{{Short description|American businessman (1854–1929)}} {{Infobox person | name = Charles M. Swift | image = Charles_May_Smith.png | alt = | caption = | birth_date = {{birth date|1854|03|19}}<ref name=VTGeneaTrails /> | birth_place = Middlebury, Vermont, U.S. | death_date = {{death date and age|1929|06|21|1854|03|19}}<ref name="NYTimesJune1929">{{cite news|title=CHARLES MAY SWIFT.; President of Philippine Railway Dies at Ferrisburg, Vt.|url=https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1929/06/22/94165741.html?zoom=15.5|access-date=25 April 2017|work=The New York Times|date=June 22, 1929|language=en}}</ref> | death_place = Ferrisburg, Vermont, U.S.<ref name="NYTimesJune1929" /> | other_names = | occupation = Lawyer, businessman | years_active = | known_for = Founding Meralco, an electrical utility in the Philippines, and several railroads in the Philippines and Michigan | notable_works = | signature = Charles_May_Swift_signature.png }}
'''Charles May Swift''' (March 19, 1854 – June 21, 1929) was the American businessman who founded Meralco, the largest electric utility and one of the leading companies of the Philippines, founded as the Manila Electric Railroad and Light Company, composed largely of Detroit and Pittsburgh capital. Swift also founded the Philippine Railway Company Inc. (now known as Panay Railways) and several other railroads in Michigan.
==Early life== On March 19, 1854, Swift was born in Middlebury, Vermont. He was the second child of George Sedgwick Swift and Louise May. In 1856, his parents decided to move to Detroit. He graduated from Detroit High School, in 1870. He studied law in his uncle's office, practised stenography and court reporting. By 1877, he was admitted to the bar.<ref name=SwiftPapers/>
==Career== He practiced law until about 1893, after which he became a promoter of surface-railroad enterprises. He was involved with building and operating electric trams and steam railroads in Michigan, particularly the Wyandotte & Detroit River Railway and Detroit & Port Huron Shore Line. All of these properties were eventually acquired by the Detroit United Railway. He was also president and director of the Nipigon Mining & Lands Co., of Detroit.<ref name=VTGeneaTrails /> He made his fortune in mining.<ref name=MuseumOffers/>
In 1903, backed by New York City-based utility and security firm J. G. White & Co. and engineering firm Westinghouse, Church, Kerr and Co. Swift was awarded the bid to construct Manila's light, power and electric railway service. The Westinghouse group was a subsidiary of the Westinghouse Electric & Manufacturing Company. He was contracted by the United States' Philippine Commission and municipal board of Manila to purchase the city's old tramway. In March 1903, articles of incorporation were filed in the State of New Jersey by the Manila Railways and Light Co. with a capital of $1,000,000. He became president of the company which was later renamed Manila Electric Railroad and Light Co., Ltd. in 1905.<ref name=MuseumOffers />
Other railroads in the Philippines that he was involved with building include, the Manila Suburban Railways Company extending the system to Fort McKinley and Pasig.<ref>Act of the Philippine Commission No. 1446 dated January 30, 1906: An act granting a franchise to Charles M. Swift; to construct, maintain, and operate an electric railway, and to construct, maintain, and operate an electric light, heat, and power system from a point in the city of Manila in an easterly direction to the town of Pasig, in the province of Rizal.</ref> This franchise merged with the Manila Electric, Rail, and Light Company in 1919, when it was then shortened to the familiar branding, '''Meralco'''. He also organized the Philippine Railway Company for the concession of railways in the islands of Cebu, Panay and Negros, chiefly in districts that produce sugar and hemp for export. The conditions were substantially the same as those imposed in Manila.<ref>Act of the Philippine Commission No. 1497 dated February 6, 1905: An act granting to the Philippine Railway Company a concession to construct railways in the islands of Panay, Negros, and Cebu and guaranteeing interest on the first mortgage bonds thereof, under authority of the Act of Congress</ref><ref name=VTGeneaTrails>{{cite web|title=Addison County Vermont Biographies|url=http://genealogytrails.com/ver/addison/bios/index.html|website=Vermont Genealogy Trails|accessdate=18 November 2015|quote=Source: The Book of Detroiters. Edited by Albert Nelson Marquis Copyright, 1908 – Contributed by Christine Walters}}</ref>
He retired in 1925 after selling his railroad interests.<ref>{{cite book|author=Sedgwick, Hubert (Merrill)|title=A Sedgwick Genealogy: Descendants of Deacon Benjamin Sedgwick|year=2021|publisher=Hassell Street Press|page=291}}</ref>
==Family and personal life== Charles May Swift was married twice. In 1886, he married Clara Buel Trowbridge, daughter of an American Revolution veteran, in Michigan. She died in 1910. Later on, he married Anna Jessica Stewart Sylvester, the daughter of politician John Wolcott Stewart of Middlebury, Vermont in 1913.<ref name=SwiftPapers /> He had no children.<ref name=SwiftPapers /> He lived for many years in Grosse Pointe, Michigan.<ref name=VTGeneaTrails />
In 1918, he was elected to the Board of Trustees of Middlebury College Middlebury College and he bequeathed US$200,000 to the college, to be paid after his wife dies and the life trust for her benefit was dissolved.<ref name="NYTimesJuly1929">{{cite news|title=C.M. Swift left $400,000 to charity; Middlebury College to Receive $200,000 From $1,000,000 Estate of Rail Head. $100,000 TO HOSPITALS Detroit and New York Centres Will Share Sum-Bequests to Be Made After Death of Wife.|url=https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1929/07/06/91849105.html?pageNumber=13|accessdate=25 April 2017|work=The New York Times|date=July 6, 1929|language=en}}</ref>
He owned two vacation homes in Vermont, both of which still exist. One on Lake Champlain in Ferrisburg, Vermont, he named Grosse Pointe<ref>At {{Coord|44.237364|-73.315401|display=inline}}</ref> after his hometown in Michigan.<ref name=Forbes.com>{{cite news|last1=Geist|first1=Isabella|title=Vermont Valhalla|url=https://www.forbes.com/2004/08/31/cx_bs_0831how.html|accessdate=18 November 2015|work=Forbes|date=August 31, 2004}}</ref> The other in Middlebury is currently an inn known as the Swift House Inn.<ref name=Forbes.com />
==Death== In 1929, Swift became ill and withdrew all his money from the stock market in order to set up family trusts.<ref name=MuseumOffers /> On June 21, he died on his yacht at Lake Champlain before the Wall Street crash of 1929, thus inadvertently saving his fortune from that financial disaster.<ref name=MuseumOffers /><ref name="NYTimesJune1929" /> He was interred in Middlebury Cemetery.<ref name="NYTimesJune1929" />
His papers are at the Henry Sheldon Museum of Vermont History in Middlebury, VT as part of the Stewart-Swift Research Center, along with papers and documents from his and his second wife's family.<ref name=MuseumOffers>{{cite web|last1=Albers|first1=Jan|title=Museum Offers a Look into the Life of local Jewel, Jessica Swift|url=http://henrysheldonmuseum.org/museum-offers-a-look-into-the-life-of-local-jewel-jessica-swift/|website=Henry Sheldon Museum of Vermont History|accessdate=18 November 2015}}</ref><ref name=SwiftPapers>{{cite web|title=Jessica Swift family papers, 1776-1982 (bulk 1850-1915)|url=http://biblio.middlebury.edu/search~S16?/Ycharles+w+swift&SORT=D/Ycharles+w+swift&SORT=D&SUBKEY=charles+w+swift/1%2C10%2C10%2CB/frameset&FF=Ycharles+w+swift&SORT=D&2%2C2%2C|website=Henry Sheldon Museum of Vermont History|accessdate=18 November 2015}}</ref>
==See also== * Meralco * Tranvía
==References== {{Reflist}}
==External links== * [http://www.swifthouseinn.com/history.html Our History, Swift House Inn], house formerly owned by Charles Swift {{Middlebury College|state=autocollapse}}
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Swift, Charles}} Category:1854 births Category:1929 deaths Category:American railway entrepreneurs Category:People from Middlebury, Vermont Category:People from Grosse Pointe, Michigan Category:Businesspeople from Vermont Category:Businesspeople from Michigan Category:Rail transportation in the Philippines Category:Middlebury College