This book's other story is the emergence of modern economic theories of financial markets. Finance was a mainstream subject of study in the business schools of U.S. universities, but until the 1960s it was treated largely descriptively. There was little or nothing in the way of sophisticated mathematical theory of financial markets. However, a distinctive academic specialty of "financial economics," which had begun to emerge in the 1950s, gathered pace in the 1960s and the 1970s. At its core were elegant mathematical models of markets.

Donald MacKenzie, An Engine, Not a Camera, loc. 33