The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1902-12-07

a vim whatever his hand found to do. he
managed TO buy his own clothes and liqui-
date his other debts and pile up eduoatio
10 the Newark public schools till he reached
schoolmastei parted company.
There usei TO be rowing regattas on
the Passaic River at Newark every Fourth
of July. Lehman thought he might as
veil make the holiday folks contribute to
his substance, 30 he walkod from Newark
across the Hackensack meadows, came
over TO Washington Market and invested
tho greater part Of his savings in hard
shell crabs, much to the disgust OF his
pious Jewish mother, who would have
persisted sooner than take a dollar from
this forbidden food
Then he set up q stand by the river bank
ard waited for the hungry. Ii was a hot
day. and he had no ice, and the upshot
OF that venture WAS that when tho odor
Of tho little traders offence against his
reision rose 70 heaven policeman ordered
him to dump the crabs into the river.
That was the only absolute failure In
Edgar Lehman's business career. One OF
tho Edison people got him TO talk the story
into a phonograph, and they sometimes
reel it of for the edifcation Of visitors at
the wizards laboratory over in West
Orange.
In the next few years Lehman learned
TO make cigars and to cut furs and TO peddle
toys. He lost his job at Cigarmaking at
II o'clock one day and went into the fur
trade before noon.
II WAS during a time OF depression +" the
frr trade that Lehman went. like Simon
Leti OF Hester street, into toy peddG,e
le was walking through a downtown
business street one day late In the fall,
when he notio'd a sign Of q dry goods auc
ton house and. lad by an instinct for bar
gains, went in
Among the goods that we're to be put up
for sale were several cases containing
thousands Of water-soaked imported dolls
Tho dissolving glue had parted their china
heads from their bodies and their saw
dust innards ware W.T. and sNasick
There wore few bidders for thss, poor
Pollvs and they were knocked down to
Lehman NJ 81 casa.
When this merchandise came home there
was a great buzging Of gossip in tn, Nor
folk street tenement house. Lehman got
his father, who was th,n out of work. to
dry out the dolls and glue their heads back
upon thcir plump shoulders. and h. and q
young partner hired horse and wagon
and peddcd them at 10 cents "a piece along
the curb on Avenue A. The larger and
better ones he sold by the dozen 10 retailers
That venture brought several hundred
dollars apiece TO all who were engaged In
II, aid never before or since have there
been ~ May hristmas dolls In tho stock
ings Of Avenue A.
In another period Of hard timss for the
lui iudnci ., ~ " if'u tOSS iTOIu u
basket In Grand street It was snowy
winter when that turn of fortune came to
him, but tho snow was never 40 deep nor
the slush 30 wet. nor the wind 40 cold az
to drive Iehman's jumping jacks and
low-born doll babies OF the busy streets,
He was married by that time and had
others to look out for, but, married or sin gle,
he tells his friends he has newer been out
OF employment for a day.
II "a less than twenty years since the
Grand street pedler hung up his basket for
good. II 10 only little more than ten years
since he went into the Wholesale fur bnsi-
less for himself He made bet In October
Of this year that ne would sell 800, 900 worth
Of goods In one day. and didn't win it-but
he sold tet 400 worth. which Is rather good
pr gress from tho toy-pedl,nR days
They ray N the wholo>a fur trade that
Lehman was the hrs, man who made his
stock look attractive to buyop. The Toe
fields q the Arctic. The jyT sles Of l.di.
E, Eur sand and both X%oric.a hsre u ..nt their
warmest and their soft~st and most brauti-
fvl pslts 70 him. Polar bear russ strstoh