OUTRAGEOUS FORTUNES: The Story of the Medici, the Rothschilds, and J. Pierpont Morgan

Brass farthings. Set into some loosely connected generalities on the history of banking (e.g., ""The lending of money goes back to the Phoenicians"") are 20-or-so pages each on the Medici, the Rothschilds, and J. P. Morgan. The section on the Medici broadly summarizes the family's political history; that on the Rothschilds recaps family history with the aid of anecdotes; that on Morgan strings together episodes and anecdotes. The result is mostly platitudes in the first case, somewhat more ""color"" in the last. The information is everywhere negligible--oversimplified or overstated, or both: ""Without the two Morgans, European investment in American railroads and industry would have been insignificant and the great post-Civil War development could not have occurred."" Best forgotten.