James de Peyster Ogden (1790-1870)
President of the New York Life Insurance Company & the N.Y. Chamber of Commerce
He was orphaned at the age of eleven and there afterwards grew up in the household of his uncle, Frederic de Peyster. He began his mercantile career with Van Horne & Clarkson before spending several years in Liverpool, England, as an agent for LeRoy, Bayard & McEvers, holding the post of U.S. Consul for Liverpool during the administration of Andrew Jackson. Returning to New York, he was the first President of the Atlantic Dock Company (1840), developing the Brooklyn Harbor, and in 1845 he became the first President of Nautilus Insurance Company (since known as the New York Life Insurance Company). He was President of the Saint Nicholas Society of the City of New York, a founding member and President (1842-45) of the New York Chamber of Commerce, and a founding member of the Union Club. His portrait (pictured0 was painted by Charles Loring Elliott (1812-1868) in 1855. He married Lavinia Beckwith and they were the parents of three children, the eldest of whom (James Ogden) died in infancy.
