Jacob I. Cohen

Jacob I. Cohen was the eldest surviving son of Israel Cohen and Judith Solomon Cohen. Born in Richmond, Virginia, he was likely named for his uncle Jacob, with whom his father had a successful business partnership. His father died when he was 14 years of age, and five years later, in 1808, he helped his widowed mother move the family to Baltimore.

It wasn’t long before Jacob began to follow his father’s footsteps into the world of finance. His first venture, in which he was joined by his brothers, was a lottery. In 1831, the lottery was parlayed into banking, through a firm bearing his name—Jacob I. Cohen, Jr. and Brothers. Several of the brothers, especially Benjamin, David and Mendes, worked for some time at the firm under Jacob’s leadership. By 1837, it was one of the premier financial institutions in the country, appointed as the American financial representative of the Rothschilds. It played a critical role in the financial stability of the nation that year during a financial crisis that arose from excessive speculation. Outside of his role as principal of the family banking concern, Cohen also played important leadership roles in a number of other developing institutions, serving as a director of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, president of the Baltimore-Philadelphia Railroad and president of the Baltimore Insurance Company.

Jacob did not reserve his civic activities to the business world. He maintained the family’s ancestral ties to Bavaria through participation in the German Society of Maryland. Along with Solomon Etting, Cohen became deeply involved in the struggle for Jewish civil equality in Maryland. Jews were then barred by the Maryland Constitution from holding elected office in the state, and Cohen lobbied extensively to remove the wording of the constitution that excluded Jews from full political participation. In 1818, as the Maryland state legislature was considering the issue, he wrote a letter to the representatives objecting to those “obnoxious parts of the State’s constitution produced only in times of darkness and prejudice [which are] blots on the present enlightened period, on the honor of the State, in direct opposition to the features and principles of the Constitution of the United States.” After the changes he fought for were finally enacted in 1825, Cohen was elected to the Baltimore City Council and served as president of that body from 1845 to 1861.

Jacob I. Cohen

early 19th century