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Although he himself lived on Water Street, Philadelphia merchant, banker, and philanthropist Stephen Girard (1750-1831) invested widely in Philadelphia real estate, so over time there have been several areas known as “Girard row,” including the 1100 block of Chestnut Street. This “Girard Row” of five houses on Spruce Street in the Society Hill neighborhood is a surviving example of the kind of income-producing rental buildings that Stephen Girard liked to build on his properties.Construction on these houses began in 1831, the last year of Stephen Girard’s life. They were constructed by mason John Struthers in a restrained Greek Revival style, after Girard's specifications. The houses feature marble facades on the basements and ground floors. In an 1842 report, Struthers, who worked on a hundred Girard buildings, noted that Stephen Girard liked marble fronts and also included them on several of his rental properties on Front Street and in his plans for the Girard block between 11/12th street.Stephen Girard died on December 26, 1831 and ownership of the property passed into his Estate, which continued the construction, completing it in 1833. Girard’s will instructed that his properties continue to be rented out, with the income going to support Girard College, a school for disadvantaged students which he also established in his will, and which still operates today. In the 20th century the Girard estate eventually sold the houses and they are now privately owned. Girard Row was included in the Philadelphia Register of Historic Places in 1957.

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These five Greek Revival homes in the Society Hill neighborhood give a glimpse into the landscape of 1830s Philadelphia. This “Girard Row” of five houses was constructed 1831-1833 by mason John Struthers on property owned by by merchant and financier Stephen Girard and are a surviving example of the income-producing rental buildings that Girard liked to build on his many properties throughout Philadelphia.

Girard Row (326-334 Spruce Street)

This trail includes a baker's dozen of historic buildings and other sites in Philadelphia that are closely connected to the life of businessman and philanthropist Stephen Girard (1750-1831), the richest Americam of his era. The tour begins at the home of Stephen Girard and continues on the the First and Second Bank of the United States, Girard Row, Pennsylvania Hospital, Girard College, and several other buildings and intuitions that are closely associated with Girard's influential life.

For the fifty-some years he called Philadelphia his home, French immigrant Stephen Girard (1750–1831) lived in residences along Water Street near the Delaware River waterfront. His first career was as a maritime merchant, hence basing himself within close proximity to the docks. Within two weeks of arriving in Philadelphia in June 1776, he had rented a store on Water Street, between Market and Arch. After relocating during the British occupation of Philadelphia, Girard returned to Water Street, and his first long-term residence was a building he rented on 31 North Water Street in 1778, which included a house above and a store below where he bought and sold goods wholesale. He lived in the house with servants and his wife, Mary Girard. When Mary was diagnosed with insanity in 1785 and later institutionalized, he took in his first mistress, Sally Bickham.  By the mid-1790s, Girard had roughly $250,000 to his name and desired a larger building for his increasingly successful business operations. In 1794, Girard purchased a plot of ground across the street at 23 North Water Street, on the block between present-day Market Street and Arch Street. The entire structure, which included a residential building and his counting-house, was constructed during 1795. When it was completed by early 1796, Girard moved into his new home with the help of Sally and his servants.  Water Street was a bustling hub of commercial activity during Girard’s life. The streets were filthy, the environment rowdy, and the air foul-smelling. Yet for Girard’s purposes, the house was optimally situated near the working docks. Girard had many vantage points from the higher stories of his residence to oversee his ships as they were preparing to set sail or returning from long voyages. Urgent news from his global agents about changing market prices or political upheaval interfering with business would be swiftly delivered to him after arriving at the harbor. Reflecting his strong sense of industry, the exterior and interior appearance of his dwelling was plain but boasted practicality and enterprise. His two-story public counting-house, where most of his maritime and commercial business took place, shared its left wall with the residential half of the property. While both had front entrances, the two facilities were connected with an internal door in-between for Girard’s use. The five-story house included: a wine cellar below ground, Girard’s private counting-house along with the kitchen and dining room on the first floor, the parlor and drawing rooms in the floor above, rooms for sleeping on the third floor, and servants' rooms on the top floor. It had a bathroom with running water and was heated with coal fireplaces. Although Girard’s wife Mary was institutionalized at Pennsylvania Hospital and they had no children, Girard’s sizable city residence was actively occupied by other relatives, young apprentices, and domestic staff. Hannah, an enslaved Black woman that Girard had owned since 1783, followed him from No. 23 to No. 31 on Water Street and continued working in his household. The servants completed domestic duties around the residence under the supervision of his housekeeper. When Sally left shortly after she helped him move into the house, Girard hired Polly Kenton as his next housekeeper and mistress. Polly got settled into the house, gradually bringing along four sisters and two nieces who would all work for Girard or call the place their home. After the death of his brother John Girard, Stephen also took custody of John’s three daughters. Young male apprentices would come and go throughout the years, learning under Girard’s mentorship at his counting-house to qualify them to start their own careers. Guests and visitors to the Girard residence were often French refugees, business partners, and the occasional party requesting a loan or charitable donation. Joseph Bonaparte, the ex-king of Spain who fled France after the defeat of his brother Napoleon Bonaparte, became a frequent face in the house while Girard advised him in financial and real estate matters. Other notable guests throughout the years included: Simon Bolivar’s brother Vincent, who asked for aid to finance their revolution in South America; Field Marshal Count Grouchy, one of the first refugees of the French Revolution to seek out Girard; and Henri Dominique Lallemand, a former French general who later married one of Girard’s nieces. Girard limited his social life to hosting small dinner parties where he invited such friends and distinguished French émigrés. On those Sunday afternoons after a full day of productivity and work, the Water Street dining table was generously lavished with delicious food and fine wines while the room filled with lively discussion about politics and business. During her 31-year term as mistress of the house, Polly assumed managerial duties of overseeing the operation of the household, supervising the children that passed through the residence, acting as hostess when guests visited, and was in charge of interior design. After Polly Kenton retired and retreated to the countryside, her young niece Emeline Kenton briefly filled the housekeeper role. Emeline had spent most of her childhood growing up in Girard’s home. Only a year later, Emeline got married and left the house. Jane Taylor, a middle-aged aunt of Emeline’s husband, took over the housekeeping and caretaking for the aging Girard in 1828. On December 26, 1831, 81-year-old Stephen Girard died in his Water Street home from flu and pneumonia. Four days later, a citywide funeral procession was held that began from his house and led to the Holy Trinity Church. His will freed Hannah and mandated that his servants be assisted in acquiring new employment. Girard left behind a grand fortune of $7.5 million dollars in money, property, and assets. His riches were mostly allocated to charitable purposes specified in his will, the most significant being an approximately $6 million dollar bequest for the construction and operation of a 1st-12th grade Philadelphia boarding school. Girard College, originally designated for poor white male orphans is still in operation today, serving financially-disadvantaged students. Girard’s will also left his furniture and belongings to the school and they were displayed at the main building of Girard College almost as soon as it opened in 1848.  With funding from Girard’s will, the City of Philadelphia made improvements to Water Street and built a new street on the waterfront called Delaware Avenue. For a little over a decade, Girard’s Water Street house was rented out, but it was eventually demolished in 1845. Rental warehouses were built on the plot of the former property to generate more funds for his will’s charitable projects. By the 1960s, construction of the new Interstate 95 highway along the Delaware River forced the city to bulldoze these warehouses, along with the rest of the Water Street block near the waterfront. The former site of Girard’s house now rests under the northbound I-95 highway lanes.  To view the site where Girard’s house once stood, walk up the Market Street pedestrian overpass between Market Street and Penn’s Landing and look north over the highway. Although Girard’s home no longer exists, its contents can still be seen today in the Founder’s Hall museum at Girard College.

Within two weeks of arriving in Philadelphia in June 1776, French immigrant Stephen Girard rented a store on Water Street, the street that would be home to the future multi-millionaire for most of his life. After relocating during the British occupation of Philadelphia, Girard returned to Water Street, where he would have two long-term residences: one at 31 Water Street that he rented beginning in 1778 and one he later built at 23 Water Street in 1796 and lived in until his death in 1831. Over those years, Girard would amass a fortune in shipping, banking, and real estate that made him the richest American of his time. The 23 Water Street home, located on the block between Market and Arch Streets, included a five-story house with an attached two-story counting-house for business. Here Girard and his housekeepers provided for numerous young relatives and teenage apprentices and entertained business associates and French émigrés. By the mid-20th century, Girard’s property and most the rest of Water Street had been torn down for construction of I-95. To view the spot where the house once stood, stroll along the Market Street pedestrian overpass and look north over the highway. Although the house is no longer extant, furniture and possessions from Stephen Girard’s home can be seen at the Founder’s Hall museum at Girard College.

Stephen Girard House (1796-1845)

When Philadelphia was laid out in William Penn and Thomas Holmes’s famous 1680s plan, Delaware Avenue (now partially renamed Columbus Boulevard) did not exist. Instead, Front Street was the street closest to the Delaware River. As settlement and commerce along the river increased, a closer street, King Street (later renamed Water St.) was laid down east of Front Street sometime in the late 1690s or early 1700s. Eventually, a footpath emerged even closer to the changing shoreline of docks and wharfs and in 1831 merchant, financier, and Water Street resident Stephen Girard left money in his will to improve port infrastructure by turning the path into Delaware Avenue. Born in France, mariner and merchant Stephen Girard landed in Philadelphia in 1776 and settled into rented quarters on Water Street, the street where he would live until his death in 1831. Over those 55 years Girard would become the richest American of his time as a merchant, banker, and landowner, a man intimately familiar with the port of Philadelphia and a strong proponent of improving infrastructure to support commerce. In his will, Girard left $500,000 to the city of Philadelphia for infrastructure projects, including: <blockquote>“To lay out, regulate, curb, light and pave a passage or street, on the east part of the city of Philadelphia, fronting the river Delaware, not less than twenty-one feet wide, and to be called Delaware Avenue, extending from South or Cedar Street, all along the east part of Water Street squares, and the west side of the logs, which form the heads of the docks, or thereabouts ; and… to remove or pull down all the buildings, fences and obstructions which may be in the way, and…to fill up the heads of such of the docks as may not afford sufficient room for the said street; to compel the owners of wharves to keep them clean and covered completely with gravel or other hard materials, and to be so levelled that water will not remain thereon after a shower of rain ; to completely clean and keep clean all the docks within the limits of the city, fronting on the Delaware ; and to pull down all platforms carried out, from the east part of the city over the river Delaware on piles or pillars.”</blockquote> In accordance with Girard’s will, Delaware Avenue was constructed from 1834 to 1835; the 25-foot wide street was paved with Belgian blocks and lit with gas lamps. The new street soon became a major thoroughfare for cargo and proved so popular that it was doubled in width to fifty feet between 1855-1865, lengthened beyond the Vine/South corridor in the 1870s, and widened again to 150 feet from 1897-1900. A cargo rail line and an elevated passenger rail line were both added in the 1890s, connecting with the docks, warehouses, and ferries along the waterfront. The elevated passenger was removed in 1938 following the demise of passenger ferries to New Jersey, but the freight rails of the Philadelphia Belt Line remain. In the 1960s and 70s, I-95 was constructed along the Delaware river waterfront, dividing Delaware Avenue from the city to the west. In Center City, the highway was sunk below the level of Front Street between Market and Lombard, with caps and bridges spanning the roadway; in other areas the interstate was largely elevated. In 1992, the portion of Delaware Avenue south of Spring Garden St. was renamed Columbus Boulevard on the 500th anniversary of his voyage. At the time, Philadelphia was the largest city without a street named for Columbus. The renaming was spearheaded by Philadelphia’s large Italian-American community, but opposed by members of the Lenni-Lenapi tribe, which led to the compromise to rename only a portion of the street. Development of Delaware Avenue continues to the present; in 2015 the street was extended northwards by over half a mile and a second phase of the Delaware Avenue Extension is slated to start in 2022.

Once the site of an improvised dockside footpath, Delaware Avenue was constructed 1834-1835 to improve access along the Philadelphia waterfront, using money left for this purpose by merchant and financier Stephen Girard. The street was widened and extended repeatedly through the 19th and 20th centuries, a project that continues to this day. In 1992 the portion of Delaware Avenue south of Spring Garden Street was renamed Christopher Columbus Boulevard.

Delaware Ave./Columbus Blvd.

The First Bank of the United States was chartered when President George Washington signed the Bank Bill in February of 1791. However, its creation was no forgone conclusion as then Secretary of State, Thomas Jefferson, led the opposition to its formation. The idea for a national bank was put forth by Secretary of the Treasury, Alexander Hamilton, as a means to secure the country’s financial well-being after the Revolutionary War and the failed Articles of Confederation. Hamilton believed the bank would achieve several necessary goals, to include establishing the secure credit of the United States, the paying off of federal and state Revolutionary War debts, the creation of a national currency, and as a means to raise and store money for the federal government.The arguments for and against the creation of the bank essentially boiled down to whether or not it was permitted under the federal government’s new framing document, the Constitution. Jefferson, who feared the power of a strong, centralized government and favored the continued existence of state banks, offered a strict interpretation of the Constitution. In this instance, he claimed that what the Constitution does not expressly allow, it prohibits. Hamilton, in the other hand, chose to interpret the Constitution in a loose manner. He claimed that what the Constitution does not expressly forbid, it allows, now known as the “implied powers” of the Constitution. As evidenced by what you’re reading, Hamilton’s argument swayed both houses of Congress and President Washington and the bank was created with a twenty-year charter.It was initially housed in Carpenters’ Hall and then was transferred to the new bank building in 1797. After the bank was not re-chartered, the building was purchased by Philadelphia business magnate Stephen Girard in 1812, who then operated his own bank from the premises. Before he bought the bank’s property, Girard was a strong advocate for the First Bank’s renewal, being its top individual shareholder shortly before the charter expired. The institution that Girard created and financed was a private unincorporated bank. Pennsylvania banks established by a group of people were required to be incorporated, but as the wealthiest American of his time Girard was able to exploit this legal loophole by maintaining sole ownership of the bank. Rival banks across the state felt threatened by the immediate success of this new competitor. They challenged the legality of Girard’s enterprise on several occasions, and refused to honor his bank’s notes when presented by customers. The War of 1812 erupted only shortly after the bank opened and in 1813 the federal government appealed to citizens of the young republic for a war loan of 16 million dollars. When subscriptions from the American public raised only half the necessary funds, Girard committed to fulfilling the rest of the crucial loan. He loaned 2.5 million dollars of his own fortune and found subscribers for the remainder, as investors were reassured by his confidence and example. In return, he requested that the Treasury deposit the loan money in his bank, adding legitimacy and reserves to the new bank. He also received a ¼ % commission on the subscriptions he arranged, an investment banking innovation. Later on, Girard's Bank would go on to arrange loans to the state legislature and even to President James Monroe.Stephen Girard, sole proprietor of Stephen Girard’s Bank, died in 1831. Girard Bank, a new incorporated and independently-run institution, later rented the building from Stephen Girard’s estate. The interior was remodeled in 1902 and Girard Bank moved its operations from the bank building in 1929. It was then acquired by the Independence National Historic Park in 1955 and was renovated in 1976. It served as a temporary visitor’s center in 1967, then as the park’s headquarters until they moved to the Merchants’ Exchange Building in 2000. Plans were underway to convert it into a Philadelphia Civil War museum, but it failed to gain the necessary state funding.

The First Bank of the United States is the country’s oldest bank building and the only federal building left from George Washington's presidency.  Completed in 1795, it served as the nation’s first central bank until 1811 when its charter was not renewed by Congress.  Wealthy businessman Stephen Girard operated his own private bank at this site afterwards for nearly two decades.  The bank is thought to have been designed by Samuel Blodgett, although some argue James Hoben was the architect.  Regardless, the three-story, neo-classically designed building provided a fitting home for the National Bank.  It is now part of the larger Independence National Historical Park and has been since 1955.  It is currently not open to the public while its future is being determined.  It was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1966 and achieved National Landmark Status in 1987.

First Bank of the United States

The United States came out of the War of 1812, which ended in 1815, in financial difficulty. It was in severe debt and state and local banks were causing chaos by being permitted to print their own bank notes. As a result, the push for a second national bank gained momentum, led by financiers John Jacob Astor, Jacob Barker, Stephen Girard, and David Parish and politicians Alexander Dallas and John C. Calhoun, and it was created with the stroke of President James Madison’s pen in 1816. Modeled after Alexander Hamilton’s First Bank, it opened its doors in January of 1817 and was responsible for all the financial transactions of the United States’ Government. It was also tasked with regulating the notes and credit issued by private and state banks, establishing a stable and secure national currency and controlling inflation, among other things. By 1832, it had established 25 branch offices in cities such as Boston, St, Louis, and Lexington.The bank came under severe criticism after the Panic of 1819, an extended recession that caused severe credit restrictions and massive unemployment. The bank’s reputation and standing was temporarily rebuilt under the guidance of its third president, Nicholas Biddle, and it was on sound footing by Andrew Jackson’s first inauguration in 1829. The bank’s constitutionality had also been established by the Supreme Court’s ruling in the McCulloch v. Maryland case of 1819. However, President Jackson still viewed the bank as unconstitutional and a corrupt institution run by the country’s elite. The bank became a major campaign issue during the election of 1832 as Jackson’s opponent, Henry Clay, sought its re-charter four years prior to its expiration. Jackson acted quickly when he vetoed the re-charter and then withdrew all federal funds from the bank after he was re-elected. The bank limped along until its original charter expired in 1836, when it became a private institution which was eventually liquidated in 1841. The building itself was designed by American architect, William Strickland, in the Greek Revival style. Strickland’s design was chosen over his mentor’s, Benjamin Latrobe. Strickland also designed the Merchants’ Exchange Building which sits a few blocks away. He used the Greek Parthenon as his model, including wide stairs leading to its main level and huge Doric columnns. It was constructed with Pennsylvania blue marble from 1819-1824. The building served numerous functions after the bank was not re-chartered, to include the Custom House of Philadelphia. Over the years, its interior was drastically altered and the only original items include its barrel-vaulted ceiling, marble columnns in the main room, and the side fireplaces. It now is home to an art gallery that focuses on the portraits of famous early Americans, many done by Charles Wilson Peale. The portraits include many well-known figures, such as Thomas Jefferson, James and Dolley Madison, and Alexander Hamilton.

Part of Philadelphia’s Independence National Historical Park, the building that is most famous for housing the Second Bank of the United States was completed in 1824.  It represented the nation’s second effort at creating a national bank after the First Bank was not re-chartered in 1811.  It served as the nation’s bank until it was dismantled, largely by President Andrew Jackson, in 1836.  The building now serves the city as an art gallery that features its “People of Independence” exhibit.  This exhibit displays over 150 portraits of influential 18th and 19th century Americans.  The building was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1987.

Second Bank of the United States

Although he himself lived on Water Street, Philadelphia merchant, banker, and philanthropist Stephen Girard (1750-1831) invested widely in Philadelphia real estate, so over time there have been several areas known as “Girard row,” including the 1100 block of Chestnut Street. This “Girard Row” of five houses on Spruce Street in the Society Hill neighborhood is a surviving example of the kind of income-producing rental buildings that Stephen Girard liked to build on his properties. Construction on these houses began in 1831, the last year of Stephen Girard’s life. They were constructed by mason John Struthers in a restrained Greek Revival style, after Girard's specifications. The houses feature marble facades on the basements and ground floors. In an 1842 report, Struthers, who worked on a hundred Girard buildings, noted that Stephen Girard liked marble fronts and also included them on several of his rental properties on Front Street and in his plans for the Girard block between 11/12th street. Stephen Girard died on December 26, 1831 and ownership of the property passed into his Estate, which continued the construction, completing it in 1833. Girard’s will instructed that his properties continue to be rented out, with the income going to support Girard College, a school for disadvantaged students which he also established in his will, and which still operates today. In the 20th century the Girard estate eventually sold the houses and they are now privately owned. Girard Row was included in the Philadelphia Register of Historic Places in 1957.

Established in 1789 to serve the German Catholic community, Holy Trinity Church was the first American parish created to serve a specific national or linguistic group.  Stephen Girard was buried in the churchyard in 1831, before being reinterred in Girard College in 1851. The churchyard is also referenced in Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s poem "Evangeline". In addition to the churchyard, Holy Trinity also acquired a strip of the St Mary’s graveyard between 5th and 6th street. Holy Trinity merged with St. Mary’s in 2009 and the church was closed in 2019. Mariner, merchant, banker, and philanthropist Stephen Girard (1750-1831) was one of America’s first millionaires and left approximately 80% of his estate to create Girard College, a boarding school for financially-disadvantaged students which still exists today. He had no children and his wife (buried at Pennsylvania Hospital) predeceased him, but he had indicated to his nieces that he wished to be buried at Holy Trinity. Born in Bordeaux France, Girard had been baptized Catholic and while largely non-practicing (and married in the Episcopal church), he never formally renounced his faith and so Bishop Francis Kenrick permitted the burial. Stephen Girard was interred on the north side of the yard, next to General Henri Lallemand, the first husband of his niece Henriette Girard. Girard was buried on December 30, 1831. Three thousand people marched in his funeral procession and twenty-thousand lined the streets. Flags were flown at half-mast. Girard’s body was brought into the church, but because of the presence of Girard’s Masonic brothers, who entered the church wearing Masonic jewels and insignia, Bishop Kenrick wrote that he “refused to go on with the [burial] rite of the Church and the body was buried without the presence of a priest.” Once Girard College was constructed, in 1851 Stephen Girard’s body was removed from Holy Trinity and reinterred in a marble sarcophagus in the main building. Holy Trinity churchyard is also associated with Longfellow’s poem "Evangeline", published in 1847, which tells the story of an Acadian expelled form Nova Scotia, who spends her life searching for her lost love. She finally moved to Philadelphia and works among the poor, finally finding her dying beloved as she cares for the sick in an epidemic and being buried with him. Longfellow had visited Philadelphia in 1824 and Holy Trinity is considered the best match for the “little Catholic churchyard” mentioned in his poem: <blockquote>Side by side, in their nameless graves, the lovers are sleeping.</blockquote><blockquote>Under the humble walls of the little Catholic churchyard,</blockquote><blockquote>In the heart of the city, they lie, unknown and unnoticed.</blockquote><blockquote>Daily the tides of life go ebbing and flowing beside them,</blockquote>

Established in 1789 to serve the German Catholic community, Holy Trinity Church was the first American parish created to serve a specific national or linguistic group. Stephen Girard was buried in the churchyard in 1831, before being reinterred in Girard College in 1851. The churchyard is also referenced in Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s poem "Evangeline". In addition to the churchyard, Holy Trinity also acquired a strip of the St. Mary’s graveyard between 5th and 6th street. Holy Trinity parish merged with St. Mary’s in 2009 and the church was closed in 2019.

Holy Trinity Churchyard

Founded by Dr. Thomas Bond and Benjamin Franklin, the Pine Building of Pennsylvania Hospital, which opened in 1756, is the site of many American firsts. The hospital itself was the first in the nation, and within its walls are the first surgical amphitheatre, first hospital apothecary, and first medical library (all dating to 1804). It was the first American hospital to treat mental illness as a curable sickness and not possession. On its grounds are a Colonial garden and the Physic Garden, which is dedicated to 18th century medicinal plants and herbs. Its staff has included the father of clinical medicine (Dr. Thomas Bond), the father of American psychiatry (Dr. Benjamin Rush), and the father of American surgery (Dr. Philip Syng Physick) [2; 5]. History of Pennsylvania HospitalPhiladelphia, by the middle of the 18th century, was a busy port and the fastest-growing city in the American colonies. Though populated primarily by a solid middle class, the city took in thousands of immigrants between 1730 and 1750, many of whom were poor and mentally or physically ill upon arrival. Dr. Thomas Bond (1712-1784), a Quaker from Maryland who had studied in both London and Paris, was appointed Philadelphia's Port Inspector for Contagious Diseases in 1739. In 1750, Bond proposed the idea of a Philadelphia hospital, which would be the first such facility in America. City leaders responded by asking Bond what Benjamin Franklin's view on the matter was. Bond and Franklin were old friends, fellow members of Franklin's Library Company and co-establishers of the American Philosophical Society and the Academy of Philadelphia (later the University of Pennsylvania). Though Bond had assumed Franklin would be disinterested in the idea of a hospital, Franklin strongly supported the idea [2; 4]. Franklin brought a signed petition before the Pennsylvania Assembly on January 20, 1751, proposing a small hospital "to care for the sick poor of the Province and for the reception and care of lunaticks" [2]. When some of the Assembly balked at the bill for the proposed undertaking, Franklin offered to raise 2,000 pounds from private citizens if the Assembly would match the amount. When Franklin returned with more than 2,000 pounds, the Assembly signed the bill, which was signed into law by Governor James Hamilton on May 11, 1751 [2].From 1752 until 1755, a temporary hospital was set up in the home of the late John Kinsey, Speaker of the Assembly prior to his death. A Quaker widow, Elizabeth Gardner, was appointed matron, and Dr. Bond volunteering his services as a doctor. The first patients (six of them psychiatric patients) were admitted on February 11, 1753. The Board of Managers refused admission to all incurable patients except "lunatics", patients suffering from small pox or other infectious diseases (until proper facilities were built), and women and children unless the children were cared for off-site. All admitted patients were required sponsorship by two tax-paying citizens who agreed to pay burial expenses or transportation to their homes upon recovery. In part, this was due to the Quaker value of work ethic, and Quaker sensibilities were also behind some of the hospital rules, including that patients were required to follow the orders of doctors and nurses and to help care for other patients if they were capable of doing so. Profane language, gambling, wearing street clothes in bed, and spitting on the floors were strictly prohibited [2; 4].The first tract of land for the hospital was purchased from the Penn family in 1754, and the cornerstone for the East Wing was inscribed by Benjamin Franklin and laid the following year. The Colonial/Federal style Pine Building was designed by architect Samuel Rhoads, who would later join the hospital's Board of Managers. The East Wing was opened to patients in 1756. Psychiatric patients were held in cells on the ground floor (now considered the basement), a men's ward occupied the second floor, and the women's ward was on the third, with the top floor housing hospital employees and patients who required isolation. The hospital's official seal is an image of the Good Samaritan, its inscription, "Take care of him and I will repay thee" [2]. In 1762, Englishman Dr. John Fothergill, a friend of Benjamin Franklin's, donated the first book to Pennsylvania Hospital's medical library; five years later, Thomas and Richard Penn donated the remainder of the square at Spruce and Pine Streets and 8th and 9th Streets to the hospital. In 1766, Bond began a series of clinical lectures for students; he is considered the American father of clinical medicine for these lectures. Pennsylvania's first medical resident, Jacob Ehrenzeller, was appointed in 1773, and served until 1778. Pennsylvania Hospital cared for both Revolutionaries and British soldiers during the American Revolution. Four members of the Board of Managers were exiled, and the hospital's finances were impacted for years after the end of the war. In 1780, the hospital acquired its own fire engine, a hand-pumper built by Philadelphian Richard Mason, which is on display in the Great Court of the Pine Building today [2].Dr. Benjamin Rush (1745-1813), now hailed as the father of American psychiatry, joined the Pennsylvania Hospital staff in 1783. Rush was a graduate of the University of Edinburgh, Scotland, and had studied in London and Paris for two years before returning to Philadelphia in 1769. He established his own medical practice, as well as taking on the roles of Resident Port-Physician, Fleet Surgeon of the Pennsylvania Navy, Physician General of the Military Hospital of the Middle Department of the American Army, President of the Philadelphia Medical Society, and Fellow of the College of Physicians. As if his medical obligations were not enough, Rush was also President of the American Society for the Abolition of Slavery. Like Franklin, had signed the Declaration of Independence in 1776. In the same year, Rush wrote a treatise on military medicine which was considered the definitive work on the subject until the American Civil War. He put a stop to the chaining and locking up of mentally ill patients in basement cells, as well as the treatment of the mentally ill as a form of entertainment by the townspeople. Rush was the first American physician to treat mental illness as a sickness rather than a spiritual affliction, believing that psychiatric problems were the result of an inflammation of the brain [2; 4]. In addition to recreational and occupational therapy, Rush also designed and utilized a "tranquilizing chair" which confined patients, under the theory that decreasing muscular action would slow the circulation of blood to the brain [4]. Some of the psychiatric patients to be treated at Pennsylvania Hospital during Rush's tenure included his own son, John Rush; Mary Girard, the wife of merchant and financier Stephen Girard; and the painter Raphaelle Peale, son of Charles Willson Peale. For both mental and physical illnesses, Rush was a proponent of the "heroic" treatment of illness (blood-letting and purging) [2; 4]. During Philadelphia's 1793 Yellow Fever epidemic (see <a href="https://theclio.com/web/entry?id=23382" target="_blank">Lazaretto Quarantine Station</a>), a fierce debate arose between physicians who treated the disease through "heroic" measures and those who believed (rightly) that such treatments taxed the patient's already weakened body [3; 4]. Particularly since Yellow Fever results in massive loss of fluids via bleeding, vomiting, and diarrhea, further inducement of the same symptoms by doctors, in fact, likely contributed to the death toll caused by the epidemic, which killed approximately one fifth of the city's population [3]. Nonetheless, Rush and his supporters (including Dr. Philip Syng Physick, who joined the Pennsylvania Hospital staff the following year) truly believed in their cure—so much so that when Rush and Physick contracted the fever themselves, Rush bled both himself and Physick. Both physicians recovered, though not because of the treatment [2; 4].As the hospital's reputation for compassionate care of the mentally ill under Rush's watch increased, so too did the number of mentally ill patients, who outnumbered the physically ill of Pennsylvania Hospital by the turn of the century [2; 4]. Though construction had begun on the west wing and center section of the Pine Building in 1794, the Board of Managers struggled financially to pay for the necessary labor and materials, and the state government provided far less funding than was needed. Private philanthropists enabled the completion and extension of the west wing, which was designated for the care of the mentally ill, in 1796-97. The central section of the Pine Building, though not completed until 1804, was in use beginning in 1800. Designed as a buffer between the physically and mentally ill, the central section was built in the Federal style, slightly updated from Rhoads' original plan in order to save money. It housed a residential area for servants and staff, the nation's first apothecary, the nation's first medical reference library, the administrative center in the Great Court, and America's first surgical amphitheatre on the third floor. Another national first, Pennsylvania Hospital created its "lying-in" (maternity) department in 1803 [2].It was in the Pennsylvania Hospital surgical amphitheatre that Dr. Physick earned his reputation as the father of American surgery, the first medical specialty of the nation. With seating for 180 and standing room for 300, surgeries were observed by both medical students and local citizens, who paid to watch operations, which were performed on sunny days between 11 am and 2 pm (for optimum light). Common surgical procedures included the removal of tumors, bladder stones, and cataracts; amputations; and repair of hernias and fractures [2].In 1804, a statue of William Penn was donated to the hospital by his grandson, John Penn. It was placed in the hospital gardens, where it still remains today. The hospital gardens, which were used to exercise psychiatric patients, contain wisteria vines and azalea bushes estimated to be over 100 years old. The medical library was moved to its permanent home in 1807 (though it was temporarily used as the maternity ward from 1824-1835); this collection has grown to over 13,000 volumes of medical, scientific, botanical, and natural history books, as well as hospital archives, paintings, photographs, and memorabilia [2]. Several books date to the 15th century, before the printing press was invented, and the most complete collection in the United States of medical books published between 1750 and 1850, including Benjamin Rush's 1812 Observations and Inquiries upon the Diseases of the Mind [2; 4]. Artist Benjamin West donated his painting "Christ Healing the Sick in the Temple" to Pennsylvania Hospital in 1817. The hospital built a special area for it and charged admission to visitors to see it; 30,000 people came in the first year, raising $15,000 for the hospital [2].In 1832, a resolution was passed to build a separate facility for proper care of the mentally ill, who outnumbered physically ill patients by two to one. The Pennsylvania Hospital for the Insane (later The Institute of Pennsylvania Hospital) was established at present-day 44th and Market Streets, on a large farm in 1841, and later included a separate ward for men at 49th and Market, built in 1859 (this campus remained in use until 1997, when the buildings were sold and the psychiatric treatment center returned to the Pennsylvania Hospital campus itself). Dr. Thomas Story Kirkbride, a Quaker, was named Superintendent in 1844, becoming one of the founding members of the organization which we now know as the American Psychiatric Association, as well as the still-operational Ivy League Private Psychiatric Hospital Group. Like his predecessor, Benjamin Rush, Kirkbride believed that mental illness could be cured. He practiced "moral treatment," including occupational therapy, recreational activities such as the on-site swimming pools, and educational opportunities including libraries for the patients. In addition, he believed in helping patients participate in "normal" social activities, including "magic lantern" shows, an early form of slide projection using candles for illumination. Guest speakers came to talk patients through the slides. Shows included themes of astronomy, history, religion, temperance, and travelogues [4].Meanwhile, at the Pine Building, surgeons began to use anesthesia for female patients in 1846; male patients received the more traditional surgery preparations of physicians getting them drunk, giving them opium, or tapping them unconscious with a mallet. Not until the 1890s would sterilization be common practice in America, at Pennsylvania Hospital or elsewhere. Nonetheless, Pennsylvania Hospital's reputation for surgery drew in 124 Civil War casualties for special treatment. In 1898, approximately 300 wounded in the Spanish American War were brought to the hospital, and during World War I, Pennsylvania Hospital sent units to France at Base Unit No. 10, where 48,000 patients were treated. During World War II, the hospital's 52nd Evacuation Hospital served the Pacific Theater [2].The hospital established its Women's Building (now called the Spruce Building) for obstetrics and gynecology in 1929 (moved to the Preston Building in 1961), and several specialized units in the 1950s and 1960s, including neurological intensive care, coronary, orthopedic, diabetes, oncology and urology, hospice, and outpatient mental health. To honor the hospital's 225th anniversary and the bicentennial of American Independence in 1976, the Pine Building underwent restoration, returning to traditional Colonial colors, refurbishing the William Penn statue and 150-year-old Portuguese tile in the Great Court (the first floor of the central section), and the creation of the Physic Garden, which had been planned and approved in 1774, but never realized. Originally designed by Martha Ludes Garra, the Physic Garden contains medicinal plants and herbs used in the 18th century, and was finally planted with the help of the Philadelphia Committee of the Garden Club of America [2].In 1997, Pennsylvania Hospital and the health system of the University of Pennsylvania (also founded by Benjamin Franklin) merged. The hospital continues groundbreaking work, particularly in the fields of fertility and psychiatric treatment. The historic Pine Building is open to the public, and several <a href="http://www.uphs.upenn.edu/paharc/collections/exhibits/" target="_blank">online exhibits</a> are available through the hospital's historic library. These include Anatomical Drawings, Flower to Pharmacy Exhibition, Natural History, Pennsylvania Hospital Serves in War, Psychiatry, Schools of Nursing at Pennsylvania Hospital (1914-1965), Surgical Amphitheatre, and Works that Altered the Course of Modern Medicine [2].Historic Marker Inscription:Pennsylvania HospitalThis is the first hospital in the U.S. Chartered by Colonial Assembly in 1751 for "relief of the sick poor." Benjamin Franklin and Dr. Thomas Bond were its chief founders. First building, erected in 1755, is still used [1].East Wing Cornerstone Inscription: IN THE YEAR OF CHRIST / MDCCLV / GEORGE THE SECOND HAPPILY REIGNING / (FOR HE SOUGHT THE HAPPINESS OF HIS PEOPLE) / PHILADELPHIA FLOURISHING / (FOR ITS INHABITANTS WERE PUBLICK SPIRITED) / THIS BUILDING / BY THE BOUNTY OF THE GOVERNMENT, / AND OF MANY PRIVATE PERSONS, / WAS PIOUSLY FOUNDED / FOR THE RELIEF OF THE SICK AND MISERABLE. / MAY THE GOD OF MERCIES / BLESS THIS UNDERTAKING. / LAID MAY 28, 1755 / as written by Benjamin Franklin [2].

Founded by Dr. Thomas Bond and Benjamin Franklin, the Pine Building of Pennsylvania Hospital, which opened in 1756, is the site of many American firsts. The hospital itself was the first in the nation, and within its walls are the first surgical amphitheatre, first hospital apothecary, and first medical library (all dating to 1804). It was the first American hospital to treat mental illness as a curable sickness and not possession. On its grounds are a Colonial garden and the Physic Garden, which is dedicated to 18th century medicinal plants and herbs. Its staff has included the father of clinical medicine (Dr. Thomas Bond), the father of American psychiatry (Dr. Benjamin Rush), and the father of American surgery (Dr. Philip Syng Physick) [2; 5].

Pennsylvania Hospital

The Stephen Girard building, now the Hilton Canopy hotel, stands on a city block once entirely owned by Philadelphia merchant, banker, and philanthropist Stephen Girard. Although he himself lived on Water Street, Girard invested widely in real estate and on July 1, 1807 he purchased the block bounded by Market, Chestnut, 11th and 12th. He bought the land from John Dunlap (known for printing first version of Declaration of Independence) for $101,820; apart from Dunlap’s house, built in 1790, the block was largely undeveloped. In 1817, Stephen Girard rented the Dunlap house on the southeast corner of 12th and Market Street to Joseph Bonaparte. Joseph was Napoleon’s older brother, who had come to America after his brother’s defeat. According to a popular tale, Bonaparte apparently liked his new environs and offered to purchase the entire block by covering the entire acreage with Spanish milled dollars. Girard supposedly agreed, but only if Bonaparte stood the dollars on edge, thus putting an end to that discussion. Stephen Girard’s original will, written in 1830, stated that after his death the block would be used as the location for a new school for disadvantaged children that Girard would endow. However in 1831, Girard purchased a larger plot of land just outside the city (now 21st and Girard Ave) and changed his will to place the school, eventually named Girard College, on that parcel. But the block remained (and remains) integrally connected to Girard College, since Stephen Girard’s will indicated that the land should continue to be rented out, with the income going to support the school. An undated map of the block, circa 1831, reveals the plans to develop the block as rental property, with Dunlap Street (running east/west) bisecting eighty-two properties, while twenty foot alleys again divided the square into four equal rows. All but twenty parcels face either north or south; ten are fronted on 11th Street, the remaining ten overlook 12th Street. Dunlap Street (named after the John Dunlap house) was renamed Girard Street by 1839, and in the 20th century was ultimately changed to Ludlow Street to correspond to similar streets on adjacent blocks. Over the 19th century, the block would be transformed as the residential properties gave way to commercial assets. At one point the Chestnut Street frontage became known as "piano row" for its concentration of piano sales and repair shops. In 1889, N. Snellenberg a Philadelphia department store moved onto the block and would be a city fixture until its closure in 1962, eventually occupying the entire block front along Market Street. The Stephen Girard Building designed by Girard College alumnus James H. Windrim, opened in 1897. Seven dwellings on Girard Street were demolished to make way for the new structure. It served as office space for the Board of Directors of City Trusts, which managed the Girard Estate, and rental office space. An ideal location, it was close to the railroad terminal, hotels, restaurants, City Hall, the courts and the principal trolley car lines.  Modern planning to redevelop the block as “East Market” began in 2008, with elements of the new construction opening to the public beginning in 2018. Today the Hilton Canopy hotel occupies the historic Stephen Girard building.

The Stephen Girard building, now the Hilton Canopy hotel, was built in 1897 and stands on a city block once entirely owned by Philadelphia merchant, banker, and philanthropist Stephen Girard (1750-1831). Although he himself lived on Water Street, Girard invested widely in real estate and on July 1, 1807 he purchased the block bounded by Market, Chestnut, 11th and 12th . Girard originally planned to situate Girard College on this block, but he later purchased a larger property specifically for the school and this site was developed as commercial property to financially support the school.

Stephen Girard Building/Girard Block

Yellow fever is a mosquito-borne viral disease, which causes fever, chills, muscle pain, nausea, and in serious cases, liver damage, which leads to the skin and eyes of its victims taking on its namesake yellow color. The cause of yellow fever wouldn’t be confirmed until 1900; in the 18th century opinions were divided between those who thought it was person-to-person contagious and those who thought it was caused by contaminated air, known as miasma. The Aedes aegypti mosquito favors prefers warmer climates, so yellow fever was not endemic to Philadelphia. The last major Philadelphia outbreak had been in 1762, but the disease-carrying mosquitoes were carried there in 1793 by ships from the Caribbean. The first cases emerged in July and early August and on August 19 Benjamin Rush officially diagnosed the epidemic as yellow fever. As the disease (and and news about it) spread, residents with the means began to flee the city, along with the state and federal governments, both then located in Philadelphia. The city almshouse was closed to the sick so those who were infected but could not afford care were sent to a makeshift quarantine shelter in an amphitheater at 12th and Market that had been built for Ricketts Circus.Faced with objections from local residents, the Guardians of the Poor requisitioned the 150-acre Bush Hill estate on August 28, 1793. Bush Hill was located outside the city (which has since expanded) and its owner, William Hamilton, “was then absent, and had no agent in the city.” Initially care at the hospital was poorly run and disorganized. A contemporary account by Mathew Carey claimed that the sick “were left almost entirely destitute of every assistance. The sick, the dying, and the dead were indiscriminately mingled together. The ordure and other evacuations of the sick were allowed to remain in the most offensive state imaginable.” On September 10, Mayor Matthew Clarkson called for citizens to form a Committee for the Relief of the Sick. The Committee first met on September 12 and three days later, Committee members Stephen Girard, a merchant, and Peter Helm, a cooper, volunteered to take charge of Bush Hill. Helm managed the exterior department while Girard managed the interior and assisted with care of the sick. Girard and Helm turned Bush Hill around, ensuring that the hospital was properly staffed and that the patients were properly evaluated, clothed, fed, housed and treated. Two doctors, Jean Deveze (lately arrived from San Domingue--modern Haiti--and familiar with yellow fever) and Benjamin Duffield were engaged to attend regularly at the hospital and Bush Hill followed the “French Method” of healing, which consisted of rest and fresh air rather than "heroic" measures such as purging and bloodletting. According to Carey the patients received “broth with rice, bread, boiled beef, veal, mutton, and chicken, with cream of rice to those whose stomachs would not bear stronger nourishment. Their second meal was at six o'clock, when they had broth, rice, boiled prunes, with cream of rice. The sick drank at their meals porter, or claret and water. Their constant drink between meals was centaury tea, and boiled lemonade.” In its reorganized state, eleven rooms and two entries of the Bush Hill mansion were allotted for the sick, for a total of “one hundred and forty bedsteads”. Men and women were separated and one room was set aside for the critically ill and another for the dying. An additional frame house was built by the Committee, with two more sick rooms and a loft for convalescents. Other convalescents were housed in the barn. Matrons and doctors also had quarters in all these buildings. To the west of the main building, the Committee built a new structure to serve as a morgue. The fever finally abated in the late fall, as November frosts killed off the mosquitoes that carried the disease. Approximately 5000 people, 10% of the city's population had died. Bush Hill was finally closed as a yellow fever hospital in January 1794, although it was rented as a general infectious disease hospital for the next year and a half. In the aftermath of the epidemic, Philadelphia founded a permanent Board of Health in 1794 to undertake public health planning. Unfortunately, waves of yellow fever returned to Philadelphia repeatedly over the next dozen years, with particularly deadly outbreaks in 1797/98/99, forcing repeated cycles of evacuation and return to the city before the disease finally abated by 1820.

In August of 1793, a deadly outbreak of yellow fever began to sweep through the city of Philadelphia; over the next three months approximately 10% of the city’s population would die as a result of the epidemic. Bush Hill, an estate outside the city belonging to William Hamilton was requisitioned and turned into a fever hospital. Although two-fifths of Philadelphia's population had fled to the countryside, citizens Stephen Girard and Peter Helm remained in the city and volunteered to supervise the hospital. Doctors Jean Deveze and Benjamin Duffield cared for the patients at Bush Hill according to the "French method" of rest and rehabilitation. There is nothing left of Bush Hill today; the house was demolished in 1875 and the area is now home to the Community College of Philadelphia. 

Bush Hill Hospital (1793)

This bronze statue of businessman and philanthropist Stephen Girard, sculpted by J. Massey Rhind, was originally installed on the plaza outside City Hall in 1897. The work was relocated to the Art Museum in 1977. Born in Bordeaux, France, Stephen Girard (1750-1831) came to Philadelphia in 1776 and made immense fortunes in shipping, banking and real estate that combined to make him the wealthiest American of his time. Stephen Girard left approximately 80% of his estate to create Girard College, a boarding school for financially-disadvantaged students which still exists today. It was the largest private charitable donation in American history to that point. This statue was dedicated at City Hall on May 20, 1897, Girard’s 177th birthday, in honor of the approaching 50th anniversary of Girard College, which opened in 1848. The money for the statue was raised by subscription, chiefly from Girard alumni, and 1766 alumni and current students marched in a mile-long parade to the dedication.  Like Stephen Girard, the sculptor J. Massey Rhind (1860-1936) was an immigrant. Scottish born, he came to America in 1889 and had a flourishing practice in architectural and monumental sculpture. He was chosen for the Girard project out of twenty-five sculptors who submitted initial sketches. Stephen Girard never sat for a portrait during his lifetime, so later representations are reliant on written accounts, as well as works commissioned shortly after his death, including an 1832 oil portrait by Bass Otis and an 1833 marble sculpture by Nicolas Gevelot. Massey depicts Girard in a casual pose, holding his glasses in his proper right hand. Girard was blind in his right eye from birth or early childhood. The base of the sculpture features Girard’s life dates on the front and a dedication on the back to “Philadelphia's Greatest Philanthropist/ Erected By Alumni of Girard College And The People Of This City And Commonwealth/ 1897” The remaining two sides of the base feature bas relief plaques: one shows Girard as a mariner and merchant with his ship “The Water Witch”; the other is a tribute to his philanthropy, showing a scene in front of the main building of Girard College. Inside the figure are two sealed copper tubes, containing a copy of Girard’s will, documents and photos relating to Girard College and the statue, and newspapers of the day.

This bronze statue of businessman and philanthropist Stephen Girard, sculpted by J. Massey Rhind, was originally installed on the plaza outside City Hall in 1897. The work was relocated to Reyburn Plaza in 1928 and later to the Art Museum. Born in Bordeaux, France, Stephen Girard (1750-1831) came to Philadelphia in 1776 and made immense fortunes in shipping, banking and real estate that combined to make him the wealthiest American of his time.

Stephen Girard Statue

French immigrant Stephen Girard (1750-1831) died in his adopted city of Philadelphia in 1831, leaving behind a multi-million dollar fortune earned from a lifetime of maritime trade, banking, and real estate. In his will, the philanthropist dictated that most of his wealth should be used to build and operate a boarding school for poor, white, male orphans. He originally intended that it would be located on a block between Market and Chestnut Streets and 11th and 12th Streets that he owned in Center City, but in 1831, he bought the 45-acre Peel Hall Farm and added a codicil to his will placing the school on this larger tract of land. Girard hoped that by providing a “better education, and a more comfortable maintenance” than the city’s publicly-funded schools or orphanages could offer, students would become productive, independent members of society. Girard endowed the school with $6 million of his $7.5 million dollar fortune for its construction and operation, the largest philanthropic gift in American history at the time. Stephen Girard detailed many specifications for the establishment of the school he would endow, from the subjects that students should be taught to the dimensions of the main building where students would learn.  Girard College opened its doors to almost one hundred orphan students on January 1, 1848. Students entered the school between six to ten years old, and were required to leave by age 18. Admission preference, as per Girard’s will, was given first towards orphans from Philadelphia, second to those living in the rest of Pennsylvania, then the city of New York, then New Orleans. The admissions department’s definition of “orphan” only required the child applicant to have a deceased father. Youth lived in boarding dormitories year-round, where they were supervised by household staff. Intending that the school should be non-sectarian, Girard’s will controversially banned clergy from setting foot on campus, but called for students to be taught “the purest principles of morality.” Thus, students were led in daily non-denominational services by College officers or invited laymen.  Educational levels at Girard College were initially organized into three departments: Primary Department No. 2 for the youngest students, Primary Department No. 1 similar to middle school grades, and a Principal Department for the highest level of students. Although division of classes and grades changed often in the 19th century, the youngest levels were consistently taught basic knowledge in reading, writing, and some arithmetic. These studies continued in the middle years, with the addition of science and history introduced. Advanced subjects for the high school equivalent were taught by specialized professors.  Initially, the school placed graduating students in the apprenticeship of master craftsmen before they reached the age of 18, as mandated by the founder’s will. In 1861, a manual labor department was established to prepare students with basic skills in several mechanical arts before they became apprentices. By the late 19th-century, the societal decline in the apprenticeship system meant Girard College was struggling to secure enough suitable apprenticeship placements for their graduates. The Mechanical School opened in 1884 as the successor to the manual labor department and a replacement for apprenticeships. Older pupils were enrolled in this secondary curriculum where they attained a variety of mechanical skills including metalworking, woodworking, carpentry, and electrical mechanics. The High School also offered a business course, with classes in accounting, typing, and finance. More Girard College graduates began pursuing higher education in the early decades of the 20th century and post-secondary enrollment climbed in the post-World War II era.  As the school constructed new campus buildings to accommodate more youth, Girard College was able to admit even more orphan boys. Student enrollment reached its peak at 1,733 students in 1940. Enrollment at institutions for orphans declined across the nation after WWII, as financial safety nets in the form of social security for widowed mothers provided families with more options, and advances in healthcare extended the survival of working fathers. Confronting the will’s restrictions on race proved to be a lengthy battle and a key struggle of the northern civil rights movement. In 1954, the Supreme Court’s ruling in the landmark case of Brown v. Board of Education declared that “separate but equal” education in public schools was unconstitutional. Although Girard College was privately funded through Girard’s bequest, it was publicly managed. The North Philadelphia neighborhood around Girard College had become home for an increasing number of African American residents. Yet, Girard College remained all white, owing to the “poor, white, male orphan” qualification required in Stephen Girard’s will. In 1954, African-American activist, lawyer, and Philadelphia city council member Raymond Pace Alexander brought a lawsuit on behalf of boys denied admission on the basis of race. Although the case ultimately went to the Supreme Court, it did not result in the school’s desegregation. In the 1960s, Cecil B. Moore, the newly elected leader of the Philadelphia branch of the NAACP, reignited the issue and beginning on May 1, 1965 he organized daily protests outside of the wall of the Girard College. On August 3, 1965 Martin Luther King came to Girard and gave his support to the activists, making a speech announcing that “the walls would crumble like the walls of Jericho.” After 7 months and 17 days of daily protests, a new lawsuit was filed in December 1965. This new suit eventually forced the desegregation of the school and in 1968 the first four African-American boys and the first two boys of Asian descent were enrolled as students.  Further enrollment changes happened in the 1970s and 80s. In hopes of admitting more students, Girard College amended its admission policy in 1977 to accept “functional orphans” ­– children from single-parent families who do not necessarily have a deceased father. This measure increased the number of applicants significantly and reversed the downward trend of student enrollment. In 1982, following the filing of a law suit by the Women’s Law Project and N.O.W. on behalf of a female applicant, the city requested and received permission from the Orphans Court to put aside the will’s male-only requirement. The school admitted its first girls in 1984, starting with an initial cohort in the elementary school. Girard became fully coeducational as these students aged and the class of 1993 was the first to include female graduates. Instruction in the Mechanical School was phased out in the 1980s, and the school’s curriculum became exclusively college preparatory in the 1990s. In 2009, Autumn Adkins Graves became the first African American and female president of Girard College. Girard College transitioned to a 5-day boarding program in the early 2010s, in which all students board on campus during the week and return home for the weekend.  Today, the 1st-12th grade school continues to provide full scholarships that cover schooling and boarding for all students. Girard College is organized into an elementary, middle, and high school. The high school’s academic focus centers on college prep, boasting a 100% college acceptance rate for all of its students. The campus’s varsity-level athletics include soccer, basketball, track, baseball, and softball. Girard College has been a major site for civic engagement, such as serving as the site of Philadelphia’s annual Martin Luther King Day of Service program since 2010. Its alumni have made substantial impact in the local community and American society.

Girard College is a 1st-12th grade independent school in Philadelphia that has provided free education and boarding for financially disadvantaged students since it first opened in 1848. Despite the name “College,” Girard has always been a residential school for students between the ages of six and eighteen. The boarding school was created and financed through the will of Stephen Girard, one of the first millionaires in US history, who originally endowed the school for “poor white male orphans.” Owing to the rigorous efforts of civil rights activists to desegregate the school, Girard admitted its first non-white students in 1968; the school became coeducational in 1984. Today, Girard students represent various cultural backgrounds, but all come from families with demonstrated financial need and with one or no birth parents living at home. For much of its history, the school taught a dual curriculum of academic subjects and vocational skill training; today it is fully college-preparatory. Girard College is a significant site in local history and a place of opportunity, student life, and achievement for many generations of students. 

Please note that Girard College is an active residential school, and campus is only open to the public for advertised events. Founder’s Hall Museum is open to the public for walk-in visitation on Thursdays, 9:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. unless otherwise noted, with additional times available by appointment. Visitors are required to check in with the Security Office and present photo ID upon arrival.

Girard College

Born in Bordeaux France, Stephen Girard (1750-1831) came to Philadelphia in 1776 and made immense fortunes in shipping, banking and real estate that combined to make him the wealthiest American of his time. When he died in 1831, he left nearly all of his multi-million dollar fortune to charity, focusing especially on education. The vast bulk of his estate went to create Girard College, a boarding school for financially-disadvantaged students which still exists today. Girard also left two other education-related bequests: $10,000 to the Comptrollers of the Philadelphia Public Schools for “the use of the Schools upon the Lancaster system in the first section of the first school district of Pennsylvania” and $6000 to create a school in Passyunk Township. The current Stephen Girard school, a public school in the Philadelphia school district, is a descendant of this Passyunk school. In 1797, Stephen Girard bought a 70-acre stretch of farmland in Passyunk township, which was then outside the city of Philadelphia. He continued to work, improve and expand the land he called “my place” through his life and remembered the township in his will. Girard’s will called for four men of Passyunk Township to: <blockquote>"purchase a suitable piece of ground, as near as may be in the centre of said township, and thereon erect a substantial brick building, sufficiently large for a school-house, and the residence of a school-master, one part thereof for poor male white children, and the other part for poor female white children of said township”</blockquote> He indicated that the completed school and any unexpended funds were to be turned over to a “board of directors” composed of townsmen and “and I do hereby recommend to the citizens of said township to make additions to the fund whereof I have laid the foundation “ A brick schoolhouse was duly built and opened in 1833 with approximately thirty students.Unfortunately as a late 19th-century history put it, "No one responded to Mr. Girard's recommendation that additions be made to the fund founded by him, and the trustees discovered that they had insufficient means with which to properly carry on the school for any length of time. It struggled along for several years, but was finally closed." The building was given to the school board and reopened as a public school in 1867. The public “Stephen Girard Combined Higher Primary School” eventually outgrew its small brick structure and a second, much large stone building was constructed on the same site in 1901. The current brick Stephen Girard Elementary School is the third school building to occupy the ground and is a public school now serving students in kindergarten through fourth grade.

Stephen Girard (1750-1831) came to Philadelphia in 1776 and made immense fortunes in shipping, banking and real estate that combined to make him the wealthiest American of his time, When he died in 1831, among his bequests was money to create a school for both boys and girls in Passyunk Township, an area where he had owned a farm for decades. The school opened in 1833, but eventually closed and the building was turned over to the school district in 1867. The current Stephen Girard Elementary School, a public school in the Philadelphia school district, is the third school building on the site.

Stephen Girard Elementary School

In 1797, Stephen Girard (1750-1831), an industrious French immigrant and one of America’s first millionaires, bought a 70-acre stretch of farmland outside of his adopted city of Philadelphia. This property was located outside of the old city limits, in a town to the southeast known as the Passyunk Township (this town would be absorbed into Philadelphia after the 1854 Act of Consolidation). Girard managed this working farm personally, later expanding the boundaries by more than 500 vast acres of fertile land. He had long been in the business of purchasing real estate and erecting homes to rent or sell, but the farm he fondly referred to as “my place” would remain a piece of his personal estate. Along with the initial purchase of the land, Girard also acquired a farmhouse. Gentilhommiere (French for “small manor house”) was lived in by the foreman’s family, farmers, and servants he employed. Throughout the years, the size of this residence extended to include new wings and quarters, leaving traces of the immigrant’s aesthetic tastes in the French architectural details (for example, the casement windows located in the center block are of the French style). Among the various occupations he juggled as merchant, businessman, and later a banker, the aging Girard would incorporate farmwork into his daily diligent routine. He rode out from his bank or his home near the Delaware waterfront down to the farm nearly every day of the growing season, even on Sundays or during inclement weather. Nursing fruit trees and beds, butchering oxen and pigs, and working the fields alongside his employed farmers became one of his favorite regular pastimes. The wealthy farmer experimented with cultivating various crops that his globe-trotting merchant ships brought back to the docks of Philadelphia, including artichokes and quince fruit. When his farm bore high-quality harvests, Girard had the fruits of his farm’s labor transported and sold at city produce stalls. He would on occasion showcase his acres to gentlemen and acquaintances, though he reputedly enforced a strict guest policy against picking ripe fruits which were to be sold. Later in life, he received recognition and accolades from the Horticultural Society of Pennsylvania for his exceptional accomplishments in breeding plants and pioneering new fruits. After Girard’s death in 1831, many of the philanthropic millionaire’s personal and rental estates were left to the City of Philadelphia; these included the Passyunk Township farmland and farmhouse. Gentilhommiere, along with the surrounding property, were not to be sold. Instead, income and rental revenue were to go towards funding Girard College, a 1st-12th grade boarding school established through Girard's will for poor white male orphans. In accordance with Girard’s will, 480 rental-only houses were constructed over the farm acreage in the early 1900s, which became known as the Girard Estates. Architects James H. Windrim, an early alumnus of Girard College, and John T. Windrim designed the properties on behalf of the Trustees of the Girard Estate. The result has been a magnificent array of homes showcasing various architectural styles, creatively varying from Colonial Revival to Arts and Crafts bungalow, all within walking distance of the present-day Stephen Girard Park. In the 1950s, renters were able to buy these houses when courts that modified the rental-only requirement in Stephen Girard’s will. The Girard Estates neighborhood was designated as a local historic district in 1999. By 1953, the land surrounding Gentilhommiere, which amounts in area to the size of a square city block, was designated as the public Stephen Girard Park. Throughout the latter decades of the 20th century, the park became a popular space of recreation and community events among local residents. A statue of the park’s namesake, sculpted by Girard College alumnus Alfred Seebode, was installed in 1990. The former farmhouse is operated by the Fairmount Park Commission and is the meeting place for Friends of Stephen Girard Park monthly meetings, although it is not visitable by the public. An official historical marker honoring Stephen Girard was mounted in 1993 on the southern side of the park near West Shunk Street. At each of the four corner entrances, two gateposts are topped with small ornamental sculptures of an acorn and pinecone, crafted by Eric de Jesus and Elizabeth Duby in 2007. Neighborhood organizations and volunteer groups such as the Girard Estate Neighbors Association hold regular park clean-ups and greenscaping projects. Most recently, a two-year long renovation project spearheaded by the Friends of Stephen Girard Park was completed in 2019, improving use and recreation of the park for the public and neighborhood.

Once the early 19th-century working farm of America’s first multi-millionaire that has since been transformed into a public park, the Stephen Girard Park is today a vibrant community centerpiece of its South Philadelphia neighborhood. During its tenure as a farm spanning over 500 acres, Stephen Girard both supervised and manually labored over the fields of his fruits, flowers, trees, and livestock. Ownership of the farmlands was turned over to the City of Philadelphia after the accomplished businessman and philanthropist died in 1831. The park’s four-acre plot, which includes the old farmhouse and a statue of Stephen Girard by a Girard College alumnus, was established in 1953. As the industrial city developed residential homes around the park during the 20th century, the entire neighborhood has become known as Girard Estate and is now a historic district.

Stephen Girard and the History of Philadelphia Heritage Trail

Girard Row (326-334 Spruce Street)

Introduction

Images

Backstory and Context

Sources

Additional Information