James Norris Gamble was an entrepreneur, industrialist, philanthropist, and civic leader best known for inventing Procter and Gamble's Ivory Soap, the "soap that floats," in 1878. Using a scientific approach, he helped transform P&G into a nationally recognized corporate leader and creator of consumer products for a rapidly growing America. Beyond P&G, he financed early efforts to educate freed southern slaves as an original sponsor of the Freedmen's Aid Society and later supported Mary McLeod Bethune's work to educate poor African American women. In Cincinnati, his philanthropy included endowing Christ Hospital and founding its Institute of Medical Research, and he funded completion of the University of Cincinnati's Nippert Stadium in 1924 as a tribute to his late grandson. In 1871, Gamble moved with his wife Margaret Penrose to his estate at 2918 Werk Road in the Village of Westwood, where he served eight consecutive terms as Village Councilman from 1871 to 1889, during which Westwood Town Hall was erected. Elected Westwood's last mayor in 1894, he guided the village through annexation with Cincinnati in 1896, revived the Cincinnati and Westwood Railroad until streetcars reached the village, and, with his wife, planted trees throughout the community to beautify Westwood. He named his Werk Road estate Ratonagh after his family's ancestral Irish home and lived there until his death.