Raymond Henry Norweb (1894-1983) was born in England and moved to Elyria, Ohio, with his family in 1907. His father was a lace maker, who ran the American Lace Company in Elyria. Henry received his B.A. from Harvard in 1916 and entered the Foreign Service, rising rapidly through the diplomatic ranks with posts in various countries including France, Japan, the Netherlands, the Dutch East Indies, Chile, the Dominican Republic, Portugal, Peru, and Bolivia. His last assignment was as ambassador to Cuba, 1945-1948. His major accomplishments included negotiations of inter-American radio frequency allocations, and the Azores Bases treaty with Portugal, 1943-1944, a key element in Allied strategy during World War II. He was a trustee of Kenyon College and of the Western Reserve Historical Society.
Norweb married Emery May Holden (1895-1984) in Paris in 1917. She was the daughter of Albert Holden and Katharine Davis, and granddaughter of Liberty Holden, owner of the Cleveland Plain Dealer. The Holden family fortune was based on real estate, hotels, and mining, and they were early benefactors of the Cleveland Museum of Art and the Holden Arboretum. Emery May graduated from the Westover School in Middlebury, Connecticut in 1916, and volunteered for the American Ambulance Corps, doing hospital work in France until her marriage to Henry Norweb in Paris, 1917. During their world travels, she studied art, languages and history, and collected pre-Columbian and Oriental art, which became the basis of a collection at the Cleveland Musuem of Art, where she served as benefactor, officer, and trustee.
Although Emery May accompanied her husband on all his assignments they maintained a family home in Bratenahl, Ohio. Their children are Jeanne, (Mother Mary Joseph, O.C.D.), Albert, and R. Henry Jr. Mr. and Mrs. Norweb were both noted experts on world and United States coins, and the Norweb collection is one of the finest ever compiled. They made important donations to the Smithsonian Institution and to the American Numismatic Society.
click here to view the Encyclopedia of Cleveland History entry for R. Henry Norweb
click here to view the Encyclopedia of Cleveland History entry for Emery May Holden
click here to view the Encyclopedia of Cleveland History entry for Liberty Holden