Sublime

His singleminded approach was so successful that he was able to buy into the Harkness family business within a few years, and shortly afterward made the acquaintance of one of his Cleveland counterparts in the grain-brokerage chain, one John D. Rockefeller.

Jack Morgan might have the minds of other American bankers, but Ivar had the hearts of American investors, and those investors now had the power. Ivar didn’t need to lend his own money to France. Instead, he could act as an intermediary, raising money from the Americans and lending their money.

The Valley’s venture investors were typically Boston merchant princes, men such as Israel Thorndike, S. A. Eliot, Samuel Cabot, Francis Stanton, and Harrison Gray Otis. Edmund Dwight, a Morgan cousin on his mother’s side, wasn’t in the same financial stratum as a Cabot, but gained access through his work at the law firm of Fisher Ames, the old Mass

But it compelled me to watch Jefferies more closely, a company whose namesake and origin, unlike Morgan Stanley, had a pretty non illustrious past (for starters, I had never worked at an established firm that had only one name).

Interestingly, Hill resembled his contemporary John D. Rockefeller in that he usually did well only by investing in his main area of focus; his many side forays into other projects quite often failed. The one truly notable exception, as we shall see, was his investment in iron ore.

Brad Johnson, Shawn Sparks, and Ryan Levesque: Thank you for your continued belief and support not only with this book but also by being the original members of the Lifestyle Investor Mastermind and Investment Club, which provided much of the original content for this book.

At his urging, Hyatt was soon producing new antifriction bearings for automobiles. At age 24, he became the president of Hyatt, where he supervised all aspects of the company’s business. Hyatt bearings became a standard in the automobile industry, and the company grew rapidly under his leadership.