Robber Baron or Captain of Industry?

Special thanks to Karen Lambert, National Endowment for the Humanities

LEARNING OBJECTIVES

Students will be able to:

1. Explain terms "robber baron" and "captain of industry" within context of time.

2. Evaluate actions taken by various captains of industry and robber barons of the time.

3. Synthesize and analyze information from primary and secondary sources to create a position on the compelling questions.

"This, then, is held to be the duty of the man of wealth: First, to set an example of modest, unostentatious living, shunning display or extravagance; … and, after doing so, to consider all surplus revenues which come to him simply as trust funds, which he is called upon to administer… to produce the most beneficial results for the community—the man of wealth thus becoming the mere trustee and agent for his poorer brethren, bringing to their service his superior wisdom, experience and ability to administer, doing for them better than they would or could do for themselves." —Andrew Carnegie, North American Review (1889)

Overview

Though a century has passed since the heyday of the great industrialists and financiers, debate continues: were these men captains of industry, without whom this country could not have taken its place as a great industrial power, or were they robber barons, limiting healthy competition and robbing from the poor to benefit the rich? Where do we draw the line between unfair business practices and competition that leads to innovation, investment, and improvement in the standard of living for everyone? Would the industrial economy have succeeded without entrepreneurs willing to take competition to its extremes?

Instructions

Using the following resources (and any academic sources you find interesting, see sites that are .edu, .gov), each group should fill in the chart for their assigned individual.

Andrew Carnegie

"It shall be the rule for the workman to be Partner with Capital, the man of affairs giving his business experience, the working man in the mill his mechanical skill, to the company, both owners of the shares and so far equally interested in the success of their joint efforts." —Andrew Carnegie

• EDSITEment resource American Memory

• Today in History

• Edgar Thomson Works, Carnegie Steel Co 

• America's Library, a link from the EDSITEment resource American Memory

• Andrew Carnegie

• Andrew Carnegie Grows Up Working

• Andrew Carnegie and His Parents

• Andrew Carnegie Philanthropist

• The Richest Man in the World: Andrew Carnegie on The American Experience, a link from the EDSITEment resource Internet Public Library

  • Letters about the Homestead Strike

  • Information about the Carnegie Mansion

  • Carnegie Biography

  • The American Experience | Andrew Carnegie | Gilded Age

  • How to Succeed in Life by Andrew Carnegie 

  • The Gospel of Wealth 

Cornelius Vanderbilt

"I have been insane on the subject of moneymaking all my life." —Cornelius Vanderbilt

"You have undertaken to cheat me. I won't sue you, for the law is too slow. I'll ruin you." —Cornelius Vanderbilt

• EDSITEment resource HarpWeek

• Cartoon, "The Great Race for the Western Stakes"

• A Business Biography of Cornelius Vanderbilt

• "Cornelius Vanderbilt" and "The Erie Railroad Wars" (move down the page until you locate the sections entitled "Cornelius Vanderbilt" and "The Erie Railroad Wars") from American History 102: Civil War to the Present

J. Pierpont Morgan

• From the EDSITEment resource Learner.org

• Labor Union versus Morgan

• Brief Biography from The American Experience

• Biography of Morgan from Morgan Library

• First Public Demonstration of Edison's Light Bulb from America's Library

• Morgan Finances Edison on The Smithsonian Museum of American History

John D. Rockefeller

• American Experience: The Rockefellers from PBS

• John D. Rockefeller Timeline

• Biography of John D. Rockefeller, Senior

• Annotated Timeline

• Critical Letter to the NY Times about Rockefeller

• Standard Oil of New Jersey (move down the page until you locate the section entitled "Standard Oil of New Jersey") 

Responding to the Workers

The following primary sources were written by workingmen and published in newspapers or magazines during the heyday of the industrialists.

• The Workingman's Ten Commandments

• Selfish Wealth is Never Good

• A Labor Newspaper Derides the Myth of the Self-Made Man

• The Labor Movement (video)
  

FFW: How do you believe your assigned industrialist would respond to these pieces?

Reflection: What do we understand about the early 20th century by analyzing visual primary sources?