Jean-Baptiste Andre Godin

Sources

bio file

Notes

Not in Santerre list

Biography

Jean-Baptiste Andre Godin


Name
  Canonical: Jean-Baptiste Andre Godin
  French: Jean-Baptiste André Godin
  Also: Godin-Lemaire (in SCEAT statutes and Savardan)
  Also: Godin-le-Maire (Savardan's spelling)

Birth: January 26, 1817, Esqueheries, Aisne, France
Death: January 15, 1888, Guise, Aisne, France

Origin: Esqueheries, Picardy. Son of a locksmith.

Occupation: Industrialist, stove manufacturer, social reformer.
  Founded a cast-iron stove factory at Guise that made him one of
  the wealthiest industrialists in France. The Godin stove became
  one of the most recognized brands in French manufacturing.

Colony role
  One of the three managing partners (gerants) of the Societe de
  Colonisation Europeeo-Americaine au Texas, alongside Allyre Bureau
  and Ferdinand Guillon. The corporate name was "Bureau, Guillon,
  Godin et Comp."

  Godin personally selected the saws and mills shipped to the colony.
  Savardan writes that "M. Godin-le-Maire, l'un de nos gerants, avait
  choisis avec tant de sollicitude" -- had chosen them with such care.
  The equipment was neglected on arrival: Cousin ordered it thrown
  under a shed where it rusted.

  Godin intended to emigrate to the colony himself but was prevented
  by health. He never came to Texas.

  He personally visited Francois Santerre before Santerre's departure
  for Texas to discuss the risks of the venture. Cordillot: "Il etait
  alors assez connu des dirigeants francais du mouvement pour que
  J.-B. Godin fasse le deplacement afin de venir s'entretenir avec
  lui des risques de l'aventure."

Post-colony: the Familistere de Guise
  After La Reunion dissolved, Godin did not abandon Fourierist ideas.
  He applied them to his own factory. Beginning in 1859, he built
  the Familistere de Guise -- a large residential complex for his
  workers, directly inspired by Fourier's phalanstere but adapted
  to industrial reality.

  The Familistere included apartments for hundreds of families,
  schools, a theater, stores, a swimming pool, and cooperative
  services. In 1880, Godin converted the company into a cooperative
  association owned by its workers.

  The Familistere operated successfully for over a century. The
  cooperative lasted until 1968. The buildings still stand in Guise
  and are now a museum and cultural center.

  Santerre visited the Familistere during a trip to France in
  1869-1870. In his 1874 letter to the Bulletin de l'Union
  republicaine, he wrote: "J'ai ete visiter l'etablissement de
  Godin Lemaire, a Guise (Familistere)."

  Godin succeeded where La Reunion failed -- not by abandoning
  Fourier's ideas but by applying them within a profitable industrial
  enterprise rather than a frontier agricultural colony.

Family: wife's maiden name was Lemaire, hence the compound name
  Godin-Lemaire in the SCEAT documents.

Sources
  SCEAT Statutes (doc/text/books/1800/other/statuts/french.txt),
    Articles 1-2: Bureau, Guillon, Godin as managing partners
  Savardan, Un Naufrage au Texas (doc/text/books/1800/savardan/
    naufrage/french.txt): "M. Godin-le-Maire" selecting equipment
  Cordillot, Au Texas (2003): Santerre biography, Godin visiting
    Santerre before departure
  Cordillot, "Les derniers fourieristes" (2003): Santerre letter
    mentioning visit to Familistere
  Santerre letter, Bulletin de l'Union republicaine, Dec 16, 1874

Notes
  Godin's involvement with La Reunion is the single strongest
  argument against the "impractical dreamers" narrative. He was
  not impractical. He was one of the wealthiest industrialists in
  France, a man who built a manufacturing empire and then used his
  fortune to construct a working alternative to capitalist labor
  relations. He was a managing partner of the SCEAT. He selected the
  colony's industrial equipment. He intended to emigrate himself.

  The fact that Godin was a managing partner of the company that
  founded La Reunion -- and went on to build the Familistere, the
  most successful Fourierist community in history -- reframes the
  colony's failure. The colony did not fail because its backers were
  naive. It failed because its management in Texas could not execute
  what its backers in Europe had financed. Godin proved this by
  succeeding with the same ideas, applied differently, at Guise.

  The equipment Godin carefully selected was left to rust under a
  shed. That detail, from Savardan, is a microcosm of the colony's
  real problem: not the ideas, not the investment, not the people,
  but the management on the ground.

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