A Biography of an Industrialist and Philanthropist From Pittsburgh

NEW BOOKS

Mellon: An American Life
by David Cannadine

David Cannadine, a British author and historian, traces the life of Andrew W. Mellon — a financier, industrialist, and so-called “robber baron” of the late 19th and early 20th century — from his family’s roots in Ireland and the amassing of his incredible wealth, to his unhappy marriage and tax-fraud trial, to the legacy he preserved through his philanthropy.

“In its length, its range, its importance, its accomplishments, and its long-term significance, Andrew Mellon’s was one of the biggest American lives of the times,” writes Mr. Cannadine.

Mr. Mellon’s first foray into philanthropy was in 1912 and 1913, when he and his brother, Richard B. Mellon, established the Mellon Institute of Industrial Research, at the University of Pittsburgh.

In the wake of a nasty confrontation with President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal government and a humiliating tax trial, Mr. Mellon’s “later years were darkened by an overwhelming sense of futility and of a life ill-lived, with his proudest and heretofore most certain achievements reviled and likely to be forgotten,” Mr. Cannadine writes. He suggests that those gloomy thoughts may have led to Mr. Mellon’s greatest philanthropic contribution: the donation of his enormous collection of artwork — worth $20.7-million — along with $10-million for an endowment, to establish the National Gallery of Art in 1937.

“The means and morality of accumulating vast fortunes, the relationship between business and government, the scope and reach and obligations of the state, the sources and purposes of philanthropy: all these issues remain very much current and with us today,” writes Mr. Cannadine.

Publisher: Alfred A. Knopf, 1745 Broadway, New York, N.Y. 10019; http://www.aaknopf.com; 560 pages; $35; ISBN 0-679-45032-7.