Alfred I. Du Pont - Relocation and Later Life

Relocation and Later Life

Du Pont and his third wife had already made several trips to Florida on their motor yacht, Nenemoosha, when Pierre du Pont was named Tax Commissioner of Delaware in 1925. Harboring hard feelings against his cousin, Alfred du Pont and Jessie Ball du Pont moved to Jacksonville, Florida in 1926, where they established permanent residency. There, du Pont purchased 58 acres (230,000 m2) of land on the St. Johns River and built a 25-room mansion and landscaped grounds, as well as a berth for the couple's motor yacht. Ball du Pont named the estate Epping Forest, after the Virginia plantation of Mary Ball Washington, George Washington's mother and Ball du Pont's relative. Edward Ball, too, relocated to Florida, to continue working with du Pont.

In Florida, du Pont made primarily small real estate investments at first, correctly fearing a drop in real estate values, before turning his attention to acquiring interest in banks. He acquired an interest in Florida National Bank (FNB) of Jacksonville, keeping it solvent during a bank run of 1929 by putting $15 million of his own money into an account. During the early 1930s, six other Florida National Banks were opened throughout Florida, including Lakeland and Bartow.

During this time, du Pont was expanding his philanthropic activities. He personally funded a pension plan program for seniors in Delaware in 1929 and turned his attention to revitalizing Florida after the devastation of a 1926 hurricane and the Great Depression.