Thomas M. Greene
Thomas M. Greene, senior member of the firm of Greene & Embry, is one of the leading commission men of Cincinnati and is also one of its most progressive and enterprising citizens. In addition to maintaining a general office in this city the firm operates branch offices at Evansville, Indiana; Dayton, Ohio; Jersey City, New Jersey and Peoria, Illinois. Mr. Greene has engaged continuously for thirty-five years in this business. He was born on a farm at Winchester, Clark County, Kentucky, April 23, 1856, a son of Colonel William Greene who was an extensive live-stock trader and gained his title in the Mexican war. He was born at Mount Sterling, Montgomery County, Kentucky, and was a son of John Greene, a native of Culpepper County, Virginia, who with his brother Samuel, emigrated to Kentucky when it was a wilderness, arriving there at a time when there was no difficulty in tracing wild animals by their footprints through the canebrake. John Greene was an extensive farmer and stock-raiser and at the outbreak of the Civil war was the owner of about one hundred and twenty-five slaves. Seven of his sons joined the Confederate army but Colonel William Green, the father of our subject, was not of this number. The Greene family is now very prominent in Montgomery and Clark counties and among its members are many large landowners, all of them being descendants of John and Samuel Greene. The family for several generations has been accustomed to handle live stock and Colonel Greene was one of the largest shippers of live stock from Kentucky to the eastern markets in his day. He died at the age of seventy-five years. The mother of our subject, Mary Elizabeth (Smith) Greene, was born at Lexington, Kentucky, a daughter of Thomas Maslin Smith. He was a native of Sheffield, England, and after coming to this country became a prominent druggist at Lexington. Mrs. Greene died at the age of fifty years.
Thomas M. Greene was reared in Clark and Montgomery counties but spent the greater part of his boyhood in the latter county. He attended the district schools and received his introduction to business at Covington, Kentucky, under Captain J. P. L. Jennings, who was a captain in the Confederate army. His home was at Morristown, Tennessee, but he engaged in the livestock brokerage business at Covington. After working for Captain Jennings about a year and a half Mr. Greene began business on his own account, continuing at Covington until the stockyards were abandoned at that point. He then moved his office to the Cincinnati stockyards. About 1885 he associated with Talton Embry in the organization of the firm of Greene, Embry & Company, which firm has continued with increasing prosperity to the present time. Mr. Greene is also a director of the Stock Yards Bank and Trust Company and holds a similar position in the Kerns Commission Company of Jersey City, New Jersey, and the Bourbon Commission Company, of Evansville, Indiana.
In 1900 Mr. Greene was married to Miss Clara Louise Peery, a daughter of Thomas Burns Peery, a prominent farmer of Decatur County, Indiana. One daughter, May Louise, has been born to this union. Mr. and Mrs. Greene reside at the Hotel Alms in this city, but he recently purchased the old homestead of ex-Governor Cumback of Indiana, at Greensburg, Indiana, and there they spend their summers. This home is situated on the highest point of land between Cincinnati and Indianapolis and is one of the most beautiful residences in the state. Mr. Greene has for many years been a member of the Chamber of Commerce of Cincinnati and he is also a member of the Business Men's Club and an honorary member of Lodge No. 5, B. P. O. E. He is known as an able conscientious and reliable man whose word is equivalent to his bond and he commands respect by deserving it. Genial, kind and sympathetic by nature, he has never lacked friends, and today after more than a third of a century in keen competition with men, he is one of the most popular representatives of the livestock business at Cincinnati.
From Cincinnati, The Queen City, Volume III by Rev. Charles Fredric Goss, S. J. Clarke Publishing Co., 1912