Fortune Builders

Presents the dramatic story of the individuals and familes who have shaped Chicago's cultural, financial, and social life, including figures with such names as Armour, Swift, Wrigley, and Marshall Field

This collection of short profiles of wealthy Chicago families purports to be biography and history but in fact is mainly gossip. Darby, a veteran Chicago newspaper columnist, here tells about such leading Windy City families as the Fields, Swifts, and Armours, and brings the story down to the present. Fast-paced but rather shallow, the book reads like series of extended columns. Good biography seeks to place a life or lives in the context of an era; good history explains change over time. But in this book we get just a parade of money-makers with little attention to the firms they operated, the business climate, or the social and political implications of generational transfers of great wealth. A possible choice for popular collections only. James W. Oberly, History Dept., University of WisconsinEau Claire
Copyright 1986 Reed Business Information, Inc.