William F. Wharton - After Politics

After Politics

William F. Wharton moved back to his home on Beacon Street in downtown Boston, and while he remained a loyal supporter of Republican causes, he did not run for office again, despite calls by the Boston Herald for him to do so. He was active in the Boston Bar Association, as well as the Massachusetts Bar Association. He and his wife had a summer home in Groton, where they socialized with members of Boston's most influential families. Wharton died at his Boston home, on May 20, 1919, at the age of 72. Despite being very influential in local politics in Massachusetts in the 1880s and 1890s, today it is all but forgotten: a Boston Globe article in January 2013 noted that "Some of the even more obscure include William F. Wharton, who was acting secretary of state twice in the early 1890s. He is so forgotten that he does not even have his own Wikipedia page." But although Wharton remains relatively unknown, at least now, he does have his own Wikipedia entry.