Carnegie and Rockefeller

John D Rockefeller
http://www.empireonline.com/images/uploaded/John-D_-Rockefeller.jpg

As this was one of the final units of the school year, my history class learned the material differently than usual.  Instead of having the lesson taught to us, we used the notes and sources my history teacher put on our Edline page to create our own essential question for the lesson and answer it ourselves.  We spent two days learning about industrialists Andrew Carnegie and John D. Rockefeller by watching informative videos, analyzing sources, and sharing information with everyone through a google document.  Next, we formed the question, "Were the captains of industry a positive or negative impact on the public?"  After constructing the essential question, my class began to create 40 questions about Carnegie and Rockefeller, which will eventually be questions on our final exam in two weeks.  Eventually, we will create similar questions for our other lessons within the next couple of weeks, which will also be on our final.  From my in-class research, I believe that Carnegie and Rockefeller, who were important captains of industry, both had mainly positive impacts on the public.

This image represents Rockefeller's hold on the oil industry.
http://www.edline.net/files/_EfHIe_/ce3d2a1e75332f203745a49013852ec4/Doug_Ernst-Inquiry_Lesson-Robber_or_Captain.pdf

John D. Rockefeller was considered one of the most important business men in history, and he had a mostly positive impact on the public.  Early in his career, he decided that he wanted to be on of the richest men in the world, and this eventually became true.  Before he had worldwide fame though, he grew up with his father, who owned a farm.  He went to Cleveland High School, and he listened to his father, who wanted him to start a business career instead of attending college.  Rockefeller originally gained the money needed to become a business mogul by supporting the Union army during the Civil War.  He started his business career by working in the American Petroleum Industry. In 1870, he founded the Standard Oil Company of Ohio, and with this company the public started to believe that he was an "underhand businessman." He created a monopoly on natural fossil fuels in the United States, and bought many oil companies with his own.  However, he had a bad public reputation, which was mainly attributed to the thought that his actions were driven by greed, and the fact that he bought some companies unfairly. The image above depicts an octopus with its tentacles around different buildings, which represents how Rockefeller's oil company had control of all the other oil companies.  He did give over 50 million dollars of his money to education and charity groups, which proves that Rockefeller was not greedy, and his business skills show that he was a great model. Rockefeller may not have been the best person, but he was a great captain of industry, so his impact on society was mostly positive.

Andrew Carnegie
http://greatimmigrants.carnegie.org/images/1835_ac.jpg

Andrew Carnegie, another important captain of industry, had a better reputation than Rockefeller, and he also had a positive impact on the public.  Carnegie, an immigrant from Ireland, worked as a bobbin boy in a textile mill and was fairly poor before he worked his way up to the top of society.  His first work as a businessman, after working for Eastern Telegraph Lines, was with the steel industry.  The methods of his steel manufacturing business were derived from Great Britain's, whose methods he had previously studied.  He invested most of his money into the steel industry, and started work with Bessemer, who taught him a cheaper way to make steel.  This meant that his company was able to produce a higher quality steel at a lower price than his competitors.  He is well-known for expanding his steel company during financially depressing times while other businesses were downsizing, and became the second richest man in the world in 1900.  However, Carnegie's plan to destroy the Iron and Steelmakers Union was revealed in a strike; the United States became angry with him and his company.  He sold his company to J. P. Morgan in 1901, and gave much of his money to education, like Rockefeller did.  Carnegie was, generally, more popular amongst the public than Rockefeller, but his success career in industry gave him a positive impact on America.  Both Carnegie and Rockefeller, successful captains of industry, had a mostly positive impact on the public.