The progressive farmer. [volume] (Winston, N.C.) 1886-1904, 1901-07-09

Choose at random almost any self
made American millionaire, get if
you can his real li~fe-story, and in
studying it you will find that the
hardest part of the work of building
a great fortune is the laying of the
foundation the first $1,000.
Andrew Carnegie, for instance,
spent the best eighteen years of his
life accommodating his first $lOOO,-
years of hard, constant work. He
began saving pennies at the age of
twelve, but not until he was thirty
did he stand forth owing no man
and owning $1,000.
On the twenty fifth of November
last Mr.. Carnegie celebrated his sixty
first birthday by making himself a
present of a 81, 600, 900 plot of ground,
two blocks long, on Fifth Avenue.
Here he intends to spend another
81, 900, 900 building a ''plain, roomy,
comfortable home," to be presented
TO his daughter two years hence.
Since that proud day thirty-one
years ago when he deposited the
thousandth dollar, the corner
stone of his present $25, 900, 900 for
tune, in the bank of Pittsburg,
MI. Carnegie has become the largest
manufacturer and exporter of steel
products, and one of the largest en-
ployers in this country. The steel
and coke companies o. which he is
the head, and, as such, the con-
troller of $50, 600, 900 capital, include
Y distinct plants within I've
miles of Pittsburg, and 10000 Of coal
lands in the Connellsville ditrict. He
employs $1,000 men in the steel
works, and 10, 900 more in the coke
works, in mine- and in transpOrta-
ton. His monthly payroll exceels
81, 125, 900. or nearly $50, 900 for each
working day.
Orator and essayist, he is, besides,
the author of three books of notice
able success Vexed if called a phi
lanthropist, he has given Pittsburg a
81, 900, 900 library, and has promised
to spend 81, 600, 900 more in the city
in which he made his fortune. For
libraries in other Pennsylvania
towns he has given another 81, 600,
900, and to Scotland, his native land,
half q million.
When C0rucgie JIQde one Dollar
q Week.-"Everything comes to him
who works while he waits, is one
of Mr.. Carnegie's notices. Wait
ing, but working meanwhile, he be
gan laying up his first $1,000 while
making $1.2O Il week as ''bObbin- boy
in a cotton-mill in Allegheny City.
His father, mother, younger brother
and himself-the family-had just
come from Scotland, and had hardly
got their two room house "tO rights
when candy" brought in his first
contribution to the family earnings.
But the lad of twelve was doing a
grown mans work, finding his way
to the mill and beginning on his
5obbins while it was still dark out
side, every morning except Sunday,
and working until dark every even
ing with only forty minutes inter
val at noon.
Seven steps above this, eight steps
I all, he had to climb before he
finally put that thousundth dollar in
the bank.
The second step was made in his
thirteenth year. He became a dunn
my-engine tender in a bObbin fac
tory, in Allegheny City. But his
work there was even harder than in
she cotton mill for he was put to
firing the boiler IN the cellar, as we'll
As to tending the little engine which
ran the machinery.
Carnegie as Eogioeer.-The full re-
spOnsibility of keeping the water at
she right temperature, and of run
ming that little engine, the danger of
making one mistake that would