Unprecedented power
Subtitle: Jesse Jones, Capitalism, and the common good
By: Steven Fenberg
Edition: 1st ed.
Publisher: Texas A&M University Press
Published: 2011
Place of publication: College Station
Language: eng
Number of pages: 611
ISBN-13: 9781603444347
Subjects: Philanthropists; Capitalists and financiers; Houston Endowment Inc; Reconstruction Finance Corporation; Biography; History
Description: As President Obama began to unveil sweeping government programs to restore the crippled economy, the pubic and media drew numerous comparisons with the actions of Franklin Roosevelt, who faced the grim prospects of the the Great Depression almost eighty years earlier. Now, Steven Fenberg tells the story of Jesse Holman Jones, the Houston businessman who went to Washington as an appointed official and provided the pragmatic leadership that salvaged capitalism during the Great Depression and militarized industry in time to fight and win World War II. Jones - an entrepreneur with an eighth-grade education who built Houston's tallest buildings of the time - was considered to be the most powerful person in the nation, next to President Roosevelt.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references and index.
Table of contents: title: Introduction; title: The most powerful person in the nation; title: Houston; title: We had a good table (1650-1898); title: The town pump (1898-1914); title: The national stage; title: Give until it hurts (1914-1918); title: The family won't discuss it (1919-1924); title: Draped and drowned in decorations (1924-1928); title: The Great Depression; title: Never rope a steer going downhill (1928-1932); title: At the end of our string (1933); title: Go directly to the RFC (1934); title: Friendly, industrious, intelligent dollars (1935); title: No actual ultimate cost (1936); title: We are not going haywire (1937); title: Spenders and lenders (1938); title: World War II; title: An avalanche of orders (1939); title: Just another loan (1940); title: You'd better see Jesse (1941); title: A material more precious than gold (1942); title: Ask God to stop him from lying (1943); title: Jump when the gong sounds (1944); title: A very difficult letter to write (1945); title: Home; title: It has grown out of bounds (1946-1956).