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John Jacob Astor (born Johann Jakob Astor; July 17, 1763 – March 29, 1848) was a German-born American businessman, merchant, real estate mogul, and investor. Astor made his fortune mainly in a fur trade monopoly , by exporting opium into the Chinese Empire , and by investing in real estate in or around New York City .
Astor in 1909 Astor as Henry IV of France. John Jacob Astor IV was born on July 13, 1864, at his parents' country estate of Ferncliff in Rhinebeck, New York.He was the youngest of five children and only son of William Backhouse Astor Jr., a businessman, collector, and racehorse breeder/owner, and Caroline Webster "Lina" Schermerhorn, a Dutch-American socialite.
The Astor family achieved prominence in business, society, and politics in the United States and the United Kingdom during the 19th and 20th centuries. With German roots, some of their ancestry goes back to the Italian and Swiss Alps, [1] the Astors settled in Germany, first appearing in North America in the 18th century with John Jacob Astor, one of the wealthiest people in history.
It’s hard to escape the name Astor when you are in New York: from Astor Place downtown to the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel and even the neighborhood of Astoria, Queens, the family’s legacy is everywhere.
Through his profits from the company, John Jacob Astor made numerous, lucrative land investments and became the richest man in the world and the first multi-millionaire in the United States. The German-born Astor is ranked as the eighteenth-wealthiest person of all time, and the eighth to create his fortune in the United States.
John Jacob Astor V was born in Manhattan, New York City in 1886, the fourth child of William Waldorf Astor, 1st Viscount Astor (1848–1919), and Mary Dahlgren Paul (1858–1894). He was five years old when his family left New York to live in England. [1]
A gold watch worn by John Jacob Astor IV, a member of the wealthy Astor family and the richest man aboard the Titanic, sold for a record-breaking £1.175 million ($1.485 million) at auction on ...
The Astor Library was a free public library in the East Village, Manhattan, developed primarily through the collaboration of New York City merchant John Jacob Astor and New England educator and bibliographer Joseph Cogswell and designed by Alexander Saeltzer. It was primarily meant as a research library, and its books did not circulate.