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Henry Flagler Quotes

12 quotes from Henry Flagler — Co-founder of Standard Oil with Rockefeller..

Read the full Henry Flagler playbook →

“Helping others is like helping yourself.”

Helping

“There has never been anything worth obtaining without grief, or suffering, and disappointment.”

Perseverance

“I would rather be my own tyrant than have someone else tyrannize me.”

Independence

“Sharp, vigorous, and decisive measures.”

Strategy

“Here was St. Augustine, the oldest city in the United States. How to build a hotel to meet the requirements of nineteenth century America and have it in keeping with the character of the place? that was my hardest problem.”

Innovation

“Flagler understood early in his career that cheap freight rates determined industrial profits.”

— Edward N. Akin, Flagler: Rockefeller Partner and Florida Baron

“In essence, Henry Flagler invented modern Florida.”

— Flagler Museum biography

“The hardest problem a man has is how to help people. The desire to help others comes when a man has more than enough for his own needs. I have come to the conclusion that the best way to help others is to help them help themselves.”

— Henry Flagler

“Now I can die happy. My dream is fulfilled.”

— Henry Flagler, on arriving in Key West, January 22, 1912

“The building of the railroad across the ocean was a colossal piece of work, born of the same impulse that made individuals believe that pyramids could be raised, cathedrals erected, and continents tamed.”

— Les Standiford, Last Train to Paradise

“Henry M. Flagler first built Standard Oil and then built the state of Florida. He may have been America's most modest industrial titan — and its most underappreciated. Henry Flagler not only was present at the creation of the modern economic world but was one of its prime creators.”

— John Steele Gordon, Audacity Magazine, 1996

“More wonderful than any palace in Europe, grander and more magnificent than any other private dwelling in the world.”

— The New York Herald, on Whitehall, 1902

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Henry Flagler

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Henry Flagler

Co-founder of Standard Oil with Rockefeller.