The Pleasantville press. (Pleasantville, N.J.) 1912-1929, 1916-04-01

ordered to put his pen and paper
away, he smiled around the room at
the pupils, who had stopped work
ing, and then resumed his writing.
Il took him by the collar, dragged
him out of his seal and gave him q
thorough whipping. He turned out
to be the son of the chairman of the
prudential committee. The old man
never spoke TO me again, not even
when l met him in the road, he rid
ing in a buggy and I walking to or
from my work"
Went to Sea for Two Years.
On his graduation at the Annapolis
Naval Academy, young John Win
gate Weeks went to sea for a cruise
of two years. Seventy men were in
his class, but there was room for only
10 of them in the navy. The navy
itself consisted of but five steam YES
sells classed as ~first-rates, and they
were obsolete and unfit for active
duty. George Barnett, his roommate,
went into the Marine Corps and is
now a major general and the COM
mandant Of that branch of the naval
service.
In Florida, where he had been en-
gagged as a surveyor on a railroad, the
late M~idshipman Weeks learned that
an old firm in Boston was going out
of business. One of the partners had
died and another had become blind.
Henry Hornblower, a son of one of
the partners, and the youthful Mr..
Weeks bought the business, the lat
ter borrowing the money with which
to begin his career as a banker and
broker.
Hornblower acted for the firm on
the floor Of the Boston Stock Ex-
change. Weeks kept the books and
waited on the customers as they ap-
peared. In a few years the two young
men had Offices all over New England
and in cities as far away as Chicago.
81 got my first valuable business
idea from a famous New England
dressmaker," Captain Weeks said to
the writer of this article. "a friend
who came to spend the night at u
house was talking to Mrs. Weeks
while | vas reading a newspaper. l
heard her say that she had bought a
dress in Boston, and that 500 after,
on returning to the store, the pro-
prietor, noticing her at the counter,
asked if she had purchased the dress
she was wearing at his establishment.
On learning that she had. he said:
ut is not right. Please give your
name and address to the clerk and we
shall correct the matter at once
A Story of Great .alue.
But the roman replied, the dress
Is satisfactory to me. Whatever is
wrong is so small that it is not worth
mentioning
Small to you, madam the man
answered, but very large to u.s.
And do you know the woman
told Mrs. Weeks, the dress was not
only taken back, but it was kept and
/ was given a new one.
81 repeated the story to my partner
next day." Captain Weeks said, land
from that time onward we tried to
please our customers before we
thought of ourselves and the probable
profits we could make In our trans
actions"
Three years ago, following at one
his election to the upper House of
Congress, Captain Weeks sold out to
his partners and disposed of every In
terest that might be thought, even in
directly, to influence his judgment as
a lawmaker. 1t it said in New Eng
land that he has always been very
careful about his reputation as a bust
ness man. An anecdote told of him
in State street, the Wall street of Bos-
ton, shows how his sensitiveness to
public opinion on one occasion proved
highly profitable to his partner and
himself.
A run on a bank in which Captain
Weeks was a director, though he
owned but 5000 OF the stock, threat
ened, so he feared, to injure his stand
ing in the community. He spent q
day and a night at the bank, pledged
two-thirds of all the property he and
his partner owned for the payment of
the banks debts and put through a re-
habilitating plan under which the
shareholders were assessed so per
cent. on their holdings. The bank
was saved, but some of the fright
ened shareholders sold out. Their in
terests were promptly bought by
Captain Weeks. The bank prospered
and later was combin with other
large banks. Boston flnanciers say
that Mr.. Hornblower and Mr.. Weeks
ultimately made $3.50, 900 on the stock
which they purchased when the bank
seemed to be on the verge of ruin.
When l asked Captain Weeks about
the matter, he said: 81 was a young
man and couldn't afford to be a d.
rector In a bank that had closed it's
doors in the faces of its depositors,
many of whom were poor and most
of whom were small merchants and
w~age-earners."
How" l asked him, inasmuch as
he was a sailor himself once, and is
now on terms of intimacy with many
high officers, would you describe the
navy of the United States?"
"At the outbreak of the war in Eu-
rope" he answered, "our navy, in my
opinion, was the second best in exis-
tence. Authorities for whom l have
great respect did not agree with me.
They ranked our navy third or fourth
some giving France second place
and some believing Germany was
stronger at sea than ourselves.
81 still think that in ships alone we
were the equal of France or Germany