US History › Section I · The West and big business › Topic I.6
From invention to industrial growth
New technology became big business through railways, steel, oil and banking. A few industrialists built corporations of unprecedented size, and Americans argued then, as historians do now, over whether they were builders or plunderers.
In this topic
- The Gilded Age economy
- Railways: the first big business
- Railway barons and their methods
- Carnegie and steel
- Worked example: two ways to grow a firm
- Rockefeller and Standard Oil
- Trusts, holding companies and the law
- Morgan and finance capitalism
- Self-made men? Ideas that justified wealth
- Worked example: robber barons or captains of industry?
- Common mistakes to avoid
- Key takeaways
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