Andrew Carnegie, (born Nov. 25, 1835, Dunfermline, Fife, Scot.—died Aug. 11, 1919, Lenox, Mass., U.S.), U.S. industrialist and philanthropist. The son of a Scottish weaver, he emigrated to the U.S. with his family in 1848. A job in a telegraph office led to his early career with the Pennsylvania Railroad Co., and his canny investments made him wealthy by age 30. In 1872–73 he founded the steelworks near Pittsburgh, Pa., that evolved into the Carnegie Steel Co. in 1889. By adopting technological innovations such as the open-hearth furnace and by increasing efficiency through vertical integration, Carnegie built a vast enterprise that dominated the U.S. steel industry. In 1901 he sold his company to J.P. Morgan, and it became part of U.S. Steel. Believing that the affluent were obliged to use their surplus wealth for the improvement of mankind, Carnegie retired to devote himself to philanthropy, giving hundreds of millions of dollars to libraries and universities, including Carnegie Mellon University, and endowing such organizations as the Carnegie Institute of Pittsburgh and the Carnegie Corp. of New York, the largest of all his foundations.
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