biography
| name: |
Crane, Charles Richard
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| sex:
| male
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| lived:
| (1858–1939)
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| biography:
| Internationalist and philanthropist, born in Chicago, Illinois, USA. Heir to the Crane Company (plumbing supplies) fortune, he travelled at an early age and met the British adventurer, Richard Burton, in Damascus. In 1912 he sold his interest in the family company to a brother, and was the largest single contributor to Woodrow Wilson's campaign that year. At the end of World War 1, he co-wrote (with Henry Churchill King) the Crane–King report on what best to do with the various lands belonging to the defeated Turkish Ottoman Empire. Although ignored at the time, their warning that Palestine was largely an Arab land would in later years be drawn into the controversy over the establishment of Israel on this territory. He served as ambassador to China (1920–1), and as a philanthropist gave generously to the Marine Biological Laboratory at Woods Hole, MA and to the American Colleges in Istanbul. He created the Institute of Current World Affairs (1925), and had many international friends and connections. |
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