Los Angeles herald., 1909-09-10
Los ANGELES HERAID FRIDAY MORNING. SEPTEMBER

If he was seen to be in a bod way, they
would tumble. Until one or the other
was definitely known there was moth |
ing doing.
His arrival satisfied the brokers that
the railroad king was far from we'll |
man. After his retreat to Arden the
rumor was noised about that he in
tended virtually to retire. On this
mere breath his stocks were hammered
down, down till Union Pacific fell off
6 or z points, Southern Pacific New
York Central and others sharing in the
decline. 1t was a striking tribute to
the mans power, a testimonial to the
estimate put upon his financial mastery
by Wall street. There was no Senti- |
ment in it, There never is in these !
bull and bear raids. They are as ut
terly merciless as an earthquake or a
cyclone. There is not a heart beat in
the whole high finance body, however |
many there may be in the individuals
who compose it. And when the bears
pounded down those Hartman securi- |
ties in the days when their master lay
i'll at Arden they merely advertised that
they had been afraid of the man and
showed what they would do when the
fear was even a little abated.
There are many popular misconcep- !
tions concerning Hartman. One is
that he was a man with an abnor-
mally large brain, which sapped the
life from his understood body. Harri-
mans head was not large. 1t was un-
der rather than over the normal size.
1t was quite we'll proportioned to his
small stature. His body gave the i'm
preston of slightness, it is true, but it
was not emaciated, except in his last
illness. 1t was wiry and quick as a
steel spring He was stopped, as are
most men who think much. He was
never a careful dresser and was quite
commonplace in appearance. But the |
idea that his brain ate up his body is
mere flight of fancy. 1t might be said
as truly of any man who is at the head
of big things in this day of gigantic |
undertakings.
Smartest Boy of His Glass
Another mistaken notion is that Mr..
Hartman was born in New Jersey. |
He was born at Hampstead, Long Is
land, in the state of New York, Feb |
ruary %, 1S4S. He was the fourth child
of a poor Episcopalean minister whose
salary sometimes amounted to as
much as 5000 a year. 1t was after the
future railroad kings advent that the
family moved to Jersey, settling in a
modest portion of Jersey City, just off
the Hackensack meadows. 1t was not
a promising environment, but there
were rich relations on both sides of the |
house. The lad went to Trinity school
in New York, walking three miles each
way He had a reputation, which still
survives of having been the worst boy
and the smartest of his class. At the
age of IA he quit school altogether and
entered a brokers' office. The first year
he earned the magnificent salary of 30 |
q week, and even this pittance he
turned over to his father.
Friend of Children
Perhaps the only beings with whom
Edward H. Hartman the man ever
entirely unbent were children. In New
York he was the head Of great boys |
institution, a sort of combined gym
nasium, club and debating society, for
more than quarter of a century
At Arden he was never so happy as
when he had an automobile load of
little ones and was spinning about the |
countryside To them he was not the |
cold business machine known to the |
world. He was "Pop" Hartman, their |
comrade and friend. Perhaps he was
so unreserved with the children be-
cause they did not ask him leading
questions and try to take away his |
money. In the country he was as God |
made him. In business he was as wall
street made him. There is differ
ence here, one that will appear greater
the more it is contemplated.
Great Constructive Genius
The best two things about Mr. Her
riman were that he was constructive |
and had a national view of things. He |
was not alone a stock manipulator
but a builder History must give him |
this credit. 1t is questionable II we
have had any greater railroad builders
than he. The manner in which he
took the rundown and bankrupt Union
Pacific, went over the ground and saw
the business there was for the line,g
coupled with the subsequent courage
and energy he displayed in pouring
hundreds of millions into straighten-
ing and improving the road, showed a
constructive genius of the first order.
Ruthless he might have been, yet the
fact that he did things, and big things
at that, must be told to his praise.
The story of bridging Great Salt lake
and draining the Salton sea is not one
that could be told of every man, not
even of every railroad king. He touched
most of the properties that came un-
der his control only to build them up.
Overcapitalize he probably did, al
though he called 1t capitalizing the fu-
ture. Used Wall street methods some
of them of a doubtful kind-with this
his enemies charged him., And Harri-
man had enemies, bitter and big ones,
with Theodore Roosevelt, president
of the United States, at their head. 1t
is perfectly true that in the world of
mon he had more foes that hated him
than friends that loved him. Yet when
this is said we cannot forget those
east side boys in New York nor those
shouting children at Arden. A man
that loves child and is loved by it in
return cannot be all bad.
Harrimans national vision was
shown in manifold ways. Though
born near New York city and living
in or about it all his life, he did not
have the New York viewpoint. He
saw America from the angle of the
Pacific coast and of the central west,
as we'll as of the east. He had enough
imagination to forecast the future of
the country, to count on it as a most
important factor in all his business
enterprises. He could see the desir-
ability of buying steamship lines
across the Pacific, of planning rail-
road in Mexico. Few men realized
the possibilities of the great empire
building on the shores of the Pacific
ocean with more clearness than Har-
riman. Though small in body and
even in brain, he was not small in
his grasp of things. He thought in
terms of the continent planned in
millions, built with systems.
His Greatest Monument
Hartman has often been compared
to Jay Gould. In my own opinion, he
was a bigger man than Gould and
better one. With all the abuse that
has been h -aped upon him he is en-
titled to that which his own deeds
carved out. He was not as shreWd