The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1898-08-22

He Is Reported to Have Made $5O,OOO,-
600 in Thirty Years.


NEW YORK, Aug. 21.-The announce
ment that Sir Thomas tombstone Upton has
challenged American yachtsmen to race for
the Americas cup calls attention to the
marvellous rise of this man from a dock
laborer to the position of the best known
merchant in the world to-day. He is re-
ported to have made $50,000,0O0 in thirty
years, and is not a yachtsman, but like a
Barnum wants to keep his name before
the world.
Thirty-eight years ago he was a messen-
ger boy in a statoner's shop in Glasgow,
and his father was a day laborer The
boys wages were shilings and pence
per week. At night, when through with his
work. he attended school, and in that way
received his education. Some five or six
years later, about the time he eight
cen, he ran away from home and took pass
age in the steerage of Anchor liner for
New York Among his fellow-passenger he
found many who were sick and who needed
the little comforts of life. He did for them
the best he could and won their friendship
Arriving at the dock in New York city, the
place was lined with runners for various
boarding houses, all eager to capture the
passengers. Upton pushed through them
and ran to the nearest hotel. Bolting in on
the surprised proprietor of the place, he
win you board me free for a month if
bring you forty patronS?'
The proprietor said he would. Then Lip
ton returned to the docks, found his friends
of the steerage, brought them to the friend
iy hotel and lodged them. The landlord
there he lived, board free. for a month.
During this time he obtained work on the
decks and saved little money.
After a short stay in New York he trav-
q SOnth Carolina
rice fields, then visited Texas, and finally
returned to New York as a stowaway on
a steamship.
AT that time he said, years afterward,
my sole ambition was to make enough
money to buy barrel of American flour
mother. l had the money in a years time,
end then / started back to Scotland with
the flour and the rocking chair. l reached
home in the night and waited until morning
before going to my parents house. then
took cab, loaded myself, the flour and the
chair into it, SO that all the neighbors
would see the collection, and drove TO the
home Of my mother"
HIS BUSINESS START.
The business start of Sir Thomas was a
humble merchant of provisions, meats of
the inferior order. His parents had $780,
and they let him add this to what he
brought back with him. He believed that
the world was always hungry and always
willing to pay decent price for something
to eat. He determined to be provisioner
In the little store he started with he was
his own clerk. bookkeeper and manager
He put up the shutters at night and took
them down in the morning. He was par
ticular to study what his customers wanted
His own peculiar individuality was kept be-
fore them until Upton, one of the smallest
provision dealers in Glasgow, was better
known than those who had been in BUSH
ness for years. BY and by as he pros
pered, he found means with which to adj
Ia mt 10 ma Of I irara 49,
every man, woman and child in Scotland
and England must see it. Naturally, after
they knew the name they desired TO fur
Their know what he did. and when they
gained that knowledge they patronized him
Possibly. though, the patronage would never
nave come II lApton had not adhered to the
rule of being honest with his trade and of
underselling old-time merchants who sur
rounded him and did business in old-time
ways.
Sir Thomas worked necessarily. iustifying
his own remark that he had labored twenty
five hours out of the tWenty-four. At the
time he was business man of some note
the middleman was great factor in all
transactions What the consumer desired
10 secure from the producer had to- be Sc
cured through the medium of third party.
Upton worked to do away with this third
party, and when he had he was able to sell
cheaper than his competitors, who made no
cnange. 80 far as possible he produced
what ne had for sale and was content TO
were many pennies coming in.
The Scottish provisioner found occasion
10 lldNel 10 CeylOn. Wnen lie arrived tnefe
he found the coffee market in a bad state.
Many disasters had befallen the planta-
tons, and they were for sale al low prices.
He purchased all of them he could. and
turned them into tea plantations and from
this transaction grew the fame of Lipton's
teas, whether you like to drink them or not.
At the time of the big packing house dis
trict fire in Chicago. some sixteen or seven
teen years ago, man by the name of Rob-
ert Neil, a foreman in one of the houses,
lost his position. He placed himself in
communication with Upton and suggested
to him that he ought to support his pro-
vision houses in England with a packing
house in Chicago. The idea was we'll re-
ceived. but the first effort made by Upton
TO open up here in that line was at Omaha.
He started there the tombstone Packing
Company, of which Robert Nell was the
manager. This house afterward became the
first which p. ID. Armour owned in Omaha,
and was really the foundation OF the