Banking in The United States - Rise of Investment Banks - Civil War

Civil War

During the Civil War, banking houses were syndicated to meet the federal government's need for money to fund its war efforts. Jay Cooke launched the first mass securities selling operation in U.S. history employing thousands of salesmen to float what ultimately amounted to $830 million worth of government bonds to a wide group of investors. Cooke then reached out to the general public, acting as an agent of the Treasury Department, personally led a war bond drive that netted approximately $1.5 billion for Treasury.

Read more about this topic:  Banking In The United States, Rise of Investment Banks

Famous quotes by civil war:

    At Hayes’ General Store, west of the cemetery, hangs an old army rifle, used by a discouraged Civil War veteran to end his earthly troubles. The grocer took the rifle as payment ‘on account.’
    —Administration for the State of Con, U.S. public relief program (1935-1943)

    He was high and mighty. But the kindest creature to his slaves—and the unfortunate results of his bad ways were not sold, had not to jump over ice blocks. They were kept in full view and provided for handsomely in his will. His wife and daughters in the might of their purity and innocence are supposed never to dream of what is as plain before their eyes as the sunlight, and they play their parts of unsuspecting angels to the letter.
    —Anonymous Antebellum Confederate Women. Previously quoted by Mary Boykin Chesnut in Mary Chesnut’s Civil War, edited by C. Vann Woodward (1981)

    We have heard all of our lives how, after the Civil War was over, the South went back to straighten itself out and make a living again. It was for many years a voiceless part of the government. The balance of power moved away from it—to the north and the east. The problems of the north and the east became the big problem of the country and nobody paid much attention to the economic unbalance the South had left as its only choice.
    Lyndon Baines Johnson (1908–1973)