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Philip Danforth Armour Sr. (1832-1901) born in upstate New York was an industrialist and a ‘founding father’ in 1867 of the renowned Chicago meatpacking firm, Armour & Company. Philip’s financial success began during the California gold rush (1852-1856). These proceeds were used to start up a wholesale soap business in Cincinnati and then in Milwaukee. Philip was a key figure in America’s gilded age during the second half of the 19th century. The newly formed railroads connecting the country was the primary catalyst for industrialisation, gigantic economic growth, and mass immigration to America. In turn this lead the way for big business to establish modern management techniques. Armour & Company were a pioneer for the innovation of the assembly-line techniques in its factories. This process allowed for almost every part of the animal to be used, making use of ‘everything but sequel’. This created the consumer byproducts such as glue, soap, pharmaceuticals and fertiliser. Also, it the first company to be able to produce canned meat and transport raw meat using the newly introduced refrigerated railcars. The success of the firm resulted in becoming the world’s largest food processing and chemical manufacturing company, headquartered in Chicago. Philip married in 1862 to Malvina Belle Ogden (1842-1927). Philip’s legacy was to donate a substantial sum to the then Armour Institute now Illinois Institute of Technology. In his honour the Union Pacific Railroad use the ‘Armour Yellow’ on their refrigerated cars to this day.
Philip and Malvina’s eldest son Jonathan Ogden Armour (1863-1927), known as J. was not supposed to inherit the family’s meatpacking dynasty. Sadly, his younger brother Philip Danforth Armour Jr. predeceased his father in 1900. J. Armour became the owner and president of Armour & Company and grew the company significantly. However, the company lost millions in the post first world war slump between 1919 – 1921and the family fortune dissipated. In 1891, J. married Lola Hughes Sheldon (1869-1953). When J. died in 1927 there was not much left in the estate. However, the remaining stocks in the Universal Oil Products Company passed to Lola. Lola or ‘Lolita’ had shrewd financial judgement and invested the capital in commercial real estate. Lola was known for her jewellery collection, so much so, she was robbed by Al Capone’s men. Locked in a cupboard as the jewellery was taken, her powerful demeanour was not going to put her off from requesting the sentimental pieces to be put back. It proved to work as the robbers obliged.
Their daughter Lolita Armour (1896-1976) was born premature and subsequently formed congenital dislocation of both hips. Lolita’s parents invited Adolf Loren, an Austrian orthopaedic surgeon and professor at the University of Vienna to help assist with her condition. The operation and rehabilitation were an apparent success. Lolita went on to marry in 1922, John ‘Jack’ Mitchell Jr. (1897-1985), the son of the president of the Illinois Trust and Savings Bank. Jack co-founded National Air Transport, which later became United Airlines. They spent their time between Chicago, El Mirador in Montecito and their 12,000 acre ranch in the Santa Ynez Valley. It was at El Mirador, where Lolita and Jack transformed the grounds into one of the most fabulous estates in the area. Jack established Los Rancheros Visitadores or the ‘Visiting Ranchers’, a social club for riders with an annual trek across the terrain.
The family have since passed on through the generations and moved countries. These rediscovered unique pieces bring back to life the story of an old American dynasty, the Armour family.
This wonderful collection is coming for sale in the Fine Jewellery & Ladies Watches auction on 12th May 2026.
(Lots 40 - 58)
Enquiries:
Claire-Laurence Mestrallet
jewellery@adams.ie
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John ffrench was an instrumental figure in the design industry in Ireland and a distinguished pioneer of Irish studio pottery.
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"I should declare my hand. I have a weakness for pictures that punch above their physical weight, and for artists who have been quietly underrated for too long. This pair is both. They are intimate enough to live with at close quarters and serious enough to repay any amount of looking. If the market has lately shown signs of catching up with eighteenth-century Irish painting and I think it has, these two small panels feel, to me, like exactly the sort of thing that will look obvious in twenty years’ time."
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James Adam & Sons Ltd, Fine Art Auctioneers and Valuers, 26 St. Stephen’s Green, Dublin 2,
D02 X665, Ireland
