History

Benjamin Franklin's fire insurer was the first mutual insurance company in the United States. The Philadelphia Contributionship, founded in 1752, was owned by the people it insured, and they elected its directors every year. Its emblem is clasped hands: a contribution, in a dictionary of 1793, was "that which is given by several hands for some common purpose." It still writes policies.

In 1781 it refused to cover houses with trees in the front yard. The members who wanted their trees left and founded their own mutual, the Green Tree, in 1784. The owners decided, and when they disagreed they could leave and own something else.