Ottumwa tri-weekly courier. [volume] (Ottumwa, Iowa) 1903-1916, 1906-10-23

and when the officials of the st. Paul
did not think his office ability was up
to the required mark he took the only
thing offered him.
1t was q saw and axe and permission
to work twelve hours cutting wood.
The engineers jollied him when they
/ stopped at his pile for wood, and bad
gered him about his ambition to be-
come railroad man.
4 son tho line yet, Brown" asked one,
some months after the boy had begun
work.
Brown nodded. ''Yessiree," he said,
Eemphatically, Il am. Monday become
a section hand"
The engineer laughed and then
slapped the boy on the back.
Good for you," he said Maybe
some day you'll be section foreman"
Section foreman was a high position,
but in odd hours and after the work
of the day, or the night was done
4 Brown mastered telegraphy. A chance
came one day when an operator did
not turn up and Brown stepped in and
sent SO well that he was put on as a
1
4 Dispatcher at Nineteen.
4 At nineteen he was we'll enough
known and highly enough esteemed to
be able to get the place of train des-
patcher on the Illinois Central, and
never lost an hour Of time or made a
bIunder.
In 1881, when he was chief train dis
patcher of the Chicago, Burlington &
Quincy, he was made trainmaster and
by 1890 had worked himself up to the
place Of superintendent
His system of working differed con-
siderably from that Of other men. Ev-
erything was organized on basis that
was almost military, and went forward
with clock-like precision The dis
cipline was strict, but the men never
protested against that, because they
knew Browns impartia! Justice.
Yet he was almost automatic in
swooping down on mistake, and
equally automatic IL following it up
to. the one who was guilty of it. The
trick of precision, and of working with
such intense attention to detail, was
learned in the train diapatcher's Office,
and was never forgotten.
| Its application to the general work
Of the ROAD brought out the best that
was in the men, and 1T eliminated in a
great degree the chance Of errors. The
effect of II, too, was good. for the men
who were trained by Brown speedily
made their mark in railroading.
Able to Handle Four Lines at Once.
During the SIX years following 1890
he was general manager of the Hanni-
Bal and st. Joseph and the Kansas
City, st. Joseph and Council Bluffs
lines of The Burlington system, and he
also found time to fill the office Of
general manager Of couple of other
lines.
In 1902 he became president of the
New York Central, and on him de-
volved mucn Of the work Of putting
the road in better shape than It had
been for several years There was
considerable frictic-, owing to lack of
centralized management. Mr.. Wander
bilt, VINO alone WIS supreme, spent
much of hi time away from business
affairs, and as no one in the system
could initiate any large undertaking,
tue road was often the loser.
Part Of the trouble was due to lack
of equipment, and the Central has suf-
/ AOACu l1ou LIN VI CitIS luOlO SOlIeu
than its rivals did, f.: one-half the po-
pulation of tho United States is in the
territory covered by the Vanderbilt
4 lines. The first work Brown under
took was to put the rolling stock in
condition and make 1t adequate to any
sudden demands. AS preliminary he
4 ordered two hundred locomotives.
Next year." he said in comforting
way, when some Of the directors held
up their hands in protest, well order
three hundred"
So the orders went out, cars by the
thousand, locomotives by the hundred
and orders placed ahead so there would
\ be chance for delivery in season
4 B.own knows the in and out of farm
ing, and his long service in and wide
knowledge of the biz agricultural re
gions of the country have fitted him
to pass upon what must be done.
He enabled the Central to take nd
vantage of the big crops of the past
few years In 1905 he sent out an order
for three hundred and eighty locomo
tives for delivery in 1906, because
there had been o shortage the previous
year. Then Def. e these were deliy
cred he placed an order for two hun
dred to be delivered in the first three
months OF 1907.
By such methods he broke the short
ag,, ana though 1t has cost millions Of
dollars for re-equipment, the expendi
I ture has been justified by the returns
that have come lin the way of traffic.