Andrew Carnegie (1835-1919)
Starting out life in humble circumstances and eventually making a fortune is not uncommon in America. Whether one is native-born or immigrates to America, the freedom America provides opens up opportunities not found in other countries. Such is the story of Andrew Carnegie. Carnegie’s rise from a Scottish immigrant to becoming the wealthiest man in the world coincided with a time when American society changed from a largely agricultural-based economy to an industrial one. At the center of this change was the steel industry, where Carnegie made his fortune.
Andrew Carnegie’s American story began when he immigrated with his family in 1848 to Allegheny, Pennsylvania, just outside Pittsburgh, from Scotland at age twelve. Although he took some night school classes, his formal education essentially stopped at this point, but Carnegie educated himself by reading.
As a young boy, his rags-to-riches story began almost immediately. He took a job as a “bobbin boy” in a cotton mill earning $1.20 per week. A year later, he worked as a telegraph messenger and eventually as a telegraph operator. This led him to a job with the Pennsylvania Railroad in 1853. Carnegie worked directly for one of the railroad’s top executives, Thomas Scott, who became a mentor to him. This was only the beginning for Carnegie, whose work ethic and business skills would lead him to greater heights.
At this still early stage of his life, Carnegie began to see the possibilities in many industries. He was an investor in a company that established the first sleeping passenger car for the railroads as well as in the oil industry in Pennsylvania. In 1865, he left his job with the Pennsylvania Railroad to form the Keystone Bridge Company. In 1868, he began constructing the Eads Bridge in St. Louis, Missouri. Although named after the architect James Eads, Carnegie believed that steel was the best way to construct it. The Eads Bridge was the first steel bridge constructed over the Mississippi River.
In 1873, during a trip to England, Carnegie met Henry Bessemer who introduced Carnegie to a new way of converting iron into steel. This new knowledge transformed Carnegie from a successful businessman to a historic figure. He returned to Pennsylvania and built the J. Edgar Thomson Steel Mill near Pittsburgh. Not only did Carnegie implement a more efficient way of producing steel, but he also took ownership of the raw materials needed to make steel and the means to transport them. In other words, he controlled every step of the process of making steel and transporting it to customers. He continued to innovate with the introduction of the open-hearth furnace in the 1890s, which improved the speed of steelmaking. He built and controlled other steel plants throughout the country, all owned by the Carnegie Steel Company. Carnegie Steel began a building boom in America that is still felt today.
The Home Insurance Building in Chicago, Illinois, completed in 1885, is considered America’s first skyscraper. It stood 10 stories tall or 138 feet and was built with steel and other metals.
Like all historical figures, Carnegie was imperfect. He had a strong desire for efficiency, often at the expense of his workers. The workers at his steel mills worked long hours for as little as fourteen cents an hour. In 1892, while he was away in Scotland, workers at his Homestead, Pennsylvania plant went on strike. An attempt by Carnegie’s manager, Henry Clay Frick, to stop the strike resulted in violence and sixteen people being killed.
In 1901, financier J.P. Morgan and his United States Steel Company bought Carnegie Steel for $480 million, of which Carnegie himself took approximately $250 million. This made the Scottish immigrant who started out making $1.20 per week in a cotton mill the wealthiest man in the world at the time.
In 1889, Carnegie wrote an article for the North American Review entitled “Wealth,” in which he stated, “a man who dies rich dies disgraced.” Thus, with the purchase of Carnegie Steel in 1901, Andrew Carnegie spent his remaining years giving away his fortune. As a young man, Carnegie was given access to the private library of a wealthy businessman and became an avid reader. He built as many as 2,800 public libraries in the United States and around the world. He donated some 7,500 organs to religious congregations around the world. In 1893, as its benefactor, his name went on Carnegie Hall in New York City. In 1900, he started what would eventually become Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, one of the top research universities in the world.
Some more of Carnegie’s charitable foundations:
Carnegie Hero Fund (to reward those who rush to the aid of others)
Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching (which, among other achievements, advanced medical education in America)
Carnegie Relief Fund (to benefit injured steelworkers)
Carnegie Institute of Washington (for scientific research)
Carnegie Dunfermline Trust (in support of his hometown in Scotland)
Carnegie Trust for the Universities of Scotland (in support of higher education in Scotland)
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace (the breakout of World War I made this endeavor unsuccessful)
Carnegie Corporation – Founded in 1911, it was established for “the advancement and diffusion of knowledge and understanding among the people of the United States.” Carnegie gave $125 million to this foundation while he was alive and an additional $10 million upon his death. It was one of the first and remains one of the largest grantmaking foundations in the United States. Among its achievements is the development of the show Sesame Street.
By the time of his death in 1919, Carnegie is thought to have given away $350 million. Adjusted for inflation, it is believed this makes Carnegie the biggest philanthropist in American history.
Andrew Carnegie married his wife Louise in 1887, and the couple had one child, Margaret.