A Guide to the Hartford Fire Insurance Company Lumber Mill Book, 1885-1914

Historical Note

On May 10, 1810, the Connecticut General Assembly incorporated the Hartford Fire Insurance Company, naming Nathaniel Terry its first president. The company wrote the first fire insurance policy for an institution of higher learning when it insured Yale in 1825. Hartford Fire expanded west to Columbus, Ohio, in 1852 and San Francisco, California, in 1870. In 1871, the company paid $2 million in claims from the Great Chicago Fire. Almost thirty years later, Hartford Fire paid for $11.6 million for damages caused by the San Francisco earthquake of 1906. In 1913, it expanded to become the Hartford Accident and Indemnity Company, providing accident, automobile liability, personal damage, and business interruption insurance, but did not branch into life insurance until 1959. By 1997, after acquisition by ITT Corporation and further expansion of its services, the company's name again changed to The Hartford Financial Services Group, Inc.

Source:

"The Hartford's Historical Timeline." The Hartford Financial Services Group, Inc. Accessed April 1, 2011.

Scope and Contents

Insurance maps, appraisals, correspondence, and reports compose the Hartford Fire Insurance Company Lumber Mill Records, 1885-1914, documenting the company's business insuring lumber mills, particularly in East Texas. Some of the maps, appraisals, correspondence, and reports related to Hartford's insuring of lumber mills have been glued onto larger insurance maps of Richmond, Virginia, and Mobile, Alabama. Additionally, loose correspondence, forms, and inspection reports also relate to Hartford's business with East Texas lumber mills, such as William Cameron & Co., Josserand Lumber Co., J. S. and W. M. Rice, and Trinity County Lumber Co.

Restrictions

Access Restrictions

This collection is open for research use.

Administrative Information

Preferred Citation

Hartford Fire Insurance Company Lumber Mill Book, 1885-1914, Dolph Briscoe Center for American History, The University of Texas at Austin.

Processing Information

Basic processing and cataloging of this collection was supported with funds from the National Historical Publications and Records Commission (NHPRC) for the Briscoe Center’s "History Revealed: Bringing Collections to Light" project, 2009-2011.

This collection contains unprocessed materials.

Detailed Description of the Papers