He was the prototype for the "Robber Baron" and the corrupt railroad king. The railroad
"pirate" Jay Gould stirred up the most enmity. He was
painted as an unscrupulous pirate who manipulated and watered
stock, deliberately running businesses down and building them
up again to his own advantage.
Jay Gould considered himself to be the most hated man in late-19th
century America. He was vilified by the press as a reckless speculator
and brutal strikebreaker. To many late 19th century Americans,
he personified the unscrupulous, greedy robber baron.
In an age of scandal and corruption, Jay Gould was regarded
as a master of bribery and insider stock manipulation. He paid
off President Grant's brother-in-law to learn the president's
intentions about government gold sales; he bribed members of New
York's legislature; and he tried to corner the gold market. But
Gould was much more than a robber baron. At a time when the rules
of modern American business were just being written, he was one
of the architects of a consolidated national railroad and communication
system. One of his major achievements was to lead Western Union
to a place of dominance in the telegraph industry.
Born into poverty on an upstate New York in 1836, Gould was
too sickly to go into farming. Instead, he went into surveying
and then into tanning animal hides. He speculated first in hides
and then in railroad stocks, engaging in one of the most colorful
struggles in American business history: a fight with Commodore
Vanderbilt for control of the Erie Railroad. To prevent gangs
of toughs sent by Vanderbilt from gaining access to his records,
Gould placed cannons on the Jersey City waterfront and launched
a flotilla of four vessels of armed gunmen. As quickly as Vanderbilt
bought stock in the railroad, Gould illegally issued more. When
Gould was placed under the custody of a court officer for this
illegal act, he bribed members of New York's legislature to change
the law.
He reduced the wages of imported Chinese laborers in his mines
to just $27 a month. He was damned as a speculator, rigging markets
for short-term gains. But in fact he had a number of actual achievements
to his name. He was actually an empire builder who sought to create
railroad and communication systems capable of meeting the needs
of an expanding nation. He operated New York City's elevated railroad
and led Western Union to victory in its battle for control of
the telegraph industry.
