Chamber of Commerce

an association of merchants and others with a view to promote the business interests of the town. Most American cities have such an organization. The newspapers contain daily items relative to their efforts in the line of favorable railroad rates, the establishment of manufactures, the reception of distinguished visitors, contributions to sufferers from great disasters, and the like. A committee from a chamber of commerce representing the united commercial interests of a city has more influence than that the same men exercise if acting on their own responsibility. This sort of association appears to have originated at Marseilles, in France, about 1400. It took definite form in 1650 and was imitated at Dunkirk, Paris, Lyon, Rouen, Toulouse, and Bordeaux. The first in Great Britain was organized at Glasgow in 1783; that of Manchester in 1820. The first in this country was established in New York as early as 1768.