Contextualizing twentieth century business life histories: The cases of Papastratos and Katsambas

Abstract

In this article the main goal is to contextualize the case of two major Greek industrialists, who both published their personal memoirs in the 1960s, written in an earlier period. Both invested in the Greek national economy and differentiated themselves from the “interlopers” of private wealth. In the mid-1960s they shared with the Greek speaking public their personal thoughts on the Greek self-made business man; Evangelos Papastratos (1884-1973) with Work and Its Toil, and Christoforos Katsambas (1893-1984) with Putting faith in the Future. They shed light in their lives, their sacrifices and labour. The term “self-made man” was used in the first decades of the 19th century American politics, while defending and praising manufacturers who deserved the nation’s honours and favours because they had acquired wealth by hard-working devotion to business. Businessmen’s lives as individuals or as groups have illuminated economic success in national and international context and have given food for thought about their perception in wider audiences. Yet the intention of a businessman’s biography to teach by example is closely related to other biographical examples