J. Pierpont Morgan (1837–1913) was one of the greatest benefactors in the Metropolitan Museum's history. A dominating figure in the world of American finance for more than fifty years, Morgan pursued a second career as a collector of art with equal vigor. His appetite for collecting was legendary, and his association with the Met spanned four decades. It began when he became a patron in 1871, then a trustee in 1888, continued with gifts of works of art (the first in 1897), and reached its high point when he became president in 1904, an office he held until his death in 1913. The final chapter in this association was written in 1917, when his son, J.P. Morgan Jr., gave the Met much of his father's collection, including works that had been on loan to almost every department at the time of his death. The 1917 gift of some seven thousand objects was among the largest and most varied ever accepted by this institution.
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