02 - Random Reminiscences of Men and Events by John D. Rockefeller

Dive into the insightful reflections of a prominent figure from the oil revolution of the 20th century. This compelling book embodies the essence of experience, as it chronicles the life of the second highest taxpayer in the U.S. during the 1920s. Though not included in the text, enjoy a glimpse of his wisdom through a poignant poem I was early taught to work as well as play, My life has been one long, happy holiday; Full of work and full of play- I dropped the worry on the way- And God was good to me every day. (Summary by sidhu177)

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Chapter one of Random Reminiscences of Men and Events by
John D. Rockefeller. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox
recordings are in the public domain. For more information or
to volunteer, please visit LibriVox dot org. Recording by William

(00:23):
tom Coe Random Reminiscences of Men and Events by John D. Rockefeller,
Chapter one, Some Old Friends. Since these reminiscences are really
what they profess to be, random and informal, I hope
I may be pardoned for setting down so many small things.

(00:44):
In looking back over my life, the impressions which come
most vividly to my mind are mental pictures of my
old associates. In speaking of these friends in this chapter,
I would not have it thought that many others of
whom I have not spoken were less important to me,
and I shall hope to refer to this subject of
my early friends in a later chapter. It is not

(01:06):
always possible to remember just how one first met an
old friend, or what one's impressions were, but I shall
never forget my first meeting with mister John d Archbold,
who was now a vice president of the Standard Oil
Company at that time, say thirty five or forty years ago,
I was traveling about the country, visiting the point where
something was happening, talking with producers, the refiners, the agents,

(01:31):
and actually getting acquainted. One day there was a gathering
of the men somewhere near the oil regions, and when
I came to the hotel, which was full of oil men,
I saw this name writ large on the register, John
d Archbold, four dollars a barrel. He was a young
and enthusiastic fellow, so full of his subject that he

(01:53):
added his slogan four dollars a barrel after his signature
on the register, that no one might misunderstan than his convictions.
The battle cry of four dollars a barrel was all
the more striking because crude oil was selling then for
much less, and this campaign for a higher price certainly
did attract attention. It was much top good, to be true.

(02:16):
But if mister Archbold had to admit in the end
that crude oil is not worth four dollars of barrel,
his enthusiasm, his energy, and his splendid power over men
have lasted. He has always had a well developed sense
of humor, and on one serious occasion, when he was
on the witness stand, he was asked by the opposing lawyer.

(02:37):
Mister Archbold, are you a director of this company? I am?
What is your occupation in this company? He promptly answered
to clamor for dividends, which led the learned counsel to
start afresh on another line. I can never cease to
wonder at his capacity for hard work. I do not
often see him now, for he has great affairs on

(02:58):
his hands, while I live like a farmer, away from
active happenings in business, playing golf, planting trees. And yet
I am so busy that no day is long enough.
Speaking of mister Archbold leads me to say again that
I have received much more credit than I deserve in
connection with the Standard Oil Company. It was my good

(03:19):
fortune to help to bring together the efficient men who
are the controlling forces of the organization, and to work
hand in hand with them for many years. But it
is they who have done the hard tasks. The great
majority of my associations were made so many years ago
that I have reached the age when hardly a month
goes by. Sometimes I think hardly a week that I

(03:40):
am not called upon to send some message of consolation
to a family with whom we have been connected and
who have met with some fresh bereavement. Only recently I
counted up the names of the early associates who have
passed away before I had finished. I found the list
numbered some sixty or more. They were faith and earnest friends.

(04:01):
We had worked together through many difficulties, and had gone
through many severe trials together. We had discussed and argued
and hammered away at questions until we came to agree.
And it has always been a happiness to me to
feel that we had been frank and above board with
each other. Without this business, associates cannot get the best

(04:23):
out of their work. It is not always the easiest
of tasks to induce strong, forceful men to agree. It
has always been our policy to hear patiently and discuss
frankly until the last shot of evidence is on the
table before trying to reach a conclusion, and to decide
finally upon a course of action. In working with so

(04:44):
many partners, the conservative ones are apt to be in
the majority, and this is no doubt a desirable thing
when the mere momentum of a large concern is certain
to carry it forward. The men who have been very
successful are correspondingly conservative, since they have much to lose
in case of disaster. But fortunately there are also the

(05:05):
aggressive and more daring ones. And they are usually the
youngest in the company, perhaps few in number, but impetuous
and convincing. They want to accomplish things and to move quickly,
and they don't mind any amount of work or responsibility.
I remember, in particular an experience when the conservative influence
met the progressive, shall I say, or the daring side

(05:30):
at all events. This was the side I represented in
this case arguments versus capital. One of my partners, who
had successfully built up a large and prosperous business, was
resisting with all his force, a plan that some of
us favored to make some large improvements. The cost of
extending the operations of this enterprise was estimated at quite

(05:52):
a sum three million dollars, I think it was. We
had talked it over and over again, and with several
other associates, discussed all the pros and cons, and we
had used every argument we could command to show why
the plan would not only be profitable, but was indeed
necessary to maintain the lead we had. Our old partner

(06:14):
was obdurate. He had made up his mind not to yield,
and I can see him standing up in his vigorous protest,
with his hands in his pockets, his head thrown back
as he shouted. No, it's a pity to get a
man into a place in an argument where he is
defending a position instead of considering the evidence. His calm

(06:34):
judgment is apt to leave him, and his mind is
for the time being closed, and only obstinacy remains. Now,
these improvements had to be made, as I said before,
it was essential. Yet we could not quarrel with our
old partner. But a minority of us had made up
our minds that we must try to get him to yield,

(06:54):
and we resolved to try another line of argument, and
said to him, you say that we do not need
to spend this money. No, he replied, it will probably
prove to be many years before such a sum must
be spent. There is no present need for these facilities
you want to create, and the works are doing well
as they are. Let's let well enough alone. Now, our

(07:18):
partner was a very wise and experienced man, older and
more familiar with the subject than some of us, and
all this we admitted to him. But we had made
up our minds, as I have said, to carry out
this idea if we could possibly get his approval, and
we were willing to wait until then. As soon as
the argument had calmed down, and when the heat of

(07:39):
our discussion had passed, the subject was brought up again.
I had thought of a new way to approach it.
I said, I'll take it and supply this capital myself.
If the expenditure turns out to be profitable, the company
can repay me, and if it goes wrong, I'll stand
the loss. That was the argument that touched him. All

(08:01):
his reserve disappeared and the matter was settled when he said,
if that's the way you feel about it, we'll go
it together. I guess I can take the risk if
you can. It is always, I presume, a question in
every business just how fast it is wise to go.
And we went pretty rapidly in those days, building and

(08:21):
expanding in all directions. We were being confronted with fresh emergencies. Constantly,
a new oil field would be discovered, thanks for storage
had to be built almost overnight, and this was going
on when old fields were being exhausted. So we were
therefore often under the double strain of losing the facilities
in one place where we were fully equipped, and having

(08:42):
to build up a plant for storing and transporting in
a new field where we were totally unprepared. These are
some of the things which make the whole oil trade
a perilous one. But we had with us a group
of courageous men who recognized the great principle that a
business cannot be a great success that does not fully
and efficiently accept and take advantage of his opportunities. How

(09:06):
often we discussed those trying questions. Some of us wanted
to jump at once into big expenditures, and others to
keep to more moderate ones. It was usually a compromise,
but one at a time we took these matters up
and settled them, never going as fast as the most
progressive ones wished, nor quite so carefully as a conservatives desired,

(09:27):
but always made the vote unanimous in the end. The
joy of achievement, the part played by one of my
earliest partners, mister H. M. Flagler, was always an inspiration
to me. He invariably wanted to go ahead and accomplish
great projects of all kinds. He was always on the
active side of every question, and to his wonderful energy

(09:50):
is do much of the rapid progress of the company.
In the early days, it was to be expected of
such a man that he should fulfill his destiny by
working out some great problems at a time when most
men want to retire to a comfortable life of ease.
This would not appeal to my old friend. He undertook
single handed the task of building up the east coast

(10:12):
of Florida. He was not satisfied to plan a railroad
from Saint Augustine to Key West, a distance of more
than six hundred miles, which would have been regarded as
an undertaking large enough for almost any one man. But
in addition he has built a chain of superb hotels
to induce tourists to go to this newly developed country.

(10:32):
Further than this, he has had them conducted with great
skill and success. This one man, by his own energy
and capital, has opened up a vast stretch of country,
so that the old inhabitants and the new settlers may
have a market for their products. He has given work
to thousands of these people, and to crown all. He

(10:52):
has undertaken and nearly completed a remarkable engineering feat in
carrying his road on the Florida Keys into the Atlantic
Ocean to Key West the point set out four years ago.
Practically all this has been done after what most men
would have considered a full business life, and a man
of any other nationality, situated as he was, would have

(11:15):
retired to enjoy the fruits of his labor. I first
knew mister Flagler as a young man who consigned produce
to Clark and Rockefeller. He was a bright and active
young fellow, full of vim and push a. By the
time we went into the oil business, mister Flagler established
himself as a commission merchant in the same building with
mister Clark, who took over and succeeded the firm of

(11:38):
Clark and Rockefeller. A little later, he bought out mister
Clark and combined his trade with his own. Naturally, I
came to see more of him. The business relations which
began with the handling of produce he consigned to our
old firm, grew into a business friendship, because people who
lived in a comparatively small place, as Cleveland was then

(11:59):
were thrown together rather much more often than in such
a place as New York. When the oil business was
developing and we needed more help, I at once thought
of mister Flagler as a possible partner, and made him
an offer to come with us and give up his
commission business. This offer he accepted, and so began that
lifelong friendship which has never had a moment's interruption. It

(12:21):
was a friendship founded on business, which mister Flagler used
to say was a good deal better than a business
founded on friendship, and my experience leads me to agree
with him. For years and years, this early partner and
I worked shoulder to shoulder. Our desks were in the
same room. We both lived on Euclid Avenue, a few
rods apart. We met and walked to the office together,

(12:44):
walked home to luncheon, back again after luncheon, and home
again at night. On these walks, when we were away
from the office interruptions, we did our thinking, talking and
planning together. Mister Flagler drew practically all our contracts. He
has always had the faculty of being able to clearly
express the intent and purpose of a contract so well

(13:06):
and accurately that there could be no misunderstanding, and his
contracts were fair to both sides. I can remember his
saying often that when you go into an arrangement, you
must measure up the rights and proprieties of both sides
with the same yardstick. And this was the way Henry M.
Flagler did. One contract mister Flagler was called upon to accept, which,

(13:31):
to my surprise, he at once passed with his okay,
and without a question. We had concluded to purchase the
land on which one of our refineries was built, and
which was held on a lease from John Irwin, whom
we both knew well. Mister Irwine drew the contract for
the purchase of this land on the back of a
large Manila envelope that he picked up in the office.

(13:53):
The description of the property ran as such contracts usually do,
until he came to the phrase the line runs south
to mullenstock, et cetera. This seemed to me a trifle indefinite,
but mister Flagler said, it's all right, John, I'll accept
that contract, and when the deed comes in you will
see that the mullenstock will be replaced by a proper stake,

(14:16):
and the whole document will be accurate and ship shape.
Of course, it turned out exactly as he said it would.
I am almost tempted to say that some lawyers might
sit at his feet and learn things about drawing contracts.
Good for them to know, but perhaps our legal friends
might think I was partial, so I won't press the point.

(14:36):
Another thing about mister Flagler for which I think he
deserves great credit, was that, in the early days he
insisted that when a refinery was to be put up,
it should be different from the flimsy shacks which it
was then the custom to build. Everyone was so afraid
that the oil would disappear and that the money expended
in buildings would be a loss, that the meanest and

(14:57):
cheapest buildings were erected for use as refine. This was
the sort of thing mister Flagler objected to. While he
had to admit that it was possible the oil supply
might fail and that the risks of the trade were great,
he always believed that if we went into the oil
business at all, we should do the work as well
as we knew how, that we should have the very

(15:18):
best facilities, that everything should be solid and substantial, and
that nothing should be left undone to produce the finest results.
And he followed his convictions of building as though the
trade was going to last, and his courage in acting
up to his beliefs laid strong foundations for later years.
There are a number of people still alive who will

(15:39):
recall the bright, straightforward young Flagler of those days with satisfaction.
At the time when we bought certain refineries at Cleveland,
he was very active. One day he met an old
friend on the street, a German baker to whom he
had so flower in years gone by. His friend told
him that he had gone out of the bakery business

(15:59):
and had built a little refinery. This surprised mister Flagler,
and he didn't like the idea of his friend investing
his little fortune in a small plant, which he felt
sure would not succeed. But at first there seemed nothing
to do about it. He had it on his mind
for some days. It evidently troubled him. Finally he came
to me and said, that little baker man knows more

(16:22):
about baking than oil refining. But I'd feel better if
we invited him to join us. I've got him on
my conscience. I of course agreed. He talked to his friend,
who said he would gladly sell if we would send
an appraiser to value his plant, which we did, and
then there arose an unexpected difficulty. The price at which

(16:43):
the plant was to be purchased was satisfactory, but the
ex baker insisted that mister Flagler should advise him whether
he should take his pay in cash or standard oil
certificates at par He told mister Flagler that if he
took it in cash, it would pay all his debts
and he would be glad to have his mind free
of many anxieties. But if mister Flagler said the certificates

(17:05):
were going to pay good dividends, he wanted to get
into and keep up with a good thing. It was
rather a hard proposition to put up to mister Flagler,
and at first he declined to advise or express any opinion,
But the German stuck to him and wouldn't let him
shirk a responsibility which in no way belonged to him. Finally,
mister Flagler suggested that he'd take half the amount in

(17:28):
cash and pay fifty percent on account of his debts,
and put the other half in certificates and see what happened.
This he did, and as time went on he bought
more certificates, and mister Flagler never had to apologize for
the advice he gave him. I am confident that my
old partner gave this affair as much time and thought

(17:49):
as he did to any of his own large problems,
and the incident may be taken as a measure of
the man the value of friendships. These old men's tales
can hardly be interesting to the present generation, though perhaps
they will not be useless if even tiresome stories make
young people realize how, above all other possessions is the

(18:12):
value of a friend in every department of life, Without
any exception whatsoever, how many different kinds of friends there are,
they should all be held close at any cost, For
although some are better than others, perhaps a friend of
whatever kind is important. And this one learns as one
grows older. There is the kind that, when you need help,

(18:33):
has a good reason just at the moment, of course,
why it is impossible to extend it. I can't endorse
your note, he says, because I have an agreement with
my partners not to I like to oblige you, but
I can explain why at the moment, et cetera, et cetera.
I do not mean to criticize this sort of friendship,

(18:53):
for sometimes it is a matter of temperament, and sometimes
the real necessities are such that the friend cannot do
as he would like to do. As I look back
over my friends, I can remember only a few of
this kind, and a good many of the more capable sort.
One especial friend I had. His name was S. V. Harkness,
and from the first of our acquaintance he seemed to

(19:15):
have every confidence in me. One day our oil warehouses
and refinery burned to the ground. In a few hours.
They were absolutely annihilated, though they were insured for many
hundred thousands of dollars. Of course, we were apprehensive about
collecting such a large amount of insurance and feared it
might take some time to arrange. That plant had to

(19:39):
be rebuilt right away, and it was necessary to lay
the financial plans. Mister Harkness was interested with us in
the business, and I said to him, I may want
to call upon you for the use of some money.
I don't know that we shall need it, but I
thought i'd speak to you in advance about it. He
took in the situation without much explaining on my part.

(20:00):
He simply heard what I had to say, and he
was a man of very few words. All right, j D,
I'll give you all i've got. This was all he said.
But I went home that night, relieved of anxiety. As
it turned out, we received the check of the Liverpool,
London and Globe Insurance Company for the full amount before
the builders required the payments. And while we didn't need

(20:23):
his money, I never shall forget the whole sold way
in which he offered it. And this sort of experience
was not I am grateful to say rare with me.
I was always a great borrower in my early days.
The business was active and growing fast, and the banks
seemed very willing to loan me the money. About this time,
when our great fire had brought up some new conditions,

(20:45):
I was studying the situation to see what our cash
requirements would be. We were accustomed to prepare for financial
emergencies long before we needed the funds. Another incident occurred
at this time, which showed again the kind of real
friends we had in those days, but I did not
hear the full story of it until long years after
the event. There was one bank where we had done

(21:08):
a great deal of business, and a friend of mine,
mister Stillman Witt, who was such a rich man, was
one of the directors. At a meeting, the question came
up as to what the bank would do in case
we wanted more money. In order that no one might
doubt his own position on the subject, mister Whitt called
for his strong box and said, here, gentlemen, these young

(21:30):
men are all okay, and if they want to borrow
more money, I want to see this bank advance it
without hesitation. And if you want more security here it
is take what you want. We were then shipping a
large quantity of oil by lake and canal to safe
in transportation, and it took additional capital to carry these shipments,

(21:51):
and we required to borrow a large amount of money.
We had already made extensive loans from another bank, whose
president informed me that his board of directors had been
making inquiries respecting our large line of discounts and had
stated that they would probably want to talk with me
on the subject. I answered that I would be very
glad of the opportunity to meet the board, as we

(22:13):
would require a great deal more money from the bank.
Suffice it to say, we got all we wanted, but
I was not asked to call for any further explanations.
But I fear I am telling too much about banks
and money and business. I know of nothing more despicable
and pathetic than a man who devotes all the waking
hours of the day to making money for money's sake.

(22:36):
If I were forty years younger, I should like to
go into business again, for the association with interesting and
quick minded men was always a great pleasure. But I
have no dearth of interest to fill my days, and
so long as I live, I expect to go on
and develop the plans which have been my inspiration for
a lifetime. During all the long period of work which

(22:58):
lasted from the time I was sixty years old until
I retired from active business when I was fifty five,
I must admit that I managed to get a good
many vacations of one kind or another, because of the
willingness of my most efficient associates to assume the burdens
of the business which they were so eminently qualified to conduct.

(23:18):
Of detail work. I feel I have done my full share.
As I began my business life as a bookkeeper, I
learned to have a great respect for figures and facts,
no matter how small they were. When there was a
matter of accounting to be done in connection with any
plan with which I was associated in the earlier years,
I usually found that I was selected to undertake it

(23:39):
I had a passion for detail, which afterward I was
forced to strive to modify. At Pocintico Hills, New York,
where I have spent portions of my time for many
years in an old house where the fine views invite
the soul, and where we can live simply and quietly,
I have spent many delightful hours studying the beautiful views,

(24:01):
the trees, and fine landscape effects of that very interesting
section of the Hudson River. And this happened in the
days when I seemed to need every minute for the
absorbing demands of business. So I fear, after I got
well started, I was not what might be called a
diligent business man. This phrase diligent in business reminds me

(24:22):
of an old friend of mine in Cleveland who was
devoted to his work. I talked to him, and no
doubt bored him unspeakably on my special hobby, which has
always been what some people call landscape gardening, but which
with me is the art of laying out roads and
paths and work of that kind. This friend of thirty
five years ago plainly disapproved of a man in business

(24:46):
wasting his time in what he looked upon as mere foolishness.
One superb spring day, I suggested to him that he
should spend the afternoon with me, a most unusual and
reckless suggestion for a business man to make in those days,
and see some beautiful paths through the woods on my place,
which I had been planning and had about completed. I

(25:06):
went so far as to tell him that I would
give him a real treat. I cannot do it, John,
he said, I have an important matter of business on
hand this afternoon. That may all be I urged, but
it will give you no such pleasure as you'll get
when you see those paths, the big tree on each side.
And go on, John, with your talk about trees and paths.

(25:29):
I tell you I've got an oarship coming in, and
our mills are waiting for her. He rubbed his hands
with satisfaction. I'd not miss seeing her come in. For
all the wood paths in Christendom. He was then getting
one hundred twenty to one hundred thirty dollars a ton
for Bessemer's steel rails. And if his mill stopped a
minute waiting for or, he felt that he was missing

(25:52):
his life's chance. Perhaps it was this same man who
often gazed out into the lake with every nerve stretch
to try to see an oar ship approaching. One day,
one of his friends asked him if he could see
the boat. No, no, he reluctantly admitted, But she's most
in sight. This oar trade was of great and absorbing

(26:15):
interest at Cleveland. My old employer was paid four dollars
a ton for carrying or from the Marquette regions fifty
years ago. And to think of the wickedness of this
maker of woodland paths, who in later years was moving
the ore in great ships for eighty cents a ton
and making a fortune at it. All. This reminds me

(26:35):
of my experiences in the ore business, but I shall
come to that later. I want to say something about
landscape gardening, to which I have devoted a great deal
of time for more than thirty years, the pleasures of
road planning. Like my old friend, others may be surprised
at my claim to be an amateur landscape architect in

(26:56):
a small way, and my family have been known to
employ a great landscape man to make quite sure that
I did not ruin the place. The problem was just
where to put the new home at Pocantico Hills, which
has recently been built. I thought I had the advantage
of knowing every foot of the land. All the old
big trees were personal friends of mine, and with the

(27:18):
views of any given point, I was perfectly familiar. I
had studied them hundreds of times. And after this great
landscape architect had laid out his plans and had driven
his lines of stakes, I asked if I might see
what I could do with the job. In a few days,
I had worked out a plan so devised that the
roads caught just the best views at just the angles

(27:41):
where in driving up the hill you came upon impressive outlooks,
and at the ending was the final burst of river
hill cloud and great sweep of country to crown the whole.
And here I fixed my stakes to show where I
suggested that the roads should run, and finally the exact
place where the househould be. Look it all over, I said,

(28:03):
and decide which plan is best. It was a proud
moment when this real authority accepted my suggestions as bringing
out the most favorite spot for views and agreed upon
the side of the house. How many miles of roads
I have laid out in my time I can hardly compute,
but I have often kept at it until I was exhausted.
While surveying roads, I have run the lines until darkness

(28:26):
made it impossible to see the little stakes and flags.
It is all very vain of me to tell of
these landscape enterprises, but perhaps they will offset the business
talks which occupy so much of my story. My methods
of attending to business matters differed from those of most
well conducted merchants of my time, and allowed me more freedom.

(28:48):
Even after the chief affairs of the Standard Oil Company
were moved to New York, I spent most of my
summers at our home in Cleveland, and I do still.
I would come to New York when my presence seemed
necess But for the most part I kept in touch
with the business through our own telegraph wires, and was
left free to attend to many things which interested me,

(29:09):
Among others, the makings of paths, the planting of trees,
and the setting out of little forests of seedlings. Of
all the profitable things which develop quickly under the hand,
I have thought my young nurseries show the greatest yield.
We keep a set of account books for each place,
and I was amazed not long ago at the increase
in value that a few years make in growing things.

(29:32):
When we came to remove some young trees from Westchester
County to Lakewood, New Jersey. We plant our young trees,
especially evergreens, by the thousand. I think we have put
in as many as ten thousand at once, and let
them develop to be used later in some of our
planting schemes. If we transfer young trees from Pocantico to

(29:52):
our home in Lakewood, we charge one place and quitted
the other for these trees at the market rate. We
are our own own best customers, and we make a
small fortune out of ourselves by selling to our New
Jersey place at a dollar fifty or two dollars each
trees which originally cost us only five or ten cents
at Pocantico in nursery stock. As in other things, the

(30:16):
advantage of doing things on a large scale reveals itself.
The pleasure and satisfaction of saving and moving large trees, trees, say,
from ten to twenty inches in diameter, or even more
in some cases, has been for years a source of
great interest. We build our movers ourselves, and work with
our own men, and it is truly surprising what liberties

(30:38):
you can take with trees if you once learn how
to handle these monsters. We have moved trees ninety feet
high and many seventy or eighty feet, and they naturally
are by no means young. At one time or another.
We have tried almost all kinds of trees, including some
which the authority said could not be moved, with success.

(30:58):
Perhaps the most sharing experiments were with horse chestnuts. We
took up large trees, transported them considerable distances, some of
them after they were actually in flower, all at a
cost of twenty dollars per tree, and lost very few.
We were so successful that we became rather reckless trying
experiments out of season. But when we worked on plans

(31:21):
we had already tried, our results were remarkably satisfactory. Taking
our experiences in many hundreds of trees of various kinds,
in and out of season, and including the time when
we were learning the art, our total loss has been
something less than ten percent, probably more nearly six or
seven percent. A whole tree moving campaign in a single

(31:44):
season has been accomplished with the loss of about three percent.
I am willing to admit that in the case of
the larger trees. The growth has been retarded perhaps two years,
but this is a small matter for people no longer
young wish to get the effects that desire at once,
and the modern tree mover does it. We have grouped
and arranged clumps of big spruces to fit the purposes

(32:07):
we were aiming for, and sometimes have completely covered a
hillside with them. Oaks we have not been successful with
except when comparatively young, and we don't try to move
oaks and hickories when they have come near to maturity.
But we have made some successful experiments with basswood, and
one of these we have moved three times without injury.

(32:29):
Birches have generally baffled us, but evergreens except cedars, have
been almost invariably successfully handled. This planning for good views
must have been an early passion with me. I remember
when I was hardly more than a boy, I wanted
to cut away a big tree, which I thought interfered
with a view from the windows of the dining room

(32:49):
of our home. I was for cutting it down, but
some other members of the family objected, though my dear mother,
I think, sympathized with me, as she said, you know,
my son We have breakfast at eight o'clock, and I
think if the tree were filled some time before we
sat down to table, there would probably be no great

(33:11):
complaint when the family saw the view which the fallen
tree revealed, so it turned out. End of Chapter one,
recording by William tom Coe