"Appearance of Correctness"

It is not only necessary to be "correct in every particular," Baltimore's Gentleman-Merchant Alexander Brown advised his sons early in the 19th Century, "but also to have the appearance of correctness." From the day he arrived in Baltimore from Ballymena, Ireland in 1800, spectacled, respectable Alexander Brown followed his own advice. He set up an Irish linen business, gradually built a fleet of eleven sailing ships, became a merchant banker. By the time he died in 1834, Alexander Brown had much more than an appearance of correctness: he had $2,000,000 as well.

This week, with a correct, quiet pride befitting the occasion, Alex. Brown & Sons held an open house to celebrate its 150th anniversary as the oldest name in U.S. investment banking. Baltimore's Mayor Thomas D'Alesandro Jr. and hundreds of other civic leaders dropped by to pay their respects and look over the ship models and old company records on display. They could thank Alex. Brown & Sons for much of the growth of Baltimore and Maryland. It had helped finance the first major U.S. railroad (the Baltimore & Ohio) and most of Maryland's bridges, including the $41 million Chesapeake Bay Bridge now being built. Over the years, the firm has had a financing hand in almost $1 billion worth of schools and sewers, tunnels, housing, utilities, and other public and private projects from Baltimore to Seattle.

Pipes & Panics. The underwriting started in 1808, when Alexander Brown and others put up $250,000 for Baltimore's first wooden pipe waterworks. As Brown's four sons joined the business, the firm opened branches in Philadelphia, New York and London, and old Alex was soon established as Baltimore's top financial brain. In 1812, when a British fleet was bombarding nearby Fort McHenry, Brown wrote: "I cannot think that they will ever destroy Baltimore." While other merchants fled, Brown helped keep the business community functioning. Years later, when a money panic threatened to wreck Baltimore's businessmen, Alexander Brown proclaimed: "No firm inherently solvent [will] be allowed to fail." This promise of support was enough to end the panic.

Banking & Tennis. As succeeding generations of Browns took over, the firm's trading business was closed down, its banking business expanded. It played a leading role in the merger of many a small railroad into the big present-day systems, and pioneered in the financing of the Federal Farm Loan System in 1916.

Though the firm is still controlled by such sixth-generation descendants as Alexander Brown Griswold, 43, and his brother Benjamin Howell Griswold Ill, 38, the active head is greying, sharp-eyed Charles Stedman Garland, 51, no kin. An Old Blue who captained the Yale and Davis Cup tennis teams and once won (with R. Norris Williams II) the world championship doubles at Wimbledon, Chuck Garland became a partner in Alex. Brown & Sons in 1939, is a past president of the venerable Investment Bankers' Association.

In the future, Partner Garland expects to keep running the firm on the principle laid down by old Alex Brown: "Don't deal with people about whose integrity and character there is question. It keeps your mind uneasy. It is far better to lose the business."

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