The Birmingham age-herald., 1907-09-20
LITTLE STORIES IF NOTABLE AMERICANS John D. Rockefeller is ExtraVa-
 gant About Shoes CHARLESTON ARMSTRONG Old Man Has Been Marine Editor for Over Fifty Years and Has
 Marvellous Mem
 ory.
BY FREDERIC J. HAsKlN.

l CHe Wollu, mas put one personal eXuaN- agance. Although he Is able to gratfy
 any desire that money can buy. and is in
 command of a salve as powerful as tie
 one attached to Alladins lamp, he doesn't t care to spend his money for anything | but shoes Simple as his taste Is in 1 spect to all other articles of wearing l apparel, Mir Rockefeller's shoes must be l just right. He has them made to order l by a Cleveland shoemaker and he doesn't
 car what the price may be if the shoes 1 suit his foot and please his fancy. He
 orders new pairs continuously, and is said
 to have as large g. personal collection of l shoes as any opera queen. On the golf l links the Standard oil magnet Is the
 most democratic of men. Of late years 1 he has showed a great fondness for as-
 sociating with younger people, even with i the somewhat irreverent young men who
 make their living by writing for newspa-
 pers. To one of his newspaper friends | who played golf with him this summer,
 Mir. Rockefeller said: "I enjoy being with young men so much that I wish
 eould seek their society more freely But
 1t Is hard for me to have friends. I meet
 people and begin to like them. Then
 they hit me in the back with a contribu-
 tion box" MT. Rockefeller than gave his
 newspaper friend an opening: How are
 you getting on financially?" he asked. As
 well as a man of my age could hope or 1 expect" replied the correspondent brave ly. And they resumed the game.
 Col James Armstrong, commercial and marine editor of the Charleston News and Courier, is blessed with a memory which
 comprehends the impor tant events and
 the minute details of all that has hap
 pened in and about the port of Charles ton for the past fifty years. The News
 and Courier is the third oldest daily newspaper in the United States. It has had a marine department since the late twenties of the last century. It's first ma
 rne editors was James Gordon Bennett, { afterwards the founder of the New York Herald and the father of modern Ameri- can journalism. He was succeeded by William S. King, who continued his acliv- ity until 1852. Then there were several , others and shortly after the civil war Colonel Armstrong took up the work,
 which he is still doing.
 To illustrate how details are stored in
 his memory a friend engaged him in con versation about ante-bellum politics. "In what building was the democratic conven- tion of 1860 hed?" he was asked Tn the old South Carolina hall which was burned
 during the war. I remember the arrival Of the Massachusetts delegation. Caleb Cushing and Benjamin r. Butler were it's leaders. Cushing was made president of the convention and Butler distinguished
 himself by voting for Jefferson Davis for nfty-seven ballots. The Massachusetts delegation came by sea in the steamer s. R. Spaulding. They had Gilmore's band
 with them, and were given a great recep- ton when they landed"
 Colonel Armstrong was a Confederate soldier, and was badly wounded in the leg a few days before Lees surrender. He was taken prisoner and was in d hos pital tent at City Point, Va. MT. Lincoln was there and came into the tent and spoke ot him kindly. After a few days Colonel Armstrong was taken to Wash ington, arriving on the same day Lincoln assassnated. When the news of the
 tragedy in Ford's theatre reached the hos pltal nurse told Colonel Armstrong. Next morning he awakened and thought he had dreamed of the President having been shot and he turned to another
 wounded prisoner and began to tell his dream. The other man held up news
 paper, black-bordered, and Armstrong knew 1t was mot dream. He was In that
 hospital Just one year Then he limped back to Charleston and his ships, to begin | five decades of hard work.
 l James T. Harahan, president of the IT. linois Central railroad, whose quarrel with 1 his predecessor, Stuyvesant Fish, has at
 tracted so much newspaper attention, was ] once a democratic ward politician. Tt was i long ago in the days when he was a sec
 ton boss. Harahan was born in New | England of Irish percentage Soon after
 the close of the civil war he found him
 self working as a section hand on the ] Illinois and Nashville railroad in Ten
 nessee. He was made boss of the section | at Columbia Politics was hot In those days, and Harahau went in and got cou-
 trol of the Third ward, which sent him
 several times to the Board of Aldermen. As a section boss he worked hard. The l men higher up noticed that he could get more work and better work out of a gang 1 of negro laborers than anybody else. He
 climbed until he was at the head of the | operating department of the Louisville l and Nashville. Then the Illinois Central
 took him away and for sixteen years he | was vice president of that railroad. His | espousal of the cause of Hartman and
 his supplanting Fish are events of re- | cent history.
 When many young men were going west 1 in accordance with the advice of Horace | Greeley. John l.. Young, promoter and | part owner of Young's new million dollar pier at Atlantic City, decided that a strip | of sand along the Atlantic coast was | the greatest piece of pay dirt between | New York and California for the man who
 worked 1t right. MT. Young was an | humble carpenter earning less than $10
 week, and for time it was difficult to save anything, but by pinching and l giving notes he managed to buy some sea front land in the village of Atlantic | City, which then had no large hotels and was in its infancy as a resort.
 | MT. Young was a native of the vicinity | of Atlantic City, and his faith was strong. although his purse was weak. He saw in
 the future a great playground for the over heated enervated millions of the
 great eastern cities. He induced fellow worlxmen to invest their savings with his
 in land and advised them to continue to put their money in Atlantic City instead of savings bank He worked for a time as a life guard when not employed at his trade All of his money went back
 into the ground as he got 1t. After a, time he built Young's hotel the first freproof hotel at Atlantic City, and Young's pier. or Youngs old pier as it is now called Then he began to make money rapidly. He bought still more land. some of which he has since dis posed of al enormous profits.