Buenaventura Marcó del Pont y Bory (1738–1818) was a Spanish businessman, and founder of the family of the same name. He was born in

Calella de Palafrugell Calella de Palafrugell is one of three coastal towns belonging to the municipality of Palafrugell in the province of Girona, Spain. The other two towns are Llafranc, only to the north, and Tamariu, some to the north. All three towns are part of ...

, Gerona in

Catalonia Catalonia (; ca, Catalunya ; Aranese Occitan: ''Catalonha'' ; es, Cataluña ) is an autonomous community of Spain, designated as a ''nationality'' by its Statute of Autonomy. Most of the territory (except the Val d'Aran) lies on the north ...

. Early in his life, he relocated to

Vigo Vigo ( , , , ) is a city and Municipalities in Spain, municipality in the province of Pontevedra, within the Autonomous communities of Spain, autonomous community of Galicia (Spain), Galicia, Spain. Located in the northwest of the Iberian Penins ...

, in Galicia, where he lived since at least 1750, and where he soon became one of its most important businessmen by building a new salting installation for the processing and distribution of fish to his native land. The good result of his business attracted some other Catalan families to the area, such as the Buch, the Curbera, the Escofet or the Fábregas. As one of the most important ship-owners in

Spain , image_flag = Bandera de España.svg , image_coat = Escudo de España (mazonado).svg , national_motto = ''Plus ultra'' (Latin)(English: "Further Beyond") , national_anthem = (English: "Royal March") , i ...

, he obtained from King

Charles III of Spain it, Carlo Sebastiano di Borbone e Farnese , house = Bourbon-Anjou , father = Philip V of Spain , mother = Elisabeth Farnese , birth_date = 20 January 1716 , birth_place = Royal Alcazar of Madrid, Spain , death_d ...

in 1773, the first concessions to allow trading between the port of Vigo and the new world. In 1779 he obtained permission to attack the British naval commerce and that of its allies such as portugueses, during the

American Revolutionary War The American Revolutionary War (April 19, 1775 – September 3, 1783), also known as the Revolutionary War or American War of Independence, was a major war of the American Revolution. Widely considered as the war that secured the independence of t ...

. The good fortune of his ships made him a fortune in such articles as salt, oil, leather and cloth among others. In 1817, as a ''regidor'' of

, he ordered the reconstruction of the Concatedral de Santa María de Vigo, which had been destroyed during the

Peninsular War The Peninsular War (1807–1814) was the military conflict fought in the Iberian Peninsula by Spain, Portugal, and the United Kingdom against the invading and occupying forces of the First French Empire during the Napoleonic Wars. In Spain ...

. He personally donated the statue of the

Cristo de la Victoria Cristo may refer to: * Christ People *Cristo Foufas, British radio presenter * Giovanni Di Cristo (born 1986), Italian judoka * Julio Sánchez Cristo (born 1959), Colombian radio personality * Inri Cristo, (born 1948), a Brazilian self-proclaimed ...

, which is still the most important religious icon of the city. Marcó del Pont married Juana Ángel Díaz y Méndez, with whom he had four sons. Two of them became very famous during their lifetime: Francisco Casimiro was the last Royal Governor of Chile and Buenaventura Miguel represented his father's company in

Buenos Aires Buenos Aires ( or ; ), officially the Autonomous City of Buenos Aires ( es, link=no, Ciudad Autónoma de Buenos Aires), is the capital and primate city of Argentina. The city is located on the western shore of the Río de la Plata, on South ...

, and his family became one of the most important and wealthy of the Argentine republic.

References

1728 births 1817 deaths 18th-century Spanish businesspeople 19th-century Spanish businesspeople {{Catalonia-business-bio-stub