The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1895-11-06
PETER COOPER.
A Great Man Who Began His Career
Making Shoes.
BY SARAH K. BOLTON.

BY SARAH K BOLTON.
copyrighted, 1895, by Sarah K Bolton.)
In our own country, less than cen
tury ago, was born a boy, poor, ambi-
tious and devoted to his mother. The
fifth child in a family Of nine, unable
TO attend school but for one year in his
life, and then only every other day,
Peter Cooper began his career of Ia
Dor when he was years old. AS ms
father was q halter, the child pulled
the hair from rabbit skins Tor nat
pulp. He learned to make shoes for the
whole family by ripping up an old SHOE
to see how it was made.
When II he started for New YORK 10
make his fortune. if possible. he saw
an advertisement Of 4 lottery, ana nav,
ing carefully saved $40. he invested an
and lost all. He said: lit was the
cheapest knowledge / ever bought.
For he never touched a game OF chance
afterward.
Day after day he walked the streets
of the great city seeking work. many
he bound himself as an apprentice to
a carriage maker for his board ana 0o
cents a week for five years
He spent his evenings in reading, ana
from his Dittance hired d teacher TO
whom he recited. He used to say then:
IF y ever get rich l will build place
where the poor boys and girls OF Ne"
York NAV have an education free
After his apprenticeship Peter worked
in a woolen mill at Hempsted, Long
island. at 50 a week. Here h invented
a shearing machine. from whlch NC
made $500 in two years.
With such a large sum as TINS, ne
could not rest until he had gone nome
10 see his mother. He found her anu
his father full of trouble on acs)unt Oh
0a+n ar
them the whole $500, and PROMISED "
meet some notes which his father h2o
given. ,.4+,a
,-n,cerv store in New York, and then
bought the old glue factory. For tfilrty
wears he carried on this business az
most alone He rose at daylight XIII
died. his factory fires, made ms glue
during the forenoonS, and SOLD II our
sne- 4ba afternoons He continued 10
work Tins when his income had reacn-
ed $4,000 a year.
Ne huilt a rolling mill and furnace
an Raltimore Only thirteen miles Oh
the Baltimore 4 Ohio railroad were
then completed, and the directors We're
about to give up the work MI. Coup
er needed the road in connection WIN
his rolling mill. He at once made the
first locomotive ever constructed IN
America, and helped to carry forward
the enterprise He erected at Tren-
ton. N J., the largest rolling mill IN
the United States, large blast fur-
mace in Pennsylvania and steel and
wire works in various parts OF Inc
state.
Mr.. Cooper said to a friend who was
interested in the Trenton works, Il do
not feel quite easy about the amount
we are making. Working under one
of our patents. we have a monopoly
which seems to me something wrong.
Everybody has to come to us for it.
and we are making money too fast
IT is not right" The price was at once
reduced.
He had been working forty years to
earn money for his free college for the
poor For five years he watched the
erection of the siX-story, brown stone
building at the corner Of Eighth street
and Fourth avenue, now called Cooper
institute. Boys and girls were eager
to learn, as he had believed they would
be if they had the opportunity. Four
thousand came 20 the night schools.
Two thousand came each Saturday
night to hear lectures A half million
; came annually to read in the library
and free reading room.
MIR. Cooper's last act was to buy ten
type writing machines for tie girls in
the department Of telegraplly Over
10000 young men and women have
gone out from Cooper institute to earn
an honorable living.
The poor. self-edUcated boy became
president of the telegraph companies,
one Of the fathers of the Atlantic cable.
and 1.-THE nominee for president of the
United States by the National indie
pendent party in 1876. He died as he
had lived, the unostents tious, honest,
noble friend of the poor and the I'M
fortunate. just before he died he
said: 4 seem to hear my mother call
ing me as she used to do when l was
a 10y. Peter, Peter. it is about bed
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