THE GOLD RING Jim Fisk Jay Gould and Black Friday 1869 eBook Kenneth D Ackerman
Download As PDF : THE GOLD RING Jim Fisk Jay Gould and Black Friday 1869 eBook Kenneth D Ackerman 
In September of 1869, two young speculators, Jay Gould and Jim Fisk, Jr., undertook perhaps the most audacious financial operation in American history – the cornering of the national gold supply. This daring plot came at a time when Wall Street finance displayed all the raw emotion, cynicism, and bravado of a Wild West shootout. The scandal reached the very household of President Ulysses Grant, and only the intervention of their friend, Boss Tweed of Tammany Hall, saved Fisk and Gould from personal ruin.
THE GOLD RING Jim Fisk Jay Gould and Black Friday 1869 eBook Kenneth D Ackerman
Few books written 22 years ago are more timely than this book by Kenneth Ackerman which shows the wretched excesses of the unregulated stock market during they heyday of Messers Jay Gould and Jim Fisk. Taking full advantage of the total lack of interest by the government in their doings (and this could be dissuaded on those rare occasions by a few well placed bribes to a few poor corrupt officials), the two scoundrels made their move to corner the market on gold. There really was no good reason to attempt such a fool-hardy act, the government held the largest reserves and one needed to have an even more than normally disinterested government to pull off such a grand gesture which must have been like scaling a veritable Mount Everest of financial and political corruption.In this enterprise Gould and Fisk were assisted by two very outstanding unindicted co-conspirators, Abel Corbin, who made a dishonest fortune as an official of the congress and married President Grant's younger sister. There was also William Marcy Tweed, the same "Boss Tweed" whose own excesses were the delight of Thomas Nast, a few years later. Corbin was supposed to keep Grant and the government in line while Tweed made sure that judges issued the correct rulings and the Tenth National Bank honoured checks for whatever amount Fisk and Gould chose to write them.
Gould had a wild idea that if he and his associates cornered the market on gold that somehow this would be good for the country as a whole, promoting exports, low prices and greater prosperity. This probably is the same sentiment some of the more recent titans of industry had regarding their own rather curious approaches to financial responsibility in an under-regulated environment. Needless to say Fisk and Gould did no one any good, particularly in the short term. Credit locked up (why is this always the way?) and with the exception of the wily Cornelius Vanderbilt, no one did particularly well in the long term either. It was Vanderbilt who referred to Gould and Fisk as a bunch of "damned theives eager to put money in their pockets." If anything, the case could be made that this was the very under regulated environment that made possible the collapse of Jay Cook and Company four years later.
This is the perfect sort of book to give to the favorite Ayn Rand fan in one's life. "Who is John Galt?" some may ask. "Where is John Galt," might be the rejoinder to that question, the answer being that Wall Street toughs like Gould and Fisk had someone like for lunch and dinner with an apple in his mouth. This is a very good popular history by Kenneth Ackerman (who has written books on other Gilded Age actors like Garfield and Tweed) which if nothing else shows us that history is doomed to repeat itself once it is forgotten.
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THE GOLD RING Jim Fisk Jay Gould and Black Friday 1869 eBook Kenneth D Ackerman Reviews
Wonderful read.
Change the date, names of the players, names of the investment instruments & you'd think it was 2008 all over again.
It reveals what happens when capitalism and bribery are loose in America.Ackerman develops real characters in Gould,Fiske and how they influenced finance and politics.
This tells the history of an interesting gold market corner and of some wild days in Wall Street. A very enjoyable and well written book.
their tricks! This is an in depth study of the times--economic, political, and social--when Jim Fisk and Jay Gould flourished in bribery, dishonest investments, and all sorts of criminal activity. It's an entertaining and interesting book.
While Black Friday is mentioned in texts and courses, this shows the greed of these men and how they could without guile could line their own pockets without regard to the consequences of their actions.
I will no longer brag about the family story that my great grandfather was a playmate of Gould!
Ackerman manages to make the financial part of this scandal easily comprehensible. He also does a great job of sketching in the principals as living, breathing characters.
At the center of this tale sit Jay Gould and Jim Fisk, an unlikely team-- one a stiff, and tightly self-controlled, the other a flamboyant high-roller who lived openly with his mistress. How they hatched a plot which nearly trashed the entire US economy is more adventure than detective story.
Ackerman has put his tale together with a good assortment of sources (once the gold scheme blew up, lots of people had lots to say, some of it in court), and he manages to give us just enough background for understanding without wandering off down some side street. And he shows how the fallout included the beginnings of federal regulations to protect the US economy.
Originally written in 1988, this is a great piece of work and a welcome reissue (though filled with an extraordinarily large number of typos). Highly recommended.
Ackerman writes another accessible, informative and engaging history of the Gilded Age in his book on the Gold Ring. At a time when government regulation was nonexistent and men with deep pockets could reign financial terror; the unthinkable happened and greed ran the country. This book details from start to finish how the key players came to know eachother and plan the gold ring under Jay Gould's masterful strategy. It is a story of daring wits, bribery at the highest levels and pure showmanship that all two men to manipulate the price of gold. Utilizing resources from newspapers, to letters to congressional hearings conducted by James Garfield the reader is given a clear picture of what happened during the gold ring.
I do second what other reviewers have said that this book is full of typos that make it hard to read at times but it does not draw away from the content. Overall this is the book to read if you want to understand further the gold ring and its implications in the financial world.
Few books written 22 years ago are more timely than this book by Kenneth Ackerman which shows the wretched excesses of the unregulated stock market during they heyday of Messers Jay Gould and Jim Fisk. Taking full advantage of the total lack of interest by the government in their doings (and this could be dissuaded on those rare occasions by a few well placed bribes to a few poor corrupt officials), the two scoundrels made their move to corner the market on gold. There really was no good reason to attempt such a fool-hardy act, the government held the largest reserves and one needed to have an even more than normally disinterested government to pull off such a grand gesture which must have been like scaling a veritable Mount Everest of financial and political corruption.
In this enterprise Gould and Fisk were assisted by two very outstanding unindicted co-conspirators, Abel Corbin, who made a dishonest fortune as an official of the congress and married President Grant's younger sister. There was also William Marcy Tweed, the same "Boss Tweed" whose own excesses were the delight of Thomas Nast, a few years later. Corbin was supposed to keep Grant and the government in line while Tweed made sure that judges issued the correct rulings and the Tenth National Bank honoured checks for whatever amount Fisk and Gould chose to write them.
Gould had a wild idea that if he and his associates cornered the market on gold that somehow this would be good for the country as a whole, promoting exports, low prices and greater prosperity. This probably is the same sentiment some of the more recent titans of industry had regarding their own rather curious approaches to financial responsibility in an under-regulated environment. Needless to say Fisk and Gould did no one any good, particularly in the short term. Credit locked up (why is this always the way?) and with the exception of the wily Cornelius Vanderbilt, no one did particularly well in the long term either. It was Vanderbilt who referred to Gould and Fisk as a bunch of "damned theives eager to put money in their pockets." If anything, the case could be made that this was the very under regulated environment that made possible the collapse of Jay Cook and Company four years later.
This is the perfect sort of book to give to the favorite Ayn Rand fan in one's life. "Who is John Galt?" some may ask. "Where is John Galt," might be the rejoinder to that question, the answer being that Wall Street toughs like Gould and Fisk had someone like for lunch and dinner with an apple in his mouth. This is a very good popular history by Kenneth Ackerman (who has written books on other Gilded Age actors like Garfield and Tweed) which if nothing else shows us that history is doomed to repeat itself once it is forgotten.
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