July 8, 1839 John Davison Rockefeller is born in Richford, upstate New York, to William Avery Rockefeller, a travelling peddler of novelties and "cures," and Eliza Davison Rockefeller, a devout Baptist. Under pressure from his father, John D. Rockefeller drops out of high school two months shy of commencement. He enters a professional school, where he studies double-entry bookkeeping, penmanship, banking, and commercial law. At 16, Rockefeller gets his first job, working for Hewitt & Tuttle, commission merchants and produce shippers Civil War begins and Rockefeller, like some other northern businessmen, hires substitutes to avoid fighting. The war at first disrupts industry, but ultimately it will accelerate economic development in the North, contributing to Rockefeller's meteoric ascent. Rockefeller gets involved in the oil business Rockefeller buys out his partners and founds Rockefeller & Andrew, Cleveland's largest refinery in the time being. John Rockefeller strikes a major deal with a railroad, guaranteeing a certain volume of shipments in exchange for rebates. The first of many, this deal was made with Jay Gould, owner of the Erie Railroad. The Rockefellers move to Euclid Avenue, Cleveland's "Millionaires' Row." Rockefeller founds Standard Oil of Ohio with $1 million in capital, the largest corporation in the country. The new company controls 10% of U.S. petroleum refining. At 38, Rockefeller -- still relatively unknown to the public -- controls almost 90% of the oil refined in the United States. Rockefeller is numbered among the country's twenty richest men. Standard Oil moves into new headquarters at 26 Broadway in New York. The address will become synonymous with Rockefeller's business empire.Standard Oil expands into the overseas markets of Western Europe and Asia, selling more oil abroad than in the U.S. The American dream is to be able to be poor and end up rich.