What makes andrew carnegie famous

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Table of Contents Expand. The Scottish Immigrant. Messenger to Superintendent. Forging an Empire. Buying When Others Sold. The Homestead War. Morgan Buys Out Carnegie. Rewriting History. Article Sources. Investopedia requires writers to use primary sources to support their work.

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The offers that appear in this table are from partnerships from which Investopedia receives compensation. He memorized Pittsburgh's street layout as well as the names and addresses of the important people he delivered to. Carnegie often was asked to deliver messages to the theater. He arranged to make these deliveries at night--and stayed on to watch plays by Shakespeare and other great playwrights. In what would be a life-long pursuit of knowledge, Carnegie also took advantage of a small library that a local benefactor made available to working boys.

One of the men Carnegie met at the telegraph office was Thomas A. Scott, then beginning his impressive career at Pennsylvania Railroad.

At the outbreak of the Civil War, Scott was hired to supervise military transportation for the North, and Carnegie worked as his right hand man. The Civil War fueled the iron industry, and by the time the war was over, Carnegie saw the potential in the field and resigned from Pennsylvania Railroad.

It was one of many bold moves that would typify Carnegie's life in industry and earn him his fortune. He then turned his attention to founding the Keystone Bridge Company in , where he focused on replacing wooden bridges with stronger iron ones.

But his wealth troubled him, as did the ghosts of his radical past. He expressed his uneasiness with the businessman's life, promising that he would stop working in two years and pursue a life of good works: "To continue much longer overwhelmed by business cares and with most of my thoughts wholly upon the way to make more money in the shortest time, must degrade me beyond hope of permanent recovery. I will resign business at thirty-five, but during the ensuing two years I wish to spend the afternoons in receiving instruction and in reading systematically.

Making Money and Starting a Family Carnegie would continue making unparalleled amounts of money for the next 30 years. Two years after he wrote that letter Carnegie would embrace a new steel refining process being used by Englishman Henry Bessemer to convert huge batches of iron into steel, which was much more flexible than brittle iron.

Carnegie threw his own money into the process and even borrowed heavily to build a new steel plant near Pittsburgh in Carnegie was ruthless in keeping down costs and managed by the motto "watch costs, and the profits take care of themselves. In , Carnegie, at age 45, began courting Louise Whitfield, age Carnegie's mother was the primary obstacle to the relationship.

Nearly 70 years old, Margaret Carnegie had long been accustomed to her son's complete attention. He adored her. They shared a suite at New York's Windsor Hotel, and she often accompanied him -- even to business meetings. Some have hinted that she exacted a promise from Carnegie that he remain a bachelor during her lifetime.

Louise was the daughter of a well-to-do New York merchant and a semi-invalid mother. Like Carnegie, Louise was devoted to her mother, who required constant medical attention. Unlike Margaret Carnegie, however, Mrs.

Whitfield encouraged her daughter to spend time with her suitor. Carnegie's mother meanwhile did her best to undermine the relationship. Undaunted, the couple were engaged in September , but they kept it a secret for the sake of mother Margaret. In , Margaret's health was failing. Over the next few decades, he created a steel empire, maximizing profits and minimizing inefficiencies through ownership of factories, raw materials and transportation infrastructure involved in steel making.

In , his primary holdings were consolidated to form Carnegie Steel Company. The steel magnate considered himself a champion of the working man; however, his reputation was marred by the violent Homestead Strike in at his Homestead, Pennsylvania, steel mill.

After union workers protested wage cuts, Carnegie Steel general manager Henry Clay Frick , who was determined to break the union, locked the workers out of the plant.

Andrew Carnegie was on vacation in Scotland during the strike, but put his support in Frick, who called in some Pinkerton armed guards to protect the plant. A bloody battle broke out between the striking workers and the Pinkertons, leaving at least 10 men dead. The state militia then was brought in to take control of the town, union leaders were arrested and Frick hired replacement workers for the plant.

Additionally, the labor movement at Pittsburgh-area steel mills was crippled for the next four decades. That same year, Morgan merged Carnegie Steel with a group of other steel businesses to form U. Among his philanthropic activities, he funded the establishment of more than 2, public libraries around the globe, donated more than 7, organs to churches worldwide and endowed organizations many still in existence today dedicated to research in science, education, world peace and other causes.

A lover of books, he was the largest individual investor in public libraries in American history. The following year, the year-old industrial baron married Louise Whitfield , who was two decades his junior and the daughter of a New York City merchant. The couple had one child, Margaret The Carnegies lived in a Manhattan mansion and spent summers in Scotland, where they owned Skibo Castle, set on some 28, acres. Carnegie died at age 83 on August 11, , at Shadowbrook, his estate in Lenox, Massachusetts.

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