John Brooks (2) (1920–1993)

This is a collection of 12 feature news articles (by the length of them, I assume they are feature magazine articles) on business events that happened in the 1960s, written probably in the late 1960s. (After googling for a bit, I think they were all published in The New Yorker.) Bill Gates really liked this book and was probably instrumental in bringing this book into reprint, by praising the book on his blog a couple of years ago. The author is a very good writer. I think I would have been captivated by his writing no matter how benign the topic. Probably because of that, he got me entranced on topics such as how the Federal Reserve Bureau monitor and maintain exchange rates of pounds and dollars, what stockbrokers experience during stock market crashes, and the pros and cons of the Federal Income Tax..... :P One of my favorite two articles is an account of how after a sulfur company discovered a silver mine in Canada, the technicians and executives who knew about the mine bought large number of stocks of their own company and made huge profits, and how the government discovered this and took them to court over it. The other favorite article is about how Xerox developed its paper copying technology through research and development, with leading executives mortgaging their home in order to fund the research, and how after Xerox reached financial success it went out of its way to give back to the community.… (more)

Question: has anyone read a contemporary history book that is no longer contemporary?

I recently wrapped up "The Go-Go Years" by John Brooks, a look at the bull market of the 60s and subsequent crash in 1970. It's a jauntily written and entertaining read (and includes perhaps the best description of Ross Perot I've ever run across). If you have an interest in economics, the stock market or the 60s, I thoroughly recommend it. Bonus points if you want to compare to similar contemporary histories of more recent economics, such as Michael Lewis' "The Big Short."

But what makes it such an oddity to me is that it was published in 1973 and, boy howdy, is it a product of its time. There's slang that is lost on me, Nixon shows up repeatedly without any reference to his wrongdoing, there is constant references to the Protestant-Jewish split on Wall Street. On its own merits, it's a pretty good book. As a time capsule, especially to a time which is just outside my own memory, it's absolutely fascinating.

It's occurred to me that this type of book makes up a fairly large chunk of current book sales (even if most of that is political tripe), but it feels like these books disappear after a few months never to resurface. There's a fascinating prospect of literary anthropology contained out there, if you only know where to find it.… (more)

This is a book that I should have enjoyed. I like business books, I read business stories every day. I like stories about success and failure in the business world. This a book that the publisher says I should have enjoyed. The publisher tells me it is a great book by a great author whose books are described as great classics. I did not enjoy this book. I did not like it. The author, I am told is a frequent contributor to the the “New Yorker”. This may explain while I never liked the “New Yorker” Please realize that having discovered and declared my dislike for the book that I did not feel obliged to read the entire book. It does not take over 400 pages to know whether something is worth one’s time. It was not. The book consists of twelve chapters, each an individual business story, so far so good, that appear to be reprints from the above noted magazine. Unfortunately there is no preface to the book explaining whether or not this is so. After reading the first story, one has no idea whether or not the second story is intended to tie into the first or is completely independent. Secondly the articles or stories are not dated. It is immediately obvious that these are not recent events but they date back far enough that a date would have been useful in having one place the events with other world or local events of that time period. Next, a reviewer suggested this author was funny - certainly not funny ha-ha as near as I could tell. Why go on. Start reading this at your own risk. Sorry that I could not enjoy it since someone out there must be rolling in the aisles.… (more)