Hetty Green (November 21, 1834 – July 3, 1916), was an American businesswoman and financier known as "the richest woman in America" during the Gilded Age. Those who knew her well referred to her admiringly as the Queen of Wall Street due to her willingness to lend freely and at reasonable interest rates to financiers and city governments during financial panics. Her extraordinary discipline during such times enabled her to amass a fortune as a financier at a time when nearly all major financiers were men. Two days after her death on July 3, 1916, The New York Times paid tribute to Green and corrected many common misconceptions, writing:
It was that Mrs. Green was a woman that made her career the subject of endless curiosity, comment, and astonishment...Her habits were the legacy of New England ancestors who had the best of reasons for knowing "the value of money," for never wasting it, and for risking it only when their shrewd minds saw an approach to certainty of profit. Though something of hardness was ascribed to her, that she harmed any is not recorded, and victims of ruthlessness are usually audible...That there are few like her is not a cause of regret; that there are many less commendable, is one.Despite Hetty Green's exceptional investment instincts, discreet generosity, and admirable character, most media reports from the era (and soon thereafter) characterized her thrift as evidence of miserliness. She was also referred to often as the Witch of Wall Street, and the Guinness Book of World Records even named her the "greatest miser." Stories that were often cited include her refusal to buy expensive clothes, pay for hot water, and her habit of wearing a single dress that was only replaced when it was worn out. Yet many of these habits were considered abnormal mainly because the Gilded Age was a time of celebrating excess rather than hiding it. When Hetty Green's life is evaluated in its entirety and in the context of the time period, it is clear that media criticism grossly misrepresented her true character.
Birth and early years
Early childhood
Henrietta ("Hetty") Howland Robinson was born in 1834 in New Bedford, Massachusetts, the daughter of Edward Mott Robinson and Abby Howland, the richest whaling family in the city. Her family members were Quakers who owned a large whaling fleet and also profited from the China trade. She had a younger brother who died as an infant.
At the age of two, Hetty was sent to live with her grandfather, Gideon Howland, and her Aunt Sylvia. Hetty would read the stock quotations and commerce reports for her grandfather and picked up some of his business methods. At the age of 10, Hetty entered Eliza Wing's boarding school in Sandwich. Hetty's father became the head of the Isaac Howland whaling firm upon Gideon's death, and Hetty began to emulate her father's business practices. Because of Gideon's influence and that of her father, and possibly because her mother was constantly ill, she was close to her father and was reading financial papers to him by the age of six. Hetty learned to read ledgers and trade commodities. When she was 13, Hetty became the family bookkeeper. Hetty accompanied her father to the countinghouses, storerooms, commodities traders, and stockbrokers. In the evening, she read him the news.
Early adulthood
In her late teens, Hetty attended multiple boarding schools and finishing schools, such as the Friends Academy and Anna Cabot Lowell's finishing school. Simultaneously, she assisted her father with the management of the family business. The unifying theme throughout this period of her life was her unapologetic rejection of societal norms established for woman at the time — especially wealthy heiresses. Hetty cared little for her personal appearance, preferring to dress in old clothes, and she disregarded the daily primping practiced by young women. Hetty’s behavior frustrated her mother and Aunt Sylvia because they feared what the future would hold for a wealthy heiress who felt more at home on the docks of New Bedford than mingling with members of her class.