How Andrew Carnegie Turned His Fortune Into A Library Legacy (Very Interesting Read) - Polidicks

[IMG]http://media.npr.org/chrome/news/nprlogo_138x46.gif[/IMG] [QUOTE][IMG]http://media.npr.org/assets/img/2013/07/31/15412v_custom-e0178a3e953aacc5d2caadd72997ca919a91ba00-s40.jpg[/IMG] [I]Patrons in the reading room of the Carnegie Library of Homestead in Munhall, Pa., circa 1900. The Carnegie Steel Co.fought back against striking steel workers in Homestead in 1892.[/I][/QUOTE] [QUOTE]Andrew Carnegie was once the richest man in the world. Coming as a dirt poor kid from Scotland to the U.S., by the 1880s he'd built an empire in steel — and then gave it all away: $60 million to fund a system of 1,689 public libraries across the country.[B]...[/B][/QUOTE] [B]Read the rest of the article and listen to the radio segment.[/B] [url]http://www.npr.org/2013/08/01/207272849/how-andrew-carnegie-turned-his-fortune-into-a-library-legacy[/url]

That would translate roughly to $1.5b in modern dollars I think, accounting for inflation, damn son

Surely he should be renown more, this is the first i have heard of this person. Has anyone else in history given away such a sum of money and for such a noble cause?

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He's from my town, Dunfermline. We have Pittencrief Park, Carnegie's Estate which he donated to the town for use by the townspeople. We also have our very own Carnegie Hall, Carnegie Leisure Centre (Swimming pool and stuff) and a Carnegie Library. It's insane how much he did for his hometown.

[QUOTE=Sword and Paint;41684398]Surely he should be renown more, this is the first i have heard of this person. Has anyone else in history given away such a sum of money and for such a noble cause?[/QUOTE] I live in South London, and there are a bunch of late Victorian billionaires who seem to have built something. There are two parks from the Billionaires former estates, and we have a Carnegie Library too.

Carnegie was a total ass who crushed the poor and tried to rationalize/make up for it when he got old. Just look at the Homestead strikes. Giving back to the community was a minimum considering his position. He ain't no saint.

[QUOTE=Mechanical43;41684551]Carnegie was a total ass who crushed the poor and tried to rationalize/make up for it when he got old. Just look at the Homestead strikes. Giving back to the community was a minimum considering his position. He ain't no saint.[/QUOTE] better than all the rich greedy fucks who take their money to the grave.

[QUOTE=Mechanical43;41684551]Carnegie was a total ass who crushed the poor and tried to rationalize/make up for it when he got old. Just look at the Homestead strikes. Giving back to the community was a minimum considering his position. He ain't no saint.[/QUOTE] To be fair, pretty much every rich business man in the late 19th/early 20th century was a scumbag. Carnegie was a lot better than most.

Most rich people got where they are by either themselves or their ancestors stepping over people. I say most because with the rise of the entertainment industry people like Gabe Newell have not had to step over anyone to get to where they are, they are creationists who have made a fortune.

I've known about him for a while; my parents are from Pittsburgh. I have a couple biographies of him, he's an amazing man to envy.

[QUOTE=Mechanical43;41684551]Carnegie was a total ass who crushed the poor and tried to rationalize/make up for it when he got old. Just look at the Homestead strikes. Giving back to the community was a minimum considering his position. He ain't no saint.[/QUOTE] I Would like links to this please

[QUOTE=Mechanical43;41684551]Carnegie was a total ass who crushed the poor and tried to rationalize/make up for it when he got old. Just look at the Homestead strikes. Giving back to the community was a minimum considering his position. He ain't no saint.[/QUOTE] Carnegie wasn't even in the US during the time of the Homestead strike. His man Frick was mostly responsible for that.

[QUOTE=Sword and Paint;41684398]Surely he should be renown more, this is the first i have heard of this person. Has anyone else in history given away such a sum of money and for such a noble cause?[/QUOTE] He was one of the many "robber barons" of the time period, those who owned the gigantic corporations that profited off of the industrial revolution. He was a complete douchebag, but a great businessman. A lot of them did things like this before they died, either to save face or because they realized they were complete douchebags and wanted to somehow repay for what they've done.

This is a really, really cool series on people like this. [video=youtube;gR7oHh-fXUw]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gR7oHh-fXUw[/video]

I've read Think and grow rich, by Napoleon Hill. Carnegie was his mentor. Amazing book, opened my eyes.

[QUOTE=Mechanical43;41684551]Carnegie was a total ass who crushed the poor and tried to rationalize/make up for it when he got old. Just look at the Homestead strikes. Giving back to the community was a minimum considering his position. He ain't no saint.[/QUOTE] Yeah, we should probably think twice before glorifying him for getting into philanthropy in his later years. Let's not forget the part where he allowed his company to hire 300 armed private security thugs to [I]break a strike with an amphibious assault[/I] that resulted in a sustained gun battle that left several people dead and wounded. I don't give a fuck how much you donate to charity, you don't get to erase something like that.

Carnegie essentially propagated the idea of 'picking yourself up by your bootstraps' and 'the self-made man,' ideas that were essentially impossible for most to reach. There's no denying that he did some great stuff. His philosophy was "first third learning, second third earning, last third giving." His philanthropy shouldn't be disregarded. He wasn't an all-out evil corporatist, he genuinely had a philosophy of giving. He did some bad shit, but he did a lot of good shit, too. Don't say "he did this bad so the good doesn't fix it." Obviously it doesn't, but take the good with the bad and notice that we wouldn't have a ton of our public libraries if not for Carnegie. He wrote the Gospel of Wealth with the best of intentions, and it's obvious that he really did want to give away his earnings to battle wealth inequality. It's not really his fault that his ideas have been commandeered to "don't tax the rich we're philanthropists we'll fix inequality with charity!" He was a pretty good guy that got in some tough situations and handled some tough shit, sometimes properly, sometimes improperly. He hasn't got a hundredth of the dirt on him that JP Morgan or Rockefeller or any other big-name guys of the era have.

I was named after him. Great man, in my opinion (though a morally questionable one).

he was both a robber baron and a captain of industry

[QUOTE=Used Car Salesman;41692116]Yeah, we should probably think twice before glorifying him for getting into philanthropy in his later years. Let's not forget the part where he allowed his company to hire 300 armed private security thugs to [I]break a strike with an amphibious assault[/I] that resulted in a sustained gun battle that left several people dead and wounded. I don't give a fuck how much you donate to charity, you don't get to erase something like that.[/QUOTE] So essentially people can't change and they're damned forever without any chance of repenting. Oh yeah, it was Frick who hired the Pickertons, not Carnegie so your rant against bad businessmen is moot toward him.

[QUOTE=Emperor Scorpious II;41692540]So essentially people can't change and they're damned forever without any chance of repenting. Oh yeah, it was Frick who hired the Pickertons, not Carnegie so your rant against bad businessmen is moot toward him.[/QUOTE] Carnegie did other negative things too.

[QUOTE=Metalcastr;41693266]Carnegie did other negative things too.[/QUOTE] But nothing compared to what Frick did with that strike.