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Friday, November 25, 2011

Happy birthday Andrew Carnegie

One of the world's greatest philanthropists

Carnegie was born in Dunfermline, Scotland, on November 25, 1835.  As a child, he migrated to the United States, where his first job was as a factory worker in a bobbin factory. Later on he became a bill logger for the owner of the company, then a messenger boy a his progress up the ranks that led to founding his own steel industry, Pittsburgh's Carnegie Steel Company, which was later merged with Elbert H. Gary's Federal Steel Company and several smaller companies to create U.S. Steel.

With the immense fortune he made, he built Carnegie Hall, founded the Carnegie Corporation of New York, the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, the Carnegie Institution of Washington, Carnegie Mellon University and the Carnegie Museums of Pittsburgh.  His greatest gift to the world, perhaps, was the establishment of libraries, schools and universities to the United States, Britain, and many other countries.  He passed away in 1919.  Current news of cutbacks in libraries is probably setting him spinning in his grave.

"No person will make a great business, who wants to do it all himself, or get all the credit," he wrote.

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