St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1894-04-22
RICH KNIGHTS OF THE KEYBOARD.
George Gould and others Who are Elk.
merit TesesraDb Operators.

George Gould and others Who are Ex-
pert Telegraph operators.
Everybody knows that Jay Gould had
trade and that if he had found himself sud-
denly in need he could have made a living as
a surveyor, for in his youth he surveyed and
made maps of Ulster, Albany and Delaware
counties. in the state of New York. There are
comparatively few persons, however, who are
aware that his son, George J. Gould, who sue
ceeded to the management of his vast prop
critics and whose reputation as fnancier is
not clouded by the greater fame of his father,
could also support himself and his family in
case of need by an occupation, to the pursuit
Of which it is very unlikely that he will ever
be reduced. George Gould is a telegraph
operator.
AS the president Of the Missouri Pacific
Railroad, he has his Office on the fifth floor
Of the Western Union building in New York,
and thus he is handy to the headquarters Of
the Western Union Telegraph Company,
which he controls. If the within ever seized
him or the necessity ever arose, he could
leave his sanctum, take the elevator three
flights up to the operating department of the
COle'toiopi COiittSuy auu WOih q hcy JUDI hh0
any one of the several hundred men who earn
their bread by doing that kind of work in that
room.
It is not certain how he came to learn the
telegraph code. Some of the old operators
around New York say that his father prompted
him to make it a study and to master the
science of electricity in its other branches as
thoroughly as possible. Others-and some of
them are in a position to know-assert that
George Gould was attracted to the matter
himself and he regarded it as pastime, but
that his father had nothing whatever to do
with it.
At any rate, Jay Gould afterwards became
interested in the young mans accomplish
ment and it is sometimes related where tele-
graph men mostly eongregate, that when
father and son were travelling in their private
car over the Gould railroad lines in the west,
the former would frequently givethe engineer
the signal to stop the train, write a message
and hand it to George, who, having strapped
a pair of spurs to his legs, would alight, shin
up telegraph pole, connect an instrument
with the wire and send the despatch to its
destination. This may or may not be true,
but anyway it is story that is worth re-
peating.
1t is fact that George Gould at the pres
ent time often makes use Of his knowledge
of telegraphy for both business and pleasure.
The ability to do this has undoubtedly been
of real value to him at times, and more often
it has been mere convenience. In the d.
rection Of the Western Union Telegraph Com
pany his practical training must often have
served him.
number of other men who are now at the
top of the ladder in one profession or an
other, have risen from the rank of telegraph
operators, where unlike Mr.. Gould, they la
bored for a living. Most conspicuous among
them and undoubtedly most proficient Of all,
is Thomas A. Edison, who in his day was one
of the finest operators in the world. He
learned the business from a railroad station
master, whose child he had saved from death
at the risk of his own life, when the little one
had wandered on the track in front of an
approaching train. Edison's subsequent
inventions, the duplex and quadruplex wires,
by which two or four messages may be sent
at the same time over the same wire, and
other improvements afterwards were the
foundation of his fame and fortune.
Andrew Carnegie is another ex-operator.
He began as messenger boy for the Atlantic
and Ohio Telegraph Company in Pittsburg,
became an operator and was one Of the first
men to read messages by sound. He after
wards entered the Pittsburg Office of the
Pennsylvania Railroad and acted as manager
Of its telegraph lines.
Thomas T. Eckert, president Of the Western
Union Telegraph Company, began at the bot
tom and rose through the successive stages
of the craft to the position he now occupies.
He rendered efficient service to the Union
during the war, first as operator in charge at
MeClellan's headquarters and afterward as
organizer and superintendent of the tele-
graph service at the War Department in
Washington, for which the rank of major was
conferred upon him.
James EMERSON, whose daughter was mar
ried to Jules Patenotre, the French Ambassa-
dor short time ago, and who is publisher Of
the Philadelphia Inquirer, Golden Days and
Saturday Night, was also telegraph operator
in his youth. With him, we will close the
list, which is sufficient to show that teleg-
raphy has contributed at least its share of
leaders to the present age.
Idol builder-sThat Miss Nutting is q
superb creaturei wonder that she doesn't
pose for an artists Venus"
Observation-Disclosures I saw her in the
surf last summer
Better beautify your mind than your body.
homely savant is preferable to a handsome
fool.
r7yls4
Every official Of Spring Hill, Kansas, is
woman, and the reason all the men don't