One might argue that if America actually got rid of the worst schemers on Wall Street, it would, like Batman finally cleaning up Gotham, have nothing else to do with its time.
Luckily, 150 years of American financial history tell us that day will probably never come.
Before Goldman Sachs, before Gordon Gekko, the original Wall Street boogeyman was Jay Gould.
Raised in obscurity, Gould would go on to become the top-five richest men in America thanks to a series of aggressive, probably criminal schemes.
He eventually gained a reputation so sinister that fellow Wall Street operator James Keene called him, "The worst man on earth since the beginning of the Christian era."
We wanted to tell the story of this one-time towering figure, if only to show all the vampire squids out there that they're not doing anything new.
Gould was born to a working-class farmer near New York's Catskill mountains.
The year was 1836 — a capital year to be born for someone with ambition: America's westward blitz had just begun.
Source: Life of Jay Gould
Gould got a taste for profiting off land early.
He worked for local merchants as a surveyor, then as a tanner. By age 20, he and his partner employed 250 men.
Source: Life of Jay Gould
He moved to the city as soon as he could.
At age 23 he moved to New York to become a Wall Street broker.
Source: Life of Jay Gould
See the rest of the story at Business Insider
Please follow Clusterstock on Twitter and Facebook.