Indiana daily times. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1914-1922, 1922-05-10
WALL STREET
BANK OFFERS
PHONE HOMAGE
Declares DR.. Bells Invention
Most Essential Tool in
Business.
BUT SOME DISAGREH
BY RICHARD sPILLANE.
Special to Indiana Daily Times
and Philadelphia Public Ledger.


and Philadelphia Public Ledger.
PHILADELPHIA, May 10.-One Of the
great banks of Wall street in current
advertisement. pays high tribute to the
telephone 1t says:
To-day DIR. Bells telephone is, together
with the telegraph, the most essential
TOOL in the conduct of business that the
business world has had laid at its dis
posal. 1t is difficult indeed to consider
how commerce and industry could have
developed to its present high powered and
hlgh-speed organization without this mo-
mentous contribution of science
And yet there are old fosies of finance
and business who fight everything that Is
new or progressive.
Within few doors of the bank referred
to there Is an insurance and trust COM
pany which, until recently, refused to
have telephone In its establishment,
typewriter, a mechanical calculating ma
chine or electric lights 1t conducted its
affairs exactly as did the founders of the
institution. Not only that, but ii would
not advertise: wouldn't tell people 1t was
In business, Lut left it for the public to
discover.
There Is banker in New York, once
very prominent, but not SO prominent
now. who represented great foreign
banking house. He insisted that all his
foreign spondence should be IN long
hand. Everything in his establishment.
except the stock ticker. was old fashioned,
or the same type and character as his
father knew. Somehow he had come to
tolerate the ticker. Possibly he couldn't
do without 1t.
Another banker, far more progressiT0
represents the great foreign bank in
group today
The first structure in America in which
an elevator was installed still stands. It
mas an elevator, not the original car, but
a very old one. The owner of the prep
erty is proud of the history connected
with the building. But he hasn't inn
proved the structure and nearby build
lngs newer and with mere conyeniences
command higher rentals.
Statesmen of multigraphing machines.
typewriters, modern office appliances and
calculating devices report that, in not a
few instances In some of the older cities
of the East, they encounter staid old
business men who are gracious in their
greetings and who watch them with In
terest as they give demonstrations of
what their articles will do but who al
ways explain tina. their father or grand
father conducted the business just as
they are conducting 1T and much as they
appreciate the kindness of the visitor they
see no reason for changing their methods.
The sailing vessel and the stage coach
probably suited their fathers and grand
fathers. Would the son or grandson
travel by them today rather than by
steamship or railroad or automobile?
Their fathers and their crandfathers
probably didn't advertise. There was no
need for 1t or little need for it in their
day.
The telephone. the telegraph. the
steamship, the typewriter, the auto
mobile the mechanical calculating ma
chimes are products of America. Men in
business who do not avail themselves Of
the proved improvements are doomed to
see their businesses die Of dry rot.
Times change and the business that
does not keep abreast of the time
withers.