John D. Rockefeller
Storyboard Text
- John D. Rockefeller was born on July 8, 1839, in Richford, New York. He was born in a house were saving money and giving to charity was a top priority. His father, William Avery Rockefeller was a "pitchman"- a "doctor"-, so he was mostly out traveling and would be out for months. Though his mother, Eliza Davison Rockefeller, was a very religious and disciplined and most of the teaching came from her. By 1853, they moved Cleveland, Ohio, and John attended high school over there.
- At an early age, John learned to save money and how to invest it. Before he started into business himself he first went into other business company to learn how they do business. On March 1, 1859, he went into business with his forming partner Maurice Clark. They each put in $2000 and formed "Clark and Rockefeller"- commission merchants in gain, hay, meat, and miscellaneous goods. Towards the end of the year, they were making $4,400 in 1860 and a profit of about $17,000 by 1861. Their business started to expand during the Civil war.
- Time passed by and John became more successful, but during the 1860s John realized that the merchant business is going to be limited in Cleveland. Although John business was going well he wanted to do more and so, he thought of refining oil in 1863. He started to look into the feasibility of getting into the oil refining business in 1862. John believes that the secret to success was to attention to details. he hired his own plumber and bought his own supplies. In fact, instead of transporting his green timber he built a kiln to dry the woods and cut the weight of the cost. He even bought his own transportation such as wagons and horses. Such techniques he used is known as the "vertical integration".
- In 1865, as his idea of new business came to mind, he bought out the Clarks brother for $72,500 and took complete control of the business. He took great steps to extend his enterprise. By 1866, he brought his brother, William Rockefeller, into the business and built a new refinery in Cleveland called Standard Works. They also opened the office in New York where his brother took care of the export business, which eventually became larger than domestic business. As his business was growing he bought multiple residences including a home in New York, an estate in Lakewood, New Jersey, and an estate called Kykuit, old Dutch "lookout," set on 3,000 acres near Terrytown, New York.
- His was a success, but critic charged him for unfair labor practices. Employes said that he could've paid the worker fair wages and settled in being a half-billionaire. The workers worked 10 hours a shift for 6 days a week, for barely enough wage to survive. Children younger than 8 years old worked for hours which is why they weren't sent to school. Men and women worked as long as their bodies could stand, women who were pregnant were often fired. There was no such thing as medical coverage nor compensation for injuries. Which eventually lead to a strike called the Ludlow Massacre. The Massacre was ongoing violence during the Colorado Coalfield wars. Miners demanded safer working condition and better wages. During this war, families were attacked and some were killed during the process. At first, John D. Rockefeller had no response, but as time went by the people because for aggressive that Woodrow Wilson sent in guards to help our and war ended with peace for fair wages to be given. Time went by and John started to control the markets and eventually created a trust in which people can gain more profit through the trust and have half the profit. This trust was built to get competition out of the way so there was nothing in the way for johns business to grow.
- From the mid-1890s until his death in 1937 Rockefeller became an active philanthropica. Till his peak into a fortune, he had almost $900,000,000 to which he gave most of them away. To places like The Chicago of University, Institue for Medical Research, he as founded and created the General Education Board, and there's also the Rockefeller Foundation. He died on May 23, 1937, and gave away most of his wealth to his son and philanthropically. During his period of wealth, John had interesting habits like he would celebrate his own personal holiday, he liked to hand out dimes to strangers, and he did everything he could to dominate the oil industry. In my opinion, he was a very interesting person to know about.
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