Fetch Your Copy King Of The Lobby: The Life And Times Of Sam Ward, Man-About-Washington In The Gilded Age Engineered By Kathryn Allamong Jacob Formatted As Textbook

decades the name Sam Ward was synonymous with federal lobbying, From his first arrival in Washington in, until his departure upon a large inheritance in the lates, he pioneered the habits of the "social lobbying," facilitating fine meals with opposing parties and subtly encouraging his clients' bills.
But lobbying was only one part of Sam Ward's fascinating life, as Kathryn Jacob demonstrates in this fine biography,

Sam Ward was the first born son of a stoic banker, but he himself tended to fritter away every opportunity to advance.
He spent most of the years after his study at Columbia University spending thousands of his fathers' dollars at fine European dining establishments, but he somehow, almost in his spare time, managed to get a doctoral degree in mathematics from the University of Tubingen and pick up half a dozen languages.
When he returned home he married a granddaughter of John Jacob Aster, and, despite promises of an appointment at Harvard, took over his father's banking house.
Yet somehow he managed to lose all his fortune, as well as his wife, and ended up with the 'ers in San Francisco.
He gained a fortune in warehousing he bought the ship Niantic as a storage site and then lost it again in thecity fire.
He spent a decade shifting around the West and in Latin America before washing up in Washington,

Sam worked for clients as diverse as the Secretary of the Treasury Hugh McCulloch, Democratic powerbroker Samuel Latham Mitchell Barlow, the Transatlantic Cable Company, the Pacific Mail Steamship Company, and the government of Paraguay his first job.
Yet the truly fascinating part of the book is all of Sam's own adventures and acquaintances, His sister Julia Ward Howe wrote the Battle Hymn of the Republic, his brotherinlaws included Julia's husband Samuel Gridley Howe founder of the first institute for the blind in the country, and Thomas Crawford, designer of the statue on the US Capitol.
His closest epistolary friend was Henry Wardsworth Longfellow, He ate regularly with secretaries of state William Seward, William Evarts, and Thomas Bayard, not to mention future President James Garfield and future British Prime Minister Lord Roseberry.
There was seemingly no one in high society who didn't come into contact with Sam Ward, and leave charmed by his bon homie and intelligence.


The amazing thing about Sam is that no matter how quickly he lost his money, or how seemingly untoward his occupations, everyone loved him.
His fundamental good nature comes across here, as well as how he was able to use that nature for political ends.
Jacob gives a marvelous vision of his life and times in this wellwrought book, Great read on Sam Ward, the King of the Lobby'' who perfected and set the standard for good lobbying and advocacy in theth century.
As Emily Biggs wrote at the time, "The last time Sam War was seen he was marching across the Capitol Rotunda.
. . His round, chubby, boyish face

and duck legs bore not the slightest resemblance to the lobby, He is brother to Julia Ward Howe, the author of the Battle Hymn of the Republic, The same kind of spiritual essence that enters this poem made his dinners famous, but let no man attempt the same high art.
The solitary vase has been broken, but the odor is left and clings to it still, '' This was a surprisingly entertaining and informative read, As a professional lobbyist in the present day, I run into characters like Sam Ward and his lesser contemporaries from time to time.
These days, though, they send people to the federal pen for the methods Ward, et, al. employed to influence Congress! Despite the unsavory "transactive" politics, Ward must have been a charming and cultured individual in an age of spittoons and sawdust.
My only regret is that, barring a technological development of Newtonian proportions, I'll never be able to travel back in time to sit at his very fine table.
I reviewed this for the Weekly Standard in December: sitelink weeklystandard. com/article King of the Lobby tells the story of how one man harnessed delicious food, fine wine, and good conversation to the task of becoming the most influential lobbyist of the Gilded Age.


Sam Ward was a colorful character, Scion of an old and honorable family, best friend of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, and charming manaboutWashington, Ward held his own in an era crowded with largerthanlife personalities.
Living by the motto that the shortest route between a pending bill and a congressmans "aye" was through his stomach, Ward elegantly entertained political elites in return for their votes.


At a time when waves of scandal washed over Washington, the popular press railed against the wickedness of the lobby, and selfrighteous politicians predicted that special interests would cause the downfall of democratic government, Sam Ward still reigned supreme.
By the earlys, he had earned the title "King of the Lobby" and jokingly referred to himself as "Rex Vestiari.
" Ward cultivated a style of lobbying that survives today in the form of expensive golf outings, extravagant dinners, and luxurious vacations.


Kathryn Allamong Jacob's engaging account shows how the "king" earned his crown through cookery and conversation and how this son of wealth and privilege helped to create a questionable profession in a city that then, as now, rested on power and influence.
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