Indeed, "do-it-yourself" is in our culture's very DNA. In the 1930s, HowtoWinFriendsandInfluencePeople became the manual for success in the business world.
The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin and hotelier Orison Swett Marden's Success magazine (founded in 1897) were mere warm-ups to Dale Carnegie's HowtoWinFriendsandInfluencePeople (1936) and Norman Vincent Peale's The Power of Positive Thinking (1952).