Jay Cooke's Address to the Firelands Historical Society in 1900

Jay Cooke was born in Sandusky, Ohio on August 10, 1821. After working for E.W. Clark and Company, he opened his own banking business in 1861, known as Jay Cooke and Company. His company prospered, and during the Civil War Jay Cooke and Company negotiated loans for the government and sold bonds to raise capital for the Union cause. Because of his fundraising efforts in the 1860s, he became known as the “financier of the Civil War.” 

On October 3, 1900 Jay Cooke read an address to the members of the Firelands Historical Society at the Trinity Methodist Church in Sandusky.

Cooke’s address was printed in the December 1, 1900 issue of the Firelands Pioneer. Besides discussing his successful fund raising efforts during the Civil War, he recalled many fond memories of his early days in Sandusky, such as going hunting with Judge Caldwell. He remembered that the first train from Sandusky to Bellevue was horse drawn, and that a cannon had been shot off at the ground breaking of the Mad River and Lake Erie Railroad. He revealed that he had sent the first telegraph to Sandusky, written in Philadelphia and sent to his father Eleutheros. 

You can read Mr. Cooke’s entire address in the Firelands Pioneer of December 1, 1900.  

In the nineteenth century photographer A.C. Platt created this stereographic card which features the steamer named Jay Cooke in honor of the Sandusky born banker.

A silver spoon with inscribed with the name “Jay Cooke” is in the historical collections of the Follett House Museum.

A marker noting the birthplace of Jay Cooke can be seen in downtown Sandusky on the north side of East Market Street.