Charles Albert Coffin (December 31, 1844 – July 14, 1926) was an American businessman who was the co-founder and first president of

General Electric General Electric Company (GE) was an American Multinational corporation, multinational Conglomerate (company), conglomerate founded in 1892, incorporated in the New York (state), state of New York and headquartered in Boston. Over the year ...

corporation.

Early life

He was born in

Fairfield, Maine Fairfield is a town in Somerset County, Maine, United States. The population was 6,484 at the 2020 census. The town includes Fairfield Center, Fairfield village and Hinckley, and borders the city of Waterville to the south. It is home to the ...

, the son of Albert Coffin and his wife Anstrus (Varney). He married Caroline Russell of Holbrook, Massachusetts, and had three children.

Career

At age 18, he moved to

Lynn, Massachusetts Lynn is the eighth-largest List of municipalities in Massachusetts, municipality in Massachusetts, United States, and the largest city in Essex County, Massachusetts, Essex County. Situated on the Atlantic Ocean, north of the Boston city line ...

, to join his uncle Charles E. Coffin and his shoe company, at which he spent the next twenty years. Eventually he established his own shoe factory named Coffin and Clough in Lynn.Charles A. Coffin
In 1883, he was approached by another Lynn businessman, Silas A. Barton, to bring to town a struggling electric company from

New Britain, Connecticut New Britain is a city in Hartford County, Connecticut, Hartford County, Connecticut, United States. It is located approximately southwest of Hartford, Connecticut, Hartford. The city is part of the Capitol Planning Region, Connecticut, Capitol ...

, finance it and lead it. With the engineering work of

Elihu Thomson Elihu Thomson (March 29, 1853 – March 13, 1937) was an English-American engineer and inventor who was instrumental in the founding of major electricity, electrical companies in the United States, the United Kingdom and France. Early life He ...

and Edwin J. Houston, Coffin was able to build up the company, renamed

Thomson-Houston Electric Company The Thomson-Houston Electric Company was a manufacturing company that was one of the precursors of General Electric. History The company began as the American Electric Company, founded by Elihu Thomson and Edwin Houston. In 1882, Charles Al ...

, to be an equal to

Thomas Edison Thomas Alva Edison (February11, 1847October18, 1931) was an American inventor and businessman. He developed many devices in fields such as electric power generation, mass communication, sound recording, and motion pictures. These inventions, ...

's companies. Under Coffin, Thomson-Houston deployed power plants in the South, including two in

Atlanta, Georgia Atlanta ( ) is the List of capitals in the United States, capital and List of municipalities in Georgia (U.S. state), most populous city in the U.S. state of Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia. It is the county seat, seat of Fulton County, Georg ...

, to run the electric lighting and in 1889, Joel Hurt's electric streetcar line. When

was formed from Thomson-Houston and Edison's companies, Coffin was its first

chief executive officer A chief executive officer (CEO), also known as a chief executive or managing director, is the top-ranking corporate officer charged with the management of an organization, usually a company or a nonprofit organization. CEOs find roles in variou ...

. The company was tested quickly during the

Panic of 1893 The Panic of 1893 was an economic depression in the United States. It began in February 1893 and officially ended eight months later. The Panic of 1896 followed. It was the most serious economic depression in history until the Great Depression of ...

, in which Coffin negotiated with New York banks to advance money in exchange for GE-owned utility stocks. He established a

duopoly A duopoly (from Greek , ; and , ) is a type of oligopoly where two firms have dominant or exclusive control over a market, and most (if not all) of the competition within that market occurs directly between them. Duopoly is the most commonly ...

of important electric patents with

Westinghouse Electric The Westinghouse Electric Corporation was an American manufacturing company founded in 1886 by George Westinghouse and headquartered in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. It was originally named "Westinghouse Electric & Manufacturing Company" and was ...

in the late 1890s, and in 1901 established a research laboratory for the company. Suggested by Charles Proteus Steinmetz, this was the first industrial research lab in the US. He supported GE engineers in the adaptation and development of the Curtis steam turbine, which advanced electric power generation. He retired from the board in 1922, and retained a large amount of GE stock. Upon his death in 1926, he was one of the wealthiest men in the world. Charles is buried in Locust Valley Cemetery, Locust Valley, New York.

Early life

Career

References

Further reading