Cornelius Vanderbilt — "The public be damned!"
The public be damned!
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More from Cornelius Vanderbilt
"I have been in business for fifty years and I have never seen a man who was afraid to lose his money who made any."
"Tricks ain't good business."
"The only way to get rich is to think big."
"I will not let my money be used to perpetuate idleness."
"I don't care half so much about making money as I do about making my point, and coming out ahead."
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.