Domingo Ghirardelli

Domingo Ghirardelli

Domenico (Domingo) Ghirardelli Sr. (* 1817 in Rapallo ; † January 17, 1894 ibid) was an Italian chocolatier .

South America

Domenico Ghirardelli was the son of a chocolatier. In 1837 he moved first to Uruguay , then in 1838 to Lima , Peru , where he opened a candy store and changed his first name to Domingo (the Spanish-speaking equivalent of his maiden name).

California

Coming from Peru, he landed on January 11, 1848, just 13 days before the gold discovery in Sutter's Mill , in San Francisco. During the California gold rush , he initially spent several months in Sonora and Jamestown . After a short time as a dealer in Stockton , he founded "Ghirardelli & Girard" in San Francisco on June 18, 1852, the forerunner of the Ghirardelli Chocolate Company . On February 7, 1852, his eldest son, Joseph Nicolas, was born and became one of the city's most honorable businessmen. He died shortly after the earthquake on May 11, 1906.

In 1865, however, out of a chance situation, his father developed a manufacturing process for chocolate that is known today as the broma process and is very widespread. After his resignation in 1892, his three sons took over the business, which they enlarged and therefore relocated to San Francisco's Northern Waterfront in 1893 , where the famous Ghirardelli Square is today .

Domingo Ghirardelli died in 1894 while traveling to his native Rapallo. He is buried in Mountain View Cemetery in Oakland .

With the Ghirardelli Chocolate Company , he left a global company in the chocolate industry that remained in the family until it was taken over by the Swiss company Lindt & Sprüngli in 1998.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ "The Ghirardelli Story" ( Memento of the original from April 21, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.