Americus times-recorder. [volume] (Americus, Ga.) 1891-current, 1919-05-18
Mr. Walter P. Chrysler
President and General Manager
The Buick Motor Company,
Flint, Mich.

Inc BUICK MOtor company,
Flint, Mich.
The rise of Walter P. Chrysler from
a job as sweeper in little railroad
roundhouse on the Union Pacific, at
Ellis, to his present responsible posi-
ton as president and general mana
ger of the great Buick Motor Com
pany, right hand man and confiden-
tial adviser to President w. c. Durant,
of the General Motors corporation, is
a story of hard work from the time
he was able to help little in the sup
port of the family. A common school
education was all he could afford. Va
cations, Saturday holidays and after
schools meant nothing in his young
life but toll. For the village grocery
man gave Walt an opportunity to
earn a few dollars by delivering gro
ceries with a little 2wheeled push
cart.
But this particular vehicle was not
equipped with self starter, valve
in head, pneumatic tires, ask the
man who owns one" or super six
features. The motive power was sim
ply healthy, ambitious yougster with
a push.
This method of earning a livelihood
however did not appeal to Walt and
so he cast his juvenile eye about for
something more to his liking. Oppor-
tunities were not lying around loose in
Ellis. They knocked at ones door
but seldom and were quickly grabbed
walt" however, located one at the
Union Pacific roundhouse. 1t didn't
amount to much-just sweeping the
floor-and there being no other appli-
cants, young Chrysler was an easy
winner Nobody envied him his job,
although the groceryman admitted
that he was sorry to lose him, ar
gued the possibilities ahead in gro
Gerry store and that peddling with a
push cart was more of gentleman's
job than sweeping in a railroad round
house.
Then the U. P. Lost Sweeper.
walt won the argument and the
following day began his climb of the
Ladder of Industrial Fame" Many of
the rungs were far apart, four years
being necessary at one period to
reach the step above, But hard, manu-
al labor the ever present desire for
something better, the determination to
get it always won. Back in the COS
that little Union Pacific engine house
lost first class sweeper but in its
loss the great automobile industry
of the world was destined to gain one
of its greatest and foremost personal
tiles.
Let's follow walt" for few years
of his early life and see if there werc
any soft spots" connected with it;
whether his present position in the
countrys' industrial life is the result
of a pull" or the push" which he
developed behind that little 2wheeled
vegetable cart and never abandoned.
Here is as good a place as any to
tell you the exact age of Walter P.
Chrysler. Wednesday, April 2, was his
birthday anniversary-his forty
fourth. Had he told me it was his
thirty-fourth I would have believed
him. Work had been his physical
friend and Time, our natural enemy
has seemingly overlooked him entirely
At the age of II Walt had finished
his schooling, quit the grocery bust
ness and become the roundhouse
sweeper, a job he did we'll for foul
months Then came the first upward
step and he became a mechanics ap-
prentice, where for four long years he
worked and studied. The next steI
landed him in the Santa Fe round
house at Wellington, Kas., as me-
chanic. A touch of homesickness-oI
was it sweetheart-wona battle and
at the end of year wal" was bacl
in his home town where he remained
for six months and then, for the first
time in his life left his native state
and accepted job" in Salt Lake
Passed Up Others for a Mechanic.
If Walt Chrysler was homesick
in Wellington, Kas., he developed an
acute attack of lonesomeness in that
Saints, so June 4, 1901, the Mendel-
beautiful and peaceful city of the
sohn wedding march was played in
the Ellis home of Miss Della V. For
ker, and she became the bride OF
Walter P. Chrysler. The young hus-
band received flood of congratula-
tions but the almost unanimous verdict
was that the bride that day became
the champion lemon picker" east OF
the California state line.
Three boys and as many girls con-
stituted about all the younger set
of the town Walt was one of these
boys but with a less lofty position
than the others. Soon after the Chrys-
Ter wedding one of the other girls be-
came the wife of G. r. Gage, now a
physician in Hutchinson, Kas. and the
third girl married H. K. Mcleod, who