Wheelock Whitney (businessman)

Wheelock "Wheels" Whitney (St. Cloud, Minnesota, August 28, 1894 [http://userdb.rootsweb.com/alumni/cgi-bin/alumni.cgi?main_id=148632&person=Wheelock%20%27Whit%27%20WHITNEY&database=Alumni%20Lists] - Wayzata, Minnesota, March 23, 1957 [http://worldconnect.rootsweb.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi?op=GET&db=:3094003&id=I605681266] ) was a Republican businessman and philanthropist and the scion of a powerful Minnesota family. He graduated from Phillips Andover Academy in 1913 [http://userdb.rootsweb.com/alumni/cgi-bin/alumni.cgi?surname=Whitney&fname=Wheelock] .

His oldest son, Wheelock "Whee" Whitney, Jr. is a Minneapolis philanthropist, who was the 1964 Republican nominee for U.S. Senate from Minnesota, losing to Eugene McCarthy, and he was the Republican nominee for governor of Minnesota in 1982 [http://politicalgraveyard.com/bio/whitney.html] . He was part-owner and president of the Minnesota Vikings football team for a number of years.

His second son is John Kimball "Kim" Whitney, a Minnesota philanthropist, and a long-time board member of the Boy Scouts of America [http://www.scoutingmagazine.org/issues/0005/d-wwas.html]

His grandsons include Wheelock Whitney III, an art historian and philanthropist; Benson Whitney, the current (as of 2006) U.S. ambassador to Norway; and Connecticut Green Party politician Charles Pillsbury of Doonesbury fame.

References

* [http://www.wheelockgenealogy.com/downloads/wheelock.pdf Wheelock family genealogy]
* [http://www.aftenposten.no/english/local/article1122141.ece "Aftenposten" newspaper (Norway)]
* [http://politicalgraveyard.com/bio/whitney.html Political Graveyard page on U.S. politicans names Whitney]