1909

Rockefeller's only book-length memoir, Random Reminiscences of Men and Events, was published in 1909 by Doubleday, Page & Company. The chapter list reads as a self-portrait in seven movements: 'Some Old Friends,' 'The Difficult Art of Getting,' 'The Standard Oil Company,' 'Some Experiences in the Oil Business,' 'Other Business Experiences and Business Principles,' 'The Difficult Art of Giving,' and 'The Benevolent Trust; The Value of the Coöperative Principle in Giving.' The arc—getting, running, then giving—is itself the operating philosophy: acquisition as a discipline, the corporation as the carrier, philanthropy as the close. His explicit framing of giving as a 'coöperative principle,' and of his philanthropic vehicles as a 'benevolent trust,' mirrors the legal architecture of the Standard Oil Trust and shows that he treated organized charity as a continuation of organized business by other means. The book is the primary textual source for Rockefeller's own account of his operating philosophy and the bridge between the Standard Oil and Rockefeller Foundation eras.