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Jersey City and Bayonne Railroad Co. Issued to and Signed by Wm. K Vanderbilt - Stock Certificate

Inv# AG2366   Stock
Jersey City and Bayonne Railroad Co. Issued to and Signed by Wm. K Vanderbilt - Stock Certificate
State(s): New Jersey
Years: 1898

Stock issued to and signed by Wm. K Vanderbilt on back. Also signed by E.V.W. Rossiter as treasurer and Chauncey Depew as president. Some staining.


William Kissam Vanderbilt (1849-1920) A member of the prominent United States Vanderbilt family.

The second son of William Henry Vanderbilt, from whom he inherited $60 million, he was for a time active in the management of the family railroads, though not much after 1903. His sons William Kissam Vanderbilt II (1878-1944) and Harold Stirling Vanderbilt (1884-1970) were the last to be active in the railroads, the latter losing a proxy battle for the New York Central Railroad in the 1950s.

William K. Vanderbilt's first wife was Alva Erskine Smith (1853-1933), who he married in 1875. Born in 1853 to a slave-owning Alabama family, she was the mother of his children and was instrumental in forcing their daughter Consuelo (1877-1964) to marry the 9th Duke of Marlborough in 1895. Not long after this the Vanderbilts divorced, William K. later marrying Anne Harriman Rutherford Sands and Alva marrying Oliver Hazard Perry Belmont.

After the death of his brother Cornelius Vanderbilt II in 1899 he was generally regarded as head of the Vanderbilt family.

Like other members of his wealthy family, he built magnificent Vanderbilt houses. His homes included Idle Hour (1900) on Long Island, New York and Marble House (1892), designed by Richard Morris Hunt who also designed his 660 Fifth Avenue mansion (1883), in Newport.

William Kissam Vanderbilt died in Paris, France in 1920. His remains were brought home and interred in the Vanderbilt family vault in the Moravian Cemetery at New Dorp on Staten Island, New York.

Edward Van Wyck Rossiter (1844-1910) President’s clerk for Hudson River Railroad; Treasurer’s office clerk for Hudson River Railroad 1860-67; cashier New York & Harlem Railroad 1867-77. Later treasurer of same company, June 1883 became treasurer and from November 1900 had been Vice President of New York Central and Hudson River Railroad, New York & Harlem Railroad as well as of almost all the lines affiliated with the New York Central Company, also Lincoln National Bank and Lincoln Safe Deposit Company.

Chauncey Depew (1834-1928) A United States Senator from 1899 to 1911. He was a member of Skull & Bones and graduated from Yale College in 1856.

He became general counsel for the New York Central Railroad, 1875-83; vice president, 1883-85; and president, 1885-89. He resigned as president in 1898, and became chairman of the board of directors for the entire Vanderbilt railroad system; which included the New York, Harlem, Hudson Valley, Central, Erie, Michigan Southern, Michigan Central, Lakeshore, and Canadian Southern Railroads.

He began his political career by serving as a New York state assemblyman in 1862-63. He then was elected Secretary of State for New York, holding that office from 1864-65. Until his was election to the U.S. Senate, 1899. Depew remained prominent in New York politics, in his later years, serving as an advisor and mentor to a younger US President Theodore Roosevelt.

In 1871 Depew married Elise Ann Hegeman, and they had one son, Chauncey Mitchell Depew Jr.; who was born in 1879. Elise died in 1893 and Depew married a second time to May Palmer in 1901. They had no children.

He was the paternal uncle of Ganson and Chancey Depew, sons of his brother William Beverly Depew. Ganson Depew was a vice president of the Buffalo & Susquehanna Coal Company; and the personnal assistant of his father-in-law Frank Henry "F.H." Goodyear. Goodyear was the president of the Buffalo & Susquehanna Railway. Chancey DePew also worked for the Vanderbilt Railway Systems.

When Chauncey Depew died, he was buried in Peekskill. In his honor, the huge concourse of Grand Central Terminal was draped in mourning.

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Condition: Good

A stock certificate is issued by businesses, usually companies. A stock is part of the permanent finance of a business. Normally, they are never repaid, and the investor can recover his/her money only by selling to another investor. Most stocks, or also called shares, earn dividends, at the business's discretion, depending on how well it has traded. A stockholder or shareholder is a part-owner of the business that issued the stock certificates.

Item ordered may not be exact piece shown. All original and authentic.
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