The Rod of Empire: Alcoa in the American South and Caribbean
Jordan Howell, University of Manitoba
In the first half of the twentieth century, the Aluminum Company of America (Alcoa) became the world’s largest producer of aluminum. The company’s growth depended not just on industrial innovation, but on investment in mines and mining towns in Arkansas and the British and Dutch Caribbean. While Alcoa has been studied as an early American “multinational,” the company was forged in a world of empires, not nations. A focus on empire helps us to better understand Alcoa’s ascent. But more than that, it helps us to see the history of American industrial capitalism in a global frame.
Respondent: Stefan Link, Dartmouth College
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