The Hazel Green herald. [volume] (Hazel Green, Wolfe County, Ky.) 1885-19??, 1894-09-13
ONCE OFFICE BOYS.
FAMOUS RICH MEN WHO BEGAN AT
THE BOTTOM.
Wanamaker's Early struggles-.-where
Bonner Got His start--Carnegie's
Strange Career---Russel Sage
and the Grocery--Begin-
ming of Other Great
Fortunes.
CO THOU AND DO LIKEWISE.
"Boyi Where's that boy ?"

boy where's tnat boy r
This is an exclamation that is heard a
thousand times day in the great office
buildings where the big financial opera
tions of the world are conducted, and in
the marts of trade and manufacture.
And the little messenger thus summoned
by call or bell appears at the Office door,
either willingly or reluctantly, and re.
receives the order, for the execution of
which he is paid anywhere from nothing
at all to-great riches-$4 a week.
But If these small men of trust could
know little of the histories of those of
their kind who, like them, have been Of
flee boys, and have risen into millionaire.
dom, they would, perhaps, step livelier
at the familiar call of boy ~ and would
try harder to make themselves both liked
and priced in order that they, too, might
stand chance of worldly distinction and
be able to look back upon their youthful
slavery and poverty as things so different
from their mature condition az to be
mere visions.
John Wanamaker began as an Office
boy, but the recollection is too vivid with
him now ever to become vague. He
worked too hard, endured too much pri-
walton in order to save money, and went
without too many hours of sleep, ever to
be able to forget his early experience.
When he was only IA years old he
went to work for Hays & Zell, an old
Philadelphia publishing house, and his
weekly pay was $3.50. Out of this sum
he bought his lunches and saved money,
until about the beginning of the war,
when, having had small advances, he
went into business for himself, choosing
his present line of fortune-making.
Before the period of being Office boy
Mr.. Wanamaker, then called Little
Johnnie had an occupation. He"'squat-
ted" in the sand and turned bricks in
the sun. His pay here was cents per
day, and his first weeks earnings came
to 7 cents, as there was too much cOmpe.
tition in the business of turning bricks
to give him the monopoly. And this
money, saved, was the nucleus of the big
Wanamaker fortune. But it was when
on $3.50 week that he really coined
money and saved most of the $4,000 that
afterward launched the dry goods house
on the sea of trade.
Robert Bonner was an Office boy, and
of the type often held up to scorn.
He was printers devil off somewhere in
New England. Young Robert got a very
small sum, and he soon saw that he must
learn more if he would ever earn more.
One day one of the printers, who was, as
Mr.. Bonner says, "a dandy" asked the
boy Bonner to "wash the rOller"-a pro-
cess familiar to every printer of the old
days.
WHERE BONNER GOT HIS START.
Young Robert said that he would
wash the roller if the printer would show
him how to Clock the press" which was
agreed upon as a bargain. After that
Robert, knowing more, became more
than the errand boy, and earned little
in advance of his clothes. When he came
to New York after the war, he had 500,
which he deposited in a savings bank.
Currency then was uncertain, and one OF
the dollars was not worth 100 cents in
the eyes of the teller. "That was the
bitterest day of my life when that dollar
was thrown back on me-" says Mr.. Bon
ner, remembering even yet the pang of
his first shortage" although he now re-
CARDS 10000 a small sum to pay for
trotter.
huuISOI SuiHHldChJ uOW OHC VI IhC |
greatest men of Wall street, remembers
when he was an errand boy. 1t was
long time ago, when he was l6, and the
city of his young endeavors was New Or
leans. Young Cammack's father had
plantation, but the boy was am
bilious to see the world, and to own money
and property of his own. So he ran
away to the city. He went into ship
ping house, ran errands, did little jobs,
and came out way ahead somehow.
Andrew Carnegie has had very
strange career. He began upon a small
and in a slow business. He
was Office boy for the Atlantic and Ohio
company in Pittsburg. Be-
tween the times when he was running
out with messages he listened to the
"click" of the instruments, and planned
how he would learn telegraphy.
. After time he was put in as a substi-
lutte operator, and one day there came an
offer TO be general manager of the Pitts
burg Office of the Pennsylvania Railroad.
How he got into great financial opera
tions is another story. But, remember
that back of all the later successful OPP
erations was the determination which
made the little errand boy resolve to adj
vance little as soon as he could.
James G. Fair, the California million i