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Chandler & Company Records
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Held at: Princeton University Library: Public Policy Papers [Contact Us]
This is a finding aid. It is a description of archival material held at the Princeton University Library: Public Policy Papers. Unless otherwise noted, the materials described below are physically available in their reading room, and not digitally available through the web.
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Chandler & Company was a New York investment banking house with offices in New York and Philadelphia. The Company issued bonds for many companies and countries, including Bolivia, China, Costa Rica, and Germany.
The firm was founded in 1914 by Percy M. Chandler, who remained head of the company until his death in 1944. The Company came into prominence in early 1915 when it offered $10,000,000 in German Imperial Treasury notes for public subscription as head of a syndicate of New York and Western bankers, despite escalating tensions between the United States and Germany due to World War I. The proceeds were held in New York banks to be used by German commercial agents as a basis for receiving loans to purchase merchandise for the German civil population. No purchases were permitted for materials that would assist the German Army or Navy. Another issue of German Imperial Treasury notes followed in 1916.
Chandler & Company continued its involvement with foreign financial operations, issuing $5,000,0000 in bonds from the Republic of China in partnership with a Chicago bank in 1916. In September 1916, Chandler & Company was appointed fiscal agent in the United States for the Republic of Costa Rica. The Company was also appointed as the fiscal agent for Bolivia in March 1917.
After World War I ended, Chandler & Company was involved in efforts to renew credit and trade relations between the United States and Germany. Robert Gade and Edward Robinette traveled to Europe in 1920 as representatives of Chandler & Company to advocate for the acceptance of the Chandler Plan. The plan outlined a means for German assets in the United States, seized during World War I and held by the Alien Property Custodian, to be returned to the Germans. The assets would be used to create an American corporation and stocks would be given to the Germans in lieu of their seized assets. Gade and Robinette met with German banks, including M. M. Warburg & Co. (and the company's director Max Warburg) and the Deutsche Bank, and with government officials, to promote the plan. They argued that without a plan such as this, there would be a long legal battle and the assets might never be returned.
Chandler & Company's records document the company's investment decisions in Germany, as well as Bolivia and Costa Rica, during the early 1920s and include correspondence and meeting minutes. The majority of the records document negotiations between the Company and Germany about the Chandler Plan and include correspondence to Percy M. Chandler from the representatives he sent to Germany (Robert Gade and Edward Robinette), meeting minutes from negotiations between Gade, Robinette, and German bankers and government officials, and clippings. The records also include correspondence and reports on Chandler & Company business with Bolivia and Costa Rica, and a graph of European exchange rates in relation to the North American dollar from 1915 to 1920.
Arranged alphabetically by document type.
The following sources were consulted during the preparation of the biographical note: "Banker Interned, Reason Kept Secret." The New York Times, July 12, 1917. "Bolivia May Float Loan." The New York Times, March 3, 1917. "Financial Notes." The New York Times, September 9, 1916. Materials from the Chandler & Company Records, Box 1; Public Policy Papers, Special Collections, Princeton University Library. "Millions in Credits to Foreign Nations." The New York Times, March 27, 1915. "Percy M. Chandler, Banker, 71, is Dead." The New York Times, October 15, 1944.
Accession information is not available for this collection.
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This collection was processed by Adriane Hanson in 2005. Finding aid written by Adriane Hanson in April 2006.
No material was separated from the collection during processing in 2005.
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Subject
- Publisher
- Public Policy Papers
- Finding Aid Author
- Adriane Hanson
- Finding Aid Date
- 2007
- Sponsor
- These records were processed with the generous support of the National Historical Publications and Records Commission and the John Foster and Janet Avery Dulles Fund.
- Access Restrictions
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The collection is open for research use.
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Collection Inventory
No arrangement action taken or arrangement information not recorded at the time of processing.
Physical Description1 box
(On the German economy.)
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1 box
1 folder
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(A graph of the exchange rate in eleven major European cities.)
Physical Description1 folder
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