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Philip Danforth Armour

1911 Encyclopedia Britannica

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PHILIP DANFORTH ARMOUR (1832-1901), American merchant and philanthropist, was born in Stockbridge, New York, on the 16th of May 1832. He was educated at Cazenovia Academy, Cazenovia, N.Y., worked for several years on his father's farm, and in 1852 with a small party went overland to California, a large part of the journey being made on foot. Here during the next four years he laid the foundations of his fortune. In 1856 he became associated with his friend, Frederick S. Miles, in a wholesale grocery and commission business at Milwaukee, In 1863 he became the head of the firm of Armour, Plankington & Co., pork packers, whose headquarters were at Milwaukee. He also obtained a large interest in the firm H. O. Armour & Co., which was founded by his brother, Herman Ossian Armour (1837-1901), and which, starting as a grain commission business, in 1868 established also a large pork-packing plant. Of this firm, the name of which was changed to Armour & Co. in 1870, he became the head in 1875, and thereafter the business made such rapid progress that in 1901 as many as 11,000 hands were employed. Besides contributing to many charitable enterprises, Armour founded the Armour Institute of Technology at Chicago in 1892 and the Armour Flats in Chicago, built for the purpose of supplying at a low rental good homes for working men and their families. He also contributed liberally to the Armour Mission in Chicago, which was founded in 1881 by his brother, Joseph Armour. At the time of his death, on the 6th of January 1901,. Philip D. Armour's private fortune was supposed to exceed $50,000,000.