Cornelius Vanderbilt — "I only ask to be let alone."
I only ask to be let alone.
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More from Cornelius Vanderbilt
"I have always gone with my own judgment."
"The only way to win is to never back down."
"I have always been a man of few words."
"Never tell your resolutions beforehand, or it's half a defeat."
"I never made a dollar that I didn't earn."
About Cornelius Vanderbilt (1794-1877)
American shipping and railroad magnate whose New York Central railroad and aggressive consolidation built the largest fortune in 19th-century America. Closely associated with John D. Rockefeller (later Gilded Age titan who learned the consolidation playbook). For an intellectual contrast, see Jay Gould, railroad speculator (1836-1892) — Vanderbilt built and ran railroads; Gould watered stock and manipulated markets. Their Erie Railroad rate-war and Gould's Black Friday (1869) gold-corner schemes were the public foil to Vanderbilt's quieter operational consolidation. The cleanest 'industrialist vs speculator' Gilded Age pairing.