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The Bigelow family sets down roots in Saint Paul and starts to build its legacy.
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 Charles H. Bigelow and his wife, Alida, moved from New York to Saint Paul in 1864. Like many young men of the day, Charles had left his family's farm to seek his fortune.
The Bigelows had five children: Emma; George; Albert, who along with George eventually moved away from Saint Paul; Deane, who died as a child; and Charles, Jr., and Frederic, who would become pillars of the Saint Paul community.
 In the fall of 1870, the Bigelows built their house on College Avenue, near the Minnesota History Center, where they lived until 1909. Later, they built a new house at 485 Portland Avenue.
Charles became a director of the Saint Paul and Sioux City Railroad being built by Egberg and Horace Thompson, J. C. and Henry Burbank, Amherst Wilder, John L. Merriam, Elias Drake and others.
 On January 23, 1871, he was elected secretary of Saint Paul Fire and Marine Insurance Company (now Travelers), Minnesota's oldest business corporation, and five years later succeeded James Burbank as its third president.
Charles' career at Fire and Marine was marked by two major disasters in American history: the Chicago fire of 1871 and the San Francisco earthquake of 1906.
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Charles, Jr. is remembered as humane, conservative and deeply interested in downtown Saint Paul. He worked his way up through the ranks of the Saint Paul wholesale company, Farwell, Ozmun and Kirk, eventually heading the firm.
An active member of House of Hope Presbyterian Church, Charles served as an elder, chaired the music committee, served on the building committee and led the Sunday school. He also served as president of Macalester College's Board of Trustees, guiding the college through the Depression years. In addition, Charles initiated the conscription that completed the Saint Paul Athletic Club.
While Charles built his career in wholesale, Frederic followed in his father's footsteps at Fire and Marine. Fascinated by his father's stories of marine disasters, Frederic apparently never considered any other career.
 Frederic joined Fire and Marine in 1891 as a clerk opening mail and moved up the ranks to bookkeeper, marine secretary, assistance secretary and vice president, traveling territories covered by the company's agents.
In 1911, upon his father's death, Frederic became Fire and Marine's fourth president. He steadily built the regional company into an international organization in his 26 years as president.
 Bigelow was known as a respected yet colorful leader who was gregarious and liked people. Those who knew him remember a man with two sides: thoughtful, generous and kind on one hand; boisterous and demanding on the other.
Like his father, Frederic cared deeply for his community and was one of the organizers of the Saint Paul Community Chest (now the United Way), a board member until his death, and its president for a time.
He was chairman of the Saint Paul Board of Public Welfare; president of the Amherst H. Wilder Charity (now Amherst H. Wilder Foundation) and a lifelong board member; a director of the Saint Paul YMCA; and followed his brother as president of the Macalester College Board of Trustees. In 1941, he was named to the Distribution Committee of the newly formed Saint Paul Foundation.
Next: The Early Days |
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