Henry S. Harper

Henry Sleeper Harper
Born	(1864-03-11)March 11, 1864
Died
Occupation	Publisher
Employer	Director, Harper & Brothers
Known for	Titanic survivor, forest conservation
Home town	New York City
Board member of	The Association for the Protection of the Adirondacks
Spouse(s)	Myra Raymond (Haxton) Harper, m. 1 Mar 1889; Anne Waterman (Hopson) Harper
Children	Henry Harper
Parent(s)	Joseph Wesley Harper, Abigail Harper; Caroline Harper (stepmother)
Relatives	Brother, Capt. William Armitage Harper; Sister, Josephine (Harper) Fiske; Sister, Mary Elizabeth (Harper) Silliman; Brother-in-law, Bradley A. Fiske

Henry Sleeper Harper (11 March 1864 - 1 March 1944) was a passenger on the RMS Titanic when it sank on April 15, 1912. He was an "incorporator of Harper & Brothers when the firm became a corporation in 1896." Harper is remembered for his work to save the Adirondack forests from logging, and for the fact that his Pekingese was one of three dogs to survive the sinking of the Titanic.

Early life and education

The son of Joseph Wesley Harper, Jr. (1839–1896) and Abigail Payson Sleeper (1829–1866), Henry graduated ftom Columbia University.

Career

Henry was a director of the Harper & Brothers Publishing House. Henry's grandfather had founded the firm Harper & Brothers, which gave way in 1900 to the publishing house.

Personal life

He was married to Myra Haxton in 1888. They had no children. In 1911, he purchased a home at 133 E. 21st St., overlooking Gramercy Park from the north. After Myra’s death on November 27, 1923, he was remarried to Anne W. Hopson, and they had a son, Henry.

Harper was a guest at Mark Twain's 67th birthday, held November 28, 1902, at the Metropolitan Club in New York.

He was a member of the University Club of New York and the Century Association. Additionallt, he owned a camp at Buck Mountain Point, on Long Lake, in the Adirondacks, and served as secretary for The Association for the Protection of the Adirondacks.

R.M.S. Titanic

Henry and his wife Myra boarded the Titanic at Cherbourg, occupying First-Class Suite D33. Accompanying the Harpers was Hammad Hassu (an Egyptian dragoman, or interpreter, whom Henry had hired in Egypt as a joke) and Henry's prized Pekinese dog, "Sun Yat Sen".

On the night of the sinking, Henry and Myra were having dinner. They were then told to go back to their cabin, get dressed warmly, put on their lifebelts, and go up to the boat deck. Henry put on an overcoat over his dinner tuxedo, and Myra put on a black fur coat over her sparkly dinner dress. She grabbed a pair of gloves, a fur muff, and her mother's pearl necklace that had been given her. Then, the wealthy couple boarded Lifeboat 3 along with Henry's dragoman and Sun Yat Sen. All four survived the sinking.

For the documentary Ghosts of the Abyss (2001), James Cameron sent a robot into the Harper's cabin and found Henry's bowler hat sitting on top of the remains of the wardrobe.