Quicknation    Andrew Carnegie

Images of Andrew Carnegie: G Y AOL AV MSN Books of Andrew Carnegie: B

Andrew Carnegie results from: AltaVista A9 AOL Clusty Gigablast Google Lycos MSN Teoma Wisenut Yahoo

Andrew Carnegie (November 25, 1835 – August 11, 1919) was a Scottish-American businessman, a major philanthropist, and the founder of the Carnegie Steel Company which later became U.S. Steel. He is known for having, later in his life, given away most of his riches to fund the establishment of many libraries, schools, and universities in America and worldwide.

table

Andrew Carnegie was born on Wednesday, November 25, 1835, in Dunfermline, Fife, Scotland. He was the son of a hand loom weaver, William Carnegie. His mother was Margaret, daughter of one Thomas Morrison, a tanner and shoemaker.

Many of Carnegie's closest relatives were self-educated tradesmen and class activists. William Carnegie, whilst poor, had educated himself and, as far as his resources would permit, saw to it that his children received an education, as well. William Carnegie was moreover a militant political activist and was involved with those organising demonstrations against the Corn laws. He was also a Chartist.

Andrew Carnegie's maternal grandfather, Thomas Morrison, was one of the most persistent campaigners for liberal reforms in Scotland. Through the dint of his own efforts of self education, Thomas Morrison acquired an eloquence with the written word that matched his more privileged "betters". He wrote frequently to newspapers and contributed articles in the radical pamphlet, . Amongst other things, he argued for: abolition of the Rotten Boroughs and reform of the British House of Commons, which occurred much later in the Great Reform Act of 1832, Catholic Emancipation, and Laws governing safety at work, which were passed many years later in the Factory Acts. Most radically of all, however, he promoted the abolition of all forms of hereditary privilege, including all monarchies.

Another great influence on the young Andrew Carnegie was his uncle, George Lauder, a proprietor of a small grocers shop in Dunfermline High Street. This uncle introduced the young Carnegie to such historical Scottish heroes as Robert the Bruce, William Wallace, and Rob Roy. He was also introduced to the writings of Robbie Burns. It was, perhaps, Burns who most influenced Carnegie, who regarded Burns as one of the greatest preachers of Democracy. Uncle George Lauder had Carnegie commit to memory many pages of Burns's writings, writings that were to stay with him for the rest of his life.

George Lauder was additionally interested in the United States. Lauder saw the U.S.A. as a country with "democratic institutions".

Another uncle, his mother's brother, "Ballie" Morrison, was also a radical political firebrand. The chief object of this gentleman's tirades was the Church of England and the Church of Scotland. "Ballie" Morrison was a fervent nonconformist. In 1842, the young Carnegie's radical sentiments were stirred further at the news of Uncle "Ballie" being imprisoned for his part in a "Cessation of Labour" (strike). At this time, withdrawal of labour by an hireling was covered by criminal law. Notwithstanding these literary and political influences, poverty in the Carnegie family was always at hand and severe.

Andrew Carnegie's father had worked as a jobbing hand loom weaver. This involved receiving the mill's raw materials at his cottage and weaving them into cloth on the primitive loom in the cottage. In the 1840's, a new system was coming into being, the factory system. During this era, mill owners began constructing large weaving mills with looms powered at first by water wheels and later by steam engines. These factories could produce cloth at far lower cost, partly through increased mechanisation and economies of scale, but partly also by paying mill workers very low wages and by working them very long hours. The success of the mills forced William Carnegie to seek work in the mills or elsewhere away from home. However, the radical views of Andrew Carnegie's father were well known, and he was not wanted.

He chose to emigrate. His mother's two sisters had already emigrated, but it was his wife who persuaded William Carnegie to make the passage. Making the passage was not easy, however, for they had to find the passage money. They were forced to sell their meagre possessions and borrow some £20 from friends, a considerable sum in 1848.

That May, his family emigrated to the U.S.A., sailing on the , an ex-Whaler that took the family from Broomielaw, in Glasgow, to New York, whereupon they proceeded up the Hudson River and the Erie Canal to Lake Erie and thence to Allegheny, Pennsylvania, where William Carnegie found work in a cotton factory.

Young Andrew Carnegie found work in the same building as a "Bobbin boy" for the sum of $1.20 per week. His younger brother, by some eight years, Thomas, was sent to school. Andrew Carnegie, the Scot, quickly became Andrew Carnegie the American. Three years after arriving in the U.S.A., the young Carnegie began writing to his friends in Scotland extolling the great virtues of American democracy whilst disparaging and criticising "feudal British institutions". At the same time, he followed in his father's footsteps and wrote letters to the newspapers including the on subjects such as slavery or "the peculiar institution" as its apologists sought euphemistically to call it.

Andrew Carnegie's education and passion for reading was given a great boost by one Colonel James Anderson, who opened his personal library of 400 volumes to working boys each Saturday night. Carnegie was a most persistent borrower. Andrew Carnegie was a "self made man" in the roundest possible sense insofar as it applied not only to his economic development but also to his intellectual and cultural development. His capacity and willingness for hard work, his perseverance, and his alertness, soon brought forth opportunities.

In 1851, he became a Telegraph Messenger boy in the Pittsburgh Office of the Ohio Telegraph Company, at $2.50 per week. This, to the young Carnegie, seemed a fortune. In addition to providing him with an increase in income, the job also provided him with a lifelong love of Shakespeare's works. He was frequently required to deliver messages to a theatre, and he often managed to contrive appearing just as the curtain had been raised on a performance. Using a charm that was to pay even greater dividends in the future, Carnegie was then usually able to convince the theatre's manager to allow him to stay and watch the performance for free. When Carnegie was not at the theatre or improving his mind with a book, he would spend time listening to the telegraph instrument itself. The electric telegraph transmitted its signals along the wires that traversed the nation. When they were received into the telegraph office, they were transcribed into readable on a long paper tape with the aid of an elaborate machine. He quickly learned to distinguish the differing sound the incoming signals produced and learned to transcribe, himself. At the time, Andrew Carnegie was one of only two or three persons so gifted in the entire country. Having learned Telegraphy, he was noted by Thomas A. Scott of the Pennsylvania Railroad Company, who employed him as a secretaryTelegraph operator starting in 1853, at the princely salary of $4.00 per week. Carnegie was sixteen and soon began a rapid advancement through the company, eventually becoming the Superintendent of the Pittsburgh Division.

Carnegie stayed with the Pennsylvania Railroad Company until 1865, by which time the U.S. Civil War had broken out and ended.

During the pre-war period, Andrew Carnegie had formed a partnership with a Mr. Woodruff, an inventor. Woodruff's invention was the sleeping car. The great distances transversed by railways had meant stopping for the night at hotels and inns by the railside, so that passengers could rest. The sleeping car sped up travel and helped Americans settle the American west. The investment proved a great success and a source of great fortune for Woodruff and Carnegie. The young Carnegie, who started work at an early age as a bobbin boy in a cotton mill, and, who was, a few years later, engaged as a telegraph clerk and operator with the Atlantic and Ohio Company, now became the superintendent of the western division of the entire line. In this post, Carnegie was responsible for several improvements in the service. When the American Civil War opened in 1861, he accompanied Scott, then Assistant United States Secretary of War, to the front.

Following his good fortune, Carnegie proceeded to increase it still further through fortunate and careful investments. In 1864, Carnegie invested the sum of $40,000 in Storey Farm on Oil Creek, in Venango County, Pennsylvania. In one year, the farm yielded over $1,000,000 in cash dividends, and oil from oil wells on the property sold profitably. Carnegie was subsequently associated with others in establishing a steel rolling mill.

Aside from Carnegie's investment successes, he was beginning to figure prominently in the American cause and in American culture. With the Civil War raging, Carnegie soon found himself in Washington. Carnegie was selected by his boss at the Pennsylvania Railroad Company, Thomas A. Scott, who was now Assistant Secretary of War in charge of military transportation, to join him in Washington. Carnegie was appointed Superintendent of the Military Railways and the Union Government's telegraph lines in the East and was Scott's right hand man. Carnegie, himself, was on the foot plate of the locomotive that pulled the first brigade of Union troops to reach Washington. Shortly after this, following the defeat of Union forces at Bull Run, he personally supervised the transportation of the defeated forces. Under his organization, the telegraph service rendered efficient service to the Union cause and significantly assisted in the eventual victory. During his work "in the field", Carnegie fell ill and needed treatment for sunstroke.

The Civil War, as so many wars before it, brought boom times to the suppliers of war. The U.S. iron industry was one such. Before the war its production was of little significance, but the sudden huge demand brought boom times to Pittsburgh and similar cities and great wealth to the iron masters.

Carnegie had some investments in this industry before the war and, after the war, left the railroads to devote all his energies to the ironworks trade. Carnegie worked to develop several iron works, eventually forming The Keystone Bridge Works and the Union Ironworks, in Pittsburgh. Although he had left the Pennsylvania Railroad Company, he did not totally sever his links with the railroads. These links would prove valuable. The Keystone Bridge Company made iron train bridges, and, as company superintendent, Carnegie had noticed the weakness of the traditional wooden structures. These were replaced in large numbers with iron bridges made in his works. As well as having good business sense, Carnegie possessed charm and literary knowledge. He was invited to many important social functions, functions that Carnegie exploited to his own advantage and to the fullest extent.

Carnegie’s philanthropic inclinations began some time before retirement. He wrote; "I propose to take an income no greater than $50,000 per annum! Beyond this I need ever earn, make no effort to increase my fortune, but spend the surplus each year for benevolent purposes! Let us cast aside business forever, except for others. Let us settle in Oxford and I shall get a thorough education, making the acquaintance of literary men. I figure that this will take three years active work. I shall pay especial attention to speaking in public. We can settle in London and I can purchase a controlling interest in some newspaper or live review and give the general management of it attention, taking part in public matters, especially those connected with education and improvement of the poorer classes. Man must have an idol and the amassing of wealth is one of the worst species of idolatry! No idol is more debasing than the worship of money! Whatever I engage in I must push inordinately; therefore should I be careful to choose that life which will be the most elevating in its character. To continue much longer overwhelmed by business cares and with most of my thoughts wholly upon the way to make more money in the shortest time, must degrade me beyond hope of permanent recovery. I will resign business at thirty-five, but during these ensuing two years I wish to spend the afternoons in receiving instruction and in reading systematically!"

Carnegie postponed most of his philanthropic intentions to "proper old age".

In the late 1860’s and into the 1870s, Carnegie was "out and about and all over the place". Carnegie now had new investments aside from the iron venture, the Keystone Bridge Company. Carnegie had added to his investments in Pennsylvania oil investments in Texas, which earned him a small fortune, and, after the war, undertook several trips to Europe selling railroad securities on a commission basis for, among others, the London firm of Junius S. Morgan Company. The last of these trips was in 1872, the commission earned being $150,000. Andrew Carnegie's multiple successes in bond selling, oil trading, and bridge building were so rapidly successful that the conservative Pittsburgh business community regarded him with a certain circumspection. It was during these trips to Europe and to Britain, in particular, that Carnegie came into contact with British steel makers, then the world leaders. He obtained a working knowledge of the Bessemer process of steel making and became a friend of its inventor, Sir Henry Bessemer.

In 1868, he introduced the Bessemer steel making process into the U.S.A. and, in 1873, decided on a now famous gamble. He decided to "put all his eggs in one basket, and then watch the basket." That year he staked all his wealth on steel making. His fellow Americans did not realise it at the time, but the day Carnegie decided to take this gamble was the day the eventual industrial supremacy of the U.S. became certain. It took Andrew Carnegie only a matter of a few years to become the principal owner of the Homestead Edgar Thompson Steel Works, and only a short time more to be heading the firms of Carnegie, Phipps

Whilst Carnegie continued his business career, some of his literary intentions were fulfilled. During this time, he made many friends in the literary and political worlds. Among these were such as Malcolm Arnold and Herbert Spencer as well as being in correspondence and acquaintance with most of the U.S. Presidents, statesmen, and notable writers of the time. Many were visitors to the Carnegie home. Carnegie greatly admired Herbert Spencer, the polymath who seemed to know everything. He did not, however, agree with Spencer's Social Darwinism which held that philanthropy was a bad idea.

In 1881, Andrew Carnegie took his family, which included his mother, then aged 70, on a trip to Great Britain. They toured the sights of England and Scotland by coach having several receptions en-route. The highlight for them all was a triumphal return to Dunfermline where Carnegie's mother laid the foundation stone of the "Carnegie Library". Andrew Carnegie's criticism of British society did not point to a dislike of the country of his birth, on the contrary, one of Carnegie's ambitions was to act as a catalyst for a close association between the English speaking peoples. To this end, he purchased, in the first part of the 1880's, a number of newspapers in England, all of which were to advocate the abolition of the monarchy and the establishment of "the British Republic". Surprisingly, Carnegie's charm aided by his great wealth meant that he had many British friends, including Prime Minister Gladstone.

In 1886, tragedy struck Carnegie when his young brother Thomas died at the early age of 43. Success in the business continued, however. At the same time as owning steel works, Carnegie had purchased, at low cost, the most valuable of the iron ore fields around Lake Superior. The same year Andrew Carnegie became a figure of controversy. Following his tour of Great Britain, he wrote about his experiences in a book entitled, . Although still actively involved in running his many businesses, Carnegie had become a regular contributor of articles to numerous serious minded magazines, most notably the , whose editor, Lloyd Bryce, oversaw the publication during its most influential period.

That year, 1886, Carnegie penned his most radical work to date, entitled . The work, liberal in its use of statistics to make its arguments, was an attempt to argue his view that the American republican system of government was superior to the British monarchical system. It not only gave a overly-favourable and idealistic view of American progress, but made some considerable criticism of the British royal family. Most antagonistic, however, was the cover that depicted amongst other motifs, an upended royal crown and a broken sceptre. Given these aspects, it was no surprise that the book was the cause of some considerable controversy in Great Britain. The book itself was successful. It made many Americans aware for the first time of their country's economic progress and sold over 40,000 copies, mostly in the U.S.A.

In 1889, Carnegie stirred up yet another hornet's nest when an article entitled "Wealth" appeared in the June issue of the . After reading it, Gladstone requested its publication in England, and it appeared under a new title, "The Gospel of Wealth" in the . The article itself was the subject of much discussion. In the article, the author argued that the life of a wealthy industrialist such as Carnegie should comprise two parts. The first part was the gathering and the accumulation of wealth. The second part was to be used for the subsequent distribution of this wealth to benevolent causes.

But all this was only a preliminary to the success attending his development of the iron and steel industries at Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Carnegie made his fortune in the steel industry, controlling the most extensive integrated iron and steel operations ever owned by an individual in the United States. His great innovation was in the cheap and efficient mass production of steel rails for railroad lines.

In the late 1880s, Carnegie Steel was the largest manufacturer of pig-iron, steel-rails, and coke in the world, with a capacity to produce approximately 2,000 tons of pig-metal a day. In 1888, he bought the rival Homestead Steel Works, which included an extensive plant served by tributary coal and iron fields, a railway 425 miles long, and a line of lake steamships. An agglutination of the assets of he and his associates occurred in 1892 with the launching of the Carnegie Steel Company.

By 1889, the U.S. output of steel exceeded that of the U.K., and Andrew Carnegie owned a large part of it. Carnegie had risen to the s he had by being a supreme organiser and judge of men. He had the talent of being able to surround himself with able and effective men, while, at the same time, retaining the control and the direction of the enterprise. Carnegie's businesses were uniquely organised in that his belief in "democratic principles" found itself interpreted into these businesses. This did not mean that Carnegie was not in absolute control, however. The businesses incorporated Carnegie's own version of profit sharing. Carnegie wanted his employees to have a stake in the business, for he knew that they would work best if they saw that their own self interest was allied to the firm's. As a result, men who had started as labourers in some cases, eventually ended up millionaires. Carnegie maintained control by incorporating his enterprises not as joint stock corporations but as limited partnerships with Carnegie as majority and controlling partner. Not a cent of stock was publicly sold. If a member died or retired, his stock was purchased at book value by the company. Similarly, the other partners could vote to call in stock from those partners who underperformed, forcing them to resign.

The internal organisation of his businesses was not the only reason for Andrew Carnegie's rise to pre-eminence. Carnegie introduced the concept of counter-cyclical investment. Carnegie's competitors, along with virtually every other business enterprise across the globe, pursued the conventional strategy of procyclical investment; manufacturers reinvesting profits in new capital in times of boom and high demand. Because demand is high, investment in bull markets is is more expensive. In response, Carnegie developed and implemented a secret tactic. He shifted the purchasing cycle of his companies to slump times, when business was depressed and prices low. Carnegie observed that business cycles alternated between "boom" and "bust". He saw that if he capitalized during a slump, his costs would be lower and profits higher. During the years 1893 to 1897, there was a great slump in economic demand, and so Carnegie made his move. At rock bottom prices, he upgraded his entire operation with the latest and most cost effective steel mills. When demand picked up, prosperity followed for the Homestead Company alone stood at $40,000,000 with $25,000,000 being Carnegie's share.

Carnegie's empire grew to include the J. Edgar Thomson Steel Works, (named for John Edgar Thomson, Carnegie's former boss and president of the Pennsylvania Railroad), Pittsburgh Bessemer Steel Works, the Lucy Furnaces, the Union Iron Mills, the Union Mill (Wilson, Walker County), the Keystone Bridge Works, the Hartman Steel Works, the Frick Coke Company, and the Scotia ore mines. Also, Carnegie, through Keystone, supplied the steel for and owned shares in the landmark Eads Bridge project across the Mississippi River in St. Louis, Missouri (completed 1874). This project was an important proof-of-concept for steel technology which marked the opening of a new steel market.

Carnegie was now 65 and was wanting to retire. He reformed his enterprises into conventional joint stock corporations as preparation to this end. Carnegie, however, wanted a good price for his stock. There was a man who was to give him his price. This man was John Pierpont Morgan.

Morgan was a banker and perhaps America's most important financial deal maker. He had observed how efficiency produced profit. He envisioned an integrated steel industry that would cut costs, lower prices to consumers and raise wages to workers. To this end he needed to buy out Carnegie and several other major producers, and integrate them all into one company by eliminating duplication and waste. Negotiations were concluded on 2nd March with the formation of the United States Steel Corporation. It was the first corporation in the world with a market capitalization in excess of $1,000,000,000.

The buyout, which was negotiated in secret by Charles M. Schwab (no relation to Charles R. Schwab, the brokerage house founder), was the largest such industrial takeover in United States history to date. The holdings were incorporated in the United States Steel Corporation, a trust organized by J. P. Morgan, and Carnegie himself retired from business. His steel enterprises were bought out at a figure equivalent to twelve times their annual earnings; $480 million [1], which at the time was the largest ever personal commercial transaction. Andrew Carnegie's share of this amounted to a massive $225,639,000 which was paid to Carnegie in the form of 5%, 50 year gold bonds. The letter agreeing to sell his share was signed on the 26th February, 1901. On the 2nd March 1901, the circular formally filing the organisation and capitalisation (at $1,400,000,000 - 4% of U.S national wealth at the time) of the United States Steel Corporation actually completed the contract. The bonds were to be delivered within two weeks to the Hudson Trust Company of Hoboken, New Jersey in trust to Robert A. Franks, Carnegie's business secretary. There, a special vault was built to house the physical bulk of nearly $230,000,000 worth of bonds. It was said that "....Carnegie never wanted to see or touch these bonds that represented the fruition of his business career. It was as if he feared that if he looked upon then they might vanish like the gossamer gold of the leprechaun. Let them lie safe in a vault in New Jersey, safe from the New York tax assessors, until he was ready to dispose of them...."

As they signed the papers of sale, Carnegie remarked, "Well, Pierpont, I am now handing the burden over to you." In return, Andrew Carnegie became one of the world's wealthiest men. Retirement was a stage in life that many men dreaded. Carnegie was not one of them. He was looking forward to retirement, for it was his intention to follow a new course from then on.

Besides steel, Carnegie's companies were involved in other areas of the railroad industry. His company, Pittsburgh Locomotive and Car Works, was noted for its building of large steam locomotives at the turn of the 20th century. His associates and partners included Henry Clay Frick and F. T. F. Lovejoy.

He owned 18 English newspapers, which he controlled in the interests of radicalism.

At the

Andrew Carnegie spent his last years as a philanthropist. From 1901 forward, public attention was turned from the shrewd business capacity which had enabled Carnegie to accumulate such a fortune, to the public-spirited way in which he devoted himself to utilizing it on philanthropic objects. His views on social subjects and the responsibilities which great wealth involved were already known from (1886), and from his "Gospel of Wealth" (1900). He acquired Skibo Castle, in Sutherland, Scotland, and made his home partly there and partly in New York and then devoted his life to the work of providing the capital for purposes of public interest and social and educational advancement.

In all his ideas, he was dominated by an intense belief in the future and influence of the English-speaking people, in their democratic government and alliance for the purpose of peace and the abolition of war, and in the progress of education on nonsectarian lines. He was a powerful supporter of the movement for spelling reform as a means of promoting the spread of the English language.

Among all of his many philanthropic efforts, the establishment of public libraries in the United States, the United Kingdom, and in other English-speaking countries was especially prominent. Carnegie libraries, as they were commonly called, sprang up on all sides. The first of which was opened in 1883 in Dunfermline, Scotland. His method was to build and equip, but only on condition that the local authority provided site and maintenance. To secure local interest, in 1885, he gave $500,000 to Pittsburgh for a public library, and in 1886, he gave $250,000 to Allegheny City for a music hall and library, and $250,000 to Edinburgh, Scotland, for a free library. In total Carnegie funded some 3,000 libraries, located in every U.S. state except Alaska, and Delaware. Carnegie also built libraries in Canada and overseas in Britain, Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, the West Indies, and Fiji.

He gave $2 million in 1901 to start the Carnegie Institute of Technology at Pittsburgh and the same amount in 1902 to found the Carnegie Institution at Washington, D.C.. He would later contribute more to these and other schools. CIT is now Carnegie Mellon University.

In Scotland, he gave $2 million in 1901 to establish a trust for providing funds for assisting education at the Scottish universities, a benefaction which resulted in his being elected Lord Rector of University of St. Andrews. He was a large benefactor of the Tuskegee Institute under Booker Washington for African American education. He also established large pension funds in 1901 for his former employees at Homestead and, in 1905, for American college professors. He also funded the construction of 7,000 church organs.

Also, long before he sold out, in 1879, he erected commodious swimming-baths for the use of the people of his hometown of Dunfermline, Scotland. In the following year, Carnegie gave $40,000 for the establishment of a free library in the same city. In 1884, he gave $50,000 to Bellevue Hospital Medical College to found a histological laboratory, now called the Carnegie Laboratory.

He owned Carnegie Hall in New York City from its construction in 1890 until his widow sold it in 1924.

He also founded the Carnegie Hero Fund commissions in America (1904) and in the United Kingdom (1908) for the recognition of deeds of heroism, contributed $500,000 in 1903 for the erection of a Peace Palace at The Hague, and donated $150,000 for a Pan-American Palace in Washington as a home for the International Bureau of American Republics.

By the rough and ready standards of 19th century tycoons, Carnegie was not a particularly ruthless man, but the contrast between his life and the lives of many of his own workers and of the poor, in general, was stark. "Maybe with the giving away of his money," commented biographer Joseph Wall, "he would justify what he had done to get that money." [2]

By the time he died in Lenox, Massachusetts, Carnegie had given away $350,695,653. At his death, the last $30,000,000 was likewise given away to foundations, charities and to pensioners.

He is interred in Sleepy Hollow Cemetery in Sleepy Hollow, New York.

In an era in which financial capital was consolidated in New York City, Carnegie famously stayed aloof from the city, preferring to live near his factories in western Pennsylvania and at Skibo Castle, Scotland, which he bought and refurbished. However, he also built (in 1901) and resided in a townhouse on New York City's Fifth Avenue that later came to house Cooper-Hewitt's National Design Museum.

Carnegie married Louise Whitfield in 1887 and had one daughter, Margaret, who was born in 1897. His brother, Thomas M. Carnegie, also born in Dunfermline, Scotland, was born on October 2, 1843. He was associated with Andrew in his business enterprises, but died in Homewood, Pennsylvania, on October 19, 1886.

The Homestead Strike was a bloody labor confrontation lasting one-hundred and forty-three days in 1892 and was one of the most serious in the history of the United States. The conflict was situated around Carnegie Steel's main Homestead, Pennsylvania plant and grew out of disputation between the National Amalgamated Association of Iron and Steel Workers of the United States and the Carnegie Steel Company.

Carnegie, who had cultivated a pro-labor image in his dealings with company mill workers, departed the country for a trip to his Scottish homeland before the unrest peaked. In doing so, Carnegie left mediation of the dispute in the hands of his associate and partner Henry Clay Frick. Frick was well known in industrialist circles as maintaining staunch anti-union sensibilities.

The company had attempted to cut the wages of the skilled steel workers, and, when the workers refused the pay cut, management locked the union out (workers considered the stoppage a "lockout" by management and not a "strike" by workers). Frick brought in thousands of strikebreakers to work the steel mills and Pinkerton agents to safeguard them.

The arrival, on the 6th of July, of a force of three hundred Pinkerton agents from New York City and Chicago resulted in a fight in which ten men - seven strikers and three Pinkertons - were killed and hundreds were injured. Pennsylvania Governor Robert Pattison discharged two brigades of the state militia to the strike site. Then, allegedly in response to the fight between the striking workers and the Pinkertons, anarchist Alexander Berkman tried to kill Henry Clay Frick with a gun provided by Emma Goldman. However, Frick was only wounded, and the attempt turned public opinion away from the striking workers. Afterwards, the company successfully resumed operations with non-unionized immigrant employees in place of the Homestead plant workers, and Carnegie returned stateside.

Carnegie was one of over 50 wealthy members of the South Fork Fishing and Hunting Club, which operated an exclusive and secretive retreat at a mountain lake near South Fork, Pennsylvania. Other prominent members included Andrew Mellon, Henry Clay Frick, Philander Knox, and Robert Pitcairn.

In 1879, the club purchased an old dam and abandoned reservoir. They created Lake Conemaugh, which was about two miles (3 km) long, approximately one mile (1.6 km) wide, and 60 feet (18 m) deep near the dam. The lake had a perimeter of 7 miles (11 km) and could hold 20 million tons of water. When the water was "up" in the spring, the lake covered over 400 acres (1.6 km²). The South Fork Dam was 72 feet (22 m) high and 931 feet (284 m) long. Between 1881, when the club was opened, and 1889, this dam frequently sprang leaks and was patched, mostly with mud and straw. Passers-by sometimes commented about the likelihood of a failure, but no action was taken. The flawed dam held the waters of Lake Conemaugh back until disaster struck on May 31, 1889.

After several days of unprecedented rainfall, the dam gave way. A torrent of water raced downstream, destroying several towns. When it reached Johnstown, over 2,200 people were killed, and there was $17 million in damage. The disaster became known as the Johnstown Flood.

In the years following this tragic event, many people blamed the members of the South Fork Fishing and Hunting Club for the tragedy, as they had originally bought and repaired the dam to turn the area into a holiday retreat in the mountains. These people contended that the members of the club had failed to properly maintain the dam, and, as a result, heavy rainfall on the eve of the disaster meant that the structure was not strong enough to hold the excess water. Despite the evidence to suggest that the members were very much to blame, they were never held legally responsible for the disaster. In keeping with the times, the courts viewed the dam's failure as an Act of God, and no legal compensation was paid to the survivors of the flood.

Individual members of the club did contribute substantially to the relief efforts. Along with about half of the club members, Henry Clay Frick donated thousands of dollars to the relief effort in Johnstown. After the flood, Andrew Carnegie, one of the club's better known members, built the town a new library. In return, he was received with a hero's welcome.

, in which he stated his belief that the rich should use their wealth to help enrich society.

The following is taken from one of Carnegie's memos to himself:

table cellspacing="0" cellMan does not live by bread alone. I have known millionaires starving for lack of the nutriment which alone can sustain all that is human in man, and I know workmen, and many so-called poor men, who revel in luxuries beyond the power of those millionaires to reach. It is the mind that makes the rich. There is no class so pitiably wretched as that which possesses money and nothing else. Money can only be the useful drudge of things immeasurably higher than itself. Exalted beyond this, as it sometimes is, it remains Caliban still and still plays the beast. My aspirations take a higher flight. Mine be it to have contributed to the enlightenment and the joys of the mind, to the things of the spirit, to all that tends to bring into the lives of the toilers of Pittsburgh sweetness and light. I hold this the noblest possible use of wealth.

Carnegie also believed that achievement of financial success could be reduced to a simple formula, which could be duplicated by the average person. In 1908, he commissioned Napoleon Hill, then a newspaper reporter, to interview over 500 millionaires to find out the common threads of their success. Hill eventually became his adviser, and their work was published in 1928, after Carnegie's death, in Hill's book

Carnegie was a frequent contributor to periodicals on labour issues.

In addition to at 5 feet (1.524 metre) 5 feet 1" (1.549 metre) 5 feet 2" (1.578 metre) or 5 feet 3" (1.6 metre) - there is even one at 5 feet 6" (1.676 metres) - but this must be considered as being incorrect - in other words; he was short.Two municipalities in the United States are named after Andrew Carnegie, the most famous being Carnegie, PA. The other is Carnegie, OK.The Tycoons: How Andrew Carnegie, John D. Rockefeller, Jay Gould, and J. P. Morgan Invented the American Supereconomy