Gore invested his fortune in a variety of businesses , including important infrastructure projects such as the Middlesex Canal and a bridge across the Charles River . He was a major investor in the early textile industry , funding the Boston Manufacturing Company and the Merrimack Manufacturing Company , whose business established the city of Lowell , Massachusetts . Gore was involved in a variety of charitable causes , and was a major benefactor of Harvard College , where the first library was named in his honor . His palatial mansion in Waltham , Massachusetts , now known as Gore Place , is one of the finest extant examples of Federalist architecture , and has been declared a National Historic Landmark .