What I learned from reading Dark Genius of Wall Street: The Misunderstood Life of Jay Gould, King of the Robber Barons by Edward J. Renehan Jr.
He was raised on a farm and milked cows.
As a boy.
He neither drank nor smoked.
He was affable to every employee, from the head of the department to the humblest.
He enjoyed his wealth quietly.
He rarely lost his temper.
Self control was one of his most profound attributes.
He was a quiet man, and when he spoke, his words were both few and carefully chosen.
He rarely boasted.
But once speaking for himself and his fellow capitalists, he said, we have made this country rich.
We have developed the country.
We have created the earning power by developing the system.
When he died, the press said that he was the world's richest man.
It also called him the world's most hated man.
The man just described sounds like John D.
Rockefeller.
It is not.
It's Jay Gold.
Rockefeller and Gold had much in common.
The two were nearly the same age.