Freelan Oscar Stanley (June 1, 1849 – October 2, 1940) was an American inventor, entrepreneur, hotelier, and architect. He made his fortune in the manufacture of photographic plates but is best remembered as the co-founder, with his brother Francis Edgar Stanley, of the Stanley Motor Carriage Company which built steam-powered automobiles until 1920. He also built and operated the Stanley Hotel in Estes Park, Colorado.
Early life Freelan Oscar Stanley and his twin Francis Edgar (1849-1918) were born on June 1, 1849, in Kingfield, Maine. They were the grandsons of Liberty Stanley, whose wife, Hannah Metcalf Fairbanks, died following the birth of their seventh child. Unable to handle the burden by himself, Liberty arranged for several of the children to be adopted. The son named after him was adopted and renamed Solomon Liberty Stanley by his brother, Solomon Stanley. The seven children of Solomon Liberty Stanley and his wife Apphia French who reached adulthood included Freelan and Francis.
Although the Stanley family was not wealthy, education was highly valued and knowledge of science, poetry, and music was encouraged from a young age. The eldest son, Isaac Newton Stanley, was named for Solomon Liberty Stanley's older brother, who had been named after the English scientist. Two of their sons, John Calvin Stanley (named for the Protestant reformer) and Ulysses Grant Stanley, died in infancy. Their one daughter, Chansonetta Stanley Emmons, achieved significant recognition as a photographer. It has been suggested that the names Francis Edgar and Freelan Oscar were drawn from the pages of Sir Walter Scott although Edgar appears to be the only one of their names shared with a character from his works. Scott's Marmion had special significance for the Stanley brothers, uniting their love of poetry and the arts with pride in their Scottish ancestry. "On, Stanley, on!" a battle cry quoted in this poem became the motto of the Stanley Dry Plate Company featured on their packaging (albeit with an error in punctuation) above the logo of a knight on horseback.
At age nine, Freelan and Francis started their first business together, refining and selling maple sugar. They used their hard-earned money to purchase wool cloth for school suits and Benjamin Greenleaf's National Arithmetic a book of equations that they completed. When they reached age eleven, their great-uncle, Liberty Stanley, who had raised their father as his own son, taught them the art of violin making. By age sixteen, Freelan had completed three instruments. He continued to make them throughout his life, creating many concert-quality pieces still prized today by collectors and musicians. In 1863, in the midst of the American Civil War, the brothers were witness to the Kingfield Rebellion, a protest against the highly unpopular Enrollment Act and the only anti-Union rebellion to occur in the State of Maine.
At age 20, the brothers began their collegiate education at Western State Normal School (now University of Maine, Farmington) with the intention of becoming educators. Francis soon found that academic schooling was not to his liking and left to pursue a career as a portrait artist. Freelan continued his education at Hebron Academy from 1871 to 1873 and Bowdoin College in Brunswick from 1873 to 1874. He was in the same class as Arctic explorer Admiral Robert Peary and present during the so-called Drill Rebellion, in which Bowdoin pupils refused to participate in the daily military drills mandated by the college president, Joshua Chamberlain.
After Bowdoin, Stanley became headmaster of the high school in Mechanic Falls, Maine. There he met Flora Jane Record Tileston (1847-1939), a teacher and pianist of some competency whom he married in 1876. In 1881, Freelan was struck with tuberculosis and his 27-year-old brother Solomon Liberty died of the disease. Believing that his survival depended on a less sedentary life, he turned to manufacturing, opening the Stanley Practical Drawing Set factory. However, this business and his investment in it were destroyed by a fire a year later, in 1882.
Stanley Dry Plate Company
After leaving school, Francis Stanley married Augusta May Walker (1848-1927) and opened a portrait studio. His first technique was "crayon" or charcoal, supplemented with his "improvement to the Atomizer," a forerunner of the modern air brush, which he patented in 1876. In 1882, Francis began experimenting with photography, about which he became passionate. After his brother's factory burned, Francis suggested that they work together to create a new photographic product. By 1885, the Stanley brothers had established the Stanley Dry Plate Company in Lewiston, Maine.
The first primitive dry photo plate had been invented by the English physician Richard Leach Maddox in 1871. Charles Bennett made important improvements to the original formula but, ten years later, most photographers were still using a wet plate collodion process. By perfecting their factory process and marketing their product across the country, the Stanley Company quickly rose to dominance at the start of the market for factory-made (rather than studio-made) photo materials. The brothers amassed a small fortune and, in 1890, moved their business to Watertown, Massachusetts, and bought homes in nearby Newton.
In Newton, Freelan and Flora Stanley were members of well-to-do society. In 1894, Freelan built a Colonial Revival house at 165 Hunnewell Avenue in the Hunnewell Hill neighborhood of Newton Corner. In 1896, his brother built a home for his family nearby at 638 Centre Street and soon acquired a summer residence at Squirrel Island, Maine. In 1897-98 the twins purchased land for and began construction of the Hunnewell Club, the seat of a social organization for their friends and neighbors. The building had a ballroom, billiard tables, and bowling alleys.
In 1900-1904, Freelan drew plans for the Amos G. Winter House in Kingfield, Maine. L.A. Norton executed the construction of the house which still stands at 33 Winter's Hill Road and is similar to Freelan's other architectural designs.
Stanley Motor Carriage Company
Freelan and Francis Stanley were well-poised to immerse themselves in the many technological advancements happening around them. Adjacent to the Stanley dry-plate factory in Watertown was a bicycle factory owned by Sterling Elliott. Francis became fascinated by the new bicycle craze and attempted to interest his wife in it. When she fell off and swore she would never ride again, Francis told her, "Never you mind, Gustie. I will build something so that we can ride together in safety and comfort." Francis began to build an automobile, a project that soon absorbed his attention. After considering the merits of combustion, electricity, and steam, he determined that steam was the most practical. His brother and he would hold steadfastly to the superiority of steam power well after the combustion engine superseded it.
By 1897, Francis Stanley had sold his horses and buggies and built his first automobile, using wagon and bicycle parts from Sterling Elliott's factory. The following year, the Stanley brothers took the car to the Boston Auto Show (1898) held in Charles River Park. It so impressed the crowd that Freelan Stanley became committed to his brother's passion for steam cars and they began to produce them on order as the Stanley Motor Carriage Company.
In 1899, John Brisben Walker (editor of Cosmopolitan Magazine, and an early investor in the area around Colorado Springs) expressed interest in purchasing the Stanleys' car business. Reluctant to sell, the brothers asked for a good deal more than they thought Walker would be willing to pay: $250,000 in ready cash. To their surprise, Walker accepted their offer, although he had to seek the partnership of "Asphalt King" Amzi L. Barber to finance the deal. For a few months, while Walker and Barber managed the enterprise together, the Stanley Brothers stayed on as consultants, Francis in manufacturing and Freelan in marketing. This period was distinguished by a number of publicity stunts for which Stanley automobiles received much notoriety.
In August 1899, Freelan and Flora Stanley became the first motorists to reach the top of Mt. Washington, the highest peak in New England. In November of that year, Freelan gave William McKinley a tour of Washington DC in a Stanley automobile, which was the first time a sitting U.S. President had ridden in a car.
Within months, due to disagreements, Walker and Barber had parted ways and created two separate car companies. Walker's company, the Mobile Company of America, moved into a new factory in North Tarrytown, New York, designed by the architect Sanford White. Barber's Locomobile Company of America, which became more successful after switching to a gasoline internal combustion engine, moved in 1900 to Bridgeport, Connecticut, an important early center for the American auto industry.
Disappointed by the disintegration of their former company, Freelan and Francis decided to start again from scratch. Their name was no longer in use and their former factory had been vacated by Barber, but the patents still belonged to Locomobile. The Stanleys resolved this problem by changing and improving their original designs. In 1901, they began production of a new Stanley Motor Carriage under their old name. The quality of their new cars was such that their rival in the photo plate business, George Eastman (of Kodak, Rochester, NY), became an avid customer, acquiring a Steamer in 1901. "If the electric [automobile] is a 'peach,'" he once remarked, "then the Stanley is a 'peacherina.'""Peacherina" was a favorite phrase of Eastman's, he having applied it in similar context to Maxfield Parrish's 1922 painting Interlude The original Stanley auto patents were purchased back from Walker in 1903 for $20,000, the same year that Locomobile abandoned steam for combustion. In 1905, the Stanleys sold their dry plate company to Eastman Kodak and Eastman soon dissolved it.
In 1906, with driver Fred Marriott behind the wheel, the Stanleys' specially designed "Rocket Racer" broke the land speed record, achieving 127.66 miles per hour over one kilometer at Ormond Beach, Florida, earning them the Dewar Trophy. The following year, when they attempted to break their own record, the Rocket Racer crashed. Although Marriott was not killed, the Stanley brothers decided to set aside their record-breaking ambitions. They did plan to compete in the 1906 Vanderbilt Cup Race with a specially designed "Vanderbilt Racer" but they were disqualified by the strict entry requirements.
Estes Park, Colorado
In 1903, Freelan Stanley was stricken with a life-threatening resurgence of tuberculosis. The most highly recommended treatment of the day was fresh, dry air with lots of sunlight and a hearty diet. Like many "lungers" of his day, he resolved to take the possibly curative air of the Rocky Mountains in Colorado. This decision may have been influenced by his acquaintance with John Brisben Walker, who had been a property investor in Colorado since 1880 and became a resident of Morrison, Colorado after selling Cosmopolitan to William Randolph Hearst in 1905.