 10, 1951, enclosing the agenda of the 94th meeting of the board (December 17, 1951) and the "Membership Proposals, Suggested List, December 1951," CIA CREST document CIA-RDP80R01731R001100170002-4. https://archive.org/details/cia-readingroom-document-cia-rdp80r01731r001100170002-4 [^41]: Henry R. Luce Papers, MS 3014, New-York Historical Society, finding aid, file "Woolley, Knight (Mr. and Mrs.), 1936-1957." https://findingaids.library.nyu.edu/nyhs/ms3014_henry_luce/all [^42]: *Foreign Relations of the United States, 1941*, vol. III, document 6, telegram 2483, the Acting Secretary of State to the Ambassador in the United Kingdom (Winant), July 9, 1941, relaying a message from Hopkins. https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1941v03/d6 [^43]: Letterhead of The Boys' Club of New York, in Medallic Art Co. correspondence, American Numismatic Society, ca. 1908 to 1931 (officers: Charles H. Sabin, president; E. Roland Harriman, vice-president; Knight Woolley and Robert A. Lovett, assistant secretaries). https://archive.org/details/medallicartco19000amer [^44]: Knight Woolley, *In Retrospect: A Very Personal Memoir* (privately printed, 1975), as cited in the notes to Darwin Payne, *Initiative in Energy: Dresser Industries, Inc., 1880-1978* (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1979). https://archive.org/details/initiativeinener00payn_0 --- *The Info Web has an MCP server for agents at https://theinfoweb.org/mcp (streamable HTTP, no auth): search by meaning, exact text, source or date, and follow typed, footnoted connections. Setup and the same tools over GET: https://theinfoweb.org/llms.txt*