John Stewart Kennedy

John Stewart Kennedy (January 4, 1830 – October 30, 1909) was a Scottish-born American businessman, financier and philanthropist. He was a member of the Jekyll Island Club (also known as The Millionaires' Club) on Jekyll Island, Georgia along with J.P. Morgan and William Rockefeller among others.

Early life Kennedy was born at Blantyre in Scotland on January 4, 1830. He was the fifth son of nine children born to John Kennedy and Isabella (née Stewart) Kennedy.

While a child, his family moved to Glasgow where he was educated until the age of thirteen before entering a shipping office as a clerk while still attending morning and evening classes in an attempt to complete his education.

Career From 1847 until 1850, he was a salesman with the Mossend Iron & Coal Company. In 1850, at age twenty, he was asked by William Bird, of the iron firm William Bird & Company of London, whom Kennedy had met during Bird's visit to Glasgow, to become the firm's representative in the United States and Canada. and served as president of the International & Great Northern Railroad Company of Texas as well as a director, and vice-president, of the Indianapolis, Cincinnati and Lafayette Railroad Company of which he helped reorganize after its 1870 bankruptcy.

On December 1, 1883, he retired and left the firm to his nephews, John Kennedy Tod and Robert Elliot Tod, as well as other junior partners who reorganized the firm under the name J. Kennedy Tod & Company. In retirement, Kennedy broadened his role as a financier with diverse interests in leading New York financial intermediaries. Kennedy held the post of president pro tem of the Bank of the Manhattan Company from 1883 to 1884, when he became vice president until he resigned for reasons of health in 1888. He had no children but mentored his sister Mary Kennedy's son John Kennedy Tod in the international banking and investment profession.

Kennedy died of whooping cough in 1909 at his home, 6 West 57 Street in New York. Honorary pallbearers at his funeral included, Stephen Baker, president of the Bank of Manhattan Company (son of Stephen Baker); Nicholas Murray Butler, president of Columbia University; Robert W. DeForest, president of the Charity Organization Society; Cleveland H. Dodge; Howard Elliot, president of the Northern Pacific Railway; Seth Low; J. Pierpont Morgan; George A. Morrison; former President of the St. Andrews Society; Henry L. Smith, John A. Stewart and Frederick Sturges, Vice President of the Presbyterian Hospital. Others present in the church for his funeral were Andrew Carnegie and his wife, Louise Whitfield Carnegie, Henry De Forest and Eugene Delano.

His widow continued his philanthropy after his death and gave millions of dollars to educational and charitable causes. She died at their summer home, Kenarden Lodge in Bar Harbor, Maine in July 1930 at the age of 96.

Philanthropy and legacy Kennedy was prominently connected during his life with New York charities, and his will gave away $30,000,000—bequests of $2,500,000 each to Columbia University, the New York Public Library, Metropolitan Museum of Art, Presbyterian Board of Home Missions, Presbyterian Board of Foreign Missions, Presbyterian Church Erection Fund, and Presbyterian Hospital of New York City; four gifts of $1,500,000 each; three of $750,000 each; nine (to colleges) of $100,000 each; and 10 (to colleges) of $50,000 each; besides numerous smaller gifts.

Kennedy was also the President of the Board of Trustees of Robert College, Istanbul, Turkey, and the chairman of the Presbyterian Hospital and United Charities boards, Second Vice President and a member of the executive committee of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Second Vice President of the New York Public Library, and was at one time the Vice President of the New York Chamber of Commerce.

The city of Kennedy, Minnesota is named for him.