Family tree of Commodore VANDERBILT
Industrialist, Businessman
Born Cornelius VANDERBILT
American entrepreneur who built his wealth in shipping and railroads
Born on May 27, 1794 in Staten Island, New York, USA , United States
Died on January 4, 1877 in New York, New York, USA
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Born in Staten Island, New York, Vanderbilt began working on his father's ferry in New York harbor as a boy, quitting school at the age of 11. At the age of 16 Vanderbilt decided to start his own ferry service. According to one version of events, he borrowed $100 from his mother to purchase a periauger (a shallow draft, two masted sailing vessel). However, according to the version of the first published account of his life, published in the magazine Scientific American in 1853, the periauger belonged to his father and he received half the profit. He began his business by ferrying freight and passengers between Staten Island and Manhattan.
... Cornelius Vanderbilt's great-great-grandfather, Jan Aertson or Aertszoon, was a Dutch farmer from the village of De Bilt in Utrecht, Netherlands, who emigrated to New York as an indentured servant in 1650. The Dutch van der ("of the"/"from") was eventually added to Aertson's village name to create "van der Bilt" ("from De Bilt"), which was eventually condensed to Vanderbilt.
Born in Staten Island, New York, Vanderbilt began working on his father's ferry in New York harbor as a boy, quitting school at the age of 11. At the age of 16 Vanderbilt decided to start his own ferry service. According to one version of events, he borrowed $100 from his mother to purchase a periauger (a shallow draft, two masted sailing vessel). However, according to the version of the first published account of his life, published in the magazine Scientific American in 1853, the periauger belonged to his father and he received half the profit. He began his business by ferrying freight and passengers between Staten Island and Manhattan.
On December 19, 1813, Vanderbilt married his first cousin, Sophia Johnson (1795–1868), daughter of his aunt Elizabeth Hand Johnson. They moved into a boarding house on Broad Street in Manhattan. He and his wife eventually had 13 children, one of whom died in childhood. In addition to running his ferry, Vanderbilt bought his brother-in-law John De Forest's schooner Charlotte, and traded in food and merchandise, in partnership with his father and others. But on November 24, 1817, a ferry entrepreneur named Thomas Gibbons asked Vanderbilt to captain his steamboat between New Jersey and New York. Though Vanderbilt kept his own businesses running, he became Gibbons's business manager.
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