Traditional accounts of John D. Rockefeller and the Standard Oil Company, as well as recent best-selling books on the subject, still accept without question charges of unethical and anti-competitive behavior by the American oil industry. In this pathbreaking synthesis of cultural, business, gender, and intellectual history, Roger and Diana Davids Olien explore how this negative image of the petroleum industry was created--and how this image in turn helped shape policy toward the industry in ways that were sometimes at odds with both the goals of reformers and the public interest.
By...
Traditional accounts of John D. Rockefeller and the Standard Oil Company, as well as recent best-selling books on the subject, still accept without qu...
The "self-made" man is a familiar figure in nineteenth-century American history. But the relentless expansion of market relations that facilitated such stories of commercial success also ensured that individual bankruptcy would become a prominent feature in the nation's economic landscape. In this ambitious foray into the shifting character of American capitalism, Edward Balleisen explores the economic roots and social meanings of bankruptcy, assessing the impact of widespread insolvency on the evolution of American law, business culture, and commercial society.
Balleisen makes...
The "self-made" man is a familiar figure in nineteenth-century American history. But the relentless expansion of market relations that facilitated suc...
The beginning of the twentieth century witnessed a remarkable growth of corporate welfare programs in American industry. By the mid-1920s, 80 percent of the nation's largest companies--firms including DuPont, International Harvester, and Metropolitan Life Insurance--engaged in some form of welfare work. Programs were implemented to achieve goals that ranged from improving basic workplace conditions, to providing educational, recreational, and social opportunities for workers and their families, to establishing savings and insurance plans.
Employing the critical lens of gender...
The beginning of the twentieth century witnessed a remarkable growth of corporate welfare programs in American industry. By the mid-1920s, 80 percent ...
From the colonial era to the present day, small businesses have been an integral part of American life. First published in 1991 and now thoroughly revised and updated, A History of Small Business in America explores the central but ever-changing role played by small enterprises in the nation's economic, political, and cultural development.
Examining small businesses in manufacturing, sales, services, and farming, Mansel Blackford argues that while small firms have always been important to the nation's development, their significance has varied considerably in different time...
From the colonial era to the present day, small businesses have been an integral part of American life. First published in 1991 and now thoroughly rev...
