Richard Warren Sears: Co-founder of Sears, Roebuck and Company
Business Owner · Retail & E-commerce
Richard Warren Sears was a Minnesota railroad station agent who, after a refused shipment of gold watches in 1886, went on to co-found Sears, Roebuck with Alvah Roebuck.
About Richard Warren Sears: Co-founder of Sears, Roebuck and Company
Richard Warren Sears (December 7, 1863 to September 28, 1914) was an American businessman who co-founded the department store Sears, Roebuck and Company with his partner Alvah Curtis Roebuck. He was born in Stewartville, Minnesota, the son of James Warren Sears, a blacksmith and wagon-maker, and Eliza Burton, both of English descent, and the family lived in Spring Valley, Minnesota, where his father served as a city councilman before selling his wagon shop in 1875. During his boyhood in Spring Valley he befriended Almanzo Wilder, the future husband of Laura Ingalls Wilder. In 1880 he began working as a telegraph operator in North Branch, Minnesota, for the Minneapolis and St. Louis Railway, and was later transferred to North Redwood Falls, Minnesota, as station agent. In 1886, when Sears was 23, his station received a shipment of gold watches from a Chicago manufacturer, but the local consignee, jeweller Edward Stegerson, refused the unsolicited shipment, a common scam of the time in which wholesalers shipped products to retailers who had not ordered them and, upon refusal, offered the price-hiked items at a lower consignment cost. Sources: English Wikipedia (Richard Warren Sears, accessed September 2026).
Basic Information
Co-founder, Sears, Roebuck and Company (1863-1914)
Company Details
Sears, Roebuck and Company
Mail-order Retail, Department Stores
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