Wiktionary
n. (context idiomatic English) A prominent business person who owns or is the highest-ranking executive of one or more major firms, especially one who has considerable wealth and influence.
Wikipedia
In the late 19th century a captain of industry was a business leader whose means of amassing a personal fortune contributed positively to the country in some way.
This may have been through increased productivity, expansion of markets, providing more jobs, or acts of philanthropy. This characterization contrasts with that of the robber baron, a business leader using political means to achieve personal ends.
Some 19th-century industrialists who were called "captains of industry" overlap with those called " robber barons". These include people such as J.P. Morgan, Andrew Carnegie, Andrew W. Mellon, and John D. Rockefeller. The term was coined by Thomas Carlyle in his 1843 book, Past and Present.
The education division of the National Endowment for the Humanities has prepared a lesson plan for schools asking whether "robber baron" or "captain of industry" is the better terminology. They state:
In this lesson, you and your students will attempt to establish a distinction between robber barons and captains of industry. Students will uncover some of the less honorable deeds as well as the shrewd business moves and highly charitable acts of the great industrialists and financiers. It has been argued that only because such people were able to amass great amounts of capital could our country become the world's greatest industrial power. Some of the actions of these men, which could only happen in a period of economic laissez faire, resulted in poor conditions for workers, but in the end, may also have enabled our present day standard of living.Usage examples of "captain of industry".
Ori could not see well over the fringe of plaster drakows and obscene spirits, but he knew that the figure he saw moving in that box was a player in the militia, and that that one was one of the Fishbone Brothers, and that in that one was a captain of industry.
It dawned upon us that wherever there was a political boss paying bribes on election day, there was a captain of industry furnishing the money for the bribes, and taking some public privilege in return.
He put it down to the uneven battle between a manipulative captain of industry and a drunken bum.
His startling genius as a captain of industry is equaled only by his splendid public spirit and his magnificent generosity to everyone who needs a helping hand.
He was the captain of industry, and his opinions about the development and potential of the Plophosian economy were the only logical things that the Chairman could want from him.
Griffin Weir (Robert Duvall), into cloning humans on a massive scale, allowing him to re place his security forces and even the star quarterback of his pro football team whenever they are killed or seriously injured (which is often, leading one to ask that if Drucker is such a poor judge of muscle, how in the hell did he become such a dominant captain of industry?
You might have been a captain of industry, a merchant prince, a big league ball player, leading hitter in the American League, with an average of .
This was where he was going to stop being a pressman and start being a captain of industry.