Question

In a few paragraphs identify two of the main ideas of this passage and explain what supporting details are given to support those main ideas.

Answer 1

Andrew Carnegie's life was a true "rags to riches" story. He was born to a poor Scottish family that immigrated to the United States, Carnegie became a powerful businessman and a leading force in the American steel industry. Today, he is remembered as an industrialist, millionaire, and philanthropist. Carnegie believed that the wealthy had an obligation to give back to society, so he donated much of his fortune to causes like education and peace.

Although Andrew Carnegie became a millionaire, he did not start life as one. He was born in 1835 into a working-class family in Dunfermline, Scotland. In 1848 his family immigrated to the United States and settled in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. When Carnegie was 13 he got his first job in a textile mill earning $1.20 a week. He then took a job in a factory tending the steam engine.
Carnegie earned $2 a week tending a steam engine.

The next year, Carnegie worked as a messenger boy in a telegraph office for $2.50 per week. Because of his quickness and hard work, he was soon promoted to telegraph operator and was paid $5 a week. Slowly but surely, Carnegie was working his way up. In 1853, he went to work for the Pennsylvania Railroad for $35 per month as the personal telegrapher and assistant to Thomas Scott, a superintendent. Under Scott, Carnegie learned all about the railroad industry and later became a superintendent himself. Scott also taught Andrew about investing in the stock market. What do you know about the stock market?

Scott explained to Carnegie that when a company performed well, it paid "dividends" out of its profits to people who owned its stock. When Carnegie received his first dividend check, he shouted, "Here's the goose that laid the golden eggs!" Do you know what he meant? This money was the first he had ever received without having worked for it himself. The golden eggs he was talking about meant that Carnegie had learned to let his money work for him.