Clayton, William Lockhart

William Lockhart Clayton was born in Tupelo, Mississippi on February 7th, 1880. In August 1902 he was married to Susan Vaughan. He was a co-founder of Anderson, Clayton and Company, based in Houston, Texas. In 1918 Clayton was a member of the Committee on Cotton Distribution with the War Industries Board. From 1940 to 1942 he was the Vice President of the Export-Import Bank.

His career in government service began in 1942 with his appointment as Assistant Secretary of Commerce, followed by appointments as Administrator of the Surplus War Property Administration (1944), Assistant Secretary of State (1944-1945), Undersecretary of State for Economic Affairs (1945-1947), and as head of the U.S. delegation at the United Nations Conference on Trade and Employment, which took place in Havana, Cuba, in 1947.

Clayton also served in the following capacities: Alternate Governor, World Bank (1946-1949), Vice President, Atlantic Union Committee (1949-1961), member on the National Security Training Commission (1951-1954), Chairman, National Committee on Campaign Contributions and Expenditures (1960), member on the Board of Governors of the Atlantic Institute (1960), and as co-Chairman of the U.S. Citizens Commission on NATO (1961).

In the 1950s Clayton authored a number of books primarily dealing with economics and their political remifications. These included We Must Trade Sovereignty For Freedom (1950), The Road To Peace (1955), What Price Oil? (1958), and We Are Losing The Cold War (1958).

William L. Clayton died on February 9th, 1966, in Houston, Texas.

From the guide to the William Lockhart Clayton - Papers, MS 7., 1897-1966, Bulk dates 1934-1964, (Rice University)

William Lockhart Clayton (1880–1966) worked in the New York office of the American Cotton Company from 1896 to 1904, eventually becoming assistant general manager. Clayton left the American Cotton Company in 1904 to form Anderson, Clayton and Company, a successful, Oklahoma City-based cotton enterprise. In 1916 the firm moved its headquarters to Houston.

During World War I Clayton served on the Committee of Cotton Distribution of the War Industries Board. In 1940, after resigning from management of his cotton firm, he became deputy to the coordinator of inter-American affairs in Washington, D.C. He went on to work in a number of high-level positions with the Export-Import Bank, the Department of Commerce, and wartime agencies until 1944. For the next three years, Clayton was assistant and then undersecretary of state for economic affairs. This was the position in which capacity he became a key member of the European Recovery Program (the Marshall Plan).

Clayton instituted a fund from which he donated charitably to Johns Hopkins University, Tufts University, the University of Texas, and the Methodist Church. He died in 1966 and was buried in Houston.

Source : Handbook of Texas Online, s.v. Clayton, William Lockhart, http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/CC/fcl23.html (accessed May 20, 2010).

From the guide to the Clayton, William Lockhart Papers, 1947, 1950, (Dolph Briscoe Center for American History, The University of Texas at Austin)