The Guardian Life Insurance Company of America

The Guardian Life Insurance Company of America (GLICOA) is a Fortune 1000 company founded in 1860 in New York, New York. It is the fourth largest mutual life insurance company in the United States of America.

Current Business

Guardian has more than 5,500 employees and more than 2,800 financial representatives, working through 13 affiliate companies and subsidiaries. Guardian has nearly three million customers who hold the company's individual life and disability income insurance and investments products (such as variable annuities, mutual funds, stocks and bonds). It also has another five million customers covered by its employee benefits, including life, health and dental insurance; pension plans; and 401(k) products. For the fiscal year 2003, the company reported $6.7 billion in sales and $37.6 billion in assets and was ranked once again as one of the top 10 most admired life and health companies in Fortune’s "America’s Most Admired Companies" list.

History

Guardian founder Hugo Wesendonck, a German civil rights lawyer, participated in the 1848-49 revolution and helped draft a constitution for a united Germany. Accused of treason, he fled post-revolution Europe and landed in the U.S. With start-up funds from fellow German refugees, he opened Germania Life Insurance Company in 1860 on Wall Street in New York, to cover the growing number of German immigrants arriving on American shores. Two years later, he opened a branch in San Francisco and, later, across the country, reaching territories like Colorado, New Mexico and the Dakotas.

In 1911 the company set up headquarters in New York City's Union Square. In 1917, the company changed its name to Guardian, in response to a break with the fatherland after WWI. In 1999 Guardian relocated back to the Wall Street area (7 Hanover Square), after branching out into financial services.