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Title: John Jacob Astor : America's First Multimillionaire by Axel Madsen ISBN: 0-471-38503-4 Publisher: Wiley Pub. Date: 19 January, 2001 Format: Hardcover Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $30.00 |
Average Customer Rating: 3 (6 reviews)
Rating: 3
Summary: Very Interesting.
Comment: John Jacob Astor led the life most people do not even dare to dream about. He was a serial entrepreneur at a time when most of the world was composed of farmers. He was so successful at his businesses that when he died he controlled one-fifteenth of all personal wealth in the United States! Among many other things it is safe to say he was a very driven man.
Born in relative poverty in Germany, he immigrated to the United States via England, arriving just after the Revolutionary War ended. Marrying the daughter of the woman who ran his boarding house in New York, his business career moves from the importing of musical instruments to the exporting of furs. So successful is he in the fur business that he is able to finance the establishment of the first American fort in Oregon and supports this effort with his own ships via Cape Horn. Returning east overland, his employees discover the route that subsequently becomes the Oregon Trail!
This is a swashbuckler of a story which spans not just the North American Continent but the global economy as it existed in his day as well. Besides furs, he traded tea, seal skins, opium and assorted other commodities through global wars and economic recession on a scale to match the great trading houses of England, the British East India Company and the Hudson Bay Company. He was a man who took huge business risks. A key focus of the book is naturally the fur trade, the dominant wealth generator of its time. This was his first truly big score, one that he engaged in for over 20 years and the primary venture through which he amasses the fortune that provided the investment capital for all the endeavors which would follow.
Alex Madsen does an excellent job of fitting Astor within the economic and political time period in which he lived. I have found information here on the fur trade I have found nowhere else. This is a very well researched book; one that not only reports on the biography of the life lived but the history of the time as well. There is a lot to appreciate here. It is a book well worth the time.
Rating: 3
Summary: This book was good, at best
Comment: I bought this book to learn about Astor and how he made his fortunes. The book goes into almost too much depth in regards to the fortune made in fur trading and shipping. Out of the 25 chapters, 23 were discussing nearly every detail of Astor, his men, indians, and his competition in regards to trading and shipping. In chapter 23, the author finally gets to where he claims Astor made his largest fortune, real estate. Since that is where he made the bulk of his fortune, then why did the author only devote one chapter to this topic? Most people who buy this book will do so to learn how Astor made his fortune, that is not explained well enough. I have to give the author credit, though, he did uncover many details that the other Astor biographers failed to see.
Rating: 3
Summary: Excellent history of fur trade, little of Real Estate.
Comment: Madsen takes the reader through an interesting account of the early fur trade and the opening of the American West. There are interesting anecdotes from Astor's deaings with historical and political figures of the time. However, if you are looking for information on his later business dealings and the development of Astor into New York's largest property owner and landlord then you will be disappointed. Nine tenths of his book is devoted to the development of the American Fur Company and the travials of those who forged through the wild countryside on Astors behalf. There is nothing in this book about how he dealt with tenants, advertised properties, developed systems of management for properties, financing, leverage, nothing.
So buy it for an interesting histort of the time but don't buy it if your looking for information on how one of the great Real Estate investors of his time developed and managed his system of success.
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Title: The Man Who Made Wall Street: Anthony J. Drexel and the Rise of Modern Finance by Dan Rottenberg ISBN: 0812236262 Publisher: University of Pennsylvania Press Pub. Date: 01 October, 2001 List Price(USD): $29.95 |
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Title: The Life & Legend of E. H. Harriman by Maury Klein ISBN: 0807825174 Publisher: University of North Carolina Press Pub. Date: 01 March, 2000 List Price(USD): $39.95 |
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Title: Carnegie by Peter Krass ISBN: 0471386308 Publisher: Wiley Pub. Date: 30 August, 2002 List Price(USD): $35.00 |
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Title: The Life and Legend of Jay Gould by Maury Klein ISBN: 0801857716 Publisher: Johns Hopkins University Press Pub. Date: 01 November, 1997 List Price(USD): $29.95 |
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Title: Henry Flagler: The Astonishing Life and Times of the Visionary Robber Barron Who Founded Florida by David L. Chandler ISBN: 0025236903 Publisher: Simon & Schuster Pub. Date: 01 June, 1986 List Price(USD): $30.00 |
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