What, if anything, do the most spectacular, high-performance periods of the twentieth-century stock market have in common? And most importantly: Can we predict when they will occur again? In this fascinating investigation, acclaimed author and financial authority Martin S. Fridson probes the past, leading an exhilarating tour through each of the twentieth-century stock market's golden years. Illuminating, entertaining, and rich in historical anecdotes, Fridson's book treats us to the opinions and investment strategies of some of the most prominent and intriguing figures on the scene. "Timely, informative, and highly readable . . . It Was a Very Good Year offers wonderful insights into the years that provided spectacular gains in the past. There are important lessons in this book for all investors."-Henry Kaufman, President, Henry Kaufman & Company, Inc. "A useful and extremely entertaining book. It's loaded with fascinating stock market lore and helpful investment approaches. I learned a lot and thoroughly enjoyed myself along the way."-Byron R. Wien, Managing Director, Investment Strategist for U.S. Equities, Morgan Stanley Dean Witter "Financial history with a purpose-it is a Very Good Book."-James Grant, Editor, Grant's Interest Rate Observer "With this book, Marty Fridson joins the ranks of the must-read economic and financial historians. He is that rare combination of scholar, wit, raconteur, and man with an eye on the bottom line. Read it for amusement, education, or profit. You can't lose."-Ben Stein, writer, law professor at Pepperdine University and host of Win Ben Stein's Money Popular wisdom holds that, over time, the stock market outperforms any other method of investment, the key words being "over time"; folks who look to the stock market to get rich quickly are definitely playing with fire. Still, for those who like to live on the edge, Martin S. Fridson's book It Was a Very Good Year might offer some helpful hints for predicting a bumper year on Wall Street. Firstly, there are certainly patterns--most years in which stocks performed extraordinarily well began with extremely depressed stock prices--but never any guarantees. Fridson, an analyst and managing director at Merrill Lynch, illustrates this principle with plenty of anecdotes about those who struck it rich--and those who didn't. It Was a Very Good Year offers interesting and entertaining information about what makes the stock market tick but presents no ironclad system for making it big on Wall Street. Looking back over ten of the U.S. stock market's best years of the century, from 1908 to 1995, the author examines patterns while capturing the common themes he feels might explain the phenomenon of the "bull-market" years. (LJ Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc. Fridson is a managing director at Merrill Lynch and is the author of Investment Illusions: A Savvy Wall Street Pro Explodes Popular Misconceptions about the Markets (1993). Like many other analysts, he suggests that clues as to which way the stock market might be headed can be found by considering past performance, but Fridson takes an original approach. At its heart, his idea is appealingly simple. He looks at the 10 individual years since 1900 when total returns on the market topped 36 percent, and he investigates each of those years for common themes. Relying not only on economic and financial figures, Fridson includes commentary from such contemporaneous publications as Barron's and Literary Digest ; and he adds personality sketches of notable figures in and out of business who in some way may have had an impact on events that affected market performance. While finding common factors, Fridson at the same time uncovers information that contradicts several popular Wall Street myths. The result is not only investing insight but also entertaining social history. David Rouse There are times when the stock market moves up in almost a straight line, when prices rise rapidly and everyone who owns stocks makes money. But can you figure out when those times will be, so as to be ready to get rich quick? That is the question Martin S. Fridson ... one of Wall Street's most thoughtful and perceptive analysts, asked when he began It Was A Very Good Year ... -- The New York Times Book Review, Floyd Norris For the first time, a leading investment authority examines the phenomenon of how every so often a particular financial market takes off beyond anyone's expectations, providing investors with an average return of 35% or more in a single year. Designed to help readers spot similar opportunities in the future, this unique resource explores the best ten years for investing over the past two centuries. Who knows when lightning will strike? It did in 1908, and then again in 1915, 1927, and a handful of other years when the stock market soared beyond everyone's expectations, producing returns on investment that exceeded 35 and even 50 percent. Why do such spectacular