Frederick W. Taylor was born in Philadelphia on March 22, 1856, into a family with deep roots in American culture and a strong religious heritage. His father, Franklin, was a fourth-generation English Quaker and his mother, Emily, a sixth – generation English Puritan. Franklin earned an undergraduate and a master’s degree from Princeton University and was an attorney in Philadelphia. He was something of a gentleman of leisure, however, and did not actively practice his profession, pursuing, instead, his interests in literature and history. He has been described as “devoid of aggressiveness and combativeness, “and little of the father was to be found in the son.