Edward Drummond Libbey, American Glassmaker

Edward Drummond Libbey, American Glassmaker
Author: Quentin R. Skrabec, Jr.
Publisher: McFarland
Total Pages: 243
Release: 2014-01-10
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 0786485485

Edward Drummond Libbey was a glassmaker, industrialist, artist, innovator and art collector. Both practical and creative, he forever changed the glass industry with the automatic bottle-making machine and automatic sheet glass machine. This work examines the long career of Libbey, particularly his innovation of American flint cut glass, his contributions to the middle-class American table through affordable glassware, and his enormous art glass and painting collections, which eventually formed the basis for the Toledo Museum of Art's collection. Libbey single-handedly revolutionized glassmaking, a craft which had gone virtually unchanged for 2000 years.

Who Built That

Who Built That
Author: Michelle Malkin
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Total Pages: 336
Release: 2016-01-12
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 1501130838

Conservative journalist Malkin provides an eclectic journey of American capitalism, from the colonial period to the Industrial Age to the present, spotlighting little-known "tinkerpreneurs" who achieved their dreams of doing well by doing good. Learn how Paul Revere became America's first tech titan, how famous patent holders Abraham Lincoln and Mark Twain championed the nation's unique system of intellectual property rights, and more.

The 100 Most Important American Financial Crises

The 100 Most Important American Financial Crises
Author: Quentin R. Skrabec Jr.
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA
Total Pages: 465
Release: 2014-12-09
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN:

Covering events such as banking crises, economic bubbles, natural disasters, trade embargoes, and depressions, this single-volume encyclopedia of major U.S. financial downturns provides readers with an event-driven understanding of the evolution of the American economy. The United States has fairly recently experienced the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression. But crippling financial crises are hardly unusual: economic emergencies have occurred throughout American history and can be seen as a cyclical and "normal" (if undesirable) aspect of an economic system. This encyclopedia supplies objective, accessible, and interesting entries on 100 major U.S. financial crises from the Colonial era to today that have had tremendous domestic impact—and in many cases, global impact as well. The entries explore the history and impact of major economic events, including banking crises, economic shortages, recessions, national strikes and labor upheavals, natural resource shortages, panics, real estate bubbles, social upheavals, and the collapse of specific American industries such as rubber and steel production. Students will find this book an essential ready-reference on key events in American economic history that documents how and why these events led to significant financial and economic problems throughout the United States and around the globe.

The 100 Most Significant Events in American Business

The 100 Most Significant Events in American Business
Author: Quentin R. Skrabec Jr.
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA
Total Pages: 449
Release: 2012-05-04
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN:

This reference book details the top 100 groundbreaking events in the history of American business, featuring case studies of successful companies who challenged traditional operating paradigms, historical perspectives on labor laws, management practices, and economic climates, and an examination of the impact of these influences on today's business practices. Throughout history, important commercial developments in the United States have made it possible for American companies to leverage tough economic conditions to survive—even thrive in a volatile marketplace. This reference book examines the top 100 groundbreaking events in the history of American business and illustrates their influence on the labor laws, business practices, and management methodologies of corporate America today. The 100 Most Significant Events in American Business: An Encyclopedia depicts the chronological order of events contributing to the evolution of American business, with an emphasis on the commercial innovations of each period. The book explores the origins of successful brands, including Apple, Wal-Mart, and Heinz; demonstrates the successful collaboration between public and private sectors illustrated by the Erie Canal, Hoover Dam, and the interstate highway system; and depicts the commercial impact of major economic events from the Panic of 1857 to the Great Recession of 2010.

Souvenirs and New Ideas

Souvenirs and New Ideas
Author: Diane Fortenberry
Publisher: Oxbow Books
Total Pages: 259
Release: 2013-06-30
Genre: History
ISBN: 1842177982

Early travellers to Egypt, Mesopotamia, Greece, Turkey and the Levant recorded and remembered their journeys by collecting or creating mementos of places they visited. This natural inclination took many guises, ranging from painting landscapes or, later, taking photographs to acquiring souvenirs, very often antiquities. The collection of antiquities, a controversial and usually illegal practice today, was in the 18th and 19th centuries not necessarily either, and many privately assembled collections now form the basis of major national museums. Souvenirs and New Ideas explores the human desire to retain the memory of a foreign journey, in a series of essays that examine the collections of a variety of travellers, from intrepid female solo voyagers to European royalty. Their acquisitions included souvenirs ranging from Egyptian mummies and ancient artefacts, to paintings and sketches of places visited, to the raw material for books written at leisure, both scholarly and popular. In their desire to share with those at home some of what they had seen, these voyagers contributed to an understanding of societies little known at the time, and the stories of their travels continue to entrance.

Aluminum in America

Aluminum in America
Author: Quentin R. Skrabec
Publisher: McFarland
Total Pages: 253
Release: 2017-02-06
Genre: History
ISBN: 1476625646

The history of aluminum: metallurgy, engineering, global business and politics--and the advance of civilization itself. The earth's most abundant metal, aluminum remained largely inaccessible until after the Industrial Revolution. A precious commodity in 1850s, it later became a strategic resource: while steel won World War I, aluminum won World War II. A generation later, it would make space travel possible and the 1972 Pioneer spacecraft would carry a message from mankind to extraterrestrial life, engraved on an aluminum plate. Today aluminum, along with oil, is the natural resource driving geopolitics, and China has taken the lead in manufacture.

Benevolent Barons

Benevolent Barons
Author: Quentin R. Skrabec, Jr.
Publisher: McFarland
Total Pages: 241
Release: 2015-06-14
Genre: History
ISBN: 1476620296

American business has always had deep roots in community. For over a century, the country looked to philanthropic industrialists to finance hospitals, parks, libraries, civic programs, community welfare and disaster aid. Worker-centered capitalists saw the workplace as an extension of the community and poured millions into schools, job training and adult education. Often criticized as welfare capitalism, this system was unique in the world. Lesser known capitalists like Peter Cooper and George Westinghouse led the movement in the mid- to late 1800s. Westinghouse, in particular, focused on good wages and benefits. Robber barons like George Pullman and Andrew Carnegie would later succeed in corrupting the higher benefits of worker-centered capitalism. This is the story of those accomplished Americans who sought to balance the accumulation of wealth with communal responsibility.