Were frontier land investments during the nineteenth century as unprofitable as most scholars have surmised? The history of one of the most significant land-investment firms serves as a useful case study in suggesting an answer.

How well did the American business traditions of domestic “self-regulation” and foreign “dollar diplomacy” fit the economic and diplomatic environment of the Eisenhower era? Professor DiBacco suggests that the issue of foreign aid — in particular, economic assistance — provided an opportunity for articulately testing old and new business creeds.

Using data from nineteenth-century New England, Dr. Siegenthaler isolates a value for the most important function which drygoods marketing agencies performed for the mills they represented. His conclusions cast new light on the key role played by fashion considerations in decision making within the textile industry.

The interplay between national economic policy and private business policy in Latin America is a constant historical theme. The case of foreign-owned railroads in Argentina illustrates the road to nationalization between 1854 and 1948.

To facilitate research in business history among scholars throughout the world, the Review presents the fourth in its current series of reports by our International Correspondents. It is our hope that comparative studies of common problems and the exchange of data and ideas will continue to follow.

A manuscript letter of prime significance in maritime history has recently come into the possession of The Marine Historical Association, Mystic, Connecticut. Contained in the letter copybook of Jeremiah Thompson, who took the prime initiative in developing the Black Ball Line of sailing packets and of bringing southern cotton up the coast to New York to provide eastbound cargoes for them, is a letter pertaining to the inauguration of the first line of regularly scheduled sailing packets. In this particular letter, reproduced below, Thompson and his three Quaker associates outline in detail to the two firms who, they hoped, would handle the Liverpool end of the shuttle, their plans for their project which would have the all-important effect of introducing the principle of “line” or “berth” service, with ships sailing on regular schedule between two ports.