1.

Record Nr.

UNINA9910450330003321

Autore

Harwood Herbert H., Jr.

Titolo

Invisible Giants [[electronic resource] ] : The Empires of Cleveland's Van Sweringen Brothers / / Herbert H. Harwood, Jr

Pubbl/distr/stampa

Bloomington and Indianapolis, : Indiana University Press, c2003

ISBN

1-282-07242-0

9786612072420

0-253-11060-2

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource (361 p.)

Disciplina

385.0922771

385/.092/2771 B

Soggetti

Railroads - Ohio - History

Real estate development - Ohio - Cleveland - History

Businessmen - Ohio

Electronic books.

Cleveland (Ohio) History

Lingua di pubblicazione

Inglese

Formato

Materiale a stampa

Livello bibliografico

Monografia

Note generali

Description based upon print version of record.

Nota di bibliografia

Includes bibliographical references (p. 313-332) and index.

Nota di contenuto

Introduction; 1  Oasis in a Gritty City; 2  The Ideal Suburb; 3  Mr. Smith Sells a Farm; 4  Mr. Smith Sells a Railroad; 5  Shaping Solid Forms; 6  A Difficult Birth at the Public Square; 7  The Beginnings of an Empire; 8  To the South, East, and North; 9  Taking Stock: 1924; 10  Some Shadows Fleet By; 11  Building, Rebuilding, and Juggling; 12  Consolidation Anarchy I: The Maverick and the General; 13  Consolidation Anarchy II: The Street Fighter; 14  The Summit I: An Appalachian Peak in the Rockies; 15  The Summit II: Filling Out the Railroad Map

16  The Summit III: Consummation in Cleveland-and a Jolt17  Completions and Complications; 18  Taking Stock: 1930; 19  Sudden Darkness; 20  The Rails Roll Downgrade; 21  A New World; 22  The Cruelest Year; 23  The Last Train; 24  Epilogue I: New Empires from Old; 25  Epilogue II: The Ghosts; Notes; Sources and Acknowledgments; Index

Sommario/riassunto

Invisible Giants is the Horatio Alger-esque tale of a pair of reclusive                



Cleveland brothers, Oris Paxton and Mantis James Van Sweringen, who rose from                poverty to become two of the most powerful men in America. They controlled the                country's largest railroad system -- a network of track reaching from the Atlantic                to Salt Lake City and from Ontario to the Gulf of Mexico. On the eve of the Great                Depression they were close to controlling the country's first coast-to-coast rail                system -- a goal that still elu