Customer Reviews

Andrew Carnegie

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This book is an outstanding account of the life of Andrew Carnegie, one of the greatest philanthropists and capitalists ever. The book is long but brilliantly written and an enthralling read. Wall has painstakingly researched Carnegie and added considerably to knowledge of the man. His central thesis is that Carnegie's life was a continuing attempt to reconcile his radical Scottish childhood with "the paramountcy he achieved within the American plutocracy as an adult". Wall's approach is generally sympathetic but he is not afraid to be critical when needed, especially over the Homestead strike. The whole of Carnegie's life is in this book, and each part of his life story is properly placed in its historical context. I learned an enourmous amount about the politics and economics of USA and Britain in the late 19th and early twentieth century, but most of all I learned about Carnegie, a man who got as rich as Bill Gates in his day and gave it all away. When you consider that he sold his interest in Carnegie Steel for over $250m in 1901 and start to think about inflation since then you will see what I mean. Read this book and find out how he did it. It is hard to believe that one man could achieve so much in one lifetime. I am not an academic and only have a lay interest in history but would recommend this to anyone. Haven't you ever wondered about Carnegie Hall, Carnegie Libraries or Carnegie Trusts? I now want to visit Pittsburgh and Skibo to see where it all happened.

Joseph Frazier Wall's one-volume biography "Andrew Carnegie" is a "must read" for anyone interested in early American industrial development. However, just as Carnegie's life was much more than simply the story of steel production, so too is this biography. It is a fascinating look at the half-century of American history between the Civil War and World War I.

Andrew Carnegie was one of the most intriguing characters of late nineteenth century America. Born into a politically active although socio-economically humble family in Scotland, Carnegie possessed a passion for advancement and material wealth that propelled him to the forefront of the industrial world. Rising from Pittsburgh telegraph message boy to protege of Pennsylvania Railroad executive Tom Scott to capitalist investor and finally steel magnate in a decade-and-a-half, Carnegie was the very embodiment of the Horatio Alger hero popularized at that time.

Although he shared the same business philosophy of using retained earnings for growth rather than dividends as John D. Rockefeller and other titans and he exhibited a personal drive and sense of destiny common to other leading trust-builders, Carnegie was in one particular way very different from his peers. He was a deeply cerebral man, very well-read and able to compose thoughtful essays on some of the most pressing and challenging political and economic issues of his time. His written defense of the gold standard was used by Mark Hanna to promote McKinley's stance against the bi-metallism of William Jennings Bryan in the crucial 1896 election; his thoughts on central banking influenced Wilson's policies in creating the Federal Reserve System; and Carnegie was one of the very first argue for a permanent League of Nations to work for arbitration of international disputes. His close personal friends were British liberals, renowned philosophers such as Herbert Spencer and other members of the intellectual elite on both sides of the Atlantic, not fellow industrialists or business associates like Henry Clay Frick or Henry Phipps who cared little for politics and even less for the recondite subjects that intrigued Carnegie.

Wall weaves these diverse cords of Carnegie's life into a masterful biography that succeeds as much as a social, political and business history of his time as it does in critically examining the complex character, beliefs, and relationships of an extraordinary man. Wall is certainly sympathetic to Carnegie and his achievements, but overall "Andrew Carnegie" is extremely objective and the author doesn't hesitate to highlight his subject's personal foibles, convenient lapses of memory, and vanity.

At over one thousand pages in length the paperback is physically imposing and can at times bog down in detail, but Wall's lucid writing style and often sardonic wit make it a fast and enjoyable read.

The blurb "as thick and densely-packed as a rail of steel" would fit nicely on the back cover of this book, I think. Blurbs aside, Wall writes well and seems to have an exceedingly good handle on every aspect of Andrew Carnegie's life. The beginning is slow to get going but as momentum builds, the author's use of source material, insightful opinions, and historical detail provides a portrait of Carnegie that would be impossible to glean from a smaller study. This is a book designed for scholars that is written well enough for a layperson. It is, however, a commitment: one to the tune of about 1000 pages. Black coffee, comfortable chair, good reading light, and an overwhelming interest in the life of Andrew Carnegie are all suggested before turning over the first page.

The theme that Wall works with is: To understand the public man, the reader needs to know the private man. And vice versa. The author never states this but as can be assumed by the length of this study, the book is intended to be encyclopedic. It lives up to the promise. Wall takes the reader through Carnegie's life in Dunfermline, his early radical leanings, immigration to America, the Pennsylvania Railroad years, steel, the Bessemer process, his Spencerian thoughts and other writings, Homestead, selling out to J. P. Morgan, and, of course, early and late philanthropy. That is a brief overview. Also included are portraits of major and minor characters in Carnegie's life. Writing about these people and events, the author exposes aspects of Carnegie that seem brilliant, tragic, comedic, stubborn, hypocritical, and downright cold-hearted; in some cases, such as the events surrounding the Homestead strike, all at the same time. Did I mention that this book is encyclopedic? Public and private correspondence, newspaper articles, books, financial records, and historical economic figures are quoted judiciously but often. Be prepared to work for your understanding. Wall is a terrific tour guide, however, and if you enjoy the level of detail David McCullough presents in his biographies, you will be comfortable with what is offered here.

The payoff of all of this research and writing is an understanding of Andrew Carnegie and the Gilded Age that few other texts could hope to provide. In an age when most of the robber barons (or "empire builders" as Wall prefers) were boring in their personal life, Carnegie is by far one of the most interesting. This book has a lot of qualities to recommend it but is not intended for the casual historian.

Also recommended: PBS American Experience: Andrew Carnegie.

This book is finest, most comprehensive, and exciting biography ever written about Carnegie. No Carnegie biography, before or since, has ever approached the excellence of Wall's masterpiece.
In fact, this might even be one of the greatest books ever written. Despite the fact that it runs to more than 1100 pages, Wall manages to tell the story and not waste a single word. This is not just a biography of Carnegie. It is also a window into another world. We see the Industrial Revolution up close and we meet the characters who actually shaped and maintained Carnegie's empire, including Henry Clay Frick, Captain William Jones, and Charles Schwab. Carnegie's relationships with contemporaries such as Herbert Spencer, J.P. Morgan, John D. Rockefeller, Andrew Mellon, and at least seven US Presidents are explored as well. The reader will be fascinated with the story, which reads like a work of fiction. Carnegie's rise conincides with the rise of the US as a world power. His success mirrored the nation's and he contributed in no small way to the propserity of the republic in which he thrived. A must read for any Carnegie student and a strongly recommended read for the novice as well.

Andrew Carnegie was born in Scotland in 1835 and came to America at age 13. He started working with the Pennsylvania Railroad, and then got in on the ground floor of the steel business. Unlike Rockefeller, his great rival in the race to become the world's richest man, who was motivated by a pious Baptist fervor, Carnegie was a Scottish agnostic Darwinist. (He was three times richer than Rockefeller, by the way.) A frequent contributor to popular magazines of the day, mainly on economic and social issues, he was a follower of Herbert Spencer.

Practical and somewhat crude in manners, the bottom line is what drove him in business. He retired in 1900 and devoted himself to philanthropy (he published a book that year - THE GOSPEL OF WEALTH - in which he proclaimed it was the duty of those who had become extremely wealthy to help those who were less fortunate). Among other things, he began donating library buildings (always just the buildings, never any books) to communities around the country. They were a huge success. Late in his life he became obsessed with world peace and pacificism, less successfully. Although the book is overwritten at 1,200+ pages, Wall writes well and commands our interest. Highly recommended.

Exhaustively researched, well written. This book starts a little slow but as the biography plays out you understand why the author took the direction he did and applaud. By the end of the book you not only understand why Carnegie did what he did but have a unique picture of life in the gilded age. One of the few biographies I have read where the author is insightful but does not interfere with reality. If you are interested in the robber barons, the gilded age, Carnegie or just unique human beings, start here. You will be rewarded.

2nd Edition (1989), University of Pittsburgh Press, 1,117 pages (of which 1,047 for main body)

Andrew Carnegie is another of the twenty books that Charlie Munger recommends at the back of the second edition of Poor Charlie's Almanack. If you've read any of my other reviews this will not surprise you, as I am working my way through his list. After all, if a man like Munger - whose thinking prowess is revered by a man of Buffett's abilities - takes the trouble to recommend only twenty books out of all those he has read over a long life time, surely one should actually read them?

You can see from the page count that even reading this book (described by the author as a 'massive tome') is a significant undertaking (let alone the 'many long years' that Wall spent on it). I am left with somewhat mixed feelings after finishing the book: admiration for the vast amount of research that went into it, but also a certain amount of disappointment that some part of Carnegie's character seemed to be missing.

When I reviewed 'Titan', the biography of Carnegie's contemporary, Rockefeller, by Ron Chernow (also on Munger's recommended list) earlier in the year I awarded the book a maximum five stars and said that it was as entertaining as a novel. I also said that I'd not read many biographies and so was somewhat hesitant in my opinion. Andrew Carnegie was thus a particularly useful book to read, as it covers a similarly successful businessman over roughly the same period and location.

I felt that Titan gave a fuller view of Rockefeller, the man, and the things that drove him. I've spent some time considering why Wall's biography of Carnegie seems somewhat two-dimensional in comparison. I've concluded that it probably has something to do with the way that Wall would say, for example, that Carnegie wrote a speech or worked on his autobiography but he doesn't give much indication of how Carnegie would actually spend his day.

Did he work all day on some days, or only at certain times of the day? How did he fit in work (whether business or, later, philanthropy) with the many visitors at Skibo in Scotland? Did he vary his work habits during the year as he moved between Scotland and the US? Did he plan his writing (he was a prolific author of speeches, articles and books) and did he find writing easy as well as enjoyable? I found the absence of these mundane details made it harder to identify with Carnegie.

That said, there were some very interesting and even exciting passages in the book. There is a marvellous story about how Carnegie's manager and business partner, Henry Clay Frick, was shot twice with a small pistol in the neck at short range and stabbed three times in the hip and legs by a would-be assassin. Frick sat in a chair without anaesthetic, directing the doctor as he extracted the bullets. He then insisted upon returning to his desk to cable his mother and Carnegie and to finish some urgent paperwork. It was at the time of the infamous strike at the Homestead plant and before Frick would allow himself to be taken home by ambulance he prepared this statement:

"This incident will not change the attitude of the Carnegie Steel Company toward the Amalgamated Association. I do not think I shall die, but whether I do or not, the Company will pursue the same policy and it will win."

Eventually Frick and Carnegie ended up in open warfare over the control of Carnegie Steel. Wall quotes sections of the board minutes as the fight begins and one feels almost like a direct spectator. Now you know something of Frick's character, you'll be unsurprised that I thought this was the most exciting part of the book.

Rather like Rockefeller, Carnegie retired from business and devoted himself to philanthropy. Also like Rockefeller, Carnegie found giving his money away more difficult and burdensome than actually making it (in fact it nearly gave Rockefeller a breakdown). I think the key here is that it is easy to give money away, but if you are determined to do it effectively (and it was anathema to men like Rockefeller and Carnegie to do it any other way) then it is extremely hard. Particularly when vast quantities of money are involved.

However, Wall's book contains a superb example of the superpower of incentives (and also of an extremely strong positive unintended consequence). Carnegie created an endowment to provide free pensions for university professors because he was concerned that their very low wages (senior professors earned salaries comparable to clerks working for Carnegie Steel) and lack of pensions were causing two major problems:

1. A lack of talented people becoming teachers.
2. Professors staying on long after they should have retired because it was the only way colleges could pay them a pension (again preventing entry of young people).

It had a huge effect because the trustees evaluated all of the colleges in the US and only approved around 50 of over 400 that applied (most were rejected because of low academic entry standards or because of sectarian requirements). The effect of the good teachers wanting to move to colleges where they could access a free pension was so strong that it forced a significant improvement of entry standards across the country, which in turn drove a significant improvement in standards in schools across the country that fed the colleges. It also forced many sectarian/religious colleges to become non-sectarian.

Munger has said that perhaps the most important job in management is to get the incentives right. The marvellous example above shows that, with the right incentives, apparently intractable problems can sometimes simply resolve themselves (just as with FedEx's initial delivery problems).

Overall, Andrew Carnegie is a fine and worthy book, but one that takes some reading.

I studied this book about 25 years ago when I was studying the Homestead Steel Strike, but I'm betting it's still the best all-around balanced and well written portrait of Carnegie. He's got to be about the most interesting of the great late 19th century US capitalists, the biggest rags to riches story of them all and a man whose mind tried to contain and maintain diametrically opposed ideas about rights of labor and rights of property. In the end, of course, he caved and went with the money, but hey, at least he never really felt good about it, and he did set the standard for philanthropy in the last 20 years of his life (after becoming the world's first billionaire in 1900). A very complex man, and Wall stays balanced about him. The biographies I've read of other steel barons in Carnegie's companies (eg, Frick, Charles Schwab) are mostly disappointing.

I have three main problems with this book:
1) The author explores the social critiques of Carnigie's life in detail and seems to side with a leftist point of view.
2) The author dwells on the personal side of Carnigie's life to the detriment of the business side of his life.
3) The first two issues result in a long tedius book to read.

I definitely would not suggest buying this book. I finally gave up on the book about 2/3 of the way through it.

It would be nice to read a book on Carnigie by someone who understands, business, capitalism and freedom.

Andrew Carnegie is the ultimate "rags to riches" story. He began life in humble circumstances in Dumferline, Scotland. He emigrated to the United States with his family when he was about 13 years old. His family was so impoverished that he was forced to take a job shortly after his arrival in America.

Then followed one of the most remarkable careers ever experienced by a person. Carnegie started as a telegraph messenger boy. He than in quick succession became a telegrapher. He was than hired by the Pennsylvania Railroad to be a telegrapher for a division superintendent. Than he was promoted to division superintendent. All the while this was going on, Carnegie seized other opportunities. He invested in the Woodruff Sleeping Car Company which did very well and than was bought out by the Pullman Sleeping Car Company. At this point, Carnegie had made the first part of his fortune and he quit his job with the Pennsylvania railroad to focus on other business opportunities he could invest in.

Carnegie lived in the environs of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Early on, he became acquainted with the Bessemer process for steel production. He realized that someone who was prepared to produce steel on a huge scale could make a huge fortune. Along with business associates, he first built the Edgar Thomson Steel Works. Later other works were purchased or contructed. The company became known as Carnegie Steel. The profits that were generated in this business were phenomenal. In the early years, Carnegie may have made as much as a 40% annual return on his investment.

For such an astute man, though, Carnegie was unwilling to face certain realities. He couldn't understand that workers in the steel mills would not just stand idly by working long hours at unsafe conditions while his fortune grew ever larger. This lead to the famous "Homestead Steel Mill Strike" of 1892. Carnegie and his manager William Clay Frick prevailed in the dispute, but at an enormous cost in reputation, money, and in human lives. Further, Carnegie could be quite ruthless to men who he had worked with and trusted for years. The way he forced William Frick out of the Carnegie Steel Company is scandalous when you realize how much Carnegie owed Frick.

In 1900, Carnegie sold his steel company to J.P. Morgan and the "House of Morgan" for the than absolutely phenomenal sum of $[...]. That company today is, of course, U.S. Steel.

Carnegie took the money from this sale and spent the remaining 20 years of his life contributing to charitable causes. He is most known for the Carnegie libraries that were established. But, he also was a large contributor to minority education, pensions for college professors, churches, and the cause of international peace.

Wall has written a fine book, but it is a long one. I spent my spare time over several weeks getting through this 1050 page volume. Wall could have condensed some portions of the book and still done a good job telling the story. However, despite the time committment involved, I recommend this book to anyone interested in American History during the Guilded Age and the Progressive Period.