Astor: The Rise and Fall of an American Fortune

“John Jacob Astor, like ‘the Commodore,’ Cornelius Vanderbilt, possessed a genius for making money that bordered on the pathological. And that pathology would go on to infect each successive generation in different ways. Both families seemed to think their money would last forever, an infinity of wealth and excess, power and privilege. Both were wrong.”

Cooper and Howe connect this book to their first collaboration on the Vanderbilts. They lay out their basic thesis: that the Astor fortune came from a “pathological” willingness to operate in a mentally or morally unhealthy way, that later generations indulged in unhealthy excess, and that this “infection” of the mind and soul eventually led to their (presumably well-earned) demise.

“It began—as great fortunes often do—with blood.”

This dramatic flourish at the end of the Introduction serves partly as a cliffhanger, inviting continued reading to learn more. “Blood” here refers most directly to trapping beavers and killing them for their fur but also hints at the way the Astors exploited other people (including trappers and explorers who lost their lives while contributing to the Astor fur trade).

“Butchers were predators, in a manner of speaking, making their living by slitting throats and letting blood and by rendering animal muscle and sinew into cuts of salable meat. Trappers were predators, too. Both the trade Astor was trained for and the one he embraced after arrival in New York relied on the ability to render living flesh and skin into money.”

Cooper and Howe omit the fact that Astor was a trader rather than a trapper in order to portray him as a predator and therefore a man who inspired fear. While Astor generally did not directly kill animals, much less people, this metaphorically refers to his eagerness to find new opportunities to make money and his lack of concern for the suffering he might cause in doing so.