Critics charged that his empire was built on unscrupulous tactics: grand-scale collusion with the railroads, predatory pricing, industrial espionage, and wholesale bribery of political officials. Rockefeller was likely the most controversial businessman in our nation's history. Branded 'the Octopus' by legions of muckrakers, the trust refined and marketed nearly 90 percent of the oil produced in America. A landmark publication full of startling revelations, the book will indelibly alter our image of this most enigmatic capitalist.īorn the son of a flamboyant, bigamous snake-oil salesman and a pious, straitlaced mother, Rockefeller rose from rustic origins to become the world's richest man by creating America's most powerful and feared monopoly, Standard Oil.

Titan is the first full-length biography based on unrestricted access to Rockefeller's exceptionally rich trove of papers.

as detailed, balanced, and psychologically insightful a portrait of the tycoon as we may ever have' (Kirkus Reviews). Now Ron Chernow, the National Book Award-winning biographer of the Morgan and Warburg banking families, gives us a history of the mogul 'etched with uncommon objectivity and literary grace. Rockefeller, Sr.-history's first billionaire and the patriarch of America's most famous dynasty-is an icon whose true nature has eluded three generations of historians. Titan is a magnificent biography-balanced, revelatory, elegantly written.John D. But he also uncovers the profound religiosity that drove him “to give all I could” his devotion to his father and the wry sense of humor that made him the country’s most colorful codger. He was the terror of his competitors, the bogeyman of reformers, the delight of caricaturists-and an utter enigma.ĭrawing on unprecedented access to Rockefeller’s private papers, Chernow reconstructs his subjects’ troubled origins (his father was a swindler and a bigamist) and his single-minded pursuit of wealth.

In the course of his nearly 98 years, Rockefeller was known as both a rapacious robber baron, whose Standard Oil Company rode roughshod over an industry, and a philanthropist who donated money lavishly to universities and medical centers. Rockefeller, Sr.-the Jekyll-and-Hyde of American capitalism. National Book Critics Circle Award Finalistįrom the acclaimed, award-winning author of Alexander Hamilton: here is the essential, endlessly engrossing biography of John D.

Titan the life of john d rockefeller sr