The Quest for Wealth: A Study of Acquisitive Man.

HEILBRONER, Robert L.

Item Number: 138530

New York: Simon and Schuster, 1956.

First edition of this classic study on the nature of the universal drive for acquisition by the author of The Worldly Philosophers. Octavo, original cloth, top edge dyed blue. Presentation copy, inscribed by the author on the front free endpaper, “To my favorite professor Bob Heilbroner 3/13/59.” From the Presidential library of John F. Kennedy with his National Archives of the United States John F. Kennedy Library bookplate to the pastedown. During a weekend visit to Boston on October 19, 1963, President Kennedy, along with John Carl Warnecke—the architect who would design the President’s tomb in Arlington—viewed several locations offered by Harvard as a site for the library and museum. At the time there were only four other Presidential Libraries: the Hoover Presidential Library, the Franklin D. Roosevelt Library, the Truman Library, and the Dwight D. Eisenhower Library. Kennedy chose a plot of land next to the Harvard Graduate School of Business Administration. The building would face the Charles River which was a few feet away, and on the other side of which, the dormitories that included Winthrop House where Kennedy spent his upperclassman days. After President Kennedy was assassinated in November 1963, his family and friends discussed how to construct a library that would serve as a fitting memorial. A committee was formed to advise Kennedy’s widow Jacqueline, who would make the final decision. On December 13, 1964, the Kennedy family announced that I. M. Pei was unanimously chosen by a subcommittee as the architect of the library. Even though Pei was relatively unknown amongst the list of candidates, Mrs. Kennedy, who viewed him as filled with promise and imagination and after spending several months inspecting the many architects’ offices and creations, selected him to create the vision she held for the project. The library and Museum were dedicated in 1979 by President Jimmy Carter and members of the Kennedy family and houses Kennedy’s personal library, original papers and correspondence of the Kennedy Administration, as well as special bodies of published and unpublished materials, such as books and papers by and about Ernest Hemingway. Near fine in a very good dust jacket. Author photograph by Fabian Bachrach.

In The Quest For Wealth, Robert L. Heilbroner explores the origin and nature of the universal drive for acquisition, its manifestation throughout history, and its peculiar role in our modern money-oriented society.