Being a former student of Dr. Porter's and a graduate of Muskingum College (1989), I was very impressed with the history of New Concord. There were lots of places (stores, businesses, etc.) that had existed long before I arrived. The old pictures made this "history study" quite interesting. Thank You, Doctor Porter for reminding how special a place New Concord, Ohio really is.

In many ways my husband and I miss the 80's. We liked the music, the fashion and the way people were concerned with simple things like hygiene and attractive clothing. This book took us back to those happy carefree teenage years when things were good and we were nearly completely free of responsibility!! As we went through this book we had many good laughs and had fun remembering things long forgotten! I recommend this book if you liked the 80's and I recommend reading it with at least one other person who enjoyed that era! Fun book!

This book was as much fun as a barrel of smurfs...required reading for those of us with a Dukes of Hazard lunch box and a Battlestar Galactica sleeping bag in the closet...awaken the Chachi within!

If you ignore the book's ugly-as-sin cover artwork and delve into this maniacal volume of absolutely useless yet totally vital pop cultural information, you will be proud to say: "I am a member of the Chachi Generation." Buy it and love it.

At a price of over $1,000, I had expected a very interesting look at one of my faviorite industrialist genuises. J.D. Rockefeller Sr. is one of the most interesting Captians of Industry both personally and professionally I have seen in my life. These published papers of his were a deeper insight into his mind and how it worked. This most fascinating man had class, style, intelligence, and logic. I can tell by these papers that he is not only consevative but also not, contratry to popular belief, an ultra malterialist. He beleived he needed to surround himself with such riches and luxuries to "meet the social image of a man of my stature". These papers are a must for any "fan" of John D. Rockefeller Sr., founder of the Standard Oil Trust and richest, in most all respectes, man of his time.

Glenn Porter's brief, but comprehensive survey of the rise of the modern, bureaucratic corporation is a solid introduction to the topic. It also contains a particularly fine review of the pertinent literature in the form of a bibliographical essay. This would be an excellent starting point for anyone interested in studying economic history in the late-nineteenth, early-twentieth century period.

The first topic that Porter examines is the nature of big business. He believes that it is particularly important to understand how the giant corporations that evolved during this period differed fundamentally from those that came before. Prior to the rise of big business, most business institutions in America were small, frequently family-run affairs; at most involving a partnership of a few men. They relied heavily on the personal integrity and prestige of these men in order to do business. These firms were capitalized in extremely small amounts and, consequently, had low fixed costs relative to operating expenses. Finally, they usually operated in limited, local areas and produced a very narrow range of goods and services.

Big business, however, represented a clean break from these traditions of the past. The new, large-scale enterprises were usually corporations, rather than partnerships; frequently characterized by a separation between ownership and control. These corporations were often typified by an anonymous, impersonal quality; a factor which contributed greatly to the public's mistrust of them. They had massive capital requirements and huge fixed costs (a significant barrier to entry which ensured reduced competition). Furthermore, they operated on a wide geographical scale and provided an array of products.

The next topic Porter looks at is the appearance and spread of big business. The first major enterprise of this type was, of course, the railroads, which achieved this status around 1860. This was a necessary condition for the rise of big business, since it could not thrive without a basic transportation system in place. The development of the telegraph system-and, later, the telephone-was also crucial to its coming.

Once these advances were in place, big business started to appear, slowly but sporadically. The corporations generally evolved through one of two methods: vertical or horizontal growth. A firm grew vertically by extending its operations backward and forward along its chain of supply and distribution. It would reach backward for raw materials and forward to the final consumers. This allowed corporations control over every facet of the production and marketing of their product. Horizontal growth, on the other hand, was where different producers who were all engaged in the same enterprise would join together to form a larger firm that served their collective interests. Initially, horizontal growth was achieved through use of the infamous, though short-lived, trust. This method was soon replaced by the holding company and, subsequently, the outright merger. Companies could, of course, integrate both horizontally and vertically, thus forming truly large and powerful businesses. This is how such familiar firms as Standard Oil, Swift and Company, Goodyear, US Steel, and American Tobacco came into prominence. (Among the forgettable failures were American Glue, National Starch, the United Button Company, and Standard Rope & Twine.)

By 1910, the industrial structure of the country had been forever altered, giving birth to the modern American economy. This radical change in society naturally caused great consternation in the minds of many Americans. Porter likens it to Turner's beliefs about the closing of the frontier. "The coming of giant corporations seemed to signal the end of an open, promising America and the beginning of a closed, unhappier society." The chief component of this dissatisfaction, Porter believes, was "the fear that the new economic order was destroying America's status as a land of opportunity." America had long been seen as a place where every man had the potential to acquire a business of his own, to be his own boss. With the advent of big business, the prospects of this were severely diminished.

Despite these fears, however, Americans gradually, if not eagerly, adapted to the new state of affairs. This transition was aided by rapid economic growth which resulted in a steadily increasing standard of living and a tremendous increase in the amount and variety of material goods. The rise of big business also resulted in the creation of a new role for government as "watchdog of the private sector." This was the spirit of progressivism finally exerting itself in the corporate world; something which Porter believes it rarely did. He views the rise of big business as not only being independent of the progressive movement, but bordering on the inevitable. As such, it was not so much a phenomenon of the Progressive Era as it was coincident to it.

"The Rise of Big Business" is recommended to anyone interested in American history since 1860.