Christiana Securities Company

The Christiana Securities Company was a private, closed-end investment company established by A. Felix, Pierre S., Irénée and Lammot du Pont and their associates. Its primary function was to retain control of E.I. du Pont de Nemours & Company in that branch of the family through the ownership of a large block of stock.

The Christiana Securities Company was incorporated on March 2, 1915, as the Du Pont Securities Company for the purpose of purchasing the shares of E.I. du Pont de Nemours & Company then held by T. Coleman du Pont. Pierre S. du Pont was president of Christiana Securities and John Raskob was treasurer. Christiana Securities also acquired stock in the Atlas Powder company which had been spun off from the Du Pont Company as a result of the 1912 antitrust suit but sold it immediately for cash. Beginning in 1919, it began buying stock in the General Motors Corporation. It was renamed General Industries Company on April 29, 1919, but the name was changed again to Christiana Securities Company two months later. By 1920 members of the du Pont family, along with the Du Pont Company and Christiana Securities, owned 25% of the stock in G.M. In 1920, Christiana Securities also purchased the entire stock of the Every Evening Printing Company and the Morning News Publishing Company, which, combined as the News-Journal Company, published Wilmington's leading, and later only, newspapers. In 1929, it purchased stock in the Wilmington Trust Company, the bank established by Pierre's branch of the family. During the last phase of the stock market boom, Christiana Securities bought heavily into Anaconda Copper Mining Company and Kennecott Copper Company, but sold these stocks within two years.

In 1948, the U.S. Department of Justice filed suit in the District Court of Northern Illinois charging that the interlocking holdings of the Du Pont Company, General Motors, the U.S. Rubber Company, Christiana Securities, and the Delaware Realty and Investment Company violated the Sherman Antitrust Act. After fourteen years of litigation, the du Ponts were forced to divest themselves of their General Motors Stock, a process that was completed on March 1, 1962. During the divestiture, on February 24, 1961, Christiana Securities absorbed the Delaware Realty and Investment Company, another family investment company, whose holdings included 300,000 shares of the Hercules Powder Company. These shares were sold in 1967.

By the early 1970s, the Christiana Securities Company had outlived the forces that had brought it into being. The founding members were dead, and the family was yielding active management of the Du Pont Company to outsiders. Christiana Securities was merged into the Du Pont Company on October 17, 1977. Du Pont then sold the entire stock of the News-Journal Company to the Gannett newspaper chain in 1978.