I first learned of the connection between Andrew Carnegie and Henry Clay Frick in The Johnstown Flood (synopsis: dam on artificial lake for the pleasure of the likes of Carnegie and Frick fails and the ensuing flood kills thousands, but no one is held accountable). Meet You in Hell mentions the flood only in passing, but focuses much of its attention on a disaster of another sort, the Homestead strike of 1896, which was crushed by Frick.
In building to the climax, author Les Standiford details the complex rivalry and partnership between the two men. Frick was a coke magnet, coke being one of the key ingredients in the making of steel. In a bid to control coke supplies, and in conjunction with a much broader deal, Carnegie turned over the day-to-day management of his companies to Frick, who devised the strategy that crushed the unions. In the midst of ensuing bad press, Carnegie essentially disavowed any knowledge of Frick's plans setting the stage for a bitter feud that would last until their dying days. (The title is taken from Frick's response to Carnegie's near-deathbed request to meet. His response was that he'd meet him in hell, where they were both going, in Frick's estimation.) Certainly the decadence of the gilded age is on display here.
I previously enjoyed Standiford's Last Train to Paradise about another titan of industry and found Meet You in Hell to be a similar work. I hadn't heard of the Homestead strike, but couldn't help but think of the similarities between the battles between the steel workers and Frick and those between the miners and mine owners depicted in The Devil is Here in These Hills.
Four stars.
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