Andrew Carnegie is a typical figure of the American dream realized. Originally a financially insecure immigrant, he became the second richest man in history.
Andrew Carnegie was born on November 25, 1835, into a family of later Scottish emigrants in the small village of Dunfermline, Scotland. At that time, little Andrew had the opportunity to meet the big new world, the USA, but his outlook was not exactly positive. Due to the poor conditions and poor family background, he had to work at the age of 12, which was not so exceptional at that time. He allegedly worked up to 12 hours every day from Monday to Saturday, earning one to two US dollars for one such week of work. At that time, of course, it was a completely different value than it is today, but this amount of money did not have a chance to pull the still young Andrew out of his poor environment. Despite poverty and the omnipresent thrift on everything possible and impossible, the Carnegie family decided to provide their son with at least a rough foundation for future professional and perhaps personal growth. Andrew therefore started attending night school, which later turned out to be the right move. From a laborer's position, which was characterized by rough manual labor, Andrew moved to the position of messenger to the director, who was primarily responsible for administrative and field work. He worked for the same company, but now directly under the boss.
"Imagine that you are standing on the threshold of unprecedented success, a bright and beautiful life lies at your feet. So get up and do it!"
Young Andrew's subsequent career progress was meteoric. Before he was eighteen, he had held several administrative positions in several companies, held important positions in the railroads, in the telegraph company (the predecessor of today's mobile operators), and at the age of eighteen he even became the head of the Pittsburgh division of the railroad company. It was the work in the railroad environment that became so interesting and valuable to him that he devoted all his time to it.
With his acquired knowledge of local legislation, financial processes and a significant dose of internal motivation, Andrew later decided to invest his money in the company's shares, which later turned out to be the right move. Thanks to the dividends paid, he acquired capital for his later activities, which can be compared perhaps only to JD Rockefeller.
Like "our" Tomáš Baťa, Andrew Carnegie also acquired a significant part of his wealth during the war. Many consider this success to be Carnegie's fault, but in fact, it was not the Civil War itself, but the demand for a certain commodity during its course that became the basis for the expansion of property and business activity. Steel was a significant innovation in heavy industry in the 19th century, until then mainly iron was used. Steel had great potential and is still widely used today thanks to its technical properties and reasonable purchase price. Carnegie invested his money and time in the emerging steel industry, and it was this step that earned him his spectacular wealth.
"Excess wealth is an inviolable credit to which the owner is bound until death to manage it for the good of society."
In 1901, Carnegie made a dramatic change in his life. He sold his company to the US Steel Corporation, founded by the legendary financier JP Morgan. The sale of the company brought him more than $ 200 million, and the 65-year-old Carnegie decided to spend the rest of his life in altruism. He invested a lot of money in educational initiatives, built libraries and contributed to various independent projects, and in the early 20th century he radically increased these investments. He donated about $ 5 million to the New York City library, thanks to which it was able to open several other smaller libraries, and it is rumored that thanks to his financial donations, a total of 2,800 libraries were opened. He did not deny himself an avid reader. In Pittsburgh, he founded the famous Carnegie Mellon University and a little later the Carnegie Foundation and the Carnegie Fellowship for International Peace.
In addition to his business and charitable interests, Carnegie enjoyed traveling and meeting prominent leaders from various fields. He became acquainted with Mark Twain and U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt, for example. Carnegie also wrote several books and countless articles, his 1889 contribution entitled "Wealth" affirming his belief that people with enormous wealth were socially responsible and should use their money to help others.
Andrew Carnegie died of pneumonia in Massachusetts in 1919. Interestingly, in his will, he donated almost all of his fortune, which at the time amounted to approximately 350 million US dollars, to charity.
Maria Synakova