The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1898-02-27
What Two Bows Did.


ergy with which they work them, and
the environment. The last is a power
tul factor, too often overpowering when
deterrent and the stock of energy is
insufficient to overcome it. But no sur
round1ngs can prevent the boy with
brains and energy and pluck from
mastering them. We have in mind two
cases that illustrate this Back in the
| fifties there came from Germany a Door
man and his wife to the frontiers. of
which New Ulm was then an outpost.
When the Sioux outbreak came the
father was killed, leaving the widow
with an infant son. The woman mar
r1ed man as poor as her first hus-
band; too poor to give the boy any fur
Their education than the village schools
offered, and attendance there was in
terrupted by home needs Of the boys
labor. But the boys brains were too
hungry to be stated with that quantity
OF food. The normal school was es-
tabllshed at Mankato, and he nursed
the ambition to enter it. He was ad-
mitted but had to work his way. He
did it bravely, earning enough money
by odd jobs about town to buy books
and pay board.
One day he read a notice, given out
by the congressman Of the district, that
an examination would be held for a
N96ptShin q AID To
enter and did so and stood first in the
tests. He went to Annapolis and met
successfully the examination there
Four years later he graduated at the
head Of his class. He took the two
years cruise; was in the Samoa tor
nado. On his return his stand
ing made him one of three sent
to the school of technology for
special training, in Paris. There,
too, he stood first in his class.
Coming back he was assigned to the
bureau of naval construction. where
only the best scholars go. He was
afterWard sent to superintend the con-
struction of some of our battleships.
He finished that task to take an exami-
nation and receive an appointment as
naval constructor. 1t is now Lieut..
Robert Stocker, instead of Bob" the
New UIm village lad
Back in the forties, ffty-six years
ago, George Sampson was one of those
men whose abilities fail to lift them
higher than the level of the odd-job
man Of the village. He lived in the
little village of Palmyra, in the state
of New York. He sawed wood for the
villagers who could afford to hire that
work done; made gardens, dug wells
and worked at all those other little Jobs
that village life provides. Billy" his
boy, was his helper trudging after him
in the winter from house to house and
splitting and piling or carrying in the
wood his father sawed; a bright.
industrious, cheerful lad At such odd
spells as he could he went to the village
schools. The village squire took Xix
ing to the sturdy little fellow and got
IAAC SOlISoI 1HIGi6SlSu enough TO
get the boy a chance to stand the ex-
animation for entrance to Annapolis.
He stood it successfully, and when the
class graduated Billy was at it's head.
He had brains and energy and pluck.
you see. Who is ''Billy?" He is now
that captain of one of our big battle
ships who is president of the board of
inquiry that is sitting in Havana har-
Dor, investigating the cause of the
destruction of the Maine When
Admiral Sicard is off duty Billy COM
mands the squadron. Capt. Sampson
is accounted by the naval department
one of its best officers. These two
cases show what American boys can
become; but they must have the brains,
and the brains must have the engine
| of energy, and then no environment,
| however retarding, can prevent them
from getting to the top.