Northwest Equipment Co. of Minnesota dated 1888 and signed by Wm. Rockefeller and Wm. G. Rockefeller - Autographed Stocks and Bonds

Stock issued to William Rockefeller and signed on the back by him and his son, Wm. G. Rockefeller. Stock certificate #13! Rare! Attractive stock!

William Avery Rockefeller Jr. (1841-1922). William was a cofounder with his older brother John D. Rockefeller of the prominent United States Rockefeller family. William Avery Rockefeller, Jr. was the son of William Avery Rockefeller, Sr. and Eliza (Davison) Rockefeller. He was born in Richford, New York and in 1853 his family moved to Strongsville, Ohio. He was to later build an ostentatious mansion called "Rockwood Hall", now demolished, which was subsequently located within the Rockefeller family estate of "Pocantico", in Westchester County New York. In 1865, he entered the oil business by starting a refinery. In 1867, his brother's company, Rockefeller & Andrews, absorbed this refinery, and in 1870, the company became Standard Oil. William Rockefeller built Standard Oil's vast export business in New York and was responsible for that entire operation. In 1872, he played an instrumental role in settling the battles between the refiner's combinations and the crude oil producers. During this time, he formed close alliances with many of the East's most important oil men such as Henry H. Rogers and Charles Pratt, eventually bringing them into Standard Oil. William was a trustee of the Standard Oil Trust until its dissolution in 1890. Rockefeller, along with Henry Rogers, devised a deceptive scheme which made them a profit of $36 million. First, they purchased Anaconda Properties from Marcus Daly for $39 million, with the understanding that the check was to be deposited in the bank and remain there for a definite time (National City Bank was run by Rockefeller’s friends). Rogers and Rockefeller then set up a paper organization known as the Amalgamated Copper Company, with their own clerks as dummy directors, saying the company was worth $75 million. They then had the Amalgamated Copper Company buy Anaconda from them for $75 million in capital stock, which was conveniently printed for the purpose. Then, they borrowed $39 million from the bank using Amalgamated Copper as collateral. They paid back Daly for Anaconda and sold $75 million worth of stock in Amalgamated stock to the public. They paid back the bank's $39 million and had a profit of $36 million in cash. So, by deceiving Daly, the bank, and the public, Rockefeller and Rogers had made Amalgamated Copper a $36 million profit before the company was even operating. Amalgamated controlled the mines of Butte, Montana, and later became the Anaconda Copper Company. Married to Almira Geraldine Goodsell, he built up the National City Bank of New York, now part of Citigroup. He had 6 children. Upon his death in 1922, he left a fortune estimated at between $150 million and $200 million.

William Goodsell Rockefeller (May 21, 1870 – November 30, 1922) was a director of the Consolidated Textile Company and a member of the prominent Rockefeller family. He was born on May 21, 1870 in Manhattan, New York City. He was the third child of Standard Oil co-founder William Avery Rockefeller Jr. and Almira Geraldine Goodsell, who married in 1864. His uncle was John D. Rockefeller and his paternal grandfather was William Rockefeller Sr. Rockefeller attended Yale University, where he was a member of Alpha Delta Phi, and graduated in 1892. Although he was predicted by Thomas W. Lawson to be the future head of Standard Oil, the prediction did not prove true. Following his graduation from Yale, he suffered a serious attack of typhoid fever before entering 26 Broadway. Rockefeller was treasurer of the Standard Oil Company of New York for several years until his retirement in 1911. He served as a director of the Brooklyn Union Gas Company (of which he was also vice-president), the Inspiration Consolidated Copper Company, the New York Mutual Gas Light Company, the Oregon Short Line Railroad, the Oregon Railroad and Navigation Company, the Union Pacific Railroad, and the Consolidated Textile Company, of which he had only been elected a director shortly before his death in 1922. On November 21, 1895, Rockefeller married Sarah Elizabeth "Elsie" Stillman (1872–1935), daughter of National City Bank president James Jewett Stillman and Sarah Elizabeth Rumrill. Rockefeller's father had become a large shareholder of the National City Bank and his alliance with the Stillman family was sealed by the marriage of his two sons with two Stillman daughters. Rockefeller's brother, Percy Avery Rockefeller, married Elsie's sister, Isabel Goodrich Stillman. Together, William and Elsie were the parents of four sons and a daughter. He was a member of the Union Club of the City of New York, the Union League Club, the Metropolitan Club, and the University Club. William Goodsell Rockefeller died of "double pneumonia" at his home, 292 Madison Avenue in Manhattan, New York City, on November 30, 1922, five months after his father. He was interred at the Rockefeller Mausoleum at Sleepy Hollow Cemetery in Sleepy Hollow, New York.

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