Andrew Carnegie is a quintessential Gilded Age titan.

He’s an industrialist and a self-made man.

Who started from nothing and created an empire in steel.

Carnegie was born in Scotland to a working class and skilled laborer family

and his father ends up losing everything and his family moves to the United States penniless.

He had no real formal schooling, but he spends a lot of time reading,

and he’s an intellectual — he’s self-taught.

The Gilded Age is marked by this economic boom.

At the forefront are the railroads and steel is critical to the building of railroads.

Carnegie recognizes this and he saw an opportunity.

By the end of his career, he had a monopoly on the production of steel in the United States.

So by 1901, Andrew Carnegie is one of the richest men in the world.