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Samuel Insull Quotes

7 quotes from Samuel Insull — Electricity magnate who built a $3B utility empire in Chicago..

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“He awoke early, abruptly, completely, bursting with energy; yet he gained momentum as the day wore on, and long into the night. Sam had near-demonic energy.”

— Forrest McDonald, Insull's biographer

“If you price your product cheaply enough, you will greatly increase your sales, and you will begin to realise the possibilities of this business, and these possibilities may exceed your wildest dreams.”

— Samuel Insull, 1910

“It is no exaggeration to say that he was the most powerful man in Chicago. He held the world's fourth largest city in the hollow of his hand. Bankers courted his favors, politicians cowed before him.”

— Robert Talley, Vancouver Sun, October 1932

“The best service at the lowest possible price can only be obtained by exclusive control of a given territory being placed in the hands of one undertaking. The obligations of monopoly must be accepted.”

— Samuel Insull, address to the National Electric Light Association, 1910

“If you pushed Edison in money matters, he was stingy as hell, but if you left the matter to him he was generous as a prince.”

— Samuel Insull, on Edison's character

“We had to go to Europe to learn something about the principles underlying the sale of the product.”

— Samuel Insull, reflecting on the Brighton discovery

“Well, if it blows up the whole company will blow up and I'll blow up too, so I might as well stay here.”

— Samuel Insull, on the Fisk Street turbine

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Samuel Insull

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Samuel Insull

Electricity magnate who built a $3B utility empire in Chicago.