Archives West Finding Aid

William Morse Nichols was born December 1, 1881, in Hartford, Connecticut, the son of William Ford Nichols (1849-1927) and Clara Quintard Nichols (b. 1857). He had three siblings: John W. Nichols, who became Bishop of Shanghai; Clara Nichols Mills; and Margaret Nichols Clark. While Billie--as he was always known by family and friends--was a young child, the family moved to San Francisco, where William Ford Nichols was appointed Episcopal Bishop of California. William briefly attended Trinity College in Hartford, Connecticut, from 1897 to 1899. He then was appointed to the U.S. Military Academy at West Point. He graduated in 1903 and became a second lieutenant in the 11th Cavalry, assigned to Yellowstone National Park. He resigned in 1905 to work for the Engineering Division of the Northern Pacific Railway. In 1907 he left the employ of the railroad to work as secretary to Harry W. Child, president of the Yellowstone Park Transportation Company. That same year he married Child's daughter, Ellen Dean Child. Nichols gradually moved up in the company administration, becoming assistant to the president in 1915. During World War I Nichols served as a major in supply and ordnance roles in the U.S. Army. He did not serve overseas. In 1927 he took over active management of the company from his ailing father-in-law. On Child's death in 1931, Nichols succeeded him as president. Under his presidency the various concessions in Yellowstone National Park--including the Yellowstone Park Transportation Company, the Yellowstone Park Hotel Company, and others--were merged to form the Yellowstone Park Company. William Nichols continued active management of the company until the mid 1940s when his older son, John Q. Nichols, gradually began to take over active management. In December 1956, William Nichols resigned as president of the company to take the position of chairman of the board of directors. John Q. succeeded him as president. In addition to his Yellowstone Park Company holdings, Nichols was active in the H.C. Child Corporation, the H.C. Child Trust, the Spanish Creek Ranch (Flying D Ranges, Inc.) the Green Meadow Farm, and numerous real estate ventures in Gardiner, Montana, and La Jolla, California. William M. Nichols and his wife E.D.C. "Dean" Nichols had three children: Adelaide, John Q., and Dean. Nichols died August 6, 1957, in Yellowstone National Park. Ellen Dean Child was born in 1885, the daughter of Harry W. Child and Adelaide Dean Child. Her aunt was Maria Dean, pioneer woman doctor of Helena. Her brother Huntley Child and nephew Huntley Child, Jr., were active in the management of the Yellowstone Park Company. She married William M. Nichols in November 1907. Maintaining households in Yellowstone in the summer, La Jolla, California, in the winter and Helena, Montana, in the spring and fall, Dean became active in social and charitable activities in all three towns. She donated the Adelaide Child Laboratory to St. Peter's Hospital, Camp Child to the YMCA, and money to the City of Helena for the building of Beattie Memorial Park. In addition she was instrumental in the formation of the Green Meadow Country Club. She was active, with her husband, in the management of the H.W. Child Corporation and H.W. Child Trust, and served briefly as president of the Yellowstone Park Company after the death of her husband in 1957. E.D.C. Nichols died in October 1966. Adelaide Nichols, daughter of William M. and Ellen Dean Child Nichols, was born in 1909. In 1930 she married Michael Casserly. They had two children Joan and Mariana. Adelaide later married Herrick Low, who was very active in the management of the Nichols' investments. She died in Burlingame, California, January 9, 1998. John Quintard Nichols was born in 1910. He attended Harvard University and Kelsey-Jenney business college. After graduating he worked briefly for the Wood, Struthers and Company investment firm before joining his father's company. He rose from dishwasher to transportation agent to auditing office clerk from 1935 to 1937 and then became Secretary-Treasurer in 1938. During World War II he was a captain in the U.S. Army Air Force and served in Leyte and the Philippines. In 1946 he returned to the Yellowstone Park Company. He became president in 1956, and then succeeded his mother after her brief term as president following the death of William M. Nichols. John Q. Nichols died in February 1980 in La Jolla, California. Dean Nichols was born in 1914. He trained at the Yale University School of Medicine, receiving his M.D. in 1942. He interned at Baltimore City Hospital and received further training at the Mayo Clinic. During the late 1940s and early 1950s he practiced as a dermatologist and radiologist in Helena. He also practiced medicine in Texas, California, and Arizona. He died in Phoenix, Arizona, on January 25, 1973. Harry Wilbour Child was born in San Francisco in 1857. He attended prep school in Massachusetts to prepare for Harvard, but went to work in a wholesale clothing house in Boston instead. He returned to San Francisco, where he worked as a broker with his father. He did not like the business and left California for Montana. During the early 1880s he managed mines at Gloster and Gregory for A.J. Seligman, and in 1888 moved to Great Falls to manage a silver smelter. After it closed in 1890, he moved to Helena. He took over operation of the Yellowstone Park Transportation Company on the death of his brother-in-law Silas S. Huntley in 1901. That same year the company acquired the Mammoth Hotel from the Northern Pacific Railway. H.W. Child built the hotels at Upper Basin, Grand Canyon, Fountain, Yellowstone Lake, and Mammoth. The Yellowstone Park Transportation Company owned 800 horses and 500 coaches. These horses were raised by Child in partnership with Charles Anceny at the Flying D Ranch. Child married Adelaide Dean. They had one daughter Ellen Dean Child and one son Huntley Child. Harry W. Child died February 4, 1931, in La Jolla, California.