The Mitchell capital. (Mitchell, Dakota [S.D.]) 1879-1918, 1907-11-08
BEN j. GREEAHu1

tering Conditions of the Girl
and Woman Who Works.
BY Maruaret Robe.
Most OF us, if born into a family
famous for fortune, would be little
inclined to follow the rigid rules of
s%elf-support laid down for the guild
ance of the less favored. For possess
ion usually dulls desire, and the in
heritor of the kingdom of millions
seldom feels called upon to prove
claim to his title by actual, strenu-
Gus effort of hands and head. When
you do meet with a man who rises
above accidental dollars and "does
the thing as he sees it for the God
Of Things as They Are" his life and
works are worth thinking about.
This sort of a rarity is Ben j.
GreenhWt, financial head of the house
of Siegel-Cooper, thirty-seven years
of age, and the youngest man in the
world to hold such a post in an es-
Enlistment of such magnitude. Ben
spoon and cut glass finger bowl and
all the rest of the classy fiXings.
There really was never any necessity
of his lifting a finger. The maid
servant or man servant would have
lifted 1t for him, at the youngsters
nod, OF the service would have been
performed by the stranger within the
gates, eager to please the heir of
the Greenhuts. Ben Greenhut didn't
have to work. through necessity. But
he did have to work through inclina-
ton.
When he was seventeen years old
Greenhut went to work for his father
who was then a big distiller. For
twenty years since he has been work
ing and it's a mighty good thing for
thousands of men and women
throughout America that this has
been so. For, in his energetic, COM
polling, tactful way, he has done
things for the workers that have had
their effect in other mercantile
houses and resulted in abundant good
to the many. Before he gets through
his self-appointed task, the present
possibilities for Improvement in the
condition of employees will probably
have become actualities.
| IJo,o +b1o%1, soIyo~ -1-, III &1yS ~.
the other day he would work anoth-
er dozen years and then stop. He
said this-his own scheme of things,
and n that bears no copyright, so
maybe its adoption by others may
follow-"Work hard until you're If
ty. You can do a lot Of good up I'd
that time. And after then you're en-
titled to enjoyment"
About the time the Siegel-Cooper
lcombination began forming, Ben
Greenhut induced his father to take
an interest in that giant enterprise,
and Ben, himself, became active as
the head of the financial branch. The
treasurer was only twenty-five years
old then, but he had some ideas
that might have been passed out by
a grey-beard without loss Of repu.
tation for wisdom. When he got the
run of things in the big New York
establishment the effect of these
a soon became apparent.
Mr.. Greenhut took an interest in
people. More than that, an interest
in persons. An overwhelming inter.
est in the success Of the store; and
this firms success he set down as
the Effect, the employees success the
Cause. When you work from a pre-.
mise like this. you are bound to gel
result. For example, here is one
OF the Greenhut observations:
IT believe in the theory that the
best people are the cheapest, no mat.
ter what the salary may be-"
And SO he proceeded to get the
best people. If he found that some
of his employees could not ~conscien.
tiously be included in such a classih.
cation. he didn't Immediately discard
them, as some employers do, but
rather set out to improve them as
Ito qualify them for the characterize
ton. To this end, he organized Wei
fare Work. He placed in charge q
woman. sympathetic, understanding,
helpful, inquiring. He wanted to i'm.
prove the standard of his house and
to do this. he had to fill his aides
with the ambition to do better things.
The Welfare Work has been and is
being conducted on the most sys-
tematic of principles. The auditors
from time to time prepare statistics
showing the amount of sales made
by each individual employee. The
names Of those in each department