HISTORIC STETSON UNIVERSITY
Founded 1883
JOHN B. STETSON STATUE
The Addition to Stetson's History
This historical site is very young in comparison to the other historic locations on campus but the history behind the inspiration makes this statue just as important as the other sites
John B. Stetson: The Industrialist
John B. Stetson was born in 1830 in Orange, New Jersey. His father was a hatter and John left school early to learn the hatter's trade. He soon became ill and was sent to Colorado until his health improved. While in the West he was impressed with the local style of a 10-gallon hat. In 1865, Stetson settled in Philadelphia and opened a hat repair business in a one-room shop on the north-east corner of 7th and Callowhill Streets.
In a short time his talent for trimming led him to manufacturing hats. His business improved so rapidly that he needed larger quarters in just over a year. In no time his hats were being sold in most of the retail establishments in Philadelphia. A novel idea of his, to move his factory to the quiet northeast area of the city, gave him the space he needed. Eventually those 12 acres held five and six story hat factory buildings and the Stetson Hospital. His aim "to do good work at fair prices" as well as his taking good care of his employees, their families and the factory neighborhood non-employees, separated this man from the usual manufacturers of the time.
By 1886, Stetson was not only a household name, but his hat brand was the largest in the world. A fully mechanized factory was churning out 2 million hats a year by 1906. Even after the West was fully won, people kept buying Stetson hats. After his death, his son G. Henry Stetson ran the company until styles of dress changed so much that hat sales declined. The plant was closed in 1971. In 1977 the buildings were given to the City of Philadelphia. During the Depression his Elkins Park Estate was sold and mansion razed. A local street now carries the Stetson name.
John B. Stetson: The Philanthropist
In 1885 Henry Deland convinced his friend John B. Stetson to visit Persimmon Hollow, now Deland. Mr. Stetson spent the next 20 winters in the blossoming town. He became an active business and community leader. Outside of his own business world he was an important contributor to the YMCA and many other Philadelphia charities. In 1888 he endowed an academy in DeLand, Florida which later changed its name to Stetson University. Stetson, gave his first donation of $3,500 to the school in 1886. As he continued contributing not only financial support but also his business savvy to the administration of the school, Stetson was elected to the Board of Trustees in 1887, and he became president of the board in 1889. That same year the trustees changed the name of the school to John B. Stetson University in appreciation of his support. The college offered liberal arts, music and business curriculums. At present it also has a college of law in St. Petersburg, Florida. John B. Stetson died in 1906 in his DeLand mansion home. He is interred in the family Mausoleum in the Ashland section of West Laurel Hill Cemetery, Bala Cynwyd, PA.
John B. Stetson: The Statue
The donor-funded sculpture, weighing approximately 1,600 pounds including the bench, was installed in Palm Court on Thursday. A crew from Stetson’s Facilities Management assisted sculptor Erik Blome, who drove his sculpture down from his Chicago studio and foundry.
Blome’s sculptures include Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. in Milwaukee, Rosa Parks in Montgomery, Alabama, and hockey great Wayne Gretzky outside the Staples Center in Los Angeles. He said these statues of legendary figures “should be a little bit larger-than-life, in my opinion.” The Stetson piece was commissioned with the support of former university Trustee and Double Hatter Troy Templeton and his wife, Sissy. He crafted the Stetson statue, basing the size on an estimate drawn from historical clues that the university benefactor stood 6 feet tall. No definitive records of his stature could be discovered.
A John B. Stetson statue on campus “has been a dream of mine,” Wendy Libby said, since she began her presidency in July 2009. The dream began to take shape when Troy and Sissy Templeton “started to get interested in May of 2018,” Libby said. “They are art lovers and this idea captured their imagination. They’ve given to many other things for Stetson for nearly 30 years. “I think this really speaks to who this university is,” Libby said. Refering to the tip of his hat, she added: “This sort of welcoming, this ‘come join us’ is really special.”
JOHN B. STETSON STATUE STREETVIEW
Unfortunately, in 2012, when Google visited Stetson for Streetview imaging, the John B. Stetson statue had not yet been erected. However, this is where the statue and bench are today.