Rise and Fall of a Frontier Entrepreneur

The story of Benjamin Rathbun's ruin reads like a primer for

the scandals and studied neglect that triggered America's

economic crisis today. Banker, builder and architect, a revered

citizen of the flourishing American northwestern frontier--in

the end he was also a convicted forger. And his forgeries were

of such gravity that they added momentum to the Panic of

1837, the rapid collapse of a system of credit and debt that

brought down the young nation's financial system.

Rathbun was surely a rascal, but a rascal somehow of

great decency. In Buffalo, a half-built landscape was strewn

with Rathbun's broken vision. Concerned for the thousands

who had depended upon him, he begged for release from

jail long enough to fix the damage. Instead, he spent five

years in prison shouldering the blame for others who fled to

Texas, beyond the reach of American law.