Ramsey County History – Fall 1988: “The Fire and Marine: Facts, Fancies, Legends—The First 100 Years of Minnesota’s Oldest Business Corporation”

The Fire and Marine: Facts, Fancies, Legends—The First 100 Years of Minnesota’s Oldest Business Corporation
Author: Ronald M. Hubbs

Businessmen generally prefer stability, but frontier towns are often shaky. The St. Paul Fire and Marine Insurance Company, born in 1853, helped create local stability. Its organizers were some of the city’s early bankers, merchants, politicians, and real estate speculators. The company soon went dormant but awakened after the Civil War. Transportation magnate James Burbank led the company into twenty-nine states and Canada and the building of its first headquarters. Fire and Marine not only survived the Great Depression, but it also did so without lowering salaries or letting employees go. Even when losses were catastrophic during World War II, it survived. The company has issued some oddball risks: banks against theft during Dillinger’s heyday; an ostrich rider against falls; and elephants against harm at the hands of college students.

PDF of Hubbs article