Quotes About Wealth

Understandably, the Rockefellers did not wish to broadcast their misfortunes to the world.

Precisely because he lost the antitrust suit, Rockefeller was converted from a mere millionaire, with an estimated net worth of $300 million in 1911, into something just short of history's first billionaire.

It never occurred to the Rockefellers to trade up to a more socially prestigious denomination. "Most Americans when they accumulate money climb the golden spires of the nearest Episcopal Church," H. L. Mencken later observed.

For many years, the Rothschilds, the Nobels, and Standard Oil circled around each other, each trying to forge links with a second party to isolate the third.

Imagining that the companies would be quite lucrative, Washington had no qualms about businessmen booking large profits as long as their work served the public weal and provided a model for future government action.

Thanks to this staggering appreciation, Rockefeller's net worth reached a lifetime peak of $900 million in 1913—more than $13 billion in 1996 dollars.

He made them all wealthy beyond their dreams.

The soaring fortunes of the Standard companies made it seem as if the cagey Rockefeller had outwitted the country again.

he mostly hoarded his money in preparation for the next panic.

a Morgan partner received a guarantee of riches and a seat on the high council of American finance.

Having been endowed with the gift I possess, I believe it is my duty to make money and still more money, and to use the money I make for the good of my fellow man according to the dictates of my conscience.

I feel, therefore, that large sums of money are, in a sense, safer there than in other fields.

Rockefeller now left Andrew Carnegie far behind and probably had at least twice as much money as Carnegie did.

The sudden wealth of young businessmen such as Rockefeller fed envy among returning soldiers, who wished to emulate their good fortune.

What a blessing the oil has been to mankind!

61 Pierpont's fortune didn't approach those of the great industrialists—Carnegie, Rockefeller, Ford, or Harriman—and he didn't quite edge out Jay Gould.

Andrew Carnegie was truly saddened by the revelation of poor Pierpont's poverty. "And to think he was not a rich man

beneath the competitive veneer, the Rothschilds were eager to come to terms with Standard Oil:

There was friction in the family regarding Anne Morgan's award of $3 million.

Rockefeller generally conformed to the requisite style, but his family constantly had to remind him to buy a new suit when his current one got too shiny.

What really disturbed him was not so much making money but spending it.

For Rockefeller, the onset of the disease coincided with his breakdown of the early 1890s.

My change is five cents short," Rockefeller declared.

Each year, Rockefeller reluctantly gave another million dollars to bolster the permanent endowment to keep pace with his free-spending president