Stagecoach: Wells Fargo and the Rise of the American Financial Services Industry

STAGECOACH Book I: Wells Fargo and the American West Book II: Wells Fargo and the Rise of the American Financial Services Industry Sweeping across prairie, plain, and mountain range, Stagecoach is the epic story of an American original, a business with the peculiar American talent for reinvention -- Wells Fargo. It's the story of a transportation-communications-financial-services network that had the audacity to survive the blizzards of the century, plagues of locusts, devastating earthquakes and fires, panics and depressions, and a civil war and world wars. From telegraph to Internet, Wells Fargo became an icon of the American West and a bastion of American finance. For some, Wells Fargo was "the greatest universal service company ever invented." It built its reputation in an era when companies were either in-business or out-of-business solely on the basis of their integrity and dependability. There were no safety nets and hardly any government. For others, Wells Fargo was a vast domain of gold and banks and bullion vaults that housed and moved the nation's mineral and agricultural wealth from the Middle and Far Western "frontier" to the "civilization" of the East. Powerful images of Wells Fargo stagecoaches, Pony Express riders, transcontinental railroads, and telegraph lines combine with the vast spaces and abundance of the American landscape and the energy of American technology to paint the portrait of a company that has fed the nation and moved its money -- securely and speedily -- for 150 years. Along the way, America grew from 20 million to 280 million people. Entrepreneurs and dreamers, farmers and mechanics, small businesses and global enterprises used the company's services alongside Wyatt Earp, Black Bart, Buffalo Bill, Levi Strauss, Amelia Earhart, and a host of other American originals. Sweeping in scope, as revealing of an era as it is of a company, Stagecoach is a wonderfully unique look at Wells Fargo as part of the history of the American West by Pulitzer Prize-winning author Philip L. Fradkin, and as part of the history of American enterprise by Wells Fargo's chief historian, Dr. Andy Anderson.
ASIN: 0743227972
VSKU: BVV.0743227972.G
Condition: Good
Author/Artist:Fradkin, Philip L.
Binding: Hardcover
Note: Any images shown are stock photographs and product may differ from what is shown.
Condition Notes: The item shows wear from consistent use, but it remains in good condition and works perfectly. All pages and cover are intact including the dust cover, if applicable . Spine may show signs of wear. Pages may include limited notes and highlighting. May NOT include discs, access code or other supplemental materials.