The Encyclopedia Americana (1920)/Wright, Carroll Davidson

WRIGHT, Carroll Davidson, American statistician and sociologist: b. Dunbarton, N. H., 28 July 1840; d. Worcester, Mass., 20 Feb. 1909. After studying law, he enlisted in the 14th New Hampshire volunteers at the outbreak of the Civil War, and in 1864 became its colonel. In 1865, he was admitted to the bar at Keene, N. H., in 1867 began practice at Boston, in 1872-73 was a member of the Massachusetts senate, and in 1873-88 chief of the Massachusetts Bureau of Labor Statistics. He was appointed national commissioner of labor in 1885, and he continued in this office for some time after his election as president of the collegiate department of Clark University (Worcester, Mass.) in 1902. In 1895 he became honorary professor of social economics in the Columbian University (now George Washington), and delivered lectures in numerous institutions. He was chosen president of the American Statistical Association, in 1902 chairman of the section on social and economic science in the American Association for the Advancement of Science and vice-president of the association, and in 1903 president. He was recorder of the commission appointed by the President to arbitrate in connection with the anthracite coal strike in the fall of 1902. In 1906 the order of Saints Maurizio e Lazzaro was conferred upon him by the king of Italy in recognition of his services as political economist. Besides numerous contributions to periodicals, he has published ‘The Industrial Evolution of the United States’ (1895); ‘Outlines of Practical Sociology’ (1899); ‘Some Ethical Phases of the Labor Question’ (1902); ‘Battles of Labor’ (1906); ‘The Apprenticeship System in its Relation to Industrial Education’ (1908). Consult Wadlin, H. G., ‘Carroll Davidson Wright: a Memorial’ (Boston 1911).