William Colgate

William Colgate was born in Hollingbourne, Kent, England, on January 25, 1783. He was the son of Robert Colgate and his wife Sarah.

The came to America with his family when he was a teenager, and settled in Baltimore, where he worked as an apprentice to a soap-boiler. Came to New York City in 1804. He there obtained employment as an apprentice to a soap-boiler, and learned the business. Young as he was, he showed even then that quickness of observation, which distinguished him in after-life. He closely watched the methods practiced by his employer, noting what seemed to him to be mismanagement, and learned useful lessons for his own guidance. At the close of his apprenticeship he was enabled, by correspondence with dealers in other cities, to establish himself in the business with some assurance of success.In 1806 he went into business for himself, selling soap, candles, and starch. After several years of financial struggle, William Colgate & Company prospered in the 1820s selling Windsor toilet soaps and Pearl starch. He followed it through life, and became one of the most prosperous men in the city of New York. This circumstance, together with his great wisdom in counsel, and his readiness to aid in all useful and practicable enterprises, gave him a wide influence in the community, and especially in the denomination of which he was from early life an active and honored member.

Thirteen years after his death in 1857, the company began selling toothpaste, and in 1893 it introduced toothpaste in a tube.

Colgate was a Baptist deacon, and one of the founders and principle underwriters of the Baptist Education Society of the State of New York, which, after his death, was renamed Colgate University in his honor. His son, Samuel Colgate, succeeded him as President of Colgate & Company, and his grandson, Gilbert Colgate, won the Bronze Medal in the bobsled competition at the 1936 Olympics.

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