The First Tycoon (Hardcover)

from rivkat

Biography of a man at the heart of huge changes in American economics and therefore politics; he started with boats across the Hudson, became a steamship mogul, then ended life as a railroad mogul. Beginning as a critic of monopolies granted to the already-rich (and a prime mover in Gibbons v. Og...

from jztemple

This book starts off well with the very interesting details of Vanderbilt's early life on the waters around New York and his transition from a minor entrepreneur to a major player in the development of shipping lines around the world as well as ferries and railroads in the northeast. However, the...

from arianr

The thing that most impressed me about this work is the amount of research that Stiles obviously put into this book. Stiles takes the position that Vanderbilt has been judged a little harshly by previous economic historians of the Gilded Age. I'll admit that I don't enough to judge the efficacy o...

from arianr

The thing that most impressed me about this work is the amount of research that Stiles obviously put into this book. Stiles takes the position that Vanderbilt has been judged a little harshly by previous economic historians of the Gilded Age. I'll admit that I don't enough to judge the efficacy o...

from ldmarquet

Yes, but how did he make his decisions? T. J. Stiles thinks Cornelius Vanderbilt has gotten a bad rap. Born during George Washington's presidency, Vanderbilt built a massive business empire starting with steamships and then railroads. His life spanned an epic period of the growth of the United St...