Jacques Balmat Jacques Balmat Jacques Balmat, called "le Mont Blanc" (1762–1834) was a mountaineer, a Savoyard mountain guide, born in the Chamonix valley in Savoy, at this time part of the Kingdom of Sardinia. A chamois hunter and collector of crystals, Balmat completed the first ascent of Mont Blanc with physician Michel-Gabriel Paccard on 8 August 1786. For this feat, King Victor Amadeus III gave him the honorary title "le Mont Blanc". Balmat and Paccard's ascent of Mont Blanc was a major accomplishment in the early history of mountaineering. C. Douglas Milner wrote "The ascent itself was magnificent; an amazing feat of
Fonderie Paccard Fonderie Paccard Fonderie Paccard is a French foundry in Annecy. Founded in 1796, the foundry has cast more than 120,000 bells located throughout the world. The foundry has been continuously operated by seven generations of the Paccard family. The largest bell cast by Paccard is the World Peace Bell. Paccard is best known in the United States for its participation in the Liberty Bell Savings Bond Project. As part of the Marshall Plan, the foundry cast 57 replicas of the Liberty Bell in 1950 and 1951. Most of the bells were distributed, one each, to the then-48 U.S. states as