davidaulloa/AmericanStories huggingface dataset:
The Birmingham age-herald., 1911-09-24

statement, over eagerness; just 8 gracious, sincere presentation. She gave her whole attention to patron. Once the customer gave her name and address, that nama or address never was forgotten. Neither dld the girl ever forget face.
 If there is an aristocracy of trade In New York. that Broadway house had the patronage of the aristocracy in it's part'c- ular line The aristocracy loves to be known and to be well served. It piq les if it does not actually offend. a woman of wealth and fashion, when in a shop, to have to explain who she is to each and every salesgirl she purchases from She remembers the girl who remembers her and sine remembers the girl who rr1ly
 knows her business.
 In the few weeks of that holiday season
 various fashionable women noted the
 clever little girl at the ribbon counter.
 When they passed her post. although they did rot need her pretty goods, they bowed a greeting and she smiled her acknowl- edgnent of 1t.
 Apparently it was not only the custoni- CTS who noticed the girl who sold ribbons those Christmas days. When the holiday season closed and the time came for the extra hands to be dismissed and even for some of the regular employees to be laid off. one of the proprietors of the estab- ltSniieHt IeilidTheu lial hiHo lhNe ioSiN11 was to be retained. The store was not so big that its proprietors were altogether removed from contact with their employees or knowledge of the workings of the whole machine. AS they made their rounds they had an opportunity to observe what WAS going on. Even the crush of holiday shop ping did not blind them to the fact that a girl out of the ordinary was behind their ribbon counter, that she knew how to dis play what she had for sale, and that the patrons left her with a smile of satisfac- tion and good feeling. They noted, too, that the sales at the ribbon counter vere greater that Christmas than they ever mad been in any psevious holiday season. So, when all the other extra hands went, Mary McCloskey stayed.
 All this time little Miss McCloskey was getting SS a week. She was born almos, round the corner from the store and Gle
The Birmingham age-herald., 1911-09-24

binations of color, that charm the eyes and hearts of the women, she searches For as a collector of rare things hunts the highways and byways for his particular treasure. And she finds them. She has become such a figure that the masters of the mills, the great princes of the palaces of trade--even the women of Normandy, of Belgium and of Ireland, whose manip- ulations of their hundreds of little spools and bobbns has raised them to the rank of artists hold their choicest products for Miss McCloskey's coming.
 The girls in the store no longer wonder why the boss selected her to go abroad. The growth of her departments has been based upon the things that the keen Judg- ment of this woman buyer has brought to them. It is chiefly through her selection of goods that her house has grown into specializing in these particular lines. To- day she buys for six departments. She buys the neckwear. the waists, the hand kerchiefs. the robes, the unmade blouscs and all the material that goes into the manufacturing workroom, which employs 100 girls and women in the busy season.
 Going abroad has no further terrors for Mary McCloskey. It Is a part of the days work. She no longer has to hunt round, dreading to make mistakes. Mill men and merchants now look for her expectantly. Her arrival is chronicled and reported as that of an important parsonage. Men Of high reputation in the trade follow Ter lead, glad to purchase anything that she approves. The ribbon girl of ten 2ears ago has become a permanent figure in the dry goods world of two continents. When she returns to New York after one of ner semi-annual trips she has the pleasant knowledge that thousands of America S best dressed and wealthiest women are wearing garments and garnitures of her personal selection.
 She has no more devoted admirers than the girls in the shops and in the work rooms. It is an event when her models are displayed. The girls never cease wonder ing where she finds many beautiful things or how she has developed her eX- quisite taste.
 Either Miss McCloskey or her employer eas a fine economical sense. The made up
The Birmingham age-herald., 1911-09-24

ner into buyer? Not only a buyer, but a foreign buyer. Sending her abroad To France, of all places, to buy goods for the house. And not only that, the girl he had selected to. buy neclIwear and waists abroad had never even sold a waist or bit of neckwear in all her life before. What did Mary McClosley, born in Sew enteenth street, practically round the cor ner from the store, still living in Seven teenth street and never far from New York in her life, know about traVelinS to Europe as purchaser for a great NeW York establishment? Assuredly 1t was ab- surd; everybody in the store realized that except the boss.
 His buyer of necllwear and waists had left suddenly. This buyer had always purchased goods in America. It would have seemed bad enough if Miss McClos- key had the responsibility of buying as the former buyer had done. But 1t was the boss's s idea to make these purchases abroad. To send Miss McCloskey over there to do buying of goods she never had handled stupefied everybody from the booklSeepers to the cash girls who sat in judgment on the boss every day and eich and every one of whom knew far better than the boss how the business should be run.
 But the boss had been watching. He had kept one eye on the ribbon counter and one on his customers who were served there. He had. in fact, studied men and women for many years. He knew . ous- mess woman when he saw one. He con- sidered the s10 a week young woman in the ribbon department as good business person as he had seen in long time. The technicalities of waists and neclSwear, he figured, could be acquired. The learning of them was detail.
 Probably the parents of Mary McClos- key did not cross the ocean from Queens town to New York with any greater par turbation than did Miss McCloskey her self when she sailed away to Europe as buyer for this New York house. It was a new world she entered. A few necessary instructions were given her, but the rest was for her to find out, guided by her own good judgment. Probably the boss was a better reader of human nature than
The Birmingham age-herald., 1911-09-24

he ever had been given credit for. Ger tain it was that the responsibility of the ribbon counter was nothing to the re- sponsibility of entering a strange city, visiting strange mills going to lana where a strange language was spoken and buying goods which might mean profit or great loss to her employer. She had to go to mills, she had to go to great whole sale and great retail establishments. She had to carry on her conversation in some instances through an interpreter. She didn't know word of French and she doesn't know much of it now. She hao to figure closely on goods upon which profit could be made. She had to sense what would appeal to the most critical women buyers of the western world. She had to have almost a psychic foreknowl- edge of coming styles It was necessary for her to pit her instinct and business sense against the shreWdest minds In the trade She had to blaze her own way. The house had never had foreign represent ative in her line before. She had to stum- ble and grope. It takes higher courage for woman to cross the ocean and travel as she did than for any man to start out and tour America selling goods. And many man has found this ordeal too much and given up. It has taken lots of them years to find themselves. Miss Mccloskeys first trip was not what she considered a perfect success. It was two years before she was satisfied with the work she did. She had much to learn, many pitfalls to avoid which are dug for inexperienced buyers, and she had to de- pend on her own common sense and chrewdness to buy wisely and well.
 But her employer never had any doub, from the beginning. Her first trip satis- fled him, and everything after that only confirmed him in his belief. It is ten years since Mary McCloslSey first crossed the seas Twice a year from that tlme sne has made trip. Now she is known to Switzerland, to France, to Belgium and to Ireland. There is nothing created by the great artists of fashion. in her P IT, ticular lines, that she is not among the first to get. The finest products of the looms, the most delicate of needlework, the daintiest of creations, the newest com
The Birmingham age-herald., 1911-09-24

than it is now. They are doing so much that their number will be increased, and 1t is the intention of the department to have each of them spend part or ms time in the United States, coming in ac- tual contact with our exporters and manu- lecturers, and giving them suggestions as to our foreign trade and how to oeVeiop It. The experts on cotton will visit the cotton centers, and those on steel VIII go to the steel mills and steel shippers. lt will be the same with every branch or business. Each industry Will pc tolu where and how it can ship its goods to the best advantage and the faults which now prevail as to our dealings With foreigners will be pointed out and corrected.
 Among the important things which the bureau of manufactures has been recently doing is the gathering of fresh informa- tion as to how goods should be packed. About a year ago pamphlet of this kind was published and it created great deal of comment Since then I am told that our shipments have been improved, and that something like so per cent of the goods now sent abroad are properly packed. The worst work is that done in the export of raw cotton. Tho bales are poorly put up; the burlap is torn and a great deal of cotton is wasted. Our consuls say that the Russians, Egyptians and East Indians have much better cot-  altogether something like s20.000,000 worth of damages is lost to railroads through improper packing.
 From the consular reports which have recently come l find many comments us to the Improvements in packing. Consul General Mason, at Paris, says our French exports gre very much better put up than they have been in the past, but that our packages are often too heavy and that the goods should be so arranged that they cannot move inside the boxes. Consul General Skinner, at Hamburg. says tnat our packing Is as good as that of any m the world and that bad packing usually comes from new firms that do not under stand the market.
 Other consuls, and especially those os Asia and South America, urge that the goods be packed in waterproof boxes or bales, and that they be so fastened that offering Is not easy. The Chinese con- suls say that the knot holes in boxes should be covered by pieces of tin .lail,d on the inside and that all packages for the interior should be made so that they could be carried on wheelbarrows or by porters.
 In my tall, with MT, Baldwin he referred to the Trade Directory which has just been issued by his bureau. This is vol- ume as big as dictionary. which contains the names of 125.C00 business men in the leading cities and ports outside the United states. These named have been sent in by the consuls and they should be of value to all those who sell goods abroad Tho book Is for sale at 8. which was about the cost of publication.
The Birmingham age-herald., 1911-09-24
UNCLE SAM EXPORTER-By Frank c. Carpenter

erlands. These are only few of several
 pages of titles. They show the range of
 the work.
 Uncle Sam's Drummers
 In talking with the chief of the bureau
 of manufacturers I gathered some lnfor.
 nation as to Uncle Sam's drummers, as
 his travelling commercial agents might. be
 called. In addition to our consuls at the
 chief cities and ports the world over, the
 bureau has it's own commercial agents who are sent abroad to investigate the
 markets for special manufactures and to report upon trade conditions. These men are specialists along the line which they investigate They know all about the in dustries at home and what is required for pushing them abroad. They are paid fixed salaries and their travelling expenses, ana they devote their entire time to going over the world looking up openings for Amer ican trade. By the time this letter is pub lished there will be about dozen of them on the road. There are nine or ten at work now, some in Europe, some in Asia, and some in South America and Austra- lia Among them are Maj. J. M. Carson, former chief of the bureau, and trade K pert from Seattle, who Is devoting himself especially to trade between our Pacific coast and the Orient.
 Chances for American Cotton The work done by these special agents
 is valuable They send back full inforra- tion as to how goods should be made for the various markets. and how packed and shipped. w.. A. Graham Clark. for in- stance. has recently returned from South
 America, where he has been Investigating
 cotton goods, and shows the enormous
 market which the United States might
 have there if its manufactures were prop
 erly pushed. He reports that the Euro
 pean trade in these goods is increasIiig
 and that it is much greater than that of
 the United States. In 1910 we shipped to
 Latin America less than $S.0Jo,G00 worth of
 cotton piece goods, while the United King
 dom sold something like s40000,O00 worth that year. The trade of Germany in such goods is more than twice as much as ours, and Italy is selling more to South Amer lea than we sell to Central America, lhe West Indies and South America conl- bined. Great Britain sells more than twice as much cotton goods to Argentina
 as we sell to the whole of Latin America, and to Argentina and Brazil more cotton than we sell to all the world outside the United States.
 Another special agent has just sent in q | report on the shoe and leather trade III which he shows that our exports of these goods have increased about $1o,0G1,090 In '- l ing the past year. Of the shoes Sz000, 600 or SS,010O00 worth went to Latin America,
 and more than s5.C0o,Cc0 to Mexico. Trade Lecturers
 Congress has made an appropriation of s6O,000 for these commercial travellers this scope of their work will be much wider
The Birmingham age-herald., 1911-09-24

models she brings home are taken to tn
 workroom and literally dissected, to flnt out just what enters into their hafmonles
 of color and fabric. Then begins the worH of duplication-the creation of articles So
 like the originals that only an expert can
 tell them apart The deicacy of some ot
 these fabrics is marvellous, and the
 amount of detail in the making of certain
 garments almost beyond belief. All of tni
 work comes under the supervision of Mary
 McCloskey. All of 1t has to be, turned
 out within certain time to catch thd
 trade for the house is both wholesale and
 retail in her particular lines. The repre- sentatives of the emporiums of the east,
 the south, the west, the middle west, watch for her spring and fall displays Of
 the great houses of the Rue de la Paix. She has become the great figure m her
 brancA of trade. a. She Noes not get $S a week now. It is
 nearer $S000 a year But she is the same
 Mary McCoskey who went behind the ribbons to a world of many wondrous fab same fine sense of making the most at | tractive exhibition of the goods she has 1 to sell, and she pays the same deep earn | est attention to those she serves. Her world has broadened from the world Of | ribbon sto world of many wondrous fab- | rics, but she was the same faithful work | CT when she got the sS a week as she is l now, when she gets nearly three times SS | day. She is one living eSampe-the best
 New York offers-of the fact that there is
 opportunity even in the big dry goods fied
 for the humblest worker in a great estab- 1 ishment. She has never worked but for the one employer. She has never had to
 ask for an increase. She has climbed to the top most rung of the ladder through | sheer ability.
 l It is not the fall display of Miss Me- l Cioskey's latest purchases that interests the girls of the shop most, however, just now They are concentrating their sonie- what uneasy attention upon certain sol itaire that gleams upon the third finger of | her left hand But it Is doubtful, even #
 their worst suspicious are confirmed, that l the business world will lose Mary Mc-
 Closkey, buyer of beautiful things.
 l Copyright, 1911, by Richard Spillane)
The Birmingham age-herald., 1911-09-24

and of them five are each making prod ucts of more than s1,00o, ,Ooo,oo0 year.
 Moreover the amounts are steadily in- creasing and We need more foreign trade to keep the hands busy. Our foreign sales already foot up over $I63. .0O0,0c0, and had we the markets we could easily make 1t a billion. They now amount to about 45 per cent of our exports, which is 10 per cent more than they were in 1900 and iver double the amount of our exports of man ufactures in the year 1899. Indeed we are rapidly climbing to the top among the na- tions which are selling the most goods made by machine and by hand. We now rank third, being only exceeded by Great Britain and Germany.
 Uncle Sam's Export Bureau
 All this is preliminary to a talk which I have just had with MT. A. H. Baldwin, the chief of the bureau of manufactures of the Department of Commerce and La bor, and of the story of how Uncle Sam
 is trying to push foreign trade. This bu- reau was established to collect informa- tion as to the openings for American goods and as to where and how the goods should be shipped. It is operated in con junction with the consular service, and gathers all sorts of information for our manufacturers who would do business
 abroad. It publishes a daily paper made
 up of the reports of the consuls as they come in. and has on hand a vast amount of confidential information which 1t for
 wards to those factories which can supply foreign needs.
 This daily is about the only paper pub | ished by the United States government l The copy issued this morning now lies be- | fore me It contains 20 pages, and has re- | ports, from Japan, China. Germany, Eng | iand Australia and Canada. Severa | pages are devoted to foreign trade oppor. l tunities. including the openings for Amer
 ican shoes in Germany. for apples in Eng | land and for lard, flour and cottonseed oi at Mediterranean ports. Another pag, 1 suggests how our vacuum cleaners nigh 1 be sold in certain European cities; an, | others report business firms in a numbe | of countries which want certain things
 which the factories making them in th 1 United States, if they write to the burea u | can arrange to supply. The paper ha also an article on industrial activity Il | Japan, one on an American bank fo l China ond one on the status of bushes at the head of the Yukon in Alaska. describes the openings for our flrearm
 in Asia, the recent discovery of diamonl l in Canada and some new features of sh | street traffic of London. It treats of th
 solor eclipse, which may be best seen a I Oporto, in Portugal. and of how wintc l apples are selling at Windsor ontario | It tells how public buildings are about t l be erected in the new capital of Austre l lia, and urges our architects to send Cl designs fof the houses of parliament am other great structures.
 In addition to these there are other ar
The Birmingham age-herald., 1911-09-24

still lives in the house where she was born. She had no car fare to pay, Sne went home to her luncheon, and SS seemed a lot of money This was her first job and sine was perfectly satisfied. She had the distinction of having been retained on the selling force when she had only been taken on as an extra" and taken all in all, life seemed very fair.
 To sell ribbon was joy. To meet and serve women of wealth and fashion had it's own charm and taugh her much or qualities and modes. There was satisfac- ton, delight even, in her work. which made her wonder why other girls com planed so much of the monotony of daily toll. There was no montony to her.
 Nine out Of ten girls who work in the big stores of various cities find much in- terest in discussing what So-andSo said or did at last nights party, or on that motor ride What "she'' wore and what "he" said cit is very important what he" said) must be thoroughly discussed and speculated upon before the customer is waited on. Miss McCloskey had plenty of amusement. but saw no reason for talking about it in detail with the other shop girls. She found enough to do attending to her own work. No one ever had to wait while she finished conversation with some other employe Possibly ons of the bosses took cosnizance of this fact along with the steady increase of sales al, the ribbon counter, for after the "cXtr4" girl hnd been there two years her wages were increased to BIO a week. It seemed like a small fortune to Miss McClosl<ey. There did not seem to be much chance after this great leap for her to go higher. She was content. She sold ribbon and !n- creased her acquaintance among the rich and extended her circle of purchasers. steadily building up her business year after year. until she had been behind the ribbon counter eight years. She still was getting s10 week.
 Then one day there was sensation in the store. Details of what ''he" said last night and what she wore were forgot ten. And shouldn't they be? Who ever heard of New York merchant doing such an absurd thing as taking a girl from be- hind the ribbon counter and transforming
The Birmingham age-herald., 1911-09-24

Copyright 1911, by Frank G. Carpenter.)
 Washington, D. c. UPPOSE you had business which
 brought in s4oGo for every day and S every night for the 3Go working days of the year. Would it not pay to take care of it? Suppose you sold on every one of those days total of about sG,o00000, and in the year something like $l,S0O. 90o000. Would not you want to increase it?
 That is what Uncle Sam is doing as to oui foreign trade. His exports in 1908 sold for over s1. 800, ,0O000o. They were almost as much last year. and they will run close to the same amount this. We are among the chief merchants in the great market house of the world. We are still led by Great Britain and Germany but our foreign trade'is rapidly growing, and the day will come when we shall be the biggest traders in the whole world.
 This letter will tell you some of the means by which Uncle Sam. patriarch, Is increasing that trade. There are two de- partments which are especially devoted to it. One Is the agricultural branch of the government. which has to do with our crop exports, and the other is the Department of Commerce and Labor, which deals with both manufactures ana crops. The crops naNe always mad a large part in the business. The manufac- lures are of more recent growth. bu; they are multiplying so rapidly that they promise in time to surpass all that whci C mes from the soil.
 Our Big Industrial Business
 Have you any idea how much our man ufactrring business amounts to? dislike to use figures. They mean so little wh they get into the millions. ] had an inter view not long ago with Mrs. Hetty Green the richest woman on earth during whic. she told me her mind refused to work cl anything over slooo,000. My mind il stunned by si00.009 and the word oiliol means nothing but exceedingly large. The only way to realize such conception is by homely comparisons.
 Well. in figures, the products We mak annually in our factories arc worth fiftecl or sixteen billions of dollars. They ar cbild on this big round earth could hay an equal share of them the amount hell Inv each would be just s10. If they wer aii divided among our own 1o0,c00,Co0 popu lation each of us would have s150 worth and the share of each family would be s15 or more.
 Again. look at the money invested in ou manufac.uring business The capital i about equal to the product and the -os of the material annually used is sonia where between s9Oo0. .O00000 and s10.o00. f51.fd0. The industries here taken into ac count are only those confined to the fac tories. ard the men employed in them ar, f1vc or six hundred thousand. The censi, divides our great industries Nto IA groups