George Francis Train
| George Francis Train | |
|---|---|
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| Born |
March 24, 1829 Boston, Massachusetts, US |
| Died | January 5, 1904 (aged 74) New York City, New York, US |
George Francis Train (March 24, 1829 – January 5, 1904) was an American entrepreneur who organized the clipper ship line that sailed around Cape Horn to San Francisco; he also organized the Union Pacific Railroad and the Credit Mobilier in the United States in 1864 to construct the eastern portion of the Transcontinental Railroad, and a horse tramway company in England while there during the American Civil War.
In 1870 Train made the first of three widely publicized trips around the globe. He believed that a report of his first journey in a French periodical inspired Jules Verne's novel Around the World in Eighty Days and the protagonist Phileas Fogg may partially be modeled on him.
In 1872 he ran for President of the United States as an independent candidate. That year, he was jailed for having defended Victoria Woodhull against obscenity charges for an issue her newspaper had published on an alleged adulterous affair. Despite his many business successes in early life, he was known as an increasingly eccentric figure in American and Australian history.
George Francis Train was born on March 24, 1829, in Boston, son of Oliver Train and his wife Maria Pickering. He had a cousin Adeline, who later became a noted author. His parents and three sisters died in a yellow fever epidemic in New Orleans in 1833 when George was four. He was raised by his strict Methodist grandparents in Boston. They hoped George would become a minister. He attended common schools. He did not go into the ministry as he sought more adventure in his life.
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Wikipedia