The great inventors and industrialists had many virtues in their lives and work -- rationality, productiveness, individualism, pride, ambition, self-reliance and independence, etc. They were otherwise often mixed in character, just as you see today among the successful, but were and still are smeared and attacked for their virtues.

Part of the mixture was pursuit of influence over use of government power by many of them, which was "solved" with more statism beginning in the early progressive movement of the late 19th century. A good history of the period is Andrew Hacker's The World of Andrew Carnegie: 1865-1901.

Ayn Rand's philosophy of rationally developed and integrated principles of course had not been formulated so it was impossible for anyone to operate on the "principles of Objectivism", and philosophical beliefs and the American sense of life were historically undermined by false and destructive ideas, including in the lives of the best men.

Now that it has been formulated it is in principle easier to live by a proper philosophy, but that takes more than reading Atlas Shrugged and following the (often contrary and destructive) conservative politics and slogans.

The philosophy that made Atlas Shrugged and its sense of life possible is radically different than traditional beliefs and ways of thinking, even though elements of it can be and often are appealing to those not familiar with it, and it must be read and understood through the non-fiction, recognizing that it is mostly about personal choices, character and ways of thinking. The politics is a consequence, and Ayn Rand's articles and lectures on politics always had a central philosophical element.

For the relation between sense of life and philosophy see https://campus.aynrand.org/works/1966... from Ayn Rand's The Romantic Manifesto, and watch Michael Paxton's video Ayn Rand: A Sense of Life https://estore.aynrand.org/p/292/ayn-...