Barnum's 1880 self-help classic, distilling his business rules into short, punchy chapters on subjects ranging from choice of business to the danger of co-signing notes. It covers promotion, persistence, money management, and the habits that build or destroy a fortune. The Founders podcast episode #137 draws several of its core principles — 'money is a terrible master but an excellent servant,' 'whatever you do, do it with all your might' — from this book.
This is the closest thing Barnum left to a founder's operating manual. Written late in his career, after he had gone bankrupt and rebuilt himself, The Art of Money Getting distills the principles he learned the hard way. The Founders episode draws its rule that 'money is a terrible master but an excellent servant' from this book — the idea that wealth is a tool, not a goal, and that pursuing money for its own sake is a recipe for misery.
The book's structure — short chapters, each on a single clear principle — anticipates the modern business-book format by a century. Barnum covers the importance of choosing the right business, avoiding debt, persevering through failure, and, distinctively for a 19th-century businessman, the value of making others happy as a legitimate business purpose: 'The noblest art is that of making others happy.' For founders, the book is a reminder that the fundamentals of business — hard work, honesty (selectively applied), persistence, and understanding what people want — have not changed since Barnum wrote them down in 1880.