Peter Paul Francis Degrand (1787–1855) or P.P.F. Degrand was a French-born broker and merchant in Boston, Massachusetts, in the 19th century.
Business career
editDegrand was born in Marseilles, France, and moved to Boston around 1803.[1] He published the Boston Weekly Report in the 1820s,[2] possibly employing Edgar Allan Poe for two weeks as a clerk and perhaps also as a reporter.[3] He was one of the thirteen founding members of the Boston Stock Exchange and was described by Clarence W. Barron and Joseph G. Martin as "the man to whose indomitable energy and foresight the existence of the Boston Stock Exchange is largely due".[4] He was a major stockholder in the Western Railroad and was instrumental in securing financial aid from the state during the railroad's early years.[5]
Personal life
editDegrand lived on Pinckney Street in Beacon Hill.[6] He was friend with President of the United States John Quincy Adams.[7] He died on December 23, 1855[1] and was buried in Forest Hills Cemetery.[8] Degrand bequeathed $120,000 to charity, a large part of which was for the acquisition of French-language scientific texts for Harvard University.[1]
References
edit- ^ a b c Ammidown, Holmes (1877). Historical Collections. Charlton, Mass.: Author.
- ^ Library of Congress. Boston Weekly Report.
- ^ Edgar Allan Poe (1969), Collected works of Edgar Allan Poe, Cambridge: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, ISBN 0-674-13935-6, OL 5610041M, 0674139356
- ^ Clarence W. Barron (1893), The Boston Stock Exchange, Boston: Hunt & Bell, OCLC 4355517, OL 6584438M
- ^ Bliss, George (1863). Historical Memoir of the Western Railroad. S. Bowles and Company. p. 153. Retrieved 19 December 2022.
- ^ House at no.105 Pinckney Street; offices kept successively on Broad St., State St., and Congress St. Boston Directory. 1823, 1832, 1848, 1851.
- ^ Adams, Henry (1918), The education of Henry Adams, Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, OCLC 421061, OL 7107431M
- ^ "Deaths." New England Historical and Genealogical Register, v.10, no.2, April 1856
Further reading
editBy Degrand
edit- PPF Degrand's Boston Weekly Report of Public Sales and of Arrivals. Boston: 1819-1828
- Proceedings of the Friends of a national bank, at their public meeting, held in Boston, fifteenth July, 1841: Including an address to the people of the U. States: showing that, to give healthful action, to the vital functions of the constitution of the United States, a national bank (not a government), invested with the powers herein described, is indispensably necessary. Boston: Dutton and Wentworth, 1841
- Proceedings of the friends of a rail-road to San Francisco at their public meeting, held at the U.S. Hotel, in Boston, April 19, 1849. Including an address to the people of the U. States; showing that, P.P.F. Degrand's plan is the only one, as yet proposed, which will secure promptly and certainly, and by a single act of legislation, the construction of a railroad to California, in the shortest time allowed by its physical obstacles. (3rd ed.), Boston: Dutton and Wentworth, 1849, OL 14035881M
About Degrand
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