The pragmatic approach adopted by business historians has inhibited utilization of their findings for theoretical purposes. Economic theory, at the same time, has hitherto provided no apparatus for attacking a whole range of problems deemed vital by historians today. The consequent breach between business history and economic theory, however, may be bridged by the development of new theoretical tools. Linear programming, statistical decision theory, and the theory of games are examples of arenas where the skills and interests of historian and theorist can converge.

Attempts to monopolize the automobile industry began early in its history but were never successful because the industry possessed characteristics which made monopolization exceptionally difficult. The first of these efforts provides an illuminating example of business failure resulting from avoidable errors of judgment. The Electric Vehicle Company began its operations on the assumption that the electric automobile was going to be the dominant type; when this became demonstrably a bad guess, the company tried to compensate by using the Selden patent to collect royalties from the manufacturers of gasoline automobiles. This scheme likewise misfired, and the company collapsed into bankruptcy. The scheme also brought disaster to the Pope Manufacturing Company of Hartford, Connecticut, which abandoned a very promising position of leadership in the automobile field in order to participate in a highly speculative enterprise.

The development of banking in Utah advanced by stages, each of which marked an increase in the degree of specialization practiced by institutions performing banking functions. After the first settlement of the territory in 1847, banking functions were assumed principally by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormon). With the inauguration of mining activity in the Mountain States in the early 1860's, formalized banking institutions were established in Salt Lake City. These miners' and merchants' banks predominated until the early 1880's when commercial banks were established in most of the settlement centers of the territory.

Standing between expanding productive capacity on the one hand and growing consumer demand on the other, the marketing middleman in our economy has been forced into a succession of adaptive measures, significant among which has been department store retailing. A study of the general developmental pattern in down state Illinois reveals a “spawning era” and identifies three generic antecedents for the department store. Case studies of individual firms reveal the external underlying forces and the innovating policies which made the department store necessary and possible in this geographic area. Since by many criteria the small cities of Illinois were typical of those elsewhere, a study of retail developments there has more than regional implications.

Nevada commercial banking has, from the start, been successively dominated by three organizations. The fact that these organizations rose to power under differing circumstances and by differing means suggests how deep-rooted and long-lived the propensity toward, economic concentration in some environments may be. In such environments the manner in which quasi-monopolistic powers are exercised has real cogency. Under two of the three historical situations studied, service to the consumer has not been noticeably different from that provided in more competitive banking areas.

The affair of the State Trust Company, which General Andrews recounts here, occurred in 1900, when trust companies were increasing in number and expanding so rapidly as to arouse current comment in financial journals. Since such companies were less stringently regulated by law than other types of banking houses, their rise was viewed with interest tinged in some quarters by alarm. The rumor of sharp practices in the State Trust Company found, eager acceptance. There were those who wanted to make political hay immediately by claiming negligence on the part of the Superintendents of Banking and of Insurance, seeking thus — in an election year — the discomfiture of Theodore Roosevelt, Governor of New York. Others used the incident as a grim example when, during the next few years, muckraking became a popular journalistic sport.

The State Trust Company had been organized in 1890. It was affiliated with the American Surety Company, and could handle investment business in which the insurance firm could not legally engage. In 1898 both companies came under the control of the group of financiers mentioned in this article. The trust company had continued to prosper, and in November of 1899 the State Bank Examiner had certified that it was in sound condition.