John D. Rockefeller, Villain or Role Model?

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The trusts that he created with industry leaders always benefited a very select few and he appears to have been totally lacking in any concern of the negative impact or repercussions that his ‘deals’ might have on anyone.
The background: Never thinking small, John Rockefeller always wanted to make deals and made sure that those deals were in his favor. He had a photographic memory and had a keen interest in numbers, which was only surpassed by his interest in business. He was fascinated by the order of business and when he left school at age sixteen to get his first job, he was hired as a bookkeeper in a Cleveland, Ohio trading company and immediately thrived. He dedicated himself to maximizing profits and found many ways to reduce costs in transportation, a skill that he would use on a far grander scale later in life. Never one satisfied with the status quo, it wasn’t long before he left that position so that he and a partner could open their own trade company. Their ...

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He convinced railroad owners that he should be given a discount because of Standards’ large quantity of shipping and proposed that they give him this discount through a system of rebates (Carr 51). His deals with the various rail companies were very secretive and to keep any competition from learning of his “special treatment,” he would pay an average market price for each barrel of oil he transported but at the end of each month submit for a substantial rebate per quota of all barrels transported during that month. This system appeared to be fair and understandable because of Standard’s considerable amount of oil that they were shipping but these rebates allowed the company to ...

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