Born in East Wareham, Massachusetts, in 1857, Nathan Augustus Gibbs came from a distinguished New England family. His father, Captain Nathan Perry Gibbs, was a famed merchant marine ship master and a descendant of Commodore Perry, while his mother, Hannah Swift Churbuck, traced her lineage back to passengers on the Mayflower. After graduating from Wareham High School and Comer’s Commercial College in Boston, Gibbs relocated to Norwich, Connecticut, on November 21, 1876, to take a position as a clerk and bookkeeper for the Norwich Savings Society, beginning a lifelong residency and professional career in the town.
Gibbs became a cornerstone of the Norwich financial community, dedicating forty-six years of his life to local banking. In 1881, he transferred to the Thames National Bank, where he steadily rose through the ranks from clerk and teller to assistant cashier, and eventually to head cashier in 1918. He also served as a director of the bank and maintained a thirty-year tenure as a trustee of the Norwich Savings Society. Highly regarded for his professional expertise, Gibbs wrote the comprehensive chapter on local banking for the 1922 History of New London County. He was highly popular throughout Norwich for his warm, approachable nature, famously keeping his private office door open to anyone who wished to speak with him
Beyond his banking achievements, Gibbs contributed immensely to the civic development and welfare of Norwich. During World War I, he took an active role in local patriotic efforts, serving as a secretary for two campaigns and as the chairman of the Victory Loan Campaign. He served on the Norwich Board of Education, was a vice-president of the Norwich Chamber of Commerce, and helped organize the local YMCA, serving as its treasurer and director. His passion for community service also shone through his ten years of dedicated Boy Scout work; he was the first—and at the time, only—Norwich resident appointed to the National Council of the Boy Scouts of America.
Gibbs was equally devoted to the religious, fraternal, and social life of Norwich. He served for twenty-five years as treasurer of the Second Congregational Church and Sunday School, and for nearly three decades as treasurer of the Second Congregational Church and Society, and later became the custodian of the United Congregational Church following a merger. A prominent Mason, he achieved the thirty-second degree in the Scottish Rite and served as a trustee for the Masonic Temple Corporation of Norwich.
Mr. Gibbs married Emily Reynolds King, the daughter of a prominent Norwich manufacturer, on June 1, 1881, and raised his family in the town. Though they endured the tragic, accidental loss of their son Nathan Jackson in 1911, the family remained deeply integrated into the civic and social fabric of Norwich.