The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1905-04-06
FILLING THE LoNG-FELr WANT

From the Washington Post
Nothing is more provocative of
sm5e than the statement that some one
has filed a long-felt want. The saying
has become trite. It is used nowadays
more in sarcasm than in earnest, and
yet there is nothing more true than the
fact that the filing OF long-felt want
is the surest road to prosperity.
A recent publication contains an in
teresting recital Of the careers of men
who have accumulated fortunes through
their keenness of vision in seeing that
something was lacking, and their ability
to supply the deficiency. The black
smith who devised the combination iron
hoops and bolts which are used to fas-
ten water tanks and large casks is en-
joying an income of $4,000 a year. The
workman who first proposed to weld the
steel rails of electric roads has already
received $780, COO in royalties. The farm
er who knew the effectiveness of a fam
lily liniment and began to peddle it
through his county now manages to ex-
list comfortably on an income of 81 900
a month A court house janitor who
spent IS cents of his hard-earned wages
on his way home in order that his chill
dren might have the pleasure of riding
upon the merry gO-round was even
wiser than the average man. He ar
gued that if he spent So cents out Of
his meager earnings, other people would
pay for amusement also. So he mort
gagged his family goods to make a first
payment on a merry-go-round for him
self. Then he began to take in other
peoples money, and now he travels in
3 private car, and has several carnival
shows upon the road.
These instances are not exceptions
Fortune after fortune has been made
because somebody made it his business
to provide something for which the
world was waiting. If you produce an
essential article a purchaser will al
ways be waiting to buy it. and the price
which it viii command viii depend al
together upon its quality, necessity, and
excIusiveness. In the markets of the
world, brains are bought and sold, and
those brains command the highest
prices which are unique in their devel-
opment and resOurcefulness The man
who achieves success is the man who can
do something better than his neighbor
Last week a vaudeville artist received
a large salary for a performance which
did not occupy him more than one hour
out Oh LEG q. he IIld0G more money III
a day than the employees Of the theater
in which he appeared would receive in
six months, simply because the thing
which he essayed to do was done bet
ter by him than by any one else in the
world. In the amusement world he
filed a long-felt want and profted
thereby, Just as the men who invented
the telephone were enabled to accumu-
late millions. People had lived for thou
sands of years without being able to
communicate over long distances with
each other. This fact did not lessen the
advantage of such communication when
it was made possible. and today the
world would feel a distinct shock to its
progress if all telephones were blotted
out Of existence.
The moral of all this is that the COM
monplace plodder. who day by day
/ YEARLY rounds out his treadmill expert
| enee, cannot hope to make substantial
/ progress in the world. A man. to be
successful nowadays must literally fill