Iron Empires, Michael Hiltzik
Iron Empires, Michael Hiltzik
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Iron Empires
Robber Barons, Railroads, and the Making of Modern America

Author: Michael Hiltzik

Narrator: Nick Tecoksy

Unabridged: 14 hr 57 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: HarperAudio

Published: 08/11/2020


Synopsis

In 1869, when the final spike was driven into the Transcontinental Railroad, few were prepared for its seismic aftershocks. Once a hodgepodge of short, squabbling lines, America’s railways soon exploded into a titanic industry helmed by a pageant of speculators, crooks, and visionaries. The vicious competition between empire builders such as Cornelius Vanderbilt, Jay Gould, J. P. Morgan, and E. H. Harriman sparked stock market frenzies, panics, and crashes; provoked strikes that upended the relationship between management and labor; transformed the nation’s geography; and culminated in a ferocious two-man battle that shook the nation’s financial markets to their foundations and produced dramatic, lasting changes in the interplay of business and government.
 
Spanning four decades and featuring some of the most iconic figures of the Gilded Age, Iron Empires reveals how the robber barons drove the country into the twentieth century—and almost sent it off the rails.

Narrated by Nick Tecosky.

About Michael Hiltzik

Michael Hiltzik is a Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist and author who has covered business, technology, and public policy for the Los Angeles Times for more than 40 years. He currently serves as the Times’s business columnist and hosts its business blog, The Economy Hub. Hiltzik received the 1999 Pulitzer Prize for articles exposing corruption in the entertainment industry. He lives in Southern California with his family.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Max on September 20, 2020

I enjoyed reading this book, the stories are fascinating ones and the writing is very good. I am an economic historian and my PhD dissertation is on railways and government in the 19th century: I like reading this type of stuff. But there are some major issues I have with this pop-history: 1. The auth......more

Goodreads review by John on January 03, 2025

(3.7) a well balanced take on the part workers, financiers and the govt plays in the rapid ascension of a new technology… “As Adams foretold, the railroad industry’s influence would penetrate every corner of American life, bringing ever more change to a country that, at the moment when the driving of......more

Goodreads review by Porter on January 20, 2021

This was a fun little book. It provided a lot of information in a meaningful interesting manner.......more

Goodreads review by GrahamReads on July 16, 2024

Just finished: "Iron Empire: Robber Barons, Railroads, and the Making of Modern America" By: Michael Hilzik Boston: Mariner Books, 2021. More about Robber Barons, through the lens of the railroads. I liked the change over time from Vanderbilt, Drew, and Gould to Harriman and Morgan. It was a good narrat......more

Goodreads review by Casey on June 07, 2020

This book is well written and well reserached making it an interesting read. The author brings the history of railroading in the 1800's and early 1900's to life. He covers a lot of ground that has been previously written about specific railroads and individuals, but brings it all together in one boo......more