Wall Street: A History

Wall Street: A History. By Charles R. Geisst New York: Oxford University Press, 1997. 404 pp. Endnotes, bibliography, index, and illustrations. $30.00. ISBN 0195115120.

This book is primarily aimed at the commercial trade market, and does not merit an extensive review in the scholarly journals. So I will be sensibly brief. Charles Geisst, a professor of finance at Manhattan College, surveys the Wall Street scene from its origins in the late eighteenth century through the 1990s. Given the scope of the project, superficiality was inevitable. Presumably in order to attract the widest possible audience, the author tends to focus on the scandals associated with colorful and allegedly …