Curtis Guild Jr. (2 February 1860-6 April 1915) was the Republican Governor of Massachusetts from 4 January 1906 to 7 January 1909, succeeding William Lewis Douglas and preceding Eben Sumner Draper.
Biography[]
Curtis Guild Jr. was born in Boston, Massachusetts in 1860, and he was the orator of his class at Harvard University; during that time, he also befriended Theodore Roosevelt. He inherited his father's successful newspaper, the Commercial Bulletin, in 1902 and he concurrently served in the state militia and as Inspector General of Havana during the Spanish-American War. He served in the State House in 1881, as Lieutenant Governor from 1903 to 1906, and as Governor form 1906 to 1909. Guild was one of the most progressive governors of his time, requiring medical inspections of schoolchildren, banning corporate lobbying, funding care for the state's mental patients, and introducing an inheritance tax. From 1911 to 1913, Guild served as Ambassador to the Russian Empire, and he was tasked with announcing the implementation of higher tariffs on Russia in retaliation for its anti-Semitic pogroms. He died in 1915.