Brigham Academy & Peter Bent Brigham

Philanthropist Peter Bent Brigham was born in Bakersfield on February 4, 1807. At the age of 17, he left to seek his fortune in Boston. With little formal schooling, he became a self-made millionaire, with success as a restaurant owner, real estate investor, and a founding director of the Fitchburg Railroad. Upon his death, Brigham generously endowed the Town of Bakersfield with $40,000. The residue of his estate was to be sold for the purpose of founding a hospital “to be called the Brigham Hospital for the care of sick persons in indigent circumstances.” The endowment reached $2,000,000 in 1902. The Peter Bent Brigham Hospital opened in 1913 in Boston, and today is part of Brigham and Women’s Hospital. (continued on other side) Peter Bent Brigham’s bequest to his hometown of Bakersfield provided a $30,000 endowment to be invested as the Brigham School Fund, with income “expended for education purposes, either in the district schools, or for a school of higher grade.” Opened in August 1879, Brigham Academy was heralded as the beginning of the educational millennium in Vermont. It was housed in a monumental Second Empire-style building designed by Ira Sweat and A.H. Goff. The high school bridged the gap between elementary school and college, offering classes in classical languages, music, art, and science. Among its famous graduates was Warren Austin, U.S. senator and first ambassador to the United Nations. Brigham Academy closed in 1966.