On October 20, 1869, the Pittsburgh Commercial reported that Frank Pierce of the Princeton Class of 1870 would soon inherit a million dollars from the estate of his uncle, former U.S. President Franklin Pierce. In 2024 dollars, that's about $23 million. We haven't found out exactly what may have taken place, but alum Pierce seems to have had a drastic reversal of fortune by 1902.
Letter from Undergraduate Alumni Files (AC104), Box 134.











