 Harry Carothers Wiess (1887-1948) was the son of William Wiess and Louisa Elizabeth Carruthers. His father and uncle, William and Mark Wiess, were twin sons of Simon Wiess. His father's first wife was Eliza Herring, daughter of William Perry Herring, a successful Beaumont businessman. Another of his uncles, Valentine Wiess, married Eliza's sister, Mary Elizabeth Herring. Harry's father was involved in the lumber industry and was an early investor in the Texas Company (Texaco). Three years after graduating from Princeton University, he followed in his father's footsteps and became President of Reliance Oil. In 1917, he became one of the founding partners of Humble Oil (now Exxon) and served as its fourth president from 1937 until his death in 1948. He married Olga Keith, the daughter of J. Frank Keith (see Texas State Handbook article) who was also in the oil business. His mother and father had been philanthropists, Mrs. Wiess having saved Southwestern University in Georgetown, Texas from bankruptcy in 1947. Continuing family tradition, in 1946, he and his wife Olga pledged the income from 30,000 shares of Humble Oil for 17.5 years to Rice Institute (now Rice University) which yielded over $1,000,000 for the school. Upon his death in 1948, the Rice University Board of Trustees prepared a tribute to him, available in the Woodson Research Center, and later the fourth dormitory on campus was named Wiess Hall (now Wiess College). The old Wiess Estate in Houston is now the home for the prisident of Rice University. Harry and Olga Wiess had three daughters, Elizabeth, Caroline and Margaret. Elizabeth's husband became a vice-president of Exxon, Caroline's second husband, T.N. Law, was heir to the Barnsdale oil fortune and, in 2004, she bequeathed $200 million to the Houston Museum of Fine Arts. Margaret married the son of Judge Elkins (see Texas State Handbook article) of Houston, a founder of the Vinson-Elkins Law Firm.
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