He intended only to send it to his father, James A. Inspired, Hamilton picked up a pen and wrote of the hurricane's disastrous effects. Croix earlier that year and had taken the young man under his wing. As Ron Chernow writes in the biography Alexander Hamilton, the 17-year-old had just attended a sermon by Hugh Knox, a Presbyterian minister who had arrived in St. It was a week after the hurricane when the future secretary of the Treasury, who was working as a clerk on St.

The resulting letter would inspire the residents of the island where Hamilton lived to pool their money for a scholarship to send him to the future United States of America … and into the history books. Professor Sylla and co-author center Hamilton's writings on finance among his most important accomplishments, making his brilliance as an economic policy maker accessible to all interested in this Founding Father's legacy.In August 1772, a hurricane ravaged the West Indies-and a young Alexander Hamilton picked up a pen to write about it. Hamilton practiced what he preached: he played a key role in the founding of three banks and a manufacturing corporation, and his deft political maneuvering and economic savvy saved the fledgling republic's economy during the country's first full-blown financial crisis in 1792. His great state papers on public credit, the national bank, the mint, and manufactures instructed reform of the nation’s finances and jump-started economic growth. The book showcases Hamilton’s thoughts on the nation's founding, the need for a strong central government, confronting problems such as a depreciating paper currency and weak public credit, and the architecture of the financial system. The authors provide commentary that demonstrates the impact Hamilton had on the modern economic system, guiding readers through Hamilton's distinguished career.

“Alexander Hamilton on Finance, Credit, and Debt” by Professor Richard Sylla and co-author traces the development of Hamilton's financial thinking, policies, and actions through a selection of his writings. financial modernization has not been fully recognized as one of his greatest achievements. Yet despite a recent surge of interest in Hamilton, U.S. Hamilton established the Treasury debt market, the dollar, and a central bank, while strategically prompting private entrepreneurs to establish securities markets and stock exchanges and encouraging state governments to charter a number of commercial banks and other business corporations. While serving as the first Treasury Secretary from 1789 to 1795, Alexander Hamilton engineered a financial revolution.

Writings by alexander hamilton