Great-lakes-anons,
I think I've found a method to prove that the great lakes industry was financially tied to the NY Central and Michigan Central railroads, the two major lines owned by Vanderbilt.
The first thing you need to do is identify the 19th century Trust companies that formed in these cities:
Rochester,
Buffalo
Cleveland
Toledo
Detroit
Chicago
Start with the one with the largest endowment, and you need to search google books and older references on the clearnet to identify the trustees of those banks and trusts. Aim for the late 1890s or early 1900s. This will be harder the further inland you go.
Then you need to expand on a network map of these trustees. Usually you'll find one or two with connections to either New York Central Railroad or Michigan Central Railroad. You may find connections to one of the many smaller lines that were consolidated under Vanderbilt's empire.
Finally, cross reference trustees against books like this: https://books.google.com/books?id=wJFOAQAAMAAJ
Its a publication that lists out the nations millionaires in the early 1900s with a brief description on how they made it. This has proven to be invaluable in getting the lay of the land in each city.
It will give you an idea of the richest people, and most likely they will be, or their descendants will be, trustees of these banks.
This will be terribly difficult for Chicago because it's scale is much larger than the rest. Churn and burn.
The expected result is going to be a network of players in each city connected by the railroads and the Vanderbilts. Then we can start sniffing out the lawyers in each city that work with the railroad and these industry players. Where are they now? Who are their clients?
We've been working on this dig for a long time. We've been able to prove the involvement of the Vanderbilts in the formation of the Rockefeller fortune. The above for Cleveland will be rather interesting. What network of power players will we be able to dig up by networking their ancestors both by blood and by business?
I know what we will find. I've already found it. It saddens me.
Vanderbilt spread the cult through the country on the back of their railroads and steamships.
The next question becomes: Who does Vanderbilt represent?
I'm not certain it's Rothschilds. They made a big play in the Baku oil fields specifically to rival Standard Oil. That would imply that Standard Oil was not their wheelhouse. Remember, this is over 100 years ago. The I Am Rofschild ama (https://archive.md/qERv5) stated that the Roths used to work for/with the devil, now the devil works for them.
So I'm guessing that implies whomever the devil is/was back then was the controlling player of Vanderbilt and the Standard Oil empire. How did the Rothschilds get their start? How did they make their money? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Landgraviate_of_Hesse-Kassel? The holy roman empire? Euro Aristocrats used to be the top of the pyramid until the roths took over the cult? How?
These are big questions, they need big efforts to make clear.