Convinced just hours before that they’d lose their jobs and salaries, employees of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc., got a surprise reprieve on Tuesday, after Barclays PLC agreed to acquire the bulk of the Wall Street firm for $1.75 billion.

Barclays is buying a stripped-clean version of Lehman’s North American business, which will include most of its people, franchise, brand name, technology and clients but won’t include the risky trades and liabilities that had hurt Lehman in the markets before its Chapter 11 bankruptcy-court filing. The takeover is a big gamble for Barclays and its president. The new plan enables Barclays to buy much of Lehman’s securities business without taking the risk of further losses on the firm’s commercial real estate and mortgage assets; but it is unclear how many of Lehman’s 26,200 employees will keep their jobs. Early estimates pin the number at about 9,000 to 10,000.

The price includes Lehman’s headquarters building, built in 2001 and which could fetch on the open market between $600 million to $900 million, according to real-estate brokers. Such a price roughly values the company’s ongoing operations at about $1 billion. The company reached an its all-time market high of $45 billion in early 2007.