Chapter I: Foreword

When, in 1914-1915, I wrote “The Authentic History of the United States Steel Corporation,” which has been enlarged and brought up to date in the present volume, the Government’s suit for the dissolution of the Corporation had not been decided. In fact, the lower court handed down its decision just about the time the book was going to press.

It was my good fortune to hear the testimony of the most important of the more than 400 witnesses and argument of counsel in the suit and to supplement the information so gained by conversations with steel men, inside and outside the Corporation, with whom my work brings me in constant contact. And all that I learned convinced me more and more that the big company was not illegal, either technically or morally, and that, in fact, its influence on industry was beneficent. It is naturally a matter of personal gratification that the suit has resulted in the complete vindication of the Corporation.

We live in a day of big corporations and the tendency seems to be to concentrate still more capital and manufacturing facilities. It is therefore important that we should know something of their activities, not only economic but social.

I believe that the United States Steel Corporation is one enterprise that endeavors always to live up fully to the responsibilities it must perforce assume to its employees and to the public, as well as to its stockholders. I believe that it has earned the title of “A Corporation With A Soul”. And, so believing, I have not hesitated to tell the story of United States Steel as I have learned it by years of personal observation and contact.

ARUNDEL COTTER.

CONTENTS

PAGE
PROLOGUE. THE MAN AT THE HELM 3

CHAPTER
I. THE WHY AND HOW OF THE BIG COMPANY 6

II. THE BIRTH OF THE BIG COMPANY 22

III. EARLY HISTORY AND GROWTH, 1901 TO 1907 42

IV. THE TENNESSEE PURCHASE 70

V. MEN WHO MADE UNITED STATES STEEL 87

VI. DEVELOPING WORLD MARKETS 111

VII. THE SPIRIT OF THE CORPORATION 132

VIII. THE CORPORATION’S IMPLEMENTS 142

IX. THE STEEL TOWNS 160

X. HUMANIZING INDUSTRY 174

XI. INVESTIGATIONS AND DISSOLUTION SUIT 197

XII. QUESTIONS OF POLICY 217

XIII. STEEL FROM THE INVESTOR’S VIEWPOINT 235

XIV. THE GREAT STEEL STRIKE 246

XV. HELPING UNCLE SAM WIN THE WAR 269

XVI. THE MIDDLE PERIOD, 1907 TO 1914 283

XVII. THE WAR AND AFTER 295