1873: The Rothschilds, the First Great Depression, and the Making of the Modern World

In time, he would become one of the great railroad robber barons of the era. In fact, his tenure was cut short in 1889, when, after twenty-one years, he was forced to resign under a cloud, accused of having misused his position to pry into the accounts of an art dealer in London with whom he was doing business. GO TO NOTE REFERENCE IN TEXT “richest people in the world”: Investigation by a Select Committee of the House of Representatives Relative to the Causes of the General Depression in Labor and Business, at 563–64 (1879). Rothschild: Glanz und Untergang des Wiener Welthauses.