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James Jerome Hill  //(9/16/1838 - 5/29/1916)// James Jerome Hill was born in Eramosa Township on September 16, 1838. When he was born, he had no middle name. Later on in life, he adopred the name Jerome, after Napoleon's brother. He attended Rockwood Academy for nine yeares, and was given free tuition. In 1852, his father died, and he was forced to leave the school. Before he left, however, he became particularly adept at mathematics and English. Those skills would help him to begin his incredible career. HE moved to St. Paul, Minnesota when he was eighteen. After he moved, he worked as a bookkeeper for a steamboat company. By 1860, he worked for wholesale grocers who dealt with the freight and transportation business. His knowledge of the business would be very important to his future career. All of his experience with transportation helped him to enter into the steamboat business in 1870.  Two years later, he had a monopoly started by merging with Norman Kittson. It was in 1867 that he started in the coal business. Seven years later, in 1974, he had also achieved a monopoly in that business. Around the same time, James Hill began himself in banking. He quickly found himself on the board of director’s for several major banks. Along with all of his other endeavors, Hill managed to adopt many bankrupt businesses, renovate them, and sell them. Doing this often made him an enormous profit. In 1873, Hill teamed up again with Norman Kittson, and also with Donald Smith, George Stephen, and John S. Kennedy to make money off of an abandoned railroad called STP&P. By 1885, the business had a net worth of 25 million dollars. Not even the law could stop James J. Hill. When there wasn’t enough industry in the area, he brought more in. Often, he bought out many businesses to be able to do it. In December 1889, he had created an easier way across the Rockies. January 1893 brought his Great Northern Railway from St. Paul, Minnesota to Seattle Washington. The distance was more than 1,700 miles.  Six months later, a depression hit, and Hill lowered the cost of carrying freight by 13%. He also lowered shipping prices to farmers and gave credit to businesses he owned, so they were able to continue paying the workers. Because he took these measures, he survived the depression and also raised his railroad’s net worth by ten million dollars.  He was admired for his ability to make it through tough times. Cutting his worker’s wages and practicing hard micromanaging, led to a railway strike. As a result, the workers were eventually given back the wages they had earned before the depression started. Toward the end of his life, Hill gave money to the soldiers in World War I to purchase food, clothing, and other things they needed. James Jerome Hill was considered both a robber baron and a captain of industry during his long lifetime. He helped people in need and earned his money fairly, but he also took money from his workers to make it through a struggle. 

 ·   //Wikipedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_J._Hill (02/20/08)//  ·  //Keith Poole, J.J. Hill Page, [|http://voteview.ucsd.jjhill.htm] (02/21/08) //
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