Was The Greatest Self-Help Book Written by a Con Artist?

An Honest Take on Napoleon Hill and the Book that Defined a Genre

I only heard two books be recommended to me over and over again that I never got around to: How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie & Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill.

When I found that the entire book was on YouTube as an audiobook, I started listening to Think and Grow Rich at work.

And there was a lot of truth in it that I’ve heard over and over and that I know is legitimate!

There was a lot of great info in there!

But sometimes I like to research the authors to see their upbringing and I found some odd accusations about Napoleon Hill.

However, we live in a time where accusations are sadly abundant, so I didn’t think too much about it.

Then, I started learning more.

And I wanted to talk about the truth about Napoleon Hill and whether or not Think and Grow Rich is just a pile of self-improvement garbage.

If it Quacks Like a Duck, It’s a Duck

This is a quote my grandfather, a therapist, said to a husband. Puzzled and a little defensive, the husband demanded that my grandfather explain himself.

To paraphrase, my grandfather said:

“What I’m saying is, it sounds like you’re having an affair.”

The husband was appalled that he would even say that, and he stormed out of the room.

We later found out he got caught a few months after the accusation.

Napoleon Hill had a lot of experience in the lumber industry and he claimed that that’s where he got to implement a lot of his practices that made him wealthy.

Not saying that lumber’s bad for money.

In fact, with the kinds of dangers that come with it, I would assume that they’re pretty well-covered.

But the more I read about what he was claiming to be the way to go, the more I thought:

This sounds like something the business consultant I worked with at a furniture store would say or do.

To give you some context, that business consultant turned out to be a convicted felon who was embezzling money the entire time he was working at the store.

Not looking good for Nappy Hill.

Come to find out, at the lumber company he was accused of multiple cases of fraud and was later caught laundering money from a charity for veterans.

My Friend Andrew

This one turned me into a full-on conspiracy theorist about this.

Throughout the book, Hill talks about his friendship and relationship with Andrew Carnegie. One of the most powerful people in the history of America.

And there’s nothing wrong with that. It actually reminded me of the way Russell Brunson advertises his connection to Tony Robbins or Daymond John.

Hill claims to have helped Carnegie and learned successful tips and tricks from him that they both revolutionized and grew over time.

There’s just one teensy tiny problem.

There is no proof that Napoleon Hill and Andrew Carnegie ever met.

That’s backed by an author who wrote Carnegie’s biography, David Nasaw.

The most damming accusation against this is the fact that he said he met Carnegie in 1908 to create all these blueprints and plans for success. But Hill was on the run after legal issues against his then-wife that year and Hill’s earliest mention of his relationship with Carnegie was documented to be 1920.

Not a big issue.

Until you realize that Andrew Carnegie died in 1919.

The only man who could fully prove that statement.

So let’s play devil’s advocate:

Maybe it’s a one-off thing.

Sure. And then you find out that he had similar stories about President Woodrow Wilson.

And when questioned about it, the White House was also scratching their heads because there was no proof that they ever met.

Matt Novak & The Foundation

I’m going to link to his article because he goes much deeper into this than I ever can, but Matt Novak was the man who proved to me that this was much more than some trolls trying to soil Hill’s name on Wikipedia.

He also got a hint that something was off so he started asking questions to the Napoleon Hill Foundation.

The group whose sole purpose is to keep Hill’s legacy and extend the reach of his teachings.

But the more Novak asked about certain things, the more the CEO Don Green would deflect and talk about all the wonderful things about the foundation.

Novak continued to badger him until finally, Green invited Novak to where Napoleon Hill was born to give him a tour and information from the archives.

All for $5,000.

An odd practice from someone with accusations of a scammer and one of the first people to use and abuse what we now call “Multi-Level Marketing”.

So… Should You Read It?

This is the tough part.

Because Think and Grow Rich does have good, insightful, and backed information on success and prosperity.

Even though, from what it seems like, it’s written by one of the most unreliable types of people.

To give you some perspective, I read the book, put it down halfway through, and have no intention of finishing it because I got all the info I needed.

Ultimately, if you are also on the fence about reading Think and Grow Rich I would say you do these things:

• Figure out the names of the chapters
• Find other books that are about the chapter topics
• Double check the sources before you read them ;)

Hopefully, How to Win Friends and Influence People will be a little more credible.

Thanks for reading! If you liked this, subscribe for more streams of consciousness or check out some of my other articles below!