34 Facts About George Peabody

George Peabody was an American financier and philanthropist.

George Peabody is often considered the father of modern philanthropy.

George Peabody founded the Peabody Trust in Britain and the Peabody Institute and George Peabody Library in Baltimore, and was responsible for many other charitable initiatives.

George Peabody was born in 1795 in what was then South Danvers, Massachusetts.

George Peabody later expressed "I have never forgotten and never can forget the great privations of my early years".

George Peabody established his residence and office in the old Henry Fite House, and became a businessman and financier.

George Peabody first visited England in 1827, seeking to use his firm and his agency to sell American states' bond issues, to raise capital for those states' various programs of "internal improvements".

The Times of London noted that while George Peabody was an "American gentleman of the most unblemished character", the Reform Club had blackballed him for being a citizen of a country that reneged on its debts.

At first, George Peabody sent letters to scold Baltimore friends about the need for the state to resume interest payment and rewarded reporters with small gratuities for favourable articles about the state.

At around this time, George Peabody began to suffer from rheumatoid arthritis and gout.

In February 1867, on one of several return visits to the United States, and at the height of his financial success, George Peabody was suggested by Francis Preston Blair, an old crony of President Andrew Jackson and an active power in the smoldering Democratic Party as a possible Secretary of the Treasury in the cabinet of President Andrew Johnson.

At about the same time, George Peabody was mentioned in newspapers as a future presidential candidate.

George Peabody described the presidential suggestion as a "kind and complimentary reference", but considered that, at age 72, he was too old for either office.

George Peabody first visited England in 1827 to purchase wares, and to negotiate the sale of American cotton in Lancashire.

George Peabody subsequently opened a branch office in Liverpool, and British business began to play an increasingly important role in his affairs.

In 1837, George Peabody took up residence in London, and the following year, he started a banking business trading on his own account.

George Peabody made a significant profit when Maryland, Pennsylvania and other states resumed payments, having previously bought up state bonds at a low cost.

George Peabody became the acknowledged father of modern philanthropy, having established the practice later followed by Johns Hopkins, Andrew Carnegie, John D Rockefeller and Bill Gates.

George Peabody died in London on November 4,1869, aged 74, at the house of his friend Sir Curtis Lampson.

George Peabody's will provided that he be buried in the town of his birth, South Danvers, Massachusetts.

Prime Minister William Ewart Gladstone arranged for George Peabody's remains to be returned to America on HMS Monarch, the newest and largest ship in the Royal Navy, arriving at Portland, Maine, where they were received by US Admiral David Farragut.

George Peabody was laid to rest in Harmony Grove Cemetery, in Salem, Massachusetts, on February 8,1870.

Historian Roderick Nash argues that George Peabody made his millions quietly in groceries and real estate, while contemporary millionaires were building more visible empires in oil, iron, land and especially railroads.

George Peabody was a pioneer, whose success in philanthropy set a new standard for American millionaires.

George Peabody was especially imaginative, and relied on his own memories of poverty and self-education to introduce new ways to educate and culturally enrich the next generation of poor youth, and thereby promote greater equality in American society.

George Peabody rejected doling out cash to the poor as a waste of money in comparison to building permanent institutions that produced a steady stream of benefits.

George Peabody's philanthropy won him many admirers in his old age.

George Peabody was praised by European contemporaries such as Prime Minister William Ewart Gladstone and author Victor Hugo, and Queen Victoria offered him a baronetcy, which he declined.

The waterway was later renamed the Kane Basin, but George Peabody Bay survives as the name of a smaller bay at the eastern side of the basin.

George Peabody became the first of only two Americans to receive the award.

On March 24,1867, George Peabody was elected a member of the American Antiquarian Society.

In 1900, George Peabody was one of the first 29 honorees to be elected to the Hall of Fame for Great Americans, located on what was then the campus of New York University, at University Heights, New York.

The Georgetown Neighborhood Library in Washington, DC, houses the Peabody Room, named after the original neighborhood Peabody Library founded by Peabody.

The Peabody Room contains historical information about the Georgetown neighborhood.