Religion Congregationalist Spouse Olive Wilbur (m. 1898) | Role Attorney Preceded by new seat Name Curtis Wilbur | |
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Profession Politician, Lawyer, Judge Similar People Francis P Matthews, J William Middendorf, Victor H Metcalf, Charles Francis Adams III, Fred Korth | ||
USS Curtis Wilbur (DDG-54)
Curtis Dwight Wilbur (May 10, 1867 – September 8, 1954) was an American lawyer, state and federal judge, and 43rd United States Secretary of the Navy.
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Biography
Wilbur was born May 10, 1867, in Boonesboro, Iowa, to Dwight Locke Wilbur and Edna M. Lyman. His family moved to Jamestown, North Dakota, where he graduated high school. In 1884, he was appointed to the United States Naval Academy. Shortly after graduation, Curtis Wilbur resigned his commission, a common practice at the time, and moved to Riverside, California. He read law at night while teaching mathematics during the day, and was admitted to the California bar in 1890.
Wilbur associated with the firm of Bruson, Wilson & Lamme, and engaged in private practice for eight years in Los Angeles. He was active in Republican politics, and in 1898 was president of the Fourth Ward Republican club. In 1898, he served as Los Angeles County Deputy Assistant District Attorney in the office of John C. Donnell, and by 1899 he was the Chief Deputy under District Attorney James C. Rives.
In September 1902, the Republican Party nominated Wilbur for the post of judge of the Los Angeles County Superior Court to the take the seat of Lucien Shaw, who was running for Supreme Court. Wilbur won the election and in November 1902 began to hear cases pro tempore. He was especially interested in promoting children's welfare: on the Superior Court, he was presiding judge of the juvenile department; in 1910, he was a founding director of the Juvenile Improvement Association; in 1912, he was president of the Social Purity League, which offered religious lectures to the public; in 1915, he helped organize the Boy Scouts in Los Angeles, and was named council president; and he served as president of the state Sunday School Association, organizing evangelical gatherings for young people.
In 1917, Governor William Stephens appointed Wilbur to the California Supreme Court, where he served as an Associate Justice from January 1, 1918. In September 1922, Wilbur defeated William Lawlor in the primary election, and in November was chosen as the 19th Chief Justice of California, holding the position from January 1923 to March 19, 1924. When Wilbur resigned, Governor Friend Richardson appointed Louis Wescott Myers to take the post of Chief Justice.
On March 19, 1924, Wilbur was sworn in as Secretary of the Navy. The first appointee of President Calvin Coolidge, Wilbur came into the position with a reputation as a man of high intellect and a character of "unimpeachable integrity." However, one critic called Wilbur "a good Sunday school teacher who wants to make the Navy safe for boys." In July 1925, he accompanied three battleships on a cruise of the Pacific coast, stopping in Marin County for a picnic of 600 midshipmen with a group of more than 100 society women on Mount Tamalpais. In August 1928, he again accompanied a fleet to San Francisco on its way to Pacific training exercises. By the end of his term, Wilbur had achieved success in enlarging and modernizing the fleet and established a naval air force, which would grow to become a potent component in the war with Japan during World War II.
In 1929, in the last hours of his presidency, Coolidge nominated Wilbur to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco. However, when the 70th Congress ended that week, the Senate had not acted on the nomination, so it expired. President Herbert Hoover then resubmitted the nomination to the Senate in the 71st Congress, which approved it. Wilbur served as a judge in active service until 1945, when his senior status began. Wilbur died in 1954.
Legacy
The guided missile destroyer USS Curtis Wilbur (DDG-54) is named for him.
Personal life
Wilbur was married twice. On November 9, 1893, Wilbur married Ella T. Chilson. She died on December 10, 1896. Next, on January 13, 1898, he remarried to Olive Doolittle. They lived in a grand home completed in 1904 on Frederick Knob in San Francisco. Following retirement, Wilbur spent time with his wife and their three surviving children: Edna, Paul C. and Lyman Dwight.
In the 1930s, one of his children, Dr. Leonard Wilbur, established a mission hospital in the province of northern China now known as Shanxi. Leonard, his wife, Jean Spaulding, and two children, Ruth and Lyman, survived invasions by Chinese communist insurgents and Japanese troops. However, on Easter Sunday 1940, Leonard died in Shanxi of typhus. His wife later gave birth to their third child, Bruce, before departing China for San Francisco.
Wilbur's brother, Ray Lyman Wilbur, was United States Secretary of the Interior under Herbert Hoover, and a president of Stanford University.