Episode 5

We must remember that Vanderbilt was born in 1794 and that at the time we are considering he was seventy-one years old.In the matter of years, therefore, his career apparently belongs to the ante-bellum days, yet the most remarkable fact about this remarkable man is that his real life work did not begin until he had passed his seventieth year.In 1865 Vanderbilt's fortune, consisting chiefly of a fleet of steamboats, amounted to about $10,000,000; he died twelve years later, in 1877, leaving $104,000,000, the first of those colossal American fortunes that were destined to astound the world.The mere fact that this fortune was the accumulated profit of only ten years shows perhaps more eloquently than any other circumstance that the United States had entered a new economic age.That new factor in the life of America and the world, the railroad, explains his achievement.Vanderbilt was one of the most astonishing characters in our history.His physical exterior made him perhaps the most imposing figure in New York.In his old age, at seventy-three, Vanderbilt married his second wife, a beautiful Southern widow who had just turned her thirtieth year, and the appearance of the two, sitting side by side in one of the Commodore's smartest turnouts, driving recklessly behind a pair of the fastest trotters of the day, was a common sight in Central Park.Nor did Vanderbilt look incongruous in this brilliant setting.His tall and powerful frame was still erect, and his large, defiant head, ruddy cheeks, sparkling, deep-set black eyes, and snowy white hair and whiskers, made him look every inch the Commodore.These public appearances lent a pleasanter and more sentimental aspect to Vanderbilt's life than his intimates always perceived.For his manners were harsh and uncouth; he was totally without education and could write hardly half a dozen lines without outraging the spelling-book.Though he loved his race-horses, had a fondness for music, and could sit through long winter evenings while his young wife sang old Southern ballads, Vanderbilt's ungovernable temper had placed him on bad terms with nearly all his children--he had had thirteen, of whom eleven survived him--who contested his will and exposed all his eccentricities to public view on the ground that the man who created the New York Central system was actually insane.