Edward Samuel Payton

Edward Samuel Payton was born in 1882 to Philip A. Payton and Annie M. Ryans Payton. His father was a barber and his mother a women’s hairdresser and wigmaker, and they were both successful business people in the hair care industry. Payton attended Westfield High School in Westfield, Massachusetts, graduating in 1901 and following his older brother James (Yale College class of 1900) to Yale. During his first year at Yale, his brother James died of typhoid fever. During this time of grief, he fell behind in his classes, but continued his studies, graduating with the class of 1906. In the years after he graduated, he lived with his family in Massachusetts and worked a number of different jobs as he considered his future career. Sadly, he died from tuberculosis in 1912.