Walton Seymour, an economic development consultant specializing in energy issues, was born in Faribault, Minnesota on July 10, 1909, the son of Charles Walton Seymour and Margaret Lucinda Rugg Seymour. He received an A.B. with a major in economics from the University of Wisconsin in 1929 and went to work for the North American Company as an economist.
Seymour joined the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) in 1934. He worked on power marketing, including negotiation of contracts, acquisition of properties, and economic studies, and moved up the ranks from rate engineer to become chief of the Rate Division and director of power utilization. During the period 1939-1940 he also served as a power rate consultant to several regional power authorities.
In 1947, Seymour joined the staff of Secretary of the Interior Julius Krug, a former Tennessee Valley Authority colleague, as director of the program staff and the power division. Seymour continued to hold both positions until he resigned in 1950 to become power advisor to the Mutual Security Administration's mission to Greece. While at the Department of the Interior, Seymour also served on an ad hoc committee studying the relationship of the power industry and the Atomic Energy Commission.
In 1952, Seymour became an independent consultant, working on several projects in Latin America and accompanying the special United Nations flood control mission to East Pakistan. From 1956 to 1973, he served as a consultant in power economics to the Puerto Rico Water Resources Authority.
In 1958, Seymour joined Development and Resources Corporation (D&R), an economic development consulting firm formed by two ex-TVA officials, David Lilienthal and Gordon Clapp. Until his retirement in 1973, Seymour served as vice president for industrial development. In that capacity he handled D&R's activities in the fields of economics and power and in industrial and minerals development. During this time, D&R conducted extensive projects with the Khuzestan [Iran] Water and Power Authority and the Ivory Coast and produced a number of smaller energy and resource studies in Africa, Southeast Asia, Latin America, and the United States. Seymour also authored several papers on energy-related issues for conferences sponsored by the United Nations and the National Planning Association.
Seymour married Katherine Rankine Denniston in November 1936. The couple had two children, Martha and Charles. Katherine Seymour died in 1960; six years later Seymour married Sonya Thorpe. Walton Seymour died on April 26, 1979.
