George Mortimer Pullman

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
George M. Pullman

George Mortimer Pullman (born March 3, 1831 in Brocton , Chautauqua County , † October 9, 1897 in Chicago ) was an American inventor and industrialist . Among other things, he was the founder of Pullman Hotels .

Live and act

Pullman dropped out of school at the age of 14 and later became one of Chicago's most influential and controversial citizens .

When he arrived in the city of Chicago in 1855, he found that the streets of the city were often covered with so much mud that it could invade many houses and that it was difficult to get around on horseback. The city had therefore decided to raise these houses and put them on a new, higher foundation. Pullman, familiar with the technology required because his father had used it to expand the Erie Canal , and some partners demonstrated its feasibility in 1857 by adding an entire block of shops and offices as part of the Chicago uplift.

Between 1859 and 1863 he worked as a gold broker in Golden, Colorado, raising capital.

With this money he developed a comfortable sleeping car from 1858 . Sleeping cars had been used by American railroad companies since 1830, but until then they were quite uncomfortable, while the “Pioneer” sleeping car, which he registered for a patent in 1863, was considered to be luxurious. Pullman sleeping cars cost more than five times as much as a regular train car. Pullman was able to sell numerous cars after arranging that the body of Abraham Lincoln be transferred from Washington, DC to Springfield in a Pullman sleeper . As a result, his sleeping cars received public attention across the country, which encouraged their sales.

Pullman's Palace Car Company share dated April 20, 1892, issued to George M. Pullman

In 1867 Pullman founded the Pullman Palace Car Company , which had the industrial city of Pullman built for its workers in 1880 by the architect Solon S. Beman . Everything from the houses to the shops was owned by the Pullman Company. The houses for the workers were comfortable according to the standards of the time and equipped with sanitary facilities and gas connections. At a time when most workers were living in shabby apartments near the factories, this was a significant social innovation.

In the recession of 1894, Pullman cut workers' salaries by 25 percent, but not the rent and prices of goods paid by workers in his company's stores. This led to the Pullman strike , which lasted two months, sparked sympathy strikes across the country, led to violent riots, and was finally ended by the deployment of the army by President Grover Cleveland . The clashes in Pullman left 25 fatalities, 60 injured and 2,000 wagons destroyed, a total of 80 million US dollars in property damage, which was accepted by the industrialists.

Because of the hostilities he had developed, his family feared after his death that workers would steal and kidnap his body. Because of this, they had the coffin poured over with asphalt and an 18-inch layer of concrete. The journalist and author Ambrose Bierce commented: "It is clear that after this painful loss, the family made sure that the son of a bitch would not get up and come back."

literature

  • Liston E. Leyendecker: Palace Car Prince: A Biography of George Mortimer Pullman . Publisher: University of Colorado Press, 1992.
  • August Mencke: The Railroad Passenger Car. Publisher: Johns Hopkins Press, Baltimore, MD 1957. Reprint, Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2000.
  • Elisabeth P. Myers: George Pullman: Young Sleeping Car Builder . Publisher: Bobbs-Merrill, Indianapolis 1963.
  • William Osborn Stoddard: George Mortimer Pullmann in: Men of business . Chapter XIII, Publisher: C. Scribner's Sons New York, 1893
  • Joseph Husband: The Story of the Pullman Car . Publisher: AC McClurg, Chicago 1917. Reprint: Black Letter Press, Grand Rapids, MI 1974.

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Pullman, George Mortimer
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American entrepreneur and inventor
DATE OF BIRTH March 3, 1831
PLACE OF BIRTH Brocton , Chautauqua County
DATE OF DEATH October 9, 1897
Place of death Chicago