E-text prepared by Juliet Sutherland, Dave Macfarlane, and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this file which includes the original illustrations. See 15161-h.htm or 15161-h.zip: (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/5/1/6/15161/15161-h/15161-h.htm) or (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/5/1/6/15161/15161-h.zip) GREAT FORTUNES, AND HOW THEY WERE MADE Or, The Struggles and Triumphs of Our Self-Made Men by JAMES D. MCCABE, JR., Author of _Planting the Wilderness_, etc., etc. Numerous Illustrations from Original Designs by G. F. & E. B. Bensell [Illustration: CONSTERNATION AT THE SIGHT OF FULTON'S MONSTER.] "MAN, it is not thy works, which are mortal, infinitely little, and the greatest no greater than the least, but only the _spirit thou workest in_, that can have worth or continuance."--CARLYLE. George Maclean, Philadelphia, New York and Boston Electrotyped at the Franklin Type Foundry, Cincinnati 1871 "The physical industries of this world have two relations in them: one to the actor, and one to the public. Honest business is more really a contribution to the public than it is to the manager of the business himself. Although it seems to the man, and generally to the community, that the active business man is a self-seeker, and although his motive may be self-aggrandizement, yet, in point of fact, no man ever manages a legitimate business in this life, that he is not doing a thousand-fold more for other men than he is trying to do even for himself. For, in the economy of God's providence, every right and well organized business is a beneficence and not a selfishness. And not less is it so because the merchant, the mechanic, the publisher, the artist, think merely of their profit. They are in fact working more for others than they are for themselves." HENRY WARD BEECHER. PREFACE. The chief glory of America is, that it is the country in which genius and industry find their speediest and surest reward. Fame and fortune are here open to all who are willing to work for them. Neither class distinctions nor social prejudices, neither differences of birth, religion, nor ideas, can prevent the man of true merit from winning the just reward of his labors in this favored land. We are emphatically a nation of self-made men, and it is to the labors of this worthy class that our marvelous national prosperity is due. This being the case, it is but natural that there should be manifested by our people a very decided desire to know the history of those who have risen to the front rank of their respective callings. Men are naturally cheered and encouraged by the success of others, and those who are worthy of a similar reward will not fail to learn valuable lessons from the examples of the men who have preceded them.