From the Chattanooga Daily Times, January 12, 1950.
We continue our journey through Tennessee and today examine the lives of two men named Zeboim. The first of these men, Zeboim Lupton Patten, was one of the outstanding civic leaders in his section of Tennessee, being the president of one of that city's oldest businesses, the Chattanooga Medicine Co. Additionally, Patten chaired the University of Chattanooga's Board of Trustees, and achieved further prominence in finance, being chairman of the local community chest campaign and was director of the American National Bank and Trust Co. Long active in Republican politics in his region, Patten was elected as a delegate to the Republican National Convention of 1940 and eight years later was named an alternate delegate.
The son of John Alanson (1867-1916) and Edith (Manker) Patten (1867-1943), Zeboim Lupton Patten was born in Chattanooga on January 29, 1907. Descended from one of the leading families in Chattanooga, Lupton Patten (as most sources list him) was the great-nephew of Zeboim Cartter Patten (1840-1925), the founder and president of the Chattanooga Medicine Company. A native of New York, Patten removed to Tennessee following his service in the Union Army and in the latter half of the 19th century had become one of the leading industrialists in Tennessee. Additionally, Patten established a life insurance company and as head of the Stone Fort Land Company made major developments to the city infrastructure of Chattanooga.
Receiving the name Zeboim, Lupton Patten's first name is of biblical origin, and is recorded in the Book of Genesis as "one of the five cities of the plain of Sodom." Zeboim is also mentioned as "a valley or rugged glen near Gibeah" in the First Book of Samuel, and an area populated by the Benjamites in the Book of Nehemiah. As the son of a pioneer Chattanooga business family, Patten was afforded a fine education, graduating from the Baylor School in 1923. He continued studies at the University of Chattanooga and graduated in 1927 with his BA degree. Shortly after his graduation, he returned to his alma mater as a junior instructor in French and Philosophy, teaching from 1927-28.
Portrait from the Moccasin Yearbook, 1927.
In May 1928 Lupton Patten married Mary McChesney Sanford (1908-1972), to who he was wed until his death. The couple had four daughters, Peggy (1931-2014), twin sisters Charlotte and Phyllis, and Mary Fontaine Patten Moore (1943-2020). In the year of his marriage, Patten joined the Chattanooga Medicine Co., working in its credit department. He quickly rose through the ranks of the business, holding the posts of assistant sales manager, sales manager, and in 1938 was named company president. Just 31 years old, he succeeded his uncle Zeboim Charles Patten (who had advanced to chairman of the board). Lupton Patten held the additional role of president of the board of the Brayton Pharmaceutical Co., and his two-decade stewardship of the Chattanooga Medicine Co. was later profiled in the Chattanooga Daily Times five years after his death, which remarked:
"Lupton Patten had business foresight. He had a vision of a modern drug manufacturing company with hospital-like cleanliness, with automated production lines and a with a thoroughly mechanized office operation...He saw a pharmaceutical division to make new drugs available to the medical profession and he saw a division to make fine chemicals available to industry. Not only did he have a vision for all these things; he set out to bring them to pass. And in less than 10 years this vision became a reality."
With his name firmly established in Chattanooga by 1940, Lupton Patten could already look back on an impressive career. A champion tennis player during the late 1920s and early 1930s, Patten helped found the Chattanooga Tennis Club, which was later renamed the Manker Patten Tennis Center in honor of his eldest brother (1894-1956). Patten would remain connected to the affairs of his alma mater through his life, serving as chairman of the University of Chattanooga's Board of Trustees from 1957-58. He held seats on the boards of the Bright School and the Girls Preparatory School of Chattanooga, and in 1940 was honored as the Junior Chamber of Commerce's Man of the Year.
From the Chattanooga News, January 14, 1936.
In addition to his prominence in the pharmaceutical industry, Lupton Patten made additional headway into Chattanooga's business sector with his service as director of the American National Bank and Trust Co. and was on the Provident Life and Accident Insurance Company's board of directors. On the civic front Patten chaired the Chattanooga community chest campaign in 1940, and from 1949-50 was its president. In these capacities, Patten directed fundraising efforts that financed the Chattanooga symphony orchestra, and "many other public service activities in his local community." In 1941 he was vice-chairman of the Greater Chattanooga War Fund and was a progressive on race issues of the day, with his donations to African-American institutions. In a Congressional Record memorial published not long after his death, Patten was acknowledged for his charity, with Congressman Brazilla Carroll Reece remarking:
"Lupton Patten, like his father, gave much of his means to Negroes, particularly Negro ministers. When adversities knocked on Negroes' doors they made a beaten path to the Chattanooga Medicine Co. to see the little man with the big heart, Lupton Patten. When Negro churches needed a roof and other things to keep them in good repair where they may religiously educate their children Mr. Patten furnished the means by which they could do the necessary work needed to be done. In that he was following in the footsteps of his illustrious father because his father, in all probability, gave more money to Negro churches in this community than anyone that I know about. Sometimes it wasn't the need for a church proper, but it was a need for the minister of the church and he also considered their pleas and helped them on their way."
From the Chattanooga Daily Times, September 13, 1940.
Despite being a political non-office holder, Patten was long an active worker for the Republican party. "An unabashed conservative", he was a prominent backer for Ohio senator Robert Taft in the 1940 Republican primary and was elected as part of the Tennessee delegation to the June 1940 Republican National Convention held in Philadephia. In 1948 Patten was chosen as an alternate delegate to the Republican National Convention (also in Philadelphia) where Thomas Dewey was nominated for the presidency. In addition to Lupton Patten's long service to the Republican party, attention must also be given to his wife's party service. Mary Sanford Patten attended three RNC conventions (two with her husband) and in 1952 chaperoned their daughter Peggy, who was a convention page. In 1955 Mrs. Patten was a candidate for Republican National Committeewoman from Tennessee and was elected, serving until at least 1960. In the last-named year, she represented Tennessee at the National Federation of Republican Women's "Bridge of Women" pageant held in Washington, D.C.
Following his service as an RNC delegate, Patten continued prominence in Chattanooga, and in 1949 was named foreman of the Hamilton County grand jury. In the next year, he participated in a "blue ribbon jury" panel that investigated jury irregularities. In 1950 his service to the pharmaceutical industry was acknowledged with his election as president of the Proprietary Association for 1950-52. For an indeterminate period, Patten sat as a member of the board of directors for the National Association of Manufacturers and the Tennessee Manufacturers Association, and in May 1957 was bestowed an honorary doctor of laws degree from Tennessee Wesleyan University.
From the Chattanooga Daily Times, December 8, 1958.
The last year of Lupton Patten's life was marred by heart ailments, first being struck in the fall of 1957. After a period of recuperation, he resumed his business dealings, but on December 7, 1958, was felled by a fatal heart attack at his home. The loss of one of Chattanooga's standout figures left the community grief-stricken, and it was left for the Chattanooga Daily News to write:
"For here indeed was a man whose abilities were manifold, whose concern for the betterment for the place of his birth and of his deserved success was without limit, whose willingness to give himself on its behalf was without measure."
Just 51 years old at the time of his death, Z. Lupton Patten was survived by his wife Mary and four daughters. Following her death in 1972, Mary Sanford Patten was interred alongside her husband at the Forest Hills Cemetery in Chattanooga. Six decades following his death, the memory of Zeboim Lupton Patten remains strong in Chattanooga, and in November 2020 a $1,000,000 endowment was given by the Patten family to the University of Chattanooga's Gary W. Rollins School of Business. The endowment, the brainchild of Patten's youngest daughter Mary Fontaine Patten Moore, came to fruition following the death of her son Douglas B. Moore, with the family noting the endowment to be "a particularly appropriate memorial to Lupton Patten's business, cultural, and civic achievements and lifelong devotion to the University as student, teacher, benefactor, and trustee."
From the Chattanooga Daily News, December 9, 1958.
Senator Zeboim Cartter Patten Jr.
Public service (and unusual names) continued in the Patten family with Zeboim Cartter Patten Jr., the son of Chattanooga Medicine Co. founder Zeboim Cartter Patten Sr. and uncle of Zeboim Lupton Patten. Like the man who preceded him here, Patten was a long distinguished figure in Chattanooga, being a life insurance company executive, banker, civic leader, and politician. He would serve one term in the state assembly, was a delegate to the 1965 state constitutional convention, and in 1960 was elected to the first of three terms in the state senate.
Born on February 2, 1903, Z. Cartter Patten Jr. was the only child of Zeboim Cartter and Sarah Avery (Key) Patten (1863-1958). Born when his father was sixty-two years old, distinction carried over to the maternal side of Patten's family with Sarah Key Patten's father, David McKendree Key (1814-1900). Prominent in Tennessee politics, Key served as U.S. Senator from 1875-77, was Postmaster General under President Hayes from 1877-80, and was a U.S. district court judge from 1880-95.
Z. Cartter Patten Jr. (as most sources refer to him) attended the Duval French and English School in Chattanooga and later studied for four years at the Asheville, North Carolina School For Boys. His time at this institution saw Patten develop a lifelong interest in conservation and, having grown up on his father's Ashland Farm in the Chattanooga Valley, carried with him a love of the outdoors for the remainder of his life.
With his interest in conservation deepening, Patten continued his studies at Cornell University, where he took agricultural courses, and in 1925 graduated with his bachelor of science degree. This was followed by a summer-long trip through Europe with a friend, and in 1926 returned to Tennessee to join his late father's life insurance firm. Becoming an assistant treasurer with the Volunteer Life Insurance Company, Patten later advanced to the post of vice president and after the company's sale continued to sit as a member of its board of directors.
Z. Cartter Patten Jr. married in Tennessee on August 19, 1931, to Elizabeth Nelson Bryan (1907-1990). The couple's five-decade marriage produced four children, Sarah Key (1932-2017), Emma Berry (1935-2020), and twin sons Z. Cartter III and Bryan.
Through the 1930s and 40s Patten's profile continued to rise in the Chattanooga business sphere, with his service as director of the Hamilton National Bank. He was chairman of the board of the First Federal Savings and Loan Association and the Ringdale Bank and Trust Co. and was a director of the Chattanooga Chamber of Commerce. Further business prominence came with Patten's tenure as president of the WDEF-TV Broadcasting Co., Chattanooga's first television station, and in 1953 served as president of Chattanoogans, Inc.
From the Chattanooga Daily Times, January 4, 1960.
Z. Cartter Patten Jr. owned and operated the Key Hotel in Chattanooga and as owner of the Grandview Company had over 20,000 acres of timberland on Signal Mountain. Having purchased as a substantial tract of land for growing pine trees on Signal Mountain in 1943, Patten was acknowledged in the Chattanooga Daily News in 1960, where he remarked that "in fifteen years it will be fully developed, growing timber as fast as it is cut." These vast tracts of pinelands later received mention as one of the "favorite conservation tracts" by the Tennessee Valley Authority. Additionally, Patten was a founding organizer of the Tennesee Conservation League in 1946.
Active as an educational booster in his region, Patten served on the University of Chattanooga's board of trustees and also chaired the Bonny Oaks School board of trustees for several years. A keen historian, Patten devoted much time to the preservation of Tennessee history, and from 1949-51 served as the first president of the Chattanooga Area Historical Association. He added the title of author to his resume in 1951 with the publication of "A Tennessee Chronicle" and in 1961 authored a history of the Signal Mountain and Walden's Ridge areas.
Patten first entered the political life of his state in 1958 when he was elected as a representative from Hamilton County to the Tennessee General Assembly. The 1959-61 session saw him named to the committees on Business, Education, Local Government, and Military and Veterans Affairs, and in November 1960 won election to the state senate.
From the 1959 Tennessee general assembly composite.
Patten's first senate term (1961-63) saw him chair the committee on Insurance and Banking, and in January 1961 made headlines when he announced that he'd prepared legislation that would repeal Tennessee's anti-evolution law. A law that had been on the books prior to the Scopes Trial of 1925, the bill (co-sponsored with Rep. Charles Galbreath) was remarked as having "little prospect" of passage during that year's session, with Patten stating:
"But I think the bill will have a good effect, in that it will concentrate attention of the legislature and the people on this matter, and perhaps it will be a start toward getting something done eventually."
In 1962 Patten won his second senate term and in 1964 won a third term. During the 1965-67 session he co-chaired the Committee on Conservation, and with fellow senator Hobart Atkins proposed a bill that would "create a board of regents of higher education which would ''develop a master plan for public higher education in the state.''' Additional legislation backed by Patten included a bill to repeal the sales tax on utilities, and in 1965 pulled political double duty when he was elected as a delegate to the state constitutional convention held in Knoxville. This convention discussed term lengths, vacancies, elections, and legislative district reapportionment, and during the proceedings, Patten proposed a constitutional amendment that "would give state clarification of the U.S. Supreme Court's ''one man-one vote reapportionment formula.'''
From the Nashville Tennesseean, May 30, 1965.
Patten's final senate term concluded in 1967 and in March 1970 he was awarded the Sears Foundation trophy for Conservationist of the Year for Tennessee. After decades of prominence in Chattanooga and Hamilton County, Z. Cartter Patten Jr. died aged 79 on February 6, 1982. He was survived by his wife and four children and was interred at the Forest Hills Cemetery in Chattanooga.
From the Nashville Tennessean, February 7, 1982.
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