Beyond Market Value chronicles Annette Campbell-White’s remarkable life, from a childhood spent in remote mining camps throughout the British Commonwealth, where books created an imaginary home; to her early adulthood in London, where she first discovered a vocation as a book collector; to Silicon Valley, where she built a pioneering career as a formidable venture capitalist. She recalls the impulsive purchase of the first book in her collection, T. S. Eliot’s A Song for Simeon, and her pursuit of rare editions of all one hundred titles listed in Cyril Connolly’s The Modern Movement. Campbell-White’s collecting and career peaked in 2005, when she acquired the last of the Connolly titles and was first named to Forbes’ Midas List, the annual ranking of the most successful dealmakers in venture capital.

In 2007, out of concern for their preservation, Campbell-White rashly sold the Connolly titles she had spent more than twenty years assembling, leading to a new appreciation of what remained of her collection and, going forward, a broader focus on collecting modernist letters, manuscripts, and ephemera. Beyond Market Value is both a loving tribute to literary collecting and a telling account of the challenges of being a woman in the male-dominated world of finance.

Long overlooked in histories of finance, women played an essential role in areas such as banking and the stock market during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Yet their presence sparked ongoing controversy. Hetty Green’s golden touch brought her millions, but she outraged critics with her rejection of domesticity. Progressives like Victoria Woodhull, meanwhile, saw financial acumen as more important for women than the vote.

George Robb’s pioneering study explores the financial methods, accomplishments, and careers of three generations of women. Plumbing sources from stock brokers’ ledgers to media coverage, Robb reveals the many ways women invested their capital while exploring their differing sources of information, approaches to finance, interactions with markets, and levels of expertise. He also rediscovers the forgotten women bankers, brokers, and speculators who blazed new trails--and sparked public outcries over women’s unsuitability for the predatory rough-and-tumble of market capitalism.

Entertaining and vivid with details, Ladies of the Ticker sheds light on the trailblazers who transformed Wall Street into a place for women’s work.