Heber Reginald Bishop (March 2, 1840 – December 10, 1902) was an American businessman and philanthropist of the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

[2] Bishop received a commercial education, until he moved to Remedios, Cuba at the age of 19 to begin work in the sugar business.

[6] The Bishop Jade Collection donated to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 1902 included not only artistic pieces from China and Japan, but also selections from Mexico, Central America, the northwest coast of America, Swiss lake dwellings, France, Italy, New Zealand and elsewhere.

It included a rare crystal of jadeite and a single mass of nephrite from Jordanów Śląski, formerly known as Jordansmühl, Silesia.

[7] The one thousand numbers included in the Bishop collection display first a mineralogical section in which samples of the minerals are shown from every known place where they may be found.

These have been gathered from China, India, Annam, Europe and New Zealand, and comprise every conceivable object of limpid beauty to which the material lends itself.

Vases from China, with graceful lines, elegant shape, and patiently carved decoration; perfect boxes of soft sheen with jewelled decoration from India; and the modern work of Europe they all give the highest presentment of sensuous charm and artistry.

[10] Contributors to the book included Dr. George Frederick Kunz, Dr. Stephen Wootton Bushell, Dr. William Hallock, Dr. Samuel Lewis Penfield, Professor Frank Wigglesworth Clarke, Logan Waller Page, Dr. Charles Palache, Dr. Henry Stephens Washington, Dr Joseph Edkins, Mrs. Zelia Nuttall, Eliza Ruhamah Scidmore, Ernst Weinschenk, and Tadamasa Hayashi.

[12] In 2000, an eBay user attempted to fraudulently auction set #100 which was in the possession of The Philadelphia Rare Books and Manuscripts Company.

[14] Heber Bishop also donated a large collection of Alaskan antiquities to the American Museum of Natural History in 1879.

He also collected, with the assistance of Major John Wesley Powell, a large collection of British Columbian ethnological artifacts, including the famous Haida canoe, which is 64 feet long, 8 feet wide and was hollowed out of a single tree trunk by the Heiltsuk tribe, formerly known as the Bella Bella tribe opposite Haida Gwaii.

[17] Together, Heber and Mary had eight children:[2][18] Bishop died on December 10, 1902, at his residence, 881 Fifth Avenue, after a long illness.

[citation needed] His estate, valued at approximately $3,500,000, was left in trust for his widow, children, sisters, and brother.

[33] Mary's brother-in-law, Darius Ogden Mills, was instrumental in introducing the Bishops to elite New York business and society circles.

[34] For example, Heber and his children Mary, Harriet, and Ogden were members of Ward McAllister's "Four Hundred" list, reportedly the number of people who could fit into Mrs. Astor's ballroom.

Kisco, NY, Glen Farm in Portsmouth, RI, and the Villa Taylor in Marrakesh, Morocco, where Winston Churchill and Franklin Delano Roosevelt "played hookey" during World War II.