Charles Merrill (businessman)

Charles Merrill (January 3, 1792 – December 28, 1872) was an American entrepreneur who owned mercantile, construction, real estate, and lumber companies in Maine, Virginia, and Michigan.

Merrill spent his earlier years on his father's farm and obtained an education attending the common school during the winter.

[2] When he became of age, he moved to nearby Portland, Massachusetts, and in partnership with his brother and a man with the last name of Scott engaged in mercantile business under the firm of S & C Merrill & Company.

The building of this road, and the familiarity it gave him with lands and localities, caused him to become a large investor in the area's real estate from 1835 to 1840.

When the panic of 1837 came, his Maine partners proposed to withdraw from the joint ownership of lands on condition that Merrill would assume and pay all the indebtedness upon them.

[2] In 1858, he built the Merrill Block on the corner of Woodward and Jefferson Avenues - at the time it was considered the finest business building in Detroit.

[1][2] His daughter, Elizabeth Palmer, had a fountain designed by the architectural firm of Carrère and Hastings and built in his honor in 1904 at a cost of US$1,000,000 (equivalent to $33,911,111 in 2023).

[4] The Merrill Humane Fountain was originally located in front of the old Detroit Opera House in Campus Martius Park.

[5][6][7] As automobile traffic increased in downtown Detroit, the city's elders decided to move the fountain to the Merrill Plaissance, at the far southern boundary of Palmer Park, in 1926.