Andrew Carnegie Dbq

Andrew Carnegie was a self-made millionaire (and in today’s money a billionaire) who rose from the bottom up. In 1835, Andrew Carnegie was born in the attic of a weaver’s cottage, located in Scotland. His schooling took place in a one-room building. Carnegie, along with his family, left Scotland for the United States in 1848 because of the poverty situation. The jobs he had in his early days in the United States include; a bobbin boy, a telegram deliverer, and a railroad job. He worked himself up at the railroad job, but decided to move to New York City. He wanted to get out of business at this point, but when introduced to the Bessemer technique, he decided to get back into business. He developed the Bessemer process and made his fortune.

In document B, we can see an article that Carnegie himself wrote, in June of 1889, where he states “(why should a man) wait until he is dead before he becomes of much good in the world?” He shows here not only his desire to help the world before he dies, but his aspiration that others do the same. He also expresses in the same article “The man who dies rich dies disgraced.” He again here exemplifies his want for the wealthy to do good for communities with their finances. These pieces of evidence show Carnegie not only wanted to make sure he was giving back, but that other affluent people were

In document C, we see a partial list of his transactions with charities, including; the Teachers’ Pension Fund, the Homestead Relief Fund, the Carnegie Institution, and public libraries. The things these donations did were very helpful to many, helping professors get old age help, funding steel workers and their families, promoting scientific research, and helping to create over 2,811 public libraries. He also created the Carnegie Corporation, which was a supertrust made to continue giving out Carnegie’s fortune after his death, primarily to education. This shows that he used his finances to give back to communities, which he could only do because of his financial