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The Project Gutenberg EBook of Captains of Industry, by James Parton

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Title: Captains of Industry

or, Men of Business Who Did Something Besides Making Money

Author: James Parton

Release Date: January 4, 2007 [EBook

#20064]

[This file was first posted on December 9, 2006]

Language: English

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CAPTAINS OF INDUSTRY

OR

MEN OF BUSINESS

WHO DID

SOMETHING BESIDES MAKING

MONEY

A BOOK FOR YOUNG

AMERICANS

BY

JAMES PARTON

FIFTH THOUSAND

BOSTON HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND

COMPANY New York: 11 East Seventeenth Street

The Riverside Press, Cambridge

1890

Copyright, 1884,

By JAMES PARTON.

All rights reserved.

The Riverside Press, Cambridge, Mass., U S.

A.

Electrotyped and Printed by H O Houghton

& Company.

In this volume are presented examples ofmen who shed lustre upon ordinarypursuits, either by the superior manner inwhich they exercised them or by the nobleuse they made of the leisure which success

in them usually gives Such men are thenobility of republics The Americanpeople were fortunate in having at anearly period an ideal man of this kind inBenjamin Franklin, who, at the age offorty-two, just mid-way in his life,deliberately relinquished the mostprofitable business of its kind in thecolonies for the sole purpose ofdeveloping electrical science In this, as

in other respects, his example has hadgreat influence with his countrymen.

A distinguished author, who lived someyears at Newport, has expressed theopinion that the men who occupy the villas

of that emerald isle exert very little powercompared with that of an orator or awriter To be, he adds, at the head of anormal school, or to be a professor in acollege, is to have a sway over thedestinies of America which reduces tonothingness the power of successful men

of business

Being myself a member of the fraternity ofwriters, I suppose I ought to yield a joyfulassent to such remarks It is flattering tothe self-love of those who drive alongBellevue Avenue in a shabby hired

vehicle to be told that they are personages

of much more consequence than the heavycapitalist who swings by in a resplendentcurricle, drawn by two matched andmatchless steeds, in a six-hundred dollarharness Perhaps they are But I adviseyoung men who aspire to serve theirgeneration effectively not to undervaluethe importance of the gentleman in thecurricle

One of the individuals who has figuredlately in the society of Newport is theproprietor of an important newspaper He

is not a writer, nor a teacher in a normalschool, but he wields a considerablepower in this country Fifty men write forthe journal which he conducts, some ofwhom write to admiration, for they are

animated by a humane and patriotic spirit.The late lamented Ivory Chamberlain was

a writer whose leading editorials were ofnational value But, mark: a telegram often words from that young man atNewport, written with perspiring hand in

a pause of the game of polo, determineswithout appeal the course of the paper inany crisis of business or politics

I do not complain of this arrangement ofthings I think it is just; I know it isunalterable

It is then of the greatest possibleimportance that the men who controlduring their lifetime, and createendowments when they are dead, shouldshare the best civilization of their age andcountry It is also of the greatest

importance that young men whom naturehas fitted to be leaders should, at thebeginning of life, take to the steep andthorny path which leads at length tomastership.

Most of these chapters were publishedoriginally in "The Ledger" of New York,and a few of them in "The Youths'Companion" of Boston, the largest twocirculations in the country I haveoccasionally had reason to think that theywere of some service to young readers,and I may add that they represent morelabor and research than would benaturally supposed from their brevity.Perhaps in this new form they may reachand influence the minds of future leaders

in the great and growing realm of

business I should pity any young man whocould read the briefest account of whathas been done in manufacturing towns bysuch men as John Smedley and RobertOwen without forming a secret resolve to

do something similar if ever he shouldwin the opportunity

TABLE OF CONTENTS.

James Gordon

Bennett, and how he

founded his "Herald" 264Three John Walters,

and their Newspaper 275

Sir Christopher Wren 363

Sir John Rennie,

Engineer 372

Sir Moses Montefiore 379

Marquis of Worcester,Inventor of the Steam-Engine 385

An Old Dry-Goods

Merchant's

Recollections 392

COOPER 313

SIR

ROWLAND

CAPTAINS OF INDUSTRY.

It is not always a foolish thing to go outinto the world far beyond the parent nest,

as the young birds do in midsummer But Ican tell you, boys, from actual inquiry, that

a great number of the most important andfamous business men of the United Statesstruck down roots where they were firstplanted, and where no one supposed therewas room or chance for any large thing togrow.

I will tell you a story of one of these men,

as I heard it from his own lips some timeago, in a beautiful village where Ilectured

He was an old man then; and a curiousthing about him was that, although he wastoo deaf to hear one word of a publicaddress, even of the loudest speaker, henot only attended church every Sunday, butwas rarely absent when a lecture wasdelivered

While I was performing on that occasion, Isaw him sitting just in front of theplatform, sleeping the sleep of the just tillthe last word was uttered.

Upon being introduced to this oldgentleman in his office, and learning thathis business was to make hammers, I was

at a loss for a subject of conversation, as

it never occurred to me that there wasanything to be said about hammers

I have generally possessed a hammer, andfrequently inflicted damage on my fingerstherewith, but I had supposed that ahammer was simply a hammer, and thathammers were very much alike At last Isaid,—

"And here you make hammers for

"No, I can't," was his reply "I can't make

a pretty good hammer I make the besthammer that's made."

That was strong language I thought, atfirst, he meant it as a joke; but I soonfound it was no joke at all

He had made hammers the study of his

lifetime, and, after many years ofthoughtful and laborious experiment, hehad actually produced an article, to which,with all his knowledge and experience, hecould suggest no improvement.

I was astonished to discover how manypoints there are about an instrument which

I had always supposed a very simplething I was surprised to learn in howmany ways a hammer can be bad

But, first, let me tell you how he came tothink of hammers

There he was, forty years ago, in a smallvillage of the State of New York; norailroad yet, and even the Erie Canal manymiles distant He was the villageblacksmith, his establishment consisting of

himself and a boy to blow the bellows.

He was a good deal troubled with hishammers Sometimes the heads would flyoff If the metal was too soft, the hammerwould spread out and wear away; if itwas too hard, it would split

At that time blacksmiths made their ownhammers, and he knew very little aboutmixing ores so as to produce the toughestiron But he was particularly troubledwith the hammer getting off the handle, amishap which could be dangerous as well

as inconvenient

At this point of his narrative the oldgentleman showed a number of oldhammers, such as were in use before hebegan to improve the instrument; and it

was plain that men had tried very hardbefore him to overcome this difficulty.One hammer had an iron rod running downthrough the handle with a nut screwed on

at the end Another was wholly composed

of iron, the head and handle being all ofone piece There were various otherdevices, some of which were exceedinglyclumsy and awkward

At last, he hit upon an improvement whichled to his being able to put a hammer upon

a handle in such a way that it would staythere He made what is called an adze-handled hammer, the head being attached

to the handle after the manner of an adze.The improvement consists in merely

making a longer hole for the handle to go

into, by which device it has a much firmerhold of the head, and can easily be madeextremely tight.

With this improvement, if the handle iswell seasoned and well wedged, there is

no danger of the head flying off He madesome other changes, all of them merely forhis own convenience, without a thought ofgoing into the manufacture of hammers.The neighborhood in which he livedwould have scarcely required half a dozennew hammers per annum But one daythere came to the village six carpenters towork upon a new church, and one of thesemen, having left his hammer at home,came to David Maydole's blacksmith'sshop to get one made

"Make me as good a hammer," said thecarpenter, "as you know how."

That was touching David upon a tenderplace

"As good a one as I know how?" said he

"But perhaps you don't want to pay for asgood a one as I know how to make."

"Yes, I do," replied the man; "I want agood hammer."

The blacksmith made him one of his best

It was probably the best hammer that hadever been made in the world, since itcontained two or three importantimprovements never before combined inthe instrument

The carpenter was delighted with it, and

showed it, with a good deal of exultation,

to his five companions; every man ofwhom came the next day to the shop andwanted one just like it They did notunderstand all the blacksmith's notionsabout tempering and mixing the metals, butthey saw at a glance that the head and thehandle were so united that there never waslikely to be any divorce between them

To a carpenter building a wooden house,the mere removal of that one defect was aboon beyond price; he could hammeraway with confidence, and without fear ofseeing the head of his hammer leap intothe next field, unless stopped by acomrade's head

When all the six carpenters had beensupplied with these improved hammers,

the contractor came and ordered twomore He seemed to think, and, in fact,said as much, that the blacksmith ought to

make his hammers a little better than those

he had made for the men

"I can't make any better ones," said honestDavid "When I make a thing, I make it aswell as I can, no matter who it's for."Soon after, the store-keeper of the village,seeing what excellent hammers thesewere, gave the blacksmith a magnificentorder for two dozen, which, in due time,were placed upon his counter for sale

At this time something happened to DavidMaydole which may fairly be called goodluck; and you will generally notice events

of the kind in the lives of meritorious men

"Fortune favors the brave," is an oldsaying, and good luck in business is veryapt to befall the man who could do verywell without it.

It so happened that a New York dealer intools, named Wood, whose store is stillkept in Chatham Street, New York,happened to be in the village gettingorders for tools As soon as his eye fellupon those hammers, he saw their merits,and bought them all He did more He left

a standing order for as many hammers ofthat kind as David Maydole could make.That was the beginning The youngblacksmith hired a man or two, then moremen, and made more hammers, and kept

on making hammers during the whole ofhis active life, employing at last a hundred

and fifteen men.

During the first twenty years, he wasfrequently experimenting with a view toimprove the hammer He discovered justthe best combination of ores to make hishammers hard enough, without being toohard

He gradually found out precisely the bestform of every part There is not a turn orcurve about either the handle or the headwhich has not been patiently considered,and reconsidered, and considered again,until no further improvement seemedpossible Every handle is seasoned threeyears, or until there is no shrink left in it.Perhaps the most important discoverywhich he made was that a perfect tool

cannot be made by machinery.

Naturally, his first thought, when he foundhis business increasing, was to applymachinery to the manufacture, and forsome years several parts of the processwere thus performed Gradually, hismachines were discarded, and for manyyears before his retirement, every portion

of the work was done by hand

Each hammer is hammered out from apiece of iron, and is tempered over a slowcharcoal fire, under the inspection of anexperienced man He looks as though hewere cooking his hammers on a charcoalfurnace, and he watches them until theprocess is complete, as a cook watchesmutton chops

I heard some curious things about themanagement of this business The foundernever did anything to "push" it He neveradvertised He never reduced the price ofhis hammers because other manufacturerswere doing so.

His only care, he said, had been to make aperfect hammer, to make just as many of

them as people wanted, and no more, and

to sell them at a fair price If people didnot want his hammers, he did not want tomake them If they did not want to paywhat they were worth, they were welcome

to buy cheaper ones of some one else.For his own part, his wants were few, and

he was ready at any time to go back to hisblacksmith's shop

The old gentleman concluded hisinteresting narration by making me apresent of one of his hammers, which Inow cherish among my treasures.

If it had been a picture, I should have had

it framed and hung up over my desk, aperpetual admonition to me to do my workwell; not too fast; not too much of it; notwith any showy false polish; not lettinganything go till I had done all I could tomake it what it should be

In telling this little story, I have toldthousands of stories Take the word

hammer out of it, and put glue in its place,

and you have the history of Peter Cooper

By putting in other words, you can makethe true history of every great business inthe world which has lasted thirty years

The true "protective system," of which we

hear so much, is to make the best article;

and he who does this need not buy a ticketfor Colorado