Why Did Andrew Carnegie Burn Stalled Railroad Cars?

David Senra says Andrew Carnegie burned stalled railroad cars to clear the tracks. Shortly after Carnegie became superintendent of the Western Division, he shocked the other executives by doing it. The core job of the railroad was to keep traffic moving, and a stalled car was a bottleneck. He did the same thing over and over. He was not worried about the other executives' opinions. If he decided an action was right, he took it. Senra describes the habit as picking the objective, then cutting through conventions, competitors, or ordinary people in the way.

The rise had been fast. Tom Scott, one of the leading railroad executives of the period, mentored Carnegie, and the two shared an office while Scott ran the work by telegraph. By the early 1860s Carnegie was already a rich man. In a period when conflicts of interest were routine, Scott steered him into investments in companies that did business with the Pennsylvania Railroad, including a sleeping-car company and a bridge builder, and often advanced the purchase money.