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The Financier Himself: Dreiser and C. T. Yerkes
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 01 December 2020
Abstract
In his Trilogy of Desire, Theodore Dreiser presented a virtual biography of the model (Charles T. Yerkes, Jr.) for his central character (Frank A. Cowperwood). Dreiser's connection with Yerkes dated from the 1880's in Chicago, continued through the 1890's when both men moved to New York, and extended past 1905, when Yerkes died, and 1910, when The Financier was begun. Yerkes, a man of many facets, was selected by Dreiser as model for the generic millionaire principally because the dissolution of his estate after 1905 demonstrated Dreiser's theory of the natural “Equation Inevitable” in action. The events portrayed in The Financier, The Titan, and The Stoic followed verbatim the events of Yerkes' life as established in Dreiser's working notes and verified by newspapers, periodicals, and books of the era. In this central fictional figure also is found a clear, though submerged, portrait of Dreiser's own hopes and desires.
- Type
- Research Article
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- Copyright
- Copyright © Modern Language Association of America, 1973
References
A Documentary Note: The story of Charles Tyson Yerkes, Jr., is well preserved in newspaper and periodical files dating from his era, and these have been drawn on whenever pertinent. By far the most relevant and accessible source is the Dreiser Collection at Charles Patterson Van Pelt Library, University of Pennsylvania, where Mrs. Neda Westlake has supervised the sorting and cataloging of the extensive Dreiser papers in order to render them usable by scholars. Chief among these are notes on 8 1/2“× 11” sheets, sealed in plastic for preservation, boxed, and numbered sequentially. Totaling something in excess of 2,000, these notes are known at least informally as “The Financier Chronology”; they form an indispensable basis for establishing Dreiser's connection with and use of the Yerkes story as model for his Trilogy of Desire. They are composed chiefly of:
Factual data, largely taken in Dreiser's own hand, regarding the lives and times of Charles Yerkes and those associated with him; for the most part, these notes are readily verifiable in newspaper accounts, city directories, various biographical dictionaries of the 1890 era, etc.
Original newspaper clippings dating from the 1890's to 1913, clipped and mounted.
(3) The author's handwritten commentaries, revealing his attitudes toward the data collected, his characters-tobe, and incidents of plot which suggested themselves as he did his preliminary work on the Trilogy. For present purposes, references to notes in the Chronology will be headed Dreiser manuscript notes, followed by the numbers assigned to them and/or identifying dates. In each case of reference, specific description of the Dreiser note/clipping has been provided. Dates so given refer not to the composition of the notes themselves but rather to historical placement of events recorded therein.
1 Theodore Dreiser, A Book About Myself (New York: Boni and Liveright, 1922), p. 264.
2 Dreiser MS notes, Charles Patterson Van Pelt Library, n. 522, dated 1889. This note is in Dreiser's hand, apparently taken from a contemporary newspaper account of the building of his mausoleum in Greenwood Cemetery.
3 Dreiser MS notes, n. 658; also the New York Times, issues between 6 and 21 April 1910.
4 Dreiser's original intention was to tell Yerkes' story in a single long volume, a plan altered in May 1912, after he realized that his manuscript was exceeding considerably its predicted length. See Dreiser's letter to Grant Richards, 26 May 1912, Letters of Theodore Dreiser (Philadelphia: Univ. of Pennsylvania Press, 1959), p. 143.
5 “Equation Inevitable,” Hey Rub-A-Dub-Dub (New York: Boni and Liveright, 1920), pp. 157–81.
6 “Equation Inevitable,” pp. 162, 178.
7 “Commercial Machiavellianism,” McClure's Magazine, March 1905, p. 462.
8 This anecdote is repeated variously in reviews of Yerkes' life, including Wayne Andrews' Battle for Chicago (New York: Harcourt, 1946), p. 176.
9 Chicago Daily Tribune, 30 Dec. 1905, pp. 1–2. 10 “What Availeth It?” Everybody's, 24 (June 1911), 839.
11 Dreiser MS notes, n. dated 16 Dec. 1898, and headed, in Dreiser's hand, “Charles T. Yerkes appears before Sunset Club to argue for a 50 year franchise.” The note consists of a newspaper report clipped and mounted, dateline Chicago.
12 Dreiser MS notes, nn. 503, 552, 842. These, among others, contain Dreiser's reaction to the press attacks on Yerkes. N. 552, e.g., in Dreiser's hand and dated 22 Jan. 1891, contains the notation: “Newspapers hostile. There is no good reason for hostility at this time.” N. 842, in Dreiser's hand and dated 31 May 1894: “Imagine the people of Chicago sitting as a jury on this man. What would they do?”
13 Dreiser MS notes, n. dated 8 Dec. 1898; the note is in Dreiser's hand and is headed “Editorial in Inter-Ocean.” The Arbeiter Zeitung and The Alarm, edited respectively by August Spies and Albert Parsons, were radical, pro-labor newspapers associated with the anarchist movement; Spies and Parsons were hanged for their participation in the 1886 Haymarket Riot. Thus, despite his charges against the Tribune, et al., Yerkes was not above loading his own guns with emotionally charged ammunition of highly explosive potential.
14 Ray Ginger, Altgeld's America (New York : Funk, 1958), p. 109.
15 The Chicago Daily Tribune, 21 March 1890, p. 3; also Dreiser, A Book About Myself, p. 264.
16 “Captains of Industry,” Cosmopolitan, Aug. 1902, p. 416.
17 Giants Gone (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1943), pp. 237, 242. Accounts of the color of Yerkes' eyes vary widely. Although Dreiser generally avoids mention of color, concentrating upon intensity and inscrutability of gaze, Cow-perwood's eyes are gray (see The Financier, New York: Harper, 1912, p. 247).
18 Dreiser MS notes, n. dated 21 April 1903; the note is in Dreiser's hand.
19 N. 436; the note is in Dreiser's hand.
20 N. 100 and dated 1 Oct. 1871. Dreiser's first impulse, toward the chess figure, was probably the more accurate of the two, retaining Yerkes' attitude of play—the approach to life as an intense game rather than a slaughter. In print, Dreiser generally selects Darwinian figures, such as that of the spider, or that of the wolf (Financier, p. 770).
21 N. 878 dated 9 June 1897; the note is in Dreiser's hand and is taken, in part, from the Chicago Tribune.
22 Nn. 842, 718, 503, 637, 513; the notes are in Dreiser's hand, are dated between 1886 and 1895, and are taken, in part, from the Chicago Tribune and other newspapers.
23 N. 453 dated 29 Nov. 1903; the note consists of a newspaper interview with Yerkes, clipped and mounted. The date is in Dreiser's hand, as well as the marginal note: “good interview.”
24 N. 519; the note is dated 3 Dec. 1886, and consists of a newspaper clipping datelined Chicago.
25 Nn. 636, dated 17 April 1896, and 719, dated 26 Feb. 1903. The notes are in Dreiser's hand.
26 N. 453 dated 29 Nov. 1903; the note consists of a newspaper interview headed: “American Capital Favors Britain, Says Mr. Yerkes.”
27 N. 723 dated 31 Dec. 1899; the note is in Dreiser's hand.
28 N. 491 dated 28 Oct. 1905; the note is in Dreiser's hand.
29 Josiah Granville Leach, Chronicle of the Yerkes Family (Philadelphia: Lippincott, 1904), pp. 120, 191, 192, 194: Dreiser MS notes, nn. 47, 89; The Financier, pp. 1, 2, 4, 41, 52, 67, 101, 108, 154, 202. Among the small number of otherwise unaccountable departures from fact is the change of the Cowperwood family's religious affiliation from Quaker to Episcopalian, most easily explained as an attempt by Dreiser to avoid trespassing upon the Quaker materials he had in mind for The Bulwark.
30 Dreiser, Hey Rub-A-Dub-Dub, p. 74. This essay, “The American Financier,” along with “Equation Inevitable” from the same book, are central to an understanding of the Trilogy.
31 The Financier, p. 69.
32 Dreiser MS notes, n. dated March 1901 ; the note is in Dreiser's hand.