WILLIAM EDMUND SCRIPPS

(1882-1952)

Pioneer aviator, engineer, motor builder, radio broadcaster, conservationist, only surviving son of James E. Scripps and publisher of Detroit News, succeeding his Uncle George G. Booth as president of the Evening News Association.

William E. was a man of many interests and talents:

*In 1920 he put the first continuously broadcast commercial radio station in the world on the air: WWJ-AM. Unable to convince his Uncle George G. Booth of the future importance of radio in disseminating the daily news, William financed WWJ personally, buying its first transmitter. He later contributed these assets to the Evening News Association. 

*Chairman of the Board of Scripps-Booth Motor Car Company 1913

*Founder with E.W. Scripps and President and General Manager of SCRIPPS MOTOR COMPANY, builder of fine gasoline propulsion marine engines>>>>financed, constructed and powered the first vessel to make a transatlantic cross powered by a gasoline marine engine.  The small, 35-foot double ended and 10 foot wide vessel, the “Detroit”, with a Scripps Motor engine and heavy hull, built by the Matthews Boat Company of Port Clinton, Ohio, crossed the Atlantic from Detroit to St. Petersburg, Russia, in 1912 with a crew of 4. Storing 1,000 gallons of gasoline under the deck and another 1,275 gallons on deck, cruising at 5 to 6 knots, powered by a 16 –horsepower Scripps gasoline engine, the “Detroit” left Detroit on July 12th. It passed through Lake Erie, the Erie Canal the Hudson River and Long Island Sound to New Rochelle from where on July 16th the ship began its 4,000 mile transatlantic crossing. Twenty-one days later the “Detroit” arrived at Cobh (Cork), Ireland. The ship after a short refit journeyed on to St. Petersburg, Russia arriving on September 13th at The Imperial River (Neva) Yacht Club. 

* One of the founders of the GOLD CUP RACES in Detroit in 1904

*Early aviation investor, who was one of the so-called “Early Birds of Aviation” taught himself how to fly and was an investor with the Wright Bros. He owned a Curtiss Model F flying boat which he flew solo underneath the Belle Isle Bridge in1913.

*Invited Amelia Earhart to his estate in Lake Orion to fly an experimental Glider

*1931 purchased an early helicopter, the Pitcairn “Autogyro” for the Detroit News. It is now in the collection of the Henry Ford Museum.

*Established Wildwood Farm, 3,880 acres in Orion Township, Michigan, intended as a model for soil conservation and renewal and also for the raising of livestock. Wildwood Farm is credited with importing the first Black Angus cattle to the States. *The house and its surrounding 70 acres are known as Moulton Manor, a large 67 room, stone Norman/Tudor revival style manor house, constructed in 1926.

*Helped to fund THE DETROIT ZOO in 1928, with the Detroit News constructing the Zoo railway in 1931. William also maintained a large private zoo at Wildwood Farm complete with cages.

NOTE: the same firm, owned by Horace P. Shaw, which supplied the railway engines and rolling stock for the Detroit Zoo also supplied the family of Henry Scripps Booth with an even more elaborate scale steam railroad for Henry’s summer camp at Lake Tipsico in western Oakland County. This railroad, known as the Tipsico Lakeshore Railroad is 7 14 “scale with over 3,600 feet of mainline. It was laid down by Henry Booth’s two sons Stephen and David Booth in 1947 and is now managed by David Booth’s son Jeff.  Tipsico Lakeshore Railroad is the longest continuously operating large model steam railway in the USA.