All who complete graduate work in the study of history and aspire to write published works know the expectation that the author exhaust the sources of the topic. Professor Mike Nagle is tireless in his quest for knowing and exemplifies this ultimate standard. It is surprising that no other historian has been aware of and motivated to write a biography of Eber Brock Ward, a major manufacturing leader in Michigan’s history. Mike Nagle is adept at telling this intriguing and revealing story of an interesting character.
~William M. Anderson, Former Director, Michigan Department of History, Arts & Libraries
No stone appears to have been left unturned in this remarkably detailed study and analysis of the industrialist’s career.
~David J. Mrozek
In writing this biography, Michael Nagle leveraged the ambitious life of industrialist Eber Brock Ward to craft a comprehensive bridge between antebellum America and the roots of the Gilded Age. Nagle weaves the compelling threads of E. B. Ward’s story together for the first time in this finely researched Great Lakes saga.
~Joel Stone
Michael Nagle graces us with an illuminating biography of Eber Brock Ward, a business titan of Michigan’s nineteenth century. Nagle brings complexity and nuance to the life of this influential and, some would say, nefarious public figure who lived an equally intriguing private life.
~Alan Gallay
One would think that these outlandish tales would make Eber Brock Ward and his role in pushing Michigan from an extractive economy into the Industrial Age unforgettable. But that's not how it went. Author Michael W. Nagle shows how Ward fell into oblivion despite scandals and exploits that would make him Twitter-famous today. One bizarre tale follows another as he hops from shipping to mining to manufacturing to becoming Michigan's richest man. As this bad-boy Horatio Alger raised his personal fortune, he also raised eyebrows and hackles. Ward may not have been remembered, but people who read Nagle's book will never forget him.
~Joe Grimm, Author of the Faygo Book (Wayne State University Press, 2008) and Coauthor of Coney Detroit (Wayne State University Press, 2012)
This is a book that Great Lakes history has long needed. Eber Brock Ward was a major figure in the development of the Midwest region and a pioneer in the fields of transportation and industry. Michael Nagle's finely researched and written book plugs a large gap in the history of the inland seas.
~Theodore J. Karamanski, Professor of History, Loyola University Chicago, and Author of Mastering the Inland Seas: How Lighthouses, Navigational Aids, and Harbors Transformed the Great Lakes and America
Eber Brock Ward may be the Forgotten Iron King, but in the history of Great Lakes shipping his name certainly had not been forgotten, and will be even more prominent in the studies that build on Nagle's work.
~Walter Lewis
This book is a significant addition to the literature of this era. ... Nagle's biography portrays a complex, not always likeable individual, ahead of the curve, and worthy of remembrance for his success and his faults.
~Matthew Lawrence Daley
