Abstract
This paper deals with a cotton manufacturing company in Manchester, New Hampshire, promoted by a group of entrepreneurs known as the “Boston Associates.”
Started as a small establishment in the 1830's, this company had grown in the space of a century to one of the largest-scale and highest quality companies in the industry. But though the mills in Manchester were firmly established, the management of the company in Boston was totally unsuited to meeting the changing situation in the early 20th century. One of the causes of the company's bankruptcy in the 1930's was attributed to mismanagement by the executives.
With an emphasis on the functions, respectively, of the company treasurer and of the local mill agent, this paper analyzes the relationship between decision-making and execution, and discusses some of the characteristics of business enterprises controlled by the so-called general entrepreneurs of 19th century America.
