The Redwood gazette. [volume] (Redwood Falls, Minn.) 1873-1940, 1929-08-28

grown. Potato vines withered be-
fore they could blossom.
"That first year," said the bronze
faced man opposite me, we ground
corn by hand in an old coffee mill
to get meal on which to live"
There were nine in the family, he
added. His father was an invalid,
nearing death. He. then a ten-year-
old boy, was soon to become the act
ing head of the house.
And the second year was like the
first. The third and fourth years
came and were as brown and barren
as their predecessors. The whole
countryside was in rags, children
were sickly, women halt-starved, the
hope had been burned from mems
eyes even as life had been burned
from the land.
/ asked about schools.
There were no schools" said my
companion.
"What was your house like %
at was built of sod cut from the
prairie. The floor was the bare
ground"
The few scrawny trees the settlers
had planted died as soon as men
ceased to carrying water to them, so
there wasn't even tree or leaf to
break the brown monotony.
Such was Frontier County, Neb-
raska, in the grim, cropless four
years of 1890-94. Such was Wash
ington w. Klingman's campus, the
Alma Mater of his young manhood,
where he dreamed his hrst vague
dream of "going to places" -.
l was alone with Klingman in his
New York office, a huge hall of a
place with enormous maps on its
walls, great broad windows, and a
view of the magnificent Hudson.
From this headquarters. Klingman
today directs the organization and
production of the 1000 agents of the
Equitable Life Assurance Society OF
the United States in the selling of
nearly one billion dollars of life in
surance a year. The fact that he
holds this position marks him as one
of the master insurance statesmen of
his day and as a genius in training
men.
"Going to places?" / repeated.
"Going to places where you want
to arrive" Klingman explained.
Were all on the road to them.
We're seldom satisfied where we are
for long, so we keep moving, if only
in thought, toward the new places
that seem to promise us better
things"
So that morning we talked of "go-
ing to places" -.
Klingman had had no choice in
the matter of his first journey. Born
in Washington. D. c., in 1880, he was
only four years old when he tumbled
from his fathers rickety homestead
er's cart onto the prairie If Frontier
County.
1t was the father who was seeking
better things. He had fought for
Lincoln, and war had taken his
health. The pittance he had received
as Treasury Department clerk had
been insufficient to feed and clothe
his growing family, so in middle-age
he had staked his claim in the prai-
RE to begin anew.
The boy, named after the city Of
his birth was large for his years. At
the age of eight he was big enough
to sweat over corn hills with a hoe
and to take his place among the pro-
more, with his father an invalid and
unable to work. his mother was turn
ing to the son for advice and accept
ing it.
Then came the drought, four years
of it. His father died. l have al
ready told you something of those
four years. A meeting was held of
the impoverished settlers, who found
| themselves with burned fields and
| empty bins, with want and suffering
at every door. 1t was decided that
somebody would have to be sent to
Iowa for help; and those grizzled
men of this new land, casting about
| for the ablest ambassador among
then, choose the fourteen-year-old
boy, "Wash" Klingman.
II don't know why they picked me"
ruminated my COMPANION. at may
have been because I'd already been
| about little.
The previous winter he had "beat-
en- his way up to the copper fields
Continued on page nine)