Lloyd Wescott

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Lloyd Bruce Wescott (November 21, 1907 – December 24, 1990) was an agriculturalist, civil servant, and philanthropist who worked in New Jersey. He was born on a dairy farm near Farmington, Wisconsin, the son of Bruce and Josephine Wescott, and his older brother was the novelist Glenway Wescott. He finished high school in Ripon, Wisconsin, and attended Ripon College before moving to New York City for several years.

In 1935 he married Barbara Harrison. In 1936 they bought Mulhocaway Farm, a 1,000-acre dairy farm in Union Township near Clinton, New Jersey. The farm housed the Artificial Breeding Association, an early dairy insemination project. In the 1950s the state of New Jersey acquired the farm to build the Spruce Run Reservoir.

In 1959 the Wescotts moved to a 147-acre farm near Rosemont in Delaware Township. Lloyd Wescott served on the New Jersey State Board of Agriculture (1952–1956) and was chairman of the State Board of Control of Institutions and Agencies (1956; later renamed the State Board of Human Services). He also chaired the National Agricultural Stabilization Committee for Dairy Products in 1961.

Wescott helped found the Hunterdon Medical Center in Flemington. He chaired its first major fundraising drive in 1949, served as president of the hospital board from 1950, and supported the development of rural medical care. The road to the hospital is named Wescott Drive in his honor.

He received honorary doctorates from Lafayette College (1955) and Rutgers University (1960). In 1966 the Wescotts donated their Rosemont farmland to create Wescott Preserve, Hunterdon County’s first county park. He sold most of his remaining farmland in 1987 and remained active in farmland preservation, helping dedicate the New Jersey Museum of Agriculture at Rutgers in 1989.

Barbara Harrison Wescott had been involved in publishing and the arts and supported various arts institutions; she died in 1977. Lloyd Wescott died at his Rosemont home on December 24, 1990, at age 83. In 2007, Hunterdon Medical Center named its Wescott Medical Arts Center in his honor.