Charles Phelps Taft

Charles Phelps Taft was born on December 21, 1843, in Cincinnati, Ohio. He was the eldest child of Fanny Phelps and Alphonso Taft. His father, Alphonso Taft, served as the 34th United States Attorney General and the 31st United States Secretary of War during President Ulysses S. Grant's administration. Taft's maternal grandfather was Judge Charles Phelps of Townshend, Vermont. His paternal grandparents were Peter Rawson Taft (1785–1867) and Sylvia Howard Taft.

He was educated at Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts. He graduated from Yale University in 1864 and from Columbia University's law department in 1866. In 1867, he obtained an additional degree from the University of Heidelberg in Germany.

After completing his education, Taft was admitted to the bar and became a partner at the law firm Sage, Haacke & Taft. He traveled abroad to study in Germany and France before returning to practice law in 1869 with General Edward F. Noyes, who later served as U.S. Minister to France and Governor of Ohio. During this period, Taft was elected to the Ohio State Legislature.

In 1879, Taft became editor of the Cincinnati Times-Star, a position that marked the beginning of his involvement in media ownership and management. The Times-Star was later acquired by the Cincinnati Post, forming part of what became his media enterprise.

Taft served as a member of the United States House of Representatives from Ohio. He was elected as a Republican, succeeding Bellamy Storer, and served one term from March 4, 1895, to March 3, 1897. He did not seek renomination in 1896, and his congressional seat was won by William B. Shattuc. Following his term in Congress, Taft resumed his work in the newspaper industry. He served as a presidential elector in the 1904 presidential election.

In addition to his legal and political careers, Taft was involved in major league baseball ownership. In 1905, he became a minority owner of the Chicago Cubs through Charles Murphy. In 1909, he and Murphy funded Horace Fogel's purchase of the Philadelphia Phillies. Although they publicly denied owning a second team, Taft did own Philadelphia's National League Park. After Fogel was banned from baseball in 1912, Taft sold the Phillies to William H. Locke. In 1914, Murphy sold his stock in the Cubs to Taft, who appointed Charles H. Thomas as club president. Taft sold his interest in the Cubs to Charles Weeghman after the 1915 season and also sold his stakes in West Side Park and National League Park to Murphy in 1916.

On December 4, 1873, Taft married Anna Sinton, an heiress to a pig iron fortune. Anna Sinton was born in 1850 and died in 1931. Together, they had four children: Jane Ellison Taft (1874–1962), David Sinton Taft (1876–1891), Anna Louise Taft Semple (1879–1961), and Charles Howard Taft (1885–1931). Their family residence became the Taft Museum of Art in Cincinnati.

Charles Phelps Taft died on December 31, 1929, in Cincinnati, Ohio. His estate was valued at approximately $6.37 million. He was interred at Spring Grove Cemetery.

Through his daughter Jane, Taft was the grandfather of David Sinton Ingalls (1899–1985), a World War I flying ace, who married Louise Hale Harkness, granddaughter of Daniel M. Harkness of the Standard Oil fortune. He was also the grandfather of Anne Taft Ingalls, who married Rupert E. L. Warburton in 1929.

Following his death, Anna Sinton Taft donated $5 million to the University of Cincinnati in 1930 and established a memorial fund in his name, which was later transformed into the Charles Phelps Taft Research Center in 2005. The city of Taft, Texas, was named after him in 1904. His art collection included works by Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot, Jean-François Millet, Ernest Meissonier, Rembrandt, Gainsborough, and others, including Chinese porcelain, and paintings by numerous European masters.