Charles E. Slayback

Charles E. Slayback (1840-1924) was a socially active grain merchant in New Orleans, Louisiana, and St. Louis, Missouri, in the 19th century. He was a founder of the Veiled Prophet organization in St. Louis.

Slayback was born on March 27, 1840, in Marion County, Missouri, the second child of Alexander L. Slayback of Ohio, a lawyer, and Anna Slayback. In 1847 the family moved from Shelbyville, Missouri, to Lexington, Missouri, where the father died in 1848 at age 31. He had two brothers, Alonzo, Preston, and a sister.

He and his brother Preston registered on the same day for the draft during the U.S. Civil War, but neither served, their places being taken by substitutes.

He and his family moved from New Orleans to St. Louis over the winter of 1874–75.

He immediately became a factor in the civic life of the city and was famous for his gift of repartee, which made him a welcome guest at social functions, no matter what their nature.

For several years he was chancellor of the American Legion of Honor in St. Louis.

He moved to Chicago, Illinois, after 1883 to live with his daughter, Bertha S. Carel. He died there on September 29, 1924. Burial was in Lexington, Missouri.

Slayback left home at age sixteen and found employment in a St. Louis commission house, with a salary of $25 a month, which was raised to $30 at the end of his first year. He left for another company, where he was made a partner at age twenty-two. By 1873 he had his own business in New Orleans and was vice president of the Chamber of Commerce and a director in banks and insurance companies.

In 1870, Slayback was secretary of a committee of the "leading citizens under the style of an 'Electoral Jury of Fifty'" which was charged with advising Louisiana Governor Henry C. Warmoth on the postwar organization of the city of New Orleans.

He was elected to the board of directors of the Merchants' Bank in January 1870.

Returned to St. Louis, Slayback became a prosperous grain broker.

He was chairman of a committee seeking to rejuvenate a Fourth of July celebration which, according to a newspaper report, "for a time looked as if it would disappear from the face of the patriotic horizon and end in smoke."

Slayback was one of the founders of the Veiled Prophet organization in 1878 . . . Two years ago he came to St. Louis and was the honor guest at the annual ball.

Slayback was elected president of the St. Louis Merchants Exchange over John Jackson in January 1882. By that time he was a principal in Slayback Smythe & Co.