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The Columbia University Libraries reserve the right to refuse to accept a copying order if, in its judgement, fulfillment of the order would involve violation of the copyright law. Author: t Title: Early exp young Place: ew Date: 905 of qH>^9^^M~^ MASTER NEGATIVE * COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY LIBRARIES PRESERVATION DIVISION BIBLIOGRAPHIC MICROFORM TARGET ORIGINAL MATERIAL AS FILMED - EXISTING BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD Rockefeller, John Davison, 1839- Early experiences of a young business man; a plain talk by a plain nan at the Club of the Young nen*s Bible class of the Fifth avenue Baptist church, Saturday ev*g. May 7th, 1904. [Ilew Yorkj 1905. 16 p. 15-^ cm. RESTRICTIONS ON USE: TECHNICAL MICROFORM DATA RLM SIZE: ^^YVv\a^ REDUCTION RATIO : ^Y IMAGE PLACEMENT: lA ^^Iia) IB ilB DATE FILMED: /l-S:VO|^ INITIALS: TRACKING # : Ai^// 0Z7V9 RLMED BY PRESERVATION RESOURCES. 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BY The Young Men's Bible Class OF THE FIFTH AVENUE BAPTIST CHURCH 'N \ \ !:• « HE last word of the elcquent speaker has touched my heart, to be called your friend. As I have looked into your faces frcm time to time, as I have had the plea- sure of meeting you, I felt that you were my friends, and I have always felt that I wanted to be your friend. And so it. is a very great pleasure to meet you here tonight — we meet as friends. And if I were to give one reason among others for my securing the first position in business — my footing — my first start in life — it would be that I had the good fortune to be associated in my early boyhood with such dear friends as you are. The association into which I was called, at fourteen, in the church and in the schools, with good men, with good young men, the asso- ciation in which I found occupation in the church, in the Sunday School, in the Young Men's Christian Association, helped me more than I '^■■iiiiM^^^^^^^ 1 !• can tell you to make the beginning, to get a posi- tion and an opportunity to begin my life work. I would name as another help in this same direction the fact that from my earliest recollec- tion I had a peculiar training in my home. It seemed to be a business training from the verv beginning. I was taught to do things, simple things such as a boy could do. I was taught to be self-reliant. At the age of seven or eight I was taught, as a boy in the country, to milk a cow. I could milk a cow as well as a man could. That is a very simple thing to refer to but that was one of the things I began to learn. I was taught at the age of eight to drive a horse, and to drive him just as carefully as a man could. 1 re- member very well the instruction of my father — " My son, hold very carefully going down the hill. Don't let him stumble. When you are on the level road let him trot right along." And I never shall forget that. . I was taught to do as much business at the age of ten and eleven as it was possible for me to do. Among other things I was sent over the hills to buy cordwood for the use of the family, and I knew what a cord of good, solid beech and maple wood was, and my father told me to select only the solid wood and the straight wood, and not to put any limbs in or any "punky" wood. That was a good training for me. 1 didn't need my father or anybody else to tell me how many feet it took to make a cord of wood, and I didn't require the presence of anybody to enable me secure from the man who sold that wood good measure. . And there are many other such things that I was taught to do. When I was a little older my father commissioned me to build a house. He i said, '* My son. here is the money. I want you to build a good, brick house that will make us a home." 1 employed an architect, we let out the contracts, and we built the house. We had no trouble with the architect or the contractor. 1 hat gave me a great deal of confidence. Every- thmg came out all right and I have the evidence of that m a little mahogany box that I treasure 1 have all those receipts, I have all those settle- ments that were made. That was a valuable experience for me. I could hardly enumerate the many experi- ences of that kind that my father seemed to think It was very desirable for me to have. Soon after he began to allow me to loan sums of money for him, and meanwhile I was saving a little money from what I could earn myself. I always had a httle money. I know of some people especially young men, who find it very difficult to keep a Httle money in their pocketbooks. J learned to keep the money, and, as we had a way of saying, '*it didn't burn a hole in mv pocket." I was taught that it was the thing to do to keep the money and to take care of it. Among the early experiences that was help- ful to me, that I recall with pleasure, was one in working a few days for a neighbor, in digginij potatoes, a very enterprising thrifty farmer who could dig a great many potatoes, I was a boy of perhaps thirteen or fourteen years of age, and it kept me very busy from morning until night— it was a ten-hour day — it was at least ten hours I was saving these little sums and soon learned ^^^iJ ^?^^^ g^t as much interest for $50 loaned at 7% , the legal rate in the State of New York at that time, for a year, as I could earn by digging potatoes ten days, and the impression was gaining — ^smrnprs"^ ll around with me that it was a good thing to let the money be my servant and not make myself a slave to money . I tried to reniember that ever since. I think money is a good thmg to have if we know how to use it properly. 1 think it is verv harmful to many people because they do not know how to use it properly. I was in school. My father had a number of rhildren to educate. He was not a rich man, but he kept me'i school all the time until I was six- t^n vears of age, and I had expected to go Srou^rcollege 'and enjoy the adv-tage *a many of you gentlemen have enjoyed and 1 congratulate you-but I can t say t^at ^ re^et that circumstances seemed to require me to take care of myself. ^ „j o ^r^m rn"hs."anA:nrin the year 185f . IJ^^/- ^^ look for something to do. And all those years from 1855 to 1860 were very trying years in the brness world. Many of you gent lernen^are too vnnntr to know about that dreadful panic we naa fn "857-rt left a blight that we did not recover from for many years. After many days and Ss of earnest Endeavor I-'^-f^iedin getting a promise, one mommg, that if I would come back in the afternoon they would see if they coufd give me a situatk^n. I .^as there mt^ afternoon-early. I did not fail to go nght back to know what the result was going to be. 1 hap SS^o meet an old gentleman last summer E said to me "I wat there, too, when you 2Se on the sWe'walk that day, that 26th day of September 1855. I was there and I knew you Sf I^new that that firm, that forwarding and cSmission firm, wanted a young man in the 6 \| f office, and I spoke to the gentlemen. This is a circumstance that I had never known before myself. I was very grateful to get that position. I was very grateful that I could keep it, and I did keep it until two years from the following April, when I engaged in business on my own account — then a boy of less than nineteen years of age I could not have done for myself better than i did for my employer. How I wish all young men could know that the way to hold a position is to do just that thing! You who employ young men know that some young men expect to do just as little as they can and are much troubled all the time that they do not get an increase in salary. That doesn't make a very permanent relationship with some business men, they look for some other to fill the place. I was very fortunate in my employers, espe- cially the man who had the accounting in the office and under whom I worked as an assistant bookkeeper for a space of a year and three months, and then, as he desired to leave the position, it was tendered to me. I should have said in respect to the question ot salary that I was to receive, that I knew nothing about that until the first of January. I cared very little about that. I wanted the position and I found myself so much interested in the work. I enjoyed my work, I was happy m it. I had been taught to work from early boyhood and this was so delightful to me— all the method and system of the office. And then, as I say, I was fortunate in the association in the office. I remember one of the things my employer did for me was to give me a book, " The Life of Amos Lawrence," and that made a very profound im- pression upon me. A successful Boston mer- chant he was, such a useful man, who made such good use of his money. At the end of the second year of my service with this company, I desired a salary of $800. The man who had filled the position previously had received $2,000. My employer was willing to give me, from the first of January of that year $700. The matter of the difference was a ques- tion which was under consideration when an opportunity offered to engage in business with a young man who was ten years older than myself, and who had saved a little money. Accordingly, on the first of x\pril, with some $800 or $900 that I had saved up, and with $1,000 which mv father loaned me at 10% until I should become of age, I contributed my part of the capital, which was $4,000. Everything started fairly well with us until we came to June, and in June we had that dreadful frost which was a bHght upon a number of the Central States, and my partner was much discouraged; but we soon found that trade as- sumed a little different channel, and we pressed forward with our business, and found that our business was much more than could be handled with the capital we had provided. As I had had an experience in this office of a number of years of a peculiarly favorable character in preparing me for financial affairs, I was undertaking to secure the money by loans and otherwise, to meet these growing demands as our business increased. We were prosperous from the beginning, we had a business of $500,000 in the produce busi- ness the first year. Our profits were not very large, I think $4,400, but I think it was better for me than the $800 which I had asked, and we had gained many other things than this money. I had 8 ) "i: "1 (• > hoped that a dear friend of mine, who had express- ed himself very kindly toward me, would, in an emergency, put his name upon my note, don't you know. And with that note I felt sure that I could borrow some money. Accordingly I asked him and he said, " John, you know I would do it for you. I would be glad to do it for you, but you know I have an agreement with my brothers and we can't endorse paper." It was all right, and I made no complaint. I had no business to ask him for it at all. He was under no obligations to me and I didn't have any unkindly feeling toward him for declining to give me the endorsement. But I had to set about it in other directions at once, and one of those directions was my father. My father had money to loan and I borrowed some money from my father, and I was very much encouraged that he was willing to trust me. I just gave him my note — he was a very careful business man. After a little while I was very greatly in need of money. My father came to me and said, ''My son, I must have that money, I need it very much, I must have it." It was a very serious question in my mind whether he really needed it. I think possibly he could have gotten along without it, but it was along the same line of training that he had been giving me since I was a little boy. I was cross and did not like that. I supposed he was going to let me keep the money until the earnings of the business made it convenient for me to hand it back to him. But he said, " 1 must have it," and I said, " Certainly, father, I will send you up a check," and I did so. In a few days he came down to me and said," My son. I have a little left over, I could let you have a little," and I intimated to him that if it was any 9 [ I t* ^wi ' saawiiiM iars' accommodation to him I would take it, certainly I was willing to oblige the old gentleman. I took It and everything went on smoothly for a month or so, and back he came again and he said, " I am very sorry, my son, I have got to have that to do so for some time until at last when he had any money he handed it to me and was very glad to have me keep it, and he knew it was all safe and right. That was a very great encourage- ment to me, for my father was a very able business man. Meanwhile, I needed mpre than I could get from him, and I went to my banker, who had known me in Sunday school, and had known me as an employee in this firm, and I said to him, ** I must have some money." He said, ** Mr. Rockefeller, how are you doing your business? " I told him. He said, ** Do you make any ad- vances on merchandise without you have the bills of lading or the property in the warehouse?" I said, ** No sir.*' Well, do you speculate?" •* No sir." •* Do you promise me, Mr. Rocke- feller, that if I loan you money, you will con- tinue to do so, and be very careful not to make any advances without you have in hand the col- lateral, in the shape of bills of lading or ware- house receipts?" And I said, ** We will." And he said, " How much do you want?" And I said ••A couple of thousand." And he said, " Cer- tamly, Mr. Rockefeller, certainly, all right." That was a happy day for me. What a service that good man rendered to me that day! I knew that my intentions were all right, but to have that man, that careful, well-trained man of It' 11/ i i * finance, say to me, " Certainly, Mr. Rockefeller, all right! " It was all right, and that was the beginning of larger accommodations that I was obliged to have from this bank and other banks ♦ for our business steadily grew. And later on, the President of this same bank — I having borrow^ed many thousands of dollars, many times the $2,000, I do not remember just how much — said to me one day, and it was another president who was then in the position, " Why, Rockefeller, do you know you've got nearly all the money of this bank, and do you know our Board of Directors want to see you and talk with you? " I said, " I thank you, I thank you, I shall be very pleased to come up and see them, and I want to come right away because I've got to borrow a great deal more." Well, I borrowed a great deal more from that bank and from other banks, and I paid it all back, and the confidence in our young firm grew, and the con- fidence, our own confidence, in ourselves grew. And we w^ere careful about making our obliga- tions, very. Another experience came on the heels of this that was interesting and very trying. One of our largest consignors from the country came in. He had been making us very large shipments and his business was profitable and we valued him as a customer, and he said to my partner, who did the talking to him, " I cannot continue these shipments without you give me some money before the grain is shipped," and my partner said to me, " We are going to lose this customer and I am greatly troubled about it, and what are we to do? " I said, ** There is but one thing to do, we can't do any other way than we have been doing, the safe way." " Well," he said, " I can't talk 11 ii T\ with him. He's cross. He's going to leave us f^t "^^-^r ??'''?,^^i*?^^ ^^at business. Now yoii talk with him.'' When the opportunity pre- sented Itself I said to the gentleman, *' We prize vour business very highly. You are one of our best customers. We don't want to lose you We can furnish you all the money you want, but it is impossible for us to do it in any other way I hope we shall not lose you. We ^11 do our best to please you. We will try to do your business better than you can get it done anywhere else " And he returned home, but we kept his business and 1 have always suspected that a certain old banker back of him in the country was trying to ascertain from him whether these drafts would be all right, and when he found that we took his position, in some way or other he made it pos- sible for this man to get the money. At all events we held the business. That was very gratifying. ^ At about this time I had an experience that the sermon of last Sunday morning called to my mind 1 had never sohcited business personally My partner was the man who attended to the buying and selling and I had attended to the office attairs When I went out into the country to solicit business for the first time I met with great success, It surprised me. I found that old men had confidence in me right away, and after I stayed for a few weeks in the country I returned home and had a most delightful session w;ith my partner even before going home— it was mght. I went to his house — and the consign- ments came in and our business was increased and it opened up a new world to me. I did not know that I could influence these men to give us the business, but my presentation to them was 1 ir^ ^y very- simple, I did not even ask for their busi- ness in many cases. I said to some, " We are engaged in the business. You may have your other business relations that are entirely satis- factory; if so, I am not asking your business— I just want you to know about us. We are pre- pared to do the business, we hope we can do it as well as anybody else d^n do it, and if you make a change, won't ^you kindly give us young men a chance? " Ann they did. That was very grati- fying to me, that was very gratifying to my partner. A little later on in the business when we re- quired so much more money, hundreds of thous- ands of dollars, instead of those smaller amounts, we had a great fire that destroyed a vast amount of property, and some of the banks began to look carefully to see how much of our paper they had . I remember that I was casting about very care- fully to see where we could get a large amount of money providing the insurance money was not paid — and I did not wait until our obligations matured — I looked in advance. The circum- stance that I am now to refer to I did not know about at the time. I did not know about it until afterward. An officer in the bank said, I think we have about enough of that paper." I was not present and knew nothing about it. Another officer in the bank said, " Those young men are all right." He was a positive man, he called to his son4n-law, who was president of the bank, and he said, " Dan, bring my box." And he brought out his box, and he said, '* Here, gen- tlemen, these young men are all right. Just take what you want. These men are all right." That was very gratifying. I would like to men- tion the name of that man. His name was Still - vears 12 r 13 man Witt. It was a well-known name thirty-five or forty years ago. Stillman Witt, a grand old man, a grand good friend of ours, and I shall be grateful to him as long as I live. And he was not the only man of that sort who knew about us and who had an interest in us and who believed in us. Another man I called upon at that time, a man of large wealth. I said to him •* We have had this fire. We may require some additional money. Can*t say now if we do. What can you do ? Do you want to do anything ? I remember very well where I found him — m his lumber yard — he was a man having different interests, very large interests, and a man of very reat wealth. This was his answer, ' All right, D., I will let you have anything I've got. „^ell, that was very gratifying. We did not ask him for anything, but so long as I live the name ot that man I shall remember with gratitude — Stephen V. Harkness. I do not know that I have ever mentioned either of these circumstances before in public, but I owe it to the memory of these men and I am happy to give these circumstances here. Many such experiences we had all the way along, and though the business increased on every hand it seemed that the successes came compara- tively easy, and I dated it all back to the httle beginnings of the training that I got at home and my wiUingness to work, and the people some way seemed to have confidence in us. What a great boon it is to a man— to have another man tell him that he believes in him, that he trusts himl What a happiness all my business experience has been because my associates beheved m me, trusted me implicitly! And many of those associates have long since passed away, but there 14 \ I •\ y ^ IS hardly a week that ever goes by that I do not recount their names and think of them, hardly a week ever passes that I do not call up the names of those honorable, able, good men with whom it was my pleasure to be associated for long, long years. If you will pardon me, I will refer just in this connection to something that happens very often to me now. In the dreams at night I find myself taking up that cash account, that first situation, and I remember that the former cashier and bookkeeper in this position was just a little short in his cash, not because he had done anything wrong, but he told me that he had been a little negligent and had not taken up the cash every day, and I saw that he put in his check for the few dollars that were short. Do you know that often I am working at night over the old cash account and I am recalling the fact that I am a Httle short in my account, instead of the former man in the place, a peculiarity of the dreams, fifty years ago coming back in this way. You have listened very patiently. I thank you for it. There are some here of the younger men, who are anxious, as I was anxious that day and in all the days preceding that memorable 26th of September, when I secured that position. All the future hung upon that day, upon that chance! Do not be discouraged, young man. I had many refusals, I did not give up. I suppose I should have been soliciting a position until this time if I hadn't got that place. T don't know whether, if I hadn't gotten it you would have wanted me to address you tonight, but I am thankful all the same that you do. I am obliged to you for your kind attention and I shall hope with your permission at some other 15 -rs" "HP" I f 1 at'- lime to have a friendly word with you. 1 feel it a great honor to be here, to be associated with you. I feel great gratitude to you all, and great respect for you. as I consider what you are doing, what a help you have been to my dear son, how you co-operate in every way to 'make this work succeed. And you may never know what this means, the association of good men entering upon life, with all its possibilities, you mav never know what this means. O, how'grateful I am that these associations were given me in mv early boyhood, that I was contented and happy with this sort of work, with the work in the church, with the work in the Sunday school, with the work with good people — that was mv environ- ment, and I thank God for it. And pardon me if I just say one further word, with respect to many who may be considering the question of whether at this tirne or in the immedi- a.te future you will identify yourself with the Christian Church. From my own experience I beg you not to put it off. Under God, it was the greatest blessing that could have come to me. I not only united with the church as a boy of four- teen years of age, but I went right to work and they found a place for me, and I w^as happy in the work. It was not all business, that was a part, I enjoyed that. I turned to this work and to other works, and so all my life has been a life full of happiness because full of such works. And the best wdsh that I could wish for any of you would be that you should have just such a happy life of w^ork. And you won't have a happy life if vou don't work. Hi INTENTIONAL SECOND EXPOSURE i "h.\. VI Jij^_j.;,i(««li*W*'«* '*»«* #■ ^'l«P«!a*l!ff«B*W:«i^^ f* ** All young men who come to tbts Cbutch md Class are welcome^ regardless of party, creed or residence. The great question for us all is not where we come from, but where "we are going to." — Dr. i^aunce. \ ) If ■■•■' THE YOUNG MEN'S BIBLE CLASS OP THB FIFTH AVENUE BAPTIST CHURCH ... 4 TO 8 West 46th Street NEW YORK CITY JOHN D. ROCKEFELLER, Jr., Leader All young men who are not members of any other Class are cordially invited to attend its se^ions on Simdays, froni October 1st to May 31st, inclusive. Rev. Willard S. Richardson general secretary ' 11 West 45Ta Street THE CLUB 11 West 45t|i Street William E. Church, president All active and honorary members of the Class are eligible to Club membership. *M''f " »»^^. * ♦■wiiiiii ii^aiig iiiiimiiwiiiiiiwiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiniiii' ' fiH ^ ^'^If ..'■■iiii'^fffiiy.^i i ff*''"'''' '''T''*"'".Lt!.!!!t "Tff"" i fr ™i: ""^'"* i"^;;.!"'! *^Mr> Date Due D410 Rockefeller R592 f^io V \ -jf R (fi Z 0:^5 "^J^irim COLUMB ^.HW'Y^RSITY LIBRARIES 0041390555 jK •• '1 t 7 'w * J \i '/ AUG t w--^:-m 5:vv:^.' ;!.--^r.s •.:n.i^;; "7 • •■ , ' m 1 |- •.■',•■: "■^!*' ■«* **- *^ 1 ' 1 1 ' 1 ■ .- ■' ■ ^1 *V'*i* ' • - 1- ,*i. <,4- •<, . 1 i*. ■ - ■ . .« ■ i ,^-;:.';r.'. - • -A f. •»,♦,, r . , . -ft .V lili it:-: .:■ ■- > ---^