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Andrew Carnegie - American Industrialist (1835-1919)
He had only five years of formal schooling when he emigrated at age thirteen to the United States from Scotland. At age seventeen he began working for the Pennsyvania Railroad as a telegraph operator. Over the next fifty years he developed railroads and brought vertical integration to the iron and steel industry. He created a steel-making empire that became U.S. Steel after he sold it in 1901 to financier J.P. Morgan for in excess of $400,000,000. Always mindful of his humble beginnings, by the time he died in 1919 Carnegie had given away over $350,000,000 to provide free libraries, schools and colleges, and public parks.
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Claus Spreckels - Sugar Manufacturer (1828-1908)
Born in Germany, he emigrated to the U.S. in 1846 and in 1863 entered the sugar business, soon establishing a near monopoly in the manufacture and sale of sugar on the Pacific coast, becoming known as The Sugar King. He developed extensive sugar plantations in the Hawaiian Islands, then still a kingdom, and was a close friend and supporter of King Kalahaua. Spreckels was one of many German immigrant entrepreneurs such as Heinz, Gerber, Kraft, Fleischmann, Hershey, Schlitz, Miller, Blatz, and Busch who founded businesses that grew to become leaders in the food and beverage industries.
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James Lick - Financier & Entrepreneur (1796-1876)
After early business success as a pianomaker and fur trader in the U.S. and South America, he moved to California in 1848 after its annexation from Mexico. Seeing a timely opportunity during the Gold Rush years, Lick bought up real estate in San Francisco, and later large tracts of land near San Jose, Lake Tahoe, and Los Angeles, as well as the whole of Santa Catalina Island. Through his land holdings he eventually grew to be the richest man in the state. In his last years he devoted a large portion of his wealth to the construction of the Lick Observatory, containing what was then the world's largest telescope.
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Chauncey DePew - Businessman, Politician (1834-1928)
DePew was President of the New York Central railroad, functioning as the front man for Cornelius Vanderbilt in the development of his empire. DePew lavished money and free railroad passes upon members of the New York State legislature in exchange for valuable subsidies and land grants for the railroad. He was active socially and politically, serving in New York as regent of the State university, a State Representative, and U.S. Senator. He also ran unsuccessfully for President of the U.S. in 1888. He was also a prominent social speaker and philathropist.
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Cornelius Vanderbilt - Businessman (1794-1877)
At age sixteen in 1810 he founded successful freight and passenger ferry businesses in the New York City area. Was captain of his own ferry line between 1818 and 1829, hence his nickname "Commodore". In 1847 he established a shipping line to California via Nicaragua. He began his career in railroads in 1862, purchased numerous railroad lines over the next decade, consolidated them and extended his rail network to Chicago. He built Grand Central Station in New York City. He left a large endowment to Central University in Nashville, Tennessee - which was then renamed as Vanderbilt University.
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Peter M. Arthur - Railroad Union Leader (18??-1903)
He served as the Grand Chief of the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers for twenty years, leading the union through the most turbulent era in railroad labor relations and working ceaselessly for the interests of locomotive engineers in the U.S. After a strike on the Pennsylvania Railroad in 1877, he devised a plan of action to have the Locomotive Engineers come to terms with the railroads rather than work in concert with rest of the labor unions. The practice was quite successful, albeit selfish, and became known as "arthurization," to characterize self-interested power-grabbing on the part of labor unions.
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George W. Childs - American Publisher (1829-1894)
He was educated in public schools, served briefly in the U.S. Navy, and in 1843 became a clerk in a Philadelphia bookshop. He later organized the publishing house of Childs & Peterson, and in 1864 with his partner Anthony J. Drexel purchased the Philadelphia Public Ledger, at that time a little-known newspaper. Childs radically changed its orientation, insisting on a high level of journalistic accuracy and morality and refusing to print sensationalism or scandal. The Ledger became one of the most influential newspapers in the country. Childs was reknowned for his philanthropy in benefit of many important civic and social projects in Philadelphia.
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Thomas Lipton - Scottish Tea Merchant (1850-1931)
At age fourteen he stowed away on a ship to America, earning a living as a farm laborer, and later as a grocery clerk in New York. In 1870, he returned to Glasgow, and soon opened his own grocery store. By age thirty he ran a chain of stores, and was a millionaire. Lipton became best known for revolutionizing the tea business. He developed tea bags, insuring consistency and freshness for tea consumers. He also sold different blends to different countries to compensate for local water characteristics, and through efficient production lowered the cost of tea. He was knighted by Queen Victoria. Lipton left much of his fortune to the city of Glasgow.
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Ernst Haeckel - German Scientist (1834-1919)
He trained as a physician, but after reading Darwin's Origin of Species he pursued an academic career, researching many groups of invertebrates, including radiolarians, sponges, and segmented worms. He coined many terms commonly used by biologists today, such as phylum, phylogeny, and ecology. He was also a free-thinker who ventured beyond biology into anthropology, psychology, and cosmology, but his speculative ideas and allegations of falsified experimental data weakened his scientific credentials. Haeckel's statement that "politics is applied biology" was later used long after his death by Nazi propagandists to support their racist and nationalist policies.
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Guglielmo Marconi - Italian Physicist (1874-1937)
His scientific experimentation was instrumental to the development of the wireless telegraph. His first successful demonstrations were conducted in Bologna in 1895. Formed the Marconi Wireless Telegraph Company in London in 1897, and was the first to transmit wireless messages across the English Channel. Founded the American Marconi Company in 1900, and was the first to successfully transmit and receive wireless messages across the Atlantic Ocean in 1901. He received the Nobel Prize for physics in 1909. His later years were spent in developing short wave radio communication technology.
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Samuel F. B. Morse - American Inventor (1791-1872)
He was the son of a distinguished geographer and clergyman. He took an interest in electricty and developed the
electric telegraph (1832-35). In 1838 he invented the Morse Code. He was also an accomplished painter of portraits. Among his friends were the French hero
of the U.S. War of Independence, the Marquis de Lafayette, and the novelist James Fenimore Cooper. He was a founder of the National Academy of Design, and was its first president from 1826 to 1845. Later in life he was well known for his philathropy, and was a founder of Vassar University.
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Carl von Linné - Swedish Biologist (1707-1778)
Better known to the scientific community by his Latinized name Carolus Linnaeus, he is recognized as the Father of Taxonomy. His system for naming, ranking, and classifying organisms, the Systema Naturae, though modified over the years, is still used throughout the world today. He greatly simplified scientific classification by utilizing one Latin name to designate genus and one for species, e.g., Homo sapiens. Linnaeus made a botanical and ethnographical expedition to Lapland in 1731. He also became the personal physician to the Swedish royal family.
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Henry Eckford - American Shipbuilder (1775-1832)
Born in Scotland, he emigrated to the U.S. in 1796. He built the steamship Robert Fulton which in 1822 made the first steam-powered voyage between New York, New Orleans, and Havana, Cuba.
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Michael Faraday - English Scientist (1791-1867)
He was a chemist and physicist. During his career he discovered benzene, was the first to liquify chlorine gas, and developed new varieties of optical glass. He also did pioneering work in the fields of electricity and magnetism.
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