Ethel Sperry Crocker Explained

Ethel Sperry Crocker (1861–1934) was an American philanthropist and art patron. In her day, she was the leading patron of French Impressionism in California.^[1]

Biography

Ethel Willard Sperry was born in Stockton, California,^[2] in 1861. Her parents were Simon Willard Sperry and Caroline Elizabeth (née Barker) Sperry, from Stockton, California, and sister to Elizabeth Helen Sperry (wife of Prince André Poniatowski).^[3]

On October 6, 1886, she married William Henry Crocker,^{[4] [5] [6]} a member of the wealthy Crocker family and a prominent member of the Republican Party. Over the course of his business career, he became the president of Crocker National Bank.

Ethel and other family members owned the Sperry Flour Company, which was heavily invested in the World War I humanitarian effort by sending its flour across the ocean to aid famine-stricken citizens of Belgium.^[7] Encouraged by Lou Henry Hoover, wife of the later President Herbert Hoover, Crocker became treasurer of the Woman's "Belgian Relief Fund" in San Francisco and State Chair for the Woman's Section of the Commission for Relief in Belgium (CRB).^{[8] [9]}

On another level, Crocker was the leading patron of French Impressionist art in California at that time. In the 1890s, Crocker and California Impressionist Lucy Bacon lent William Kingston Vickery, owner of the San Francisco art gallery Vickery, Atkins & Torrey, several French Impressionist paintings. Vickery then supervised a series of these loan exhibitions in San Francisco and introduced Impressionism to California in the form of paintings by Claude Monet, Eugène Boudin, Paul Cézanne, Camille Pissarro, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, and Edgar Degas. Crocker also sponsored the studies of the Zoellner Quartet with César Thomson in Belgium.^[10]

Personal life

Ethel and William were the parents of four children:^[11]

• Ethel Mary Crocker (1891–1964) married in 1918 French Count André de Limur (who became an American citizen in 1942 and joined the US Army),^[12] who gave William and Ethel their first granddaughter.^{[13] [14]}
• William Willard Crocker (1893–1964) married Ruth Hobart, daughter of playboy Walter Hobart and granddaughter of the Comstock silver millionaire Walter S. Hobart, in 1923. They divorced in 1948 and he married Gertrude (Hopkins) Parrott, former wife of William G. Parrott. After her death in 1958, he married Elizabeth (Fullerton) Coleman, former wife of George L. Coleman, in 1960.
• Helen Crocker (1897–1966) married Henry Potter Russell, the son of Charles Howland Russell who had previously married Ethel Borden.
• Charles Crocker (1904–1961) married Virginia Bennett in 1926. They divorced and he married Marguerite Brokaw, a daughter of Howard Crosby Brokaw, in 1938.

She was a member of the Daughters of the American Revolution.

Ethel Sperry Crocker died in Hillsborough, California, on July 21, 1934.

Notes and References

1. Web site: Crocker, Ethel . 2024-01-21 . The San Mateo County Historical Association - Online Collections Database.
2. Book: Daughters of the American Revolution . Lineage Book of the Charter Members of the Daughters of the American Revolution . 1904 . Daughters of the American Revolution . 205 . 17 May 2024 . en.
3. Web site: 1861 . Ethel Willard Crocker . 2024-01-21 . geni_family_tree . en-US.
4. Book: Buford . Mary Hunter . Seth Read, Lieut-col. Continental Army: Pioneer at Geneva, New York, 1787, and at Erie, Penn., June, 1795 : His Ancestors and Descendants . 1895 . Books on Demand . 978-0-598-99871-2 . 37 . 17 May 2024 . en.
5. News: MRS. CROCKER DIES; A PHILANTHROPIST; Wife of Noted San Franoisco Banker Helped to Rebuild Vetrimont, French Town. AIDED IN 'BELGIAN RELIEF Married in 1886 to Son of One of 'Big Four' Who Built the Central Pacific Railroad. . 17 May 2024 . The New York Times . 23 July 1934 . en.
6. Web site: William H. Crocker, Ethel Crocker, & Helen Crocker Russell - Cypress Lawn Heritage Museum . cypresslawnheritagefoundation.org . 17 May 2024 . 4 September 2020.
7. Web site: 2021-02-02 . Sperry Flour Mill . 2024-01-21 . retroramblings.nsgw.org . en-US.
8. Web site: Slepchenkova . Angelina . Summer 2017 . The Life and Times of the American Journalist Arno Dosch Fleurot (1879-1951): Defining American Liberalism in World War One Era Through the Lense of Foreign Reporting. (thesis) . Fullerton: California State University.
9. Web site: 2022-12-31 . Sperry Mills – American Indian – California – Decorated Flour Sacks from WW I . 2024-01-21 . nl, en.
10. https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1985-12-22-ca-20526-story.html Cariaga, Daniel, "Not Taking It with You: A Tale of Two Estates", Los Angeles Times
11. Web site: 1861-01-13 . William Henry Crocker . 2024-01-21 . geni_family_tree . en-US.
12. Web site: Andre de Limur Is Dead at 80; Ex‐French Count and Diplomat . . January 31, 1971 .
13. News: 1964-07-01 . MRS. ANDRE DE LIMUR, WIFE OF AN EX-COUNT . 2024-01-20 . The New York Times . en-US . 0362-4331.
14. Web site: San Francisco Call 16 September 1920 — California Digital Newspaper Collection : William H. Crocker Hailed As Grand Dad . 2024-01-20 . cdnc.ucr.edu.