Ken Lay, Meet Sam Insull

Last night's broadcast of Marketplace had an intriguing piece on Chicago tycoon Samuel Insull, whom biographer Jon Wasik (The Merchant of Power: Sam Insull, Thomas Edison, and the Creation of the Modern Metropolis) calls "probably the most influential businessman of the 20th Century that you've never heard of." Wasik draws some surprisingly sharp parallels between Insull (founder of Commonwealth Edison) and Enron's Kenneth Lay.