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Commodore: The Life of Cornelius Vanderbilt | 
 enlarge | Manufacturer: Basic Books
Category: EBooks
List Price: $27.50
Buy New: $16.34
You Save: $11.16 (41%)
Avg. Customer Rating:  6 reviews
Format: Kindle Book
Media: Kindle Edition
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 364
Dewey Decimal Number: 385.092
ASIN: B0012OYBJ4
Publication Date: October 14, 2007
Shipping: Eligible for Super Saver Shipping
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
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Product Description
Using previously unreleased archives, Edward J. Renehan Jr. narrates the compelling life of Cornelius Vanderbilt: willful progenitor of modern American business. Vanderbilt made his initial fortune building ferry and cargo routes for sailing vessels. Then he moved into steamboats and railroads. With the New York Central, Vanderbilt established the nation's first major integrated rail system, linking New York with Boston, Montreal, Chicago, and St. Louis. At the same time, he played a key role in establishing New York as the financial center of the United States. When he died in 1877, Vanderbilt left a fortune that, in today's dollars, would dwarf that of even Bill Gates. Off Wall Street, Vanderbilt was a hard-drinking egotist and whoremonger devoid of manners or charity. He disinherited most of his numerous children and received an editorial rebuke from Mark Twain for his lack of public giving. Commodore sheds startling new light on many aspects of Vanderbilt's business and private life including, most notably, the revelation that advanced stage syphilis marred his last years. This is the definitive biography of a man whose influence on American life and commerce towers over all who followed him.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 1 more reviews...
 Good biography, better story March 18, 2008
2 out of 3 found this review helpful
Cornelius Vanderbilt's life makes for anything but a dull story. It is a classic 19th century rags to riches story in which a farmer's cunning and pugnacious son forges a powerful shipping empire through any means at his disposal. The Commodore goes so far as to orchestrate a coup against an American puppet government in Nicaragua to push up the value of his stock. Renehan spins a fine yarn, but also dwells in tedious detail on the antitrust and state vs. federal government dynamic - i.e. his sections on Ogden and Gibbons - which are unnecessary and less relevant in a brief book about Vanderbilt.
Overall, the book is informative and colored with choice anecdotes. During his slow syphilis induced demise, a septuagenarian Vanderbilt takes a pair of young sisters - one only in her twenties - as mistresses which he believes to have magnetic healing powers. Ultimately the two women go on to start the first female owned brokerage - relying on inside information provided by Vanderbilt's son in an effort to keep them away from his married father - the Commodore.
 How a nearly illiterate man created a historic fortune February 14, 2008
4 out of 5 found this review helpful
Tycoon "Commodore" Cornelius Vanderbilt is an important figure in the history of American business. Author Edward J. Renehan Jr. set out to "put a face" on Vanderbilt's ambition, enterprise and mania for wealth, and he succeeded. You will get a solid understanding of the vast, rapid changes the U.S. experienced during Vanderbilt's life and his significant role in that change. His descendants, including his granddaughter, designer Gloria Vanderbilt, and her son, CNN anchor Anderson Cooper, continue to be prominent. Though this interesting, reportorial biography could have focused more on the historic context and economic impact of this financial giant, and a bit less on his all-too-human failings, getAbstract finds that it deserves to be read by anyone who is interested in American history.
 enjoyable, yet slightly off the mark February 2, 2008
1 out of 2 found this review helpful
The Author has previously done marvelous work with the Jay Gould biography. In this case, while the book makes a good read, there is too much coverage of irrelevant material, such as the shipping wars in New York and New Jersey, at the time the Commodore was a mere employee, or the Vanderbilt Bronze, a statue now towering over Grand Central. I hope that in future editions, the author correct these imbalances, and puts more emphasis on Vanderbilt's incredible transition from Shipping to Railroading, which I am sure the author's considerable talent will allow. Despite these shortcomings, I STRONGLY RECOMMEND THIS BOOK to anyone interested in business, or business history. Nitsan Ben-Horin, New York
 Factually detailed but empty as a biography January 1, 2008
3 out of 5 found this review helpful
The book is rich in the factual detail of the "Commodore's" buisness rise to the top. If one wishes to know the greater detail of what was being shipped where and when and whom the mid level bean counters were during Vanderbilt's rise to economic power then this is the book for you. However, the book fails to deliver on the promises of insight into his personal life and thought. Yes it is interspersed with paragraphs here and there on his venomous capitilist demeanor and his lack of shame in his refusal to give to the more unfortunate in society but there lacks a richness and depth in bringing Cornelius to life in any kind of meaningful way. One does not get a feel for the real person from this book and in that way it lacks tremendously as a biography worthy of rapture.
The man and the trade that built nothing into one of America's great personal fortunes December 26, 2007
14 out of 16 found this review helpful
I grew up during the 1960s and the term "Robber Barons" was still fashionable and it was shorthand for dismissing all those nineteenth century tycoons. Somehow, we were supposed to just simply know that these guys all got their wealth by taking it from others in a zero sum game. However, the more you know about history, how men like Vanderbilt, Carnegie, and Rockefeller actually earned their money the less that explanation satisfies.
This very interesting biography of Cornelius Vanderbilt reports a picture of the man from his hard youth on Staten Island and his work on its surrounding waters since he was eleven years old in 1805. While unschooled, Cornelius was obviously intelligent about the ways of sailing, was physically strong, brave, and a tireless worker. He admitted to a mania for making money and was willing to work in conditions that left others too afraid or too sensible to sail in. He saved much of his money, but was willing to spend some on drink and rough women around the docks. As his reputation and collection of sailing vessels grew, the newspapers named him "the Commodore" and he retains that title to this day.
Vanderbilt was always willing to challenge the status quo and not let others rest on the political advantages or wealth. He worked for Thomas Gibbons for several years and worked with him in Gibbons breaking the New York monopoly that awarded steamboat trade to a preferred group. Using the Commerce Clause in the Constitution with Daniel Webster arguing their case, Gibbons and Vanderbilt beat the monopoly and bankrupted a man with whom Gibbons had a persona feud. But after Gibbons death and the Commodore's deteriorating relationship with Gibbons' son, he struck out on his own in 1829. As Vanderbilt grew his fleet and range to span the continent through Nicaragua, his personal fortune grew to $20 million by the time of the Civil War.
During the Civil War, Vanderbilt refitted his ship "Vanderbilt" and piloted it with the intention of ramming and sinking the Confederate ironclad the "Merrimack". But the confrontation never took place because the Confederates blew it up in the river in which it had taken refuge and fled. After the war, Vanderbilt was awarded a medal for his generosity and bravery (even though he had intended the use of the "Vanderbilt" as a loan rather than a gift, it ended up being a gift).
His son, William, began to play a bigger part in the Commodore's business, as did the railroad business. At the time of his death, Vanderbilt's wealth was more than $100 million. William, who had done much of the work in growing the $20 million into $100 million, used the remaining eight years of his own life to take the family total to $200 million. That was the zenith of Vanderbilt wealth. Subsequent generations did little earning and many simply squandered their patrimony.
Yes, Cornelius was a sharp dealer and was merciless with his competitors, but he made his money through industry, thrift, and providing valuable transportation to the public at better terms than his competitors. How is that being a Robber Baron? He did bequest $1 million to build Vanderbilt University as his one charitable act, and probably should have done more. However, the public would be engaging in phony accounting if they did not include the benefits his life's provided them and enriched them through the use of his shipping by sail, steam, and rail. In my view, the real Robber Barons were those who used political connections to give themselves monopolies at the taxpayer's expense and who were able to extract high prices because of the lack of competition.
While this isn't the deepest biography I have read, I enjoyed it and found it to be informative about an important figure in American history.
Recommended.
Reviewed by Craig Matteson, Ann Arbor, MI
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