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While always popular, get-rich-quick schemes were particularly attractive during times of economic distress. These two works were published not long after the close of the Civil War, when so many solders – many maimed – were looking for work. In addition to suggesting the material trappings of wealth (the book has a gold seal and gilt edges), the works incorporated rhetoric familiar to us today, promising to reveal “secrets” for “honest business” that would easily generate great fortunes. Ultimately, however, the books were money-making schemes for their authors, fetching $1.00 a copy, a significant amount. Yet the works offered nothing new: the biographies of famous businessmen, advice for saving, and supposedly profitable recipes for patent medicines were copied from other works. |
