Professor Livesay describes the prevailing marketing patterns in the various branches of the iron manufacturing industry in the United States before the Civil War. Iron products, like most antebellum manufactured goods, were distributed by independent merchants who played a dominant role in many aspects of economic life. The coming of integrated rail mills, however, foreshadowed the merchants' eventual decline later in the nineteenth century.

Edward L. Bernays was a pioneer in the development of public relations in modern America. For more than half a century he has advised a wide range of institutions, including government, corporations, trade associations, and many private organizations. In this memoir he gives his views of the proper role, methods, and principles of public relations and recalls some of his early experiences with businessmen and other clients.

An examination of interlocking directorates in major American businesses since 1896 indicates that the incidence of interlocking has declined considerably in this century.

Mr. Jeremy traces since the Middle Ages the interaction of technology and business organization in shaping the measuring systems for yarn in the British and later the American textile industries. Despite the attendant confusion and difficulties, a remarkable motley of such systems arose and has persisted.