bank. He made temporary loans to the Government, never refusing his aid.
When near the close of the war the Government endeavored to float a loan
of five million dollars, the bonds to bear interest at seven per cent
per annum, and a bonus offered to capitalists, there was so much
indifference or fear of future payment, or opposition to the war with
Great Britain, that only $20,000 were subscribed for. Mr. Girard
determined to stake his whole fortune to save the credit of his adopted
country. He put his name opposite the whole of the loan still
unsubscribed for.
The effect was magical. People at once had faith in the Government,
professed themselves true patriots, and persisted in taking shares from
Mr. Girard, which he gave them on the original terms. "The sinews of war
were thus furnished," says Mr. Arey, "public confidence was restored,
and a series of brilliant victories resulted in a peace, to which he
thus referred in a letter written in 1815 to his friend Morton of
Bordeaux: 'The peace which has taken place between this country and
England will consolidate forever our independence, and insure our
tranquillity.'"
Soon after the close of the war, on Sept. 13, 1815, word was sent to Mr.
Girard that his wife, still insane, was dying. Years before, when he
found that she was incurable, he had sought a divorce, which those who
admire him most must wish that he had never attempted; and the bill
failed. He was now sixty-five, and growing old. His life had been too
long in the shadow ever to be very full of light.
He asked to be sent for when all was over. Toward sunset, when Mary
Girard was in her plain coffin, word was sent to him. He came with his
household, and followed her to her resting-place, in the lawn at the
north front of the hospital. "I shall never forget the last and closing
scene," writes Professor William Wagner. "We all stood about the coffin,
when Mr. Girard, filled with emotion, stepped forward, kissed his wife's
corpse, and his tears moistened her cheek."
She was buried in silence, after the manner of the Friends, who manage
the hospital. After the coffin was lowered, Mr. Girard looked in, and
saying to Mr. Samuel Coates, "It is very well," returned to his home.
Mary Girard's grave, and that of another who died in 1807, giving the
hospital five thousand dollars on condition that he be buried there, are
now covered by the Clinic Building, erected in 1868. The bodies were not
disturbed, as there is no cellar under the structure. As a reward for
the care of his wife, soon after the burial Mr. Girard gave the hospital
about three thousand dollars, and small sums of money to the attendants
and nurses. It was his intention to be buried beside his wife, but this
plan was changed later.
The next year, 1816, President Madison having chartered the second Bank
of the United States, there were so few subscribers that it was evident
that the scheme would fail. At the last moment Mr. Girard placed his
name against the stock not subscribed for,--three million one hundred
thousand dollars. Again confidence was restored to a hesitating and
timid public. Some years later, in 1829, when the State of Pennsylvania
was in pressing need for money to carry on its daily functions, the
governor asked Mr. Girard to loan the State one hundred thousand
dollars, which was cheerfully done.
As it was known that Mr. Girard had amassed great wealth, and had no
children, he was constantly besought to give, from all parts of the
country. Letters came from France, begging that his native land be
remembered through some grand institution of benevolence.
Ambitious though Mr. Girard was, and conscious of the power of money,
he had without doubt been saving and accumulating for other reasons than
love of gain. His will, made Feb. 16, 1830, by his legal adviser, Mr.
William J. Duane, after months of conference, showed that Mr. Girard had
been thinking for years about the disposition of his millions. When
persons seemed inquisitive during his life, he would say, "My deeds must
be my life. When I am dead, my actions must speak for me."
To the last Mr. Girard was devoted to business. "When death comes for
me," he said, "he will find me busy, unless I am asleep in bed. If I
thought I was going to die to-morrow, I should plant a tree,
nevertheless, to-day."
His only recreation from business was going daily to his farm of nearly
six hundred acres, in Passyunk Township, where he set out choice plants
and fruit-trees, and raised the best produce for the Philadelphia
market. His yellow-bodied gig and stout horse were familiar objects to
the townspeople, though he always preferred walking to riding.
His home in later years, a four-story brick house, was somewhat
handsomely furnished, with ebony chairs and seats of crimson plush from
France, a present from his brother Étienne; a tall writing-cabinet,
containing an organ given him by Joseph Bonaparte, the brother of
Napoleon, and the ex-king of Spain and Naples, who usually dined with
Mr. Girard on Sunday; a Turkey carpet, and marble statuary purchased in
Leghorn by his brother Jean. The home was made cheerful by his young
relatives. He had in his family the three daughters of Jean, and two
sons of Étienne, whom he educated.
He loved animals, always keeping a large watch-dog at his home and on
each of his ships, saying that his property was thus much more
efficiently protected than through the services of those to whom he paid
wages. He was very fond of children, horses, dogs, and canary-birds. In
his private office several canaries swung in brass cages; and these he
taught to sing with a bird organ, which he imported from France for that
purpose.
When Mr. Girard was seventy-six years of age a violent attack of
erysipelas in the head and legs led him to confine himself thereafter to
a vegetable diet as long as he lived. The sight of his one eye finally
grew so dim that he was scarcely able to find his way about the streets,
and he was often seen to grope about the vestibule of his bank to find
the door. On Feb. 12, 1820, as he was crossing the road at Second and
Market Streets, he was struck and badly injured by a wagon, the wheel of
which passed over his head and cut his face. He managed to regain his
feet and reach his home. While the doctors were dressing the wound and
cleansing it of the sand, he said, "Go on, Doctor, I am an old sailor; I
can bear a good deal."
After some months he was able to return to his bank; but in December,
1831, nearly two years after the accident, an attack of influenza, then
prevailing, followed by pneumonia, caused his death. He lay in a stupor
for some days, but finally rallied, and walked across the room. The
effort was too great, and putting his hand against his forehead, he
exclaimed, "How violent is this disorder! How very extraordinary it is!"
and soon died, without speaking again, at five o'clock in the afternoon
of Dec. 26, 1831, nearly eighty-two years old.
He was given a public funeral by the city which he had so many times
befriended. A great concourse of people gathered to watch the procession
or to join it, all houses being closed along the route, the city
officials walking beside the coffin carried in an open hearse. So large
a funeral had never been known in Philadelphia, said the press. The body
was taken to the Holy Trinity Roman Catholic Church, and placed in the
vault of Baron Henry Dominick Lallemand, General of Artillery under
Napoleon I., who had married the youngest daughter of Girard's brother
Jean. Mr. Girard was born in the Romish Church, and never severed his
connection, although he attended a church but rarely. He liked the
Friends, and modelled his life after their virtues; but he said it was
better for a man to die in the faith in which he was born. He gave
generously to all religious denominations and to the poor.
When Mr. Girard's will was read, it was apparent for what purpose he had
saved his money. He gave away about $7,500,000, a remarkable record for
a youth who left home at fourteen, and rose from a cabin-boy to be one
of the wealthiest men of his time.
The first gift in the will, and the largest to any existing corporation,
was $30,000 to the Pennsylvania hospital where Mary Girard died and was
buried, the income to be used in providing nurses. To the Institution
for the Deaf and Dumb, Mr. Girard left $20,000; to the Philadelphia
Orphan Asylum, $10,000; public schools, $10,000; to purchase fuel
forever, in March and August, for distribution in January among poor
white housekeepers of good character, the income from $10,000; to the
Society for poor masters of ships and their families, $10,000; to the
poor among the Masonic fraternity of Pennsylvania, $20,000; to build a
schoolhouse at Passyunk, where he had his farm, $6,000; to his brother
Étienne, and to each of the six children of this brother, $5,000; to
each of his nieces from $10,000 to $60,000; to each captain of his
vessels $1,500, and to each of his housekeepers an annuity or yearly sum
of $500, besides various amounts to servants; to the city of
Philadelphia, to improve her Delaware River front, to pull down and
remove wooden buildings within the city limits, and to widen and pave
Water Street, the income of $500,000; to the Commonwealth of
Pennsylvania, for internal improvements by canal navigation, $300,000;
to the cities of New Orleans and Philadelphia, "to promote the health
and general prosperity of the inhabitants," 280,000 acres of land in the
State of Louisiana.
The city of Philadelphia has been fortunate in her gifts. The Elias
Boudinot Fund, for supplying the poor of the city with fuel, furnished
over three hundred tons of coal last year; "and this amount will
increase annually, by reason of the larger income derived from the
12,000 acres of land situated in Centre County, the property of this
trust." The investments and cash balance on Dec. 31, 1893, amounted to
$40,600.
Benjamin Franklin, at his death, April 17, 1790, gave to each of the two
cities, Philadelphia and Boston, in trust, £1,000 ($5,000), to be loaned
to young married mechanics under twenty-five years of age, to help them
start in business, in sums not to exceed £60, nor to be less than £15,
at five per cent interest, the money to be paid back by them in ten
annual payments of ten per cent each. Two respectable citizens were to
become surety for the payment of the money. This Franklin did because
two men helped him when young to begin business in Philadelphia by a
loan, and thus, he said, laid the foundation of his fortune. A bequest
somewhat similar was founded in London more than twenty years
previously, in 1766,--the Wilson's Loan Fund, "to lend sums of £100 to
£300 to young tradesmen of the city of London, etc., at two per cent per
annum."
Dr. Franklin estimated that his $5,000 at interest for one hundred years
would increase to over $600,000 (£131,000); and then the managers of the
fund were to lay out $500,000 (£100,000) says the will, "in public
works, which may be judged of most general utility to the inhabitants,
such as fortifications, bridges, aqueducts, public buildings, baths,
pavements, or whatever may make living in the town more convenient to
its people, and render it more agreeable to strangers resorting hither
for health or a temporary residence." In Philadelphia Dr. Franklin hoped
the £100,000 would be used in bringing by pipes the water of the
Wissahickon Creek to take the place of well water, and in making the
Schuylkill completely navigable. If these things had been done by the
end of the hundred years, the money could be used for other public
works.
The remaining £31,000 was to be put at interest for another hundred
years, when it would amount to £4,600,000 or $23,000,000. Of this amount
£1,610,000 was to be given to Philadelphia, and the same to Boston, and
the balance, £3,000,000 or $15,000,000, paid to each State. The figures
are of especial interest, as showing how fast money will accumulate if
kept at interest.
The descendants of Franklin have tried to break the will, but have not
succeeded. The Board of Directors of City Trusts of Philadelphia report
for the year ending Dec. 31, 1893, that the fund of $5,000 for the first
hundred years, though not equalling the sum which Franklin hoped, has
yet reached the large amount of $102,968.48. The Boston fund, says Mr.
Samuel F. McCleary, the treasurer, amounted, at the end of a hundred
years, to $431,395.70. Of this sum, $328,940 was paid to the city of
Boston, and $102,455.70 was put at interest for another hundred years.
This has already increased to $110,806.83. What an amount of good some
other man or woman might do with $5,000!
It remains to be seen to what use the two cities will put their gifts.
Perhaps they will provide work for the unemployed in making good roads
or in some other useful labor, or instead of loaning money to mechanics,
as Franklin intended, perhaps they will erect tenement houses for
mechanics or other working people, as is done by some cities in England
and Scotland, following the example so nobly set by George Peabody, when
he gave his $3,000,000, which has now doubled, to build houses for the
London poor. He said, "If judiciously managed for two hundred years, its
accumulation will amount to a sum sufficient to buy the city of London."
If Stephen Girard's $300,000 to the State of Pennsylvania had been given
for the making of good roads, thousands of the unemployed might have
been provided with labor, tens of thousands of poor horses saved from
useless over-work in hauling loads over muddy roads where the wheels
sink to the hubs, and the farmers saved thousands of dollars in carrying
their produce to cities.
Stephen Girard had a larger gift in mind than those to his adopted city
and State. He said in his will, "I have been for a long time impressed
with the importance of educating the poor, and of placing them, by the
early cultivation of their minds, and the development of their moral
principles, above the many temptations to which, through poverty and
ignorance, they are exposed; and I am particularly desirous to provide
for such a number of poor male white orphan children, as can be trained
in one institution, a better education, as well as a more comfortable
maintenance, than they usually receive from the application of the
public funds."
With this object in view, a college for orphan boys, Mr. Girard gave to
"the Mayor, Aldermen, and citizens of Philadelphia, all the residue and
remainder of my real and personal estate" in trust; first, to erect and
maintain a college for poor white male orphans; second, to establish "a
competent police;" and third, "to improve the general appearance of the
city itself, and, in effect, to diminish the burden of taxation, now
most oppressive, especially on those who are the least able to bear it,"
"after providing for the college as my primary object."
He left $2,000,000, allowing "as much of that sum as may be necessary in
erecting the college," which was "to be constructed with the most
durable materials, and in the most permanent manner, avoiding needless
ornament." He gave the most minute directions in his will for its size,
material, "marble or granite," and the training and education of the
inmates.
This residue "and remainder of my real and personal estate" had grown in
1891 to more than $15,000,000, with an income yearly of about
$1,500,000. Truly Stephen Girard had saved and labored for a magnificent
and enduring monument! The Girard estate is one of the largest owners of
real estate in the city of Philadelphia. Outside of the city some of the
Girard land is valuable in coal production. In the year 1893, 1,542,652
tons of anthracite coal were mined from the Girard land. More than
$4,500,000 received from its coal has been invested, that the college
may be doubly sure of its support when the coal-mines are exhausted.
Girard College, of white marble, in the form of a Greek temple, was
begun in May, 1833, two years after Mr. Girard's death, and was fourteen
years and six months in building. A broad platform, reached by eleven
marble steps, supports the main building. Thirty-four Corinthian columns
form a colonnade about the structure, each column six feet in diameter
and fifty-five feet high, and each weighing one hundred and three tons,
and costing about $13,000 apiece. They are beautiful and substantial,
and yet $13,000 would support several orphans for a year or more.
The floors and roof are of marble; and the three-story building weighs
over 76,000 tons, the average weight on each superficial foot of
foundation being, according to Mr. Arey, about six tons. Four auxiliary
white marble buildings were required by the will of Mr. Girard for
dormitories, schoolrooms, etc. The whole forty-five acres in which stand
the college buildings are surrounded, according to the given
instructions, by a wall ten feet high and sixteen inches thick, covered
with a heavy marble capping.
The five buildings were completed Nov. 13, 1847, at a cost of nearly
$2,000,000 ($1,933,821.78); and on Jan. 1, 1848, Girard College was
opened with one hundred orphans. In the autumn one hundred more were
admitted, and on April 1, 1849, one hundred more. Those born in the city
of Philadelphia have the first preference, after them those born in the
State, those born in New York City where Mr. Girard first landed in
America, and then those born in New Orleans where he first traded. They
must enter between the ages of six and ten, be fatherless, although the
mother may be living, and must remain in the college till they are
between fourteen and eighteen, when they are bound out by the mayor till
they are twenty-one, to learn some suitable trade in the arts,
manufacture, or agriculture, their tastes being consulted as far as
possible. Each orphan has three suits of clothing, one for every day,
one better, and one usually reserved for Sundays.
The first president of Girard College was Alexander Dallas Bache, a
great-grandson of Benjamin Franklin, and head of the Coast Survey of the
United States. He visited similar institutions in Europe, and purchased
the necessary books and apparatus for the school.
While the college was building, the heirs, with the not unusual
disregard of the testator's desires, endeavored to break the will. Mr.
Girard had given the following specific direction in his will: "I enjoin
and require that no ecclesiastic, missionary, or minister of any sect
whatsoever shall ever hold or exercise any station or duty whatever in
the said college, nor shall any such person ever be admitted for any
purpose, or as a visitor, within the premises appropriated to the
purposes of the said college:--In making this restriction I do not mean
to cast any reflection upon any sect or person whatsoever; but as there
is such a multitude of sects, and such a diversity of opinion amongst
them, I desire to keep the tender minds of the orphans, who are to
derive advantage from this bequest, free from the excitement which
clashing doctrines and sectarian controversy are so apt to produce. My
desire is that all the instructors and teachers in the college shall
take pains to instil into the minds of the scholars the purest
principles of morality, so that on their entrance into active life they
may from inclination and habit evince benevolence toward their
fellow-creatures, and a love of truth, sobriety, and industry, adopting
at the same time such religious tenets as their matured reason may
enable them to prefer." The heirs of Mr. Girard claimed that by reason
of the above the college was "illegal and immoral, derogatory and
hostile to the Christian religion;" but it was the unanimous decision of
the Supreme Court that there was in the will "nothing inconsistent with
the Christian religion, or opposed to any known policy of the State."
On Sept. 30, 1851, the body of Stephen Girard was removed from the Roman
Catholic Church, but not without a lawsuit by the heirs on account of
its removal, to the college, and placed in a sarcophagus in the
vestibule. The ceremony was entirely Masonic, the three hundred orphans
witnessing it from the steps of the college. Over fifteen hundred Masons
were in the procession, and each deposited his palm-branch upon the
coffin. In front of the sarcophagus is a statue of Mr. Girard, by
Gevelot of Paris, costing thirty thousand dollars.
Girard College now has ten white marble auxiliary buildings for its
nearly or quite two thousand orphans. There are more applicants than
there is room to accommodate. Its handsome Gothic chapel is also of
white marble, erected in 1867. Here each day the pupils gather for
worship morning and evening, the exercises, non-sectarian in character,
consisting of a hymn, reading from the Bible, and prayer. On Sundays the
pupils assemble in their section rooms at nine in the morning and two in
the afternoon for religious reading and instruction; and at 10.30 and 3
they attend worship in the chapel, addresses being given by the
president, A. H. Fetterolf, Ph.D. LL.D., or some invited layman.
In 1883 the Technical Building was erected in the western part of the
grounds. Here instruction is given in metal and woodwork, mechanical
drawing, shoemaking, blacksmithing, carpentry, foundry, plumbing,
steam-fitting, and electrical mechanics. Here the pupils learn about the
dynamo, motor, lighting by electricity, telegraphy, and the like. About
six hundred boys in this department spend five hours a week in this
practical work.
At the World's Columbian Exposition at Chicago, in the exhibit made by
Girard College, one could see the admirable work of the students in a
single-span bridge, a four horse-power yacht steam-engine, a vertical
engine, etc. The whole exhibit was given at the close of the Exposition
to Armour Institute, to which the founder, Mr. Philip D. Armour, has
given $1,500,000.
To the west of the main college building is the monument erected by the
Board of Directors to the memory of Girard College boys killed in the
Civil War. A life-size figure of a soldier stands beneath a canopy
supported by four columns of Ohio sandstone. The granite base is
overgrown with ivy. On one side are the names of the fallen; on the
other, these words, from Mr. Girard's will, "And especially do I desire
that, by every proper means, a pure attachment to our Republican
institutions, and to the sacred rights of conscience, as guaranteed by
our happy constitutions, shall be formed and fostered in the minds of
the scholars."
On May 20, each year, the anniversary of Mr. Girard's birth, the
graduates of Girard College gather from all parts of the country to do
honor to the generous giver. Games are played, the cadets parade, and a
dinner is provided for scholars and guests. The pupils seem happy and
contented. Their playgrounds are large; and they have a bathing-pool for
swimming in summer, and skating in winter. They receive a good education
in mathematics, astronomy, geology, history, chemistry, physics, French,
Spanish, with some Latin and Greek, with a course in business,
shorthand, etc. Through all the years they have "character lessons,"
which every school should have throughout our country,--familiar
conversations on honesty, the dignity of labor, perseverance, courage,
self-control, bad language, value and use of time, truthfulness,
temperance, good temper, the good citizen and his duties, kindness to
animals, patriotism, the study of the lives and deeds of noble men and
women, the Golden Rule of play,--"No fun unless it is fun on both
sides," and similar topics. Oral and written exercises form a part of
this work. There is also a department of military science, a two years'
course being given, with one recitation a week. A United States army
officer is one of the college faculty, and commandant of the battalion.
The annual cost of clothing and educating each of the two thousand
orphans, including current repairs on the buildings, is a little more
than three hundred dollars. On leaving college, each boy receives a
trunk with clothing and books, amounting to about seventy-five dollars.
Probably Mr. Girard, with all his far-sightedness, could not have
foreseen the great good to the nation, as well as to the individual, in
thus fitting, year after year, thousands of poor orphans for useful
positions in life. Mr. Arey well says: "When in the fulness of time many
homes have been made happy, many orphans have been fed, clothed, and
educated, and many men rendered useful to their country and themselves,
each happy home, or rescued child, or useful citizen, will be a living
monument to perpetuate the name and embalm the memory of the dead
'Mariner and Merchant.'"