A biography of George Peabody

Published in 1951, this biography of George Foster Peabody (1852-1938) tells the story of an industry pioneer, railroad magnate, and philanthropist. A native of Georgia, Peabody is often listed alongside such men as John D. Rockefeller, Andrew Carnegie, and J. P. Morgan--men who rose from obscurity to prominence after Reconstruction. Peabody's businesses were central to the building of railroads in the United States and Mexico, and to financing mining, electrical, and sugar beet industries. Peabody also took a prominent role in civic affairs, using his position of power as an active philanthropist. Peabody's greatest concern was the advancement of education, and he eventually retired from his many business interests to devote himself to humanitarian work. Today, Peabody may be recognized most widely as the person after whom the George Foster Peabody Awards--which recognize distinguished achievement and meritorious service in the electronic media--are named.

Eddie Peabody is at the peak of his musical career, known to his many fans as the King of the Banjo. But after entertaining White House guests in the Rose Garden, he is summoned by Franklin Delano Roosevelt and asked to rejoin the armed forces. Secretly commissioned a lieutenant in the U.S. Naval Reserve, he continues performing in theaters across the country while training for his reconnaissance mission in Germany. Eddie photographs a newly constructed German U-boat, verifying the American government's suspicions. His mission complete, he troupes on to Berlin with the theater group. Unbeknown to the Allies, however, German intelligence has found a photograph of Eddie in his uniform. The head of the German state invites him to play at a private party for the chancellor and his entourage. Will this be Eddie's final performance? George Robert is the second son of Eddie and Ragna Peabody. Whenever he heard his mother yell out "George Robert " he knew he was in trouble.

Pulitzer Prize Finalist: “A stunning work of biography” about three little-known New England women who made intellectual history (The New York Times). Elizabeth, Mary, and Sophia Peabody were in many ways the American Brontës. The story of these remarkable sisters—and their central role in shaping the thinking of their day—has never before been fully told. Twenty years in the making, Megan Marshall’s monumental biography brings the era of creative ferment known as American Romanticism to new life. Elizabeth Peabody, the oldest sister, was a mind-on-fire influence on the great writers of the era—Emerson, Hawthorne, and Thoreau among them—who also published some of their earliest works; it was she who prodded these newly minted Transcendentalists away from Emerson’s individualism and toward a greater connection to others. Middle sister Mary Peabody was a passionate reformer who finally found her soul mate in the great educator Horace Mann. And the frail Sophia, an admired painter among the preeminent society artists of the day, married Nathaniel Hawthorne—but not before Hawthorne threw the delicate dynamics among the sisters into disarray. Casting new light on a legendary American era, and on three sisters who made an indelible mark on history, Marshall’s unprecedented research uncovers thousands of never-before-seen letters as well as other previously unmined original sources. “A massive enterprise,” The Peabody Sisters is an event in American biography (The New York Times Book Review). “Marshall’s book is a grand story . . . where male and female minds and sensibilities were in free, fruitful communion, even if men could exploit this cultural richness far more easily than women.” —The Washington Post “Marshall has greatly increased our understanding of these women and their times in one of the best literary biographies to come along in years.” —New England Quarterly

The National Book Award–winning history of American finance by the renowned biographer and author of Hamilton: “A tour de force” (New York Times Book Review). The House of Morgan is a panoramic story of four generations in the powerful Morgan family and their secretive firms that would transform the modern financial world. Tracing the trajectory of J. P. Morgan’s empire from its obscure beginnings in Victorian London to the financial crisis of 1987, acclaimed author Ron Chernow paints a fascinating portrait of the family’s private saga and the rarefied world of the American and British elite in which they moved—a world that included Charles Lindbergh, Henry Ford, Franklin Roosevelt, Nancy Astor, and Winston Churchill. A masterpiece of financial history—it was awarded the 1990 National Book Award for Nonfiction and selected by the Modern Library as one of the 100 Best Nonfiction Books of the Twentieth Century—The House of Morgan is a compelling account of a remarkable institution and the men who ran it. It is essential reading for anyone seeking to understand the money and power behind the major historical events of the last 150 years.

These characters have been chosen from various countries and from varied professions, so that the youth who read this book may see that poverty is no barrier to success. It usually develops ambition, and nerves people to action. Life at best has much of struggle, and we need to be cheered and stimulated by the careers of those who have overcome obstacles. If Lincoln and Garfield, both farmer-boys, could come to the Presidency, then there is a chance for other farmer-boys. If Ezra Cornell, a mechanic, could become the president of great telegraph companies, and leave millions to a university, then other mechanics can come to fame. If Sir Titus Salt, working and sorting wool in a factory at nineteen, could build one of the model towns of the world for his thousands of workingmen, then there is encouragement and inspiration for other toilers in factories. These lives show that without work and will no great things are achieved.