The Bamberg herald. [volume] (Bamberg, S.C.) 1891-1972, 1917-09-20
FAILURES WHO SUCCEEDED.
James A. Garfield; the Failure Who
Became President

An Ohio man, not yet thirty, but
having undergone more hard work
and hard knocks than came to many
people in a lifetime announced to his
| widowed mother that he was fail
| ure.
AS matter of fact, he was nothing
of the sort; and in the bottom of his
| heart he doubtless knew that no one
| with his energy and brains could ever
| fail. But he had met with one dis
| couragement after another until, for
! the moment, he had lost heart and
hope.
Most people who knew his story
would have agreed with him at that
period of despair that he was total
failure.
He was James Abram Garfield. He
began life as chore boy in an Ohio
village. He ended his career in 1881
with two hundred days as President
of the United States-until an assas-
sins bullet struck him down in his
| prime.
Garfield's father died soon after
James's birth, leaving widow and
four little children and almost moth
! ing for them to live on.
At az age when the average young
! ster is in primary school Garfield was
working like slave to help in his
family's support. He cut brush for
fences, tended cattle, toiled in the
harvest fields, grubbed stumps, chop.
ped wood and drove, teams.
There was a log schoolhouse with
in walking distance of his home, but
| the overburdened boy found scant
time to attend it. Yet at intervals in
his work and after hard day in the
fields he forced himself to study when
he was so tired he could hardly keep
awake.
Next he found job as mule-driver
for an Ohio canal-boat that lugged
coal srom the mines to Cleveland. The
surroundings were enough to brutal
ize the average lad and to turn him
into day laborer of the dullest sort.
But Garfield fought his way toward
an education, later working his way
through Chester Academy, thence to
Hirams college and to Williams.
It was bitter, uphill struggle all
the time. For he had not. only him.
self and others to look out for, and he
was in debt. At last he decided to
apply as school teacher in an effort to
better himself. No school board
would give him chance. He tramp
ed from one village to another wher-
ever he heard there was vacancy.
But he could get no employment. {
One evening he came home worn
out and desperate. He told his moth
er he was a failure and that there
was no hope for him to get on in the
world.
In his morbid downheartedness he
also registered a strange VOW, VOW
he kept to the last day of his life. He
swore he would never again go look
ing for work of any kind. AS if Fate
heard his cry of surrender, Garfeld's
luck changed from that hour. The
very next day came the offer OF
school to teach-a far better offer
than he had ever dared to hope for. 1t
was the first SD in Garfield's trium-
phant climb of the success-ladder.
After that every thing seemed to
come his way. He continued to work
and to work hard, for the rest OF
his life. Butt henceforth Opportunity
sought him. He did not seek Oppor-
| tunity.
Through his labors as clergymen,
lawyer, college president, Congress-
man and army officer it was always
Circumstance which brought the po-
sition within his reach. He was mere
ly ready when the chance "ame.
The same old rule held gf in his
nomination to the Presiden.y. This
came to him, says one biographer, to
the surprise of himself and of the Ma
tion."
The man who had once looked on
himself as a Failure was chosen by
big majority to the highest Office in
his country's gift.
n11,cn cIIOHH GAIHSE