Thomas William Lamont Jr. (September 30, 1870 – February 2, 1948) was an American banker. Early life Lamont was born in Claverack, New York. His parents were Thomas Lamont, a Methodist minister, and Caroline Deuel Jayne. Since his father was a minister, they moved around Upstate New York a lot and they were not very wealthy. He graduated from Phillips Exeter Academy in 1888, where he was editor of the school newspaper, The Exonian, as well as the school yearbook and literary magazine. He then attended Harvard College. Early career At Harvard, he became first freshman editor of The Harvard Crimson, which helped him pay off some of his tuition. He graduated cum laude with a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1892. He met his wife, Florence Haskell Corliss, at the 1890 Harvard commencement. He started working under the city editor for the New York Tribune two days after he graduated from Harvard in 1892. He married Florence on October 31, 1895 in Englewood, New Jersey. He also worked for the Albany Evening Journal, Boston Advertiser, Boston Herald, and New York Tribune, which paid only $25, while he was at Harvard. At the Tribune, he received many promotions, including night editor and helping the financial editor, which gave him his first taste of the financial world. He left journalism because of the low pay and went into business He began working in business for Cushman Bros., which later became Lamont, Corliss, and Company, and turned it into a successful importing and marketing firm. It was an advertising agency that worked for food corporations. The company was in a bad financial status, but Lamont fixed it, and the company changed its name to Lamont, Corliss, and Company. He was partners with his brother-in-law, Corliss. His banking caught the attention of banker Henry P. Davison, who asked Thomas to join the new Bankers Trust. He started as secretary and treasurer and then moved up to being Vice President and then was promoted to director. He rose to the vice presidency of the First National Bank. He was a member of the Jekyll Island Club on Jekyll Island, Georgia. There, along with J. P. Morgan Jr. and a few others, they secretly made a plan in 1910 for a central bank, similar to the Federal Reserve System. In 1918, he purchased the New York Evening Post, of which his brother, Hammond, had been