The progressive farmer. [volume] (Winston, N.C.) 1886-1904, 1901-06-04

"SucceSS'
The sacrifice incident to a college
course involves an investment or at
least five things.
LIT is an investment of money.
To go through college represents a
sum seldom less than one thousand,
two hundred dollars, and seldom
more than five thousand dollars.
This investment of money should
mean, and usually does mean, a
return in money. About One-third
of the graduates of many colleges
are now entering business, and at
least q part of the return of the in
vestment made in college education,
by those who ener business, should
be made in money. Illustrations
abound to prove that the financial
returns received by a college gradu-
ate, are very remunerative. The
graduate begins his business career
at the bottom, and receives the
wages which the lowest subaltern
does and must receive but he rises
rapidly from the bottom, and, the
higher he rises, the more rapid is his
progress. Only last night a great
manufacturer said to me, 81 am
looking for a man to come into my
office, to whom l can pay more than
$4,000 a yeur - and, shaking his
head, he added, 81 can't find him.''
The place to look for men who are
capable of earning SO $1,000 or $50, 600
a year is the list of the graduates of
the American colleges of the last ten
or thirty years. The Pennsylvania
Railroad is taking many college men
into the various departments of it's
service. The ~pecuniary rewards which
these men will receive, in the next
forty years, will represent a very
high rate Of compound interest upon
the SUM invested in an education.
But the peculiarly return, some
would say, is the least vital, impor-
tant as it is. The return in time
of the investment in in a college edu-
cation many would consider of more
advantage. Education is a great
time-saver in a career. 1t represents
the going back a few steps of the
one who is to make a leap it gives
a spring, a buOyancy, and a sw~iftness
and effectiveness. The four years
which a boy spends in college helps
him to get into the great places in
his chosen calling earlier, and prob
ably to continue in them longer. l
chance to know that one of the
greatest retail houses in one of the
greatest cities-the identity of which
[ cannot, of course, reveal-has re-
Gently drawn up articles of part
nership TO cover the next fifty years.
Among the articles of the compact is
that every son of these partners
shall serve an apprenticeship of five
years but, it is added, every son
who has had a college education may
have this period of five years re-
duced to three. This instance posi-
bly, receives additional force from
the fact that this house is composed
of members of that race which, on
the whole, furnishes the BEST mer-
chants in the worId,-tne Jewish ;
a race that has not been specially dis
tinguished-despite many ~cOnspicu-
{ CyceptiOns,-fOr its partiality
tO"aru til higher ouucutloD. one
of the great hardware firms of Cleve-
land Is accustomed to say that, when
a college graduate has been in it's
employ a fortnight, he is of as much
value as d high-scOOl graduate who
has been in its employ four years ;
and, Of course, after the fortnight,
his value increases in "a geOmetrical
ratio. This remark of my Cleve-
LAND friend seems to be o strong.
but 1 venture TO give 1t as evidence
OF the claim that a college education
Is a good investment of time.
3.-WOrk, too, is force which the