Eleuthère Irénée du Pont

American industrialist

• Born: June 24, 1771
• Birthplace: Paris, France
• Died: October 31, 1834
• Place of death: Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Combining sharp business acumen with innovative technical methods and tenacious moral principles, du Pont founded E. I. du Pont de Nemours and Company, which became a powerful commercial empire that endured into the twenty-first century.

Early Life

Eleuthère Irénée du Pont (ay-lew-tahr ee-ray-nay dew-pahn) was born on June 24, 1771, in Paris, France. He was named in honor of liberty and peace (after the Greek words for these ideals) at the insistence of his godfather, Turgot, who was also his father’s benefactor. His father, Pierre Samuel du Pont, served the corrupt French throne for many years and was rewarded with nobility. His mother, Nicole Charlotte Marie Le Dée, died when Irénée was fourteen years old. He also had an older brother, Victor, to whom he was very close. Irénée grew up at the family estate at Bois-des-Fosses, about sixty miles south of Paris.

Irénée spent all of his young life in the harsh and oppressive political atmosphere of France during the epochs of Louis XVI , of the revolutionary mobs whose favorite instrument was the guillotine, and finally of Napoleon Bonaparte. After the death of his mother, Irénée’s life became closely interwoven with that of his politically active father. In 1788, when Irénée was seventeen years old, the popular rebellion took place. As the nation’s ideology was more and more identified with the political Left, Pierre remained on the Right.

Irénée and the Marquis de Lafayette, with whom he shared the title of commander of the National Guard, founded the Société de 1789, an organization constituting the most conservative wing of the bourgeoisie that favored a constitutional monarchy. Pierre and Irénée began to attack the Jacobins, the radical party of the petite bourgeoisie, from their newly acquired publishing house in Paris. On August 10, 1792, they led their sixty-man private guard to defend the king’s palace from a Jacobinian assault that was demanding an end to the monarchy. During this period, at the age of twenty, Irénée married Sophie Madeleine Dalmas, with whom he had seven children during the course of their marriage.

After the uprising, Irénée served as apprentice to the chemist Antoine Lavoisier, the greatest scientist of his day and a close friend of his father. Lavoisier was the head of the French monarch’s gunpowder mills, and it was there that Irénée learned the craft of gunpowder-making and acquired a precise sense of the scientific method. The revolution struck, however, and the king and Lavoisier were guillotined per the orders of Robespierre. Pierre was arrested shortly thereafter and would have also been guillotined had not the bourgeoisie, now convinced that their revolution was irreversible, asserted their control over the revolution by seizing power from the radicals. Robespierre was executed and Pierre was granted his freedom.

At this point, Irénée was making a precarious living operating the publishing house. The print shop, which was the main source of his income, had once been wrecked by the mob during a political uproar and there was no guarantee that the same thing might not happen again. His newspaper, Le Républicain, carried a revolutionary theme. Pierre’s new newspaper, L’Historien, was a vehicle for reviving royalism and opposing Napoleon’s appointment as commander-in-chief of the French forces in Italy. The bourgeoisie, however, struck and backed Napoleon’s coup. Pierre and Irénée were imprisoned. With the help of a friend who was a member of the commission that prepared lists for deportation, Pierre regained their freedom under a plea of senility, but he had to pledge to leave France.

So it was that the du Pont family set sail aboard the American Eagle and arrived on the shores of Newport, Rhode Island, on December 31, 1800. It was in the United States that Irénée’s individuality, creativity, innovative spirit, and strong character began to emerge. His physical appearance—he was small in size, with a cleft chin, a long sharp nose, and weak lips—belied the strength and courage he later displayed as he built his empire. His ability to restrain his emotions and his instinctive caution in befriending anyone who was not family also contributed to the building and solidifying of his dynasty in years to come.

Life’s Work

Du Pont found in the United States a political climate that was very different from that of France. Insistence on freedom had led to the Declaration of Independence and the American Revolution. The American economy encouraged initiative, and the door of advancement was open to all.

Gunpowder was a much-needed commodity on the American frontier. It was needed for protection from Indians and wild animals, to shoot game for meat and skins, and to help clear land to build new homes and roads. American powder makers during the revolution had made some acceptable powder, although 90 percent had been bought from France. By 1800, explosions and British competition had put most of the domestic mills out of business.

Shortly after his arrival in the United States, du Pont went to purchase some gunpowder for hunting. His expert eye recognized its poor quality and its inability to meet the urgent needs of the American frontier. This discovery sparked his ingenuity and his dream was born. On July 19, 1802, at the age of thirty-one, he purchased land on the Brandywine Creek near Wilmington, Delaware, on the site of what had been the first cotton mill in America. He had originally planned to call his plant Lavoisier Mills out of respect for his mentor. He reconsidered, however, and decided to name it Eleutherian Mills, in honor of freedom, as a happy portent to political refugees. In the spring of 1804, the first du Pont gunpowder went on public sale.

Du Pont spent thirty-two years on the Brandywine Creek as president of E. I. du Pont de Nemours and Company. Throughout these years, the shortage of liquid capital was a constant problem for him. Although his original investors had pledged funds to build and run the mills, they did not give the amount promised, and he was forced to raise the difference through notes. When the mills began to show a profit, the stockholders demanded the earnings in dividends instead of reinvesting a portion to increase production and sales as he wanted to do. Du Pont had the business acumen of a modern-day entrepreneur, while his investors were stagnating in eighteenth century procedures. His way out of the impasse was to purchase their stock. They demanded exorbitant prices, so he signed more notes to meet them. In this way, he assured himself that only he and other family members would control the company, and by the time of his death, most of these notes had been paid off.

During his tenure with the company, du Pont established the technical, methodological, and ethical principles to which the company still adheres. With regard to the technical and methodological aspects, du Pont addressed the need to give careful attention to raw material preparation. Charcoal was made from willow trees because they always grew new branches and had an inexhaustible supply. Saltpeter was always thoroughly cleaned regardless of its state of cleanliness when it was received. Sulphur was always pure and clear in color.

Du Pont also had the foresight to install a labor-saving device for kerneling powder. In times of prosperity as well as in times of adversity, du Pont always sought out means to improve the quality of his product and improve his methods. This was the forerunner of the product and process improvement approach of modern industry. He even anticipated the modern principle of enlarging a company’s income and usefulness through diversification. Du Pont provided one of the earliest examples of industrial integration by growing grain for the horses that transported the gunpowder in fields adjacent to the mills.

Du Pont was a man who abided by an exemplary code of ethics. The most salient example of this manifested itself during the tragedy that befell his mills in March, 1818. Explosions ruined much of the plant and killed forty men. At that time, there were no laws that committed the company to compensate the families of the victims, but du Pont pensioned the widows, gave them homes, and took responsibility for the education and medical care of the children. He paid these costs and those of rebuilding the plant by renewing his notes and signing more. Another example of du Pont’s strong social and moral consciousness involved his principle that quality was a matter of pride, with which no compromise could be made. He constantly refused offers to manufacture inferior powder for shipping. He was once approached by the government of one of the states, which was irritated at a new federal tariff law and had threatened to resist its reinforcement by force of arms. Du Pont replied that he had no powder for such a purpose.

Du Pont’s unyielding adherence to these principles brought him rewarding results. In 1804, during the first year of production, he made 44,907 pounds of gunpowder, which sold for $15,116.75. In 1805, both amounts had tripled. In 1808, an additional mill and new facilities accounted for the annual production of 300,000 pounds. In 1810, the profits exceeded thirty thousand dollars. In 1811, with a profit of forty-five thousand dollars, the du Pont mills were the largest in the Western Hemisphere.

The War of 1812 brought government orders totaling 750,000 pounds of gunpowder. Although this would appear to be a profitable assignment, the business realities proved to be the contrary. The company had to risk its cash and borrow heavily to extend the capacity of the mills. Du Pont purchased an adjoining property called the Hagley Estate, erected additional facilities, renamed it the Hagley Yards, and thereby completed the first major expansion in the company’s history. By the time of his death on October 31, 1834, the output of corps of workmen, with constantly improving machinery and equipment, exceeded one million pounds. The Brandywine mills had become a major American enterprise.

Significance

Du Pont created much more than a family business; he bred a tradition that has endured into the twenty-first century. This tradition espoused his code of business honor that was inseparable from his code of personal honor. His guiding principle was that privilege was inextricably bound to duty, and this principle ruled his entire life. He had a sense of obligation to his customers that was a rarity in the business world of his time. He staked personal fortunes on many occasions in order to fulfill a pledge. His commitment to technological innovations and increased productivity never undermined his commitment to top-quality products. His foresight and ingenuity antedated his century in technological and moral consciousness. These precepts, which originated from the Brandywine mills, still guide the Du Pont Company. The du Pont family empire is a global one that has expanded to include real estate, arms and defense industries, computers, communications, media, utilities, oil, food industries, banks, aviation, chemicals, rubber, insurance, and many other businesses.

When du Pont came to the United States in 1800, he was a strange man in a strange country. Nevertheless, he recognized that the United States was a land of opportunity, and the Du Pont Company grew because the fledgling nation’s needs, and free traditions, encouraged progress. The United States grew because people such as du Pont contributed the seeds of growth that bloom in risk, courage, and innovation. He may have been forced to come to the United States, but he died as Delaware’s most valuable citizen.

Generations of men and women contributed to the development of the Du Pont Company from a single gunpowder mill to a company that is international in scope and significance. The original Du Pont mills have been replaced by more modern and efficient buildings and procedures, but it is the spirit of du Pont that remains and reigns: His code of business honor and his code of personal integrity, of privilege and duty, still pervade his business empire.

Bibliography

Dorian, Max. The du Ponts: From Gunpowder to Nylon. Boston: Little, Brown, 1961. Concentrates on the du Pont genealogy and the way in which each family member contributed to the building of the empire. Stresses the role of Pierre du Pont, his service to Louis XVI, his title of nobility, and the political connections that enabled him to migrate to America.

Du Pont de Nemours, E. I., et al. Du Pont: The Autobiography of an American Enterprise. Wilmington, Del.: E. I. du Pont de Nemours, 1952. The best book on du Pont’s life and ingenuity. Also explores the century and a half that followed the first gunpowder mill on the Brandywine in terms of the parallel development of the Du Pont Company and the United States.

Du Pont de Nemours, Pierre Samuel. Irénée Bonfils. Wilmington, Del.: E. I. du Pont de Nemours, 1947. Discusses the religious beliefs of the du Pont family, which were somewhat redefined after the death of du Pont’s mother, who was a Catholic. The tone is one of tolerance toward other religions and a strong appeal is made for a united church.

Kinnane, Adrian. Du Pont: From the Banks of the Brandywine to Miracles of Science. Wilmington, Del.: E. I du Pont de Nemours, 2002. An updated corporate history. Chapter 1, “A Vision and Product,” describes how E. I. du Pont established his gunpowder business in 1802.

Winkler, John K. The du Pont Dynasty. New York: Reynal and Hitchcock, 1935. Explores the du Pont family history from their early days in France to their early days in Delaware. It also details the advancements and expansion of the company from its inception.

Zilg, Gerard Colby. Du Pont: Behind the Nylon Curtain. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1974. Chronicles the life of the du Pont family from France, their migration to America, the success of du Pont’s first gunpowder mill, and the expansion of the du Pont dynasty.