Imagine a chilly mid-November afternoon in 1914, shortly following the outbreak of World War I. The place: a sumptuous fifth-floor salon in the new Beaux Arts Renaissance Hotel in Chicago. The salon’s electric lamps have just been turned on. The room is decorated with red velvet couches, a long mahogany table, and deep Persian carpets. A fire crackles in the marble fireplace.
Imagine, too, that the early captains of industry have gathered in this room for cigars, bourbon, and a discussion of the most pressing issues facing their companies: the establishment of the first central bank in the United States, the need to transport goods more quickly via the Pennsylvania and Union Pacific Railroads, the desire to bring more of Edison’s electricity into their plants, the implications of the war for manufacturing opportunities, and the whisperings about new government regulations that would limit the hiring of children under 14.
