Henry Walters (September 26, 1848 – November 30, 1931) was noted as an art collector and philanthropist, a founder of the Walters Art Gallery (now the Walters Art Museum) in Baltimore, Maryland, which he donated to the city in his 1931 will for the benefit of the public. From the late 19th century, Walters lived most of the time in New York City, where from 1903 on, he served on the executive committee of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in Manhattan on Fifth Avenue. He was selected as second vice president in 1913, a position he held until his death. Like his father William Thompson Walters, (1820-1894), he was a businessman in the railroad industry, serving as president of the Atlantic Coast Line Railroad (1894-1902), which had been established by his father. Biography Henry Walters was born in 1848 to William Thompson Walters, (1820-1894), a businessman who later founded the southeastern railroad line, Atlantic Coast Line Company. Henry graduated from Georgetown University in 1869. He did graduate work in the Lawrence Scientific School at Harvard University from 1869–72. In 1889 Walters moved to Wilmington, North Carolina, to serve as general manager of his father's railroad, the Atlantic Coast Line Company. Following his father's death in 1894, Henry Walters was elected president of the Atlantic Coast Line Company. He transferred the line's headquarters to New York. Under his leadership, the railroad experienced rapid growth until World War I. In 1902 Walters also took control of the Louisville and Nashville Railroad. In New York, Walters lived with Pembroke and Sarah Jones, friends whom he had met in Wilmington, North Carolina. Each of them was interested in art, and their town house was filled with their collections. Seldom did Walters return to Baltimore other than to attend board meetings of the Safe Deposit and Trust Company. Three years after Pembroke Jones' death in 1919, Walters married the widow Sarah Jones in 1922, his first marriage. They continued living in the Manhattan house surrounded by their art collections. He died in 1931. Art collection When his father died in 1894, he bequeathed his collection to Henry Walters, who greatly expanded the scope of acquisitions. He purchased the contents of a palace in Rome that contained over 1,700 pieces. In September 1900, Henry bought the three houses adjoining the property owned by his father in the Mount Vernon neighborhood of Baltimore, in order to house