03 - 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 two 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

(00:22):
tom Coe. Random Reminiscences of Men and Events by John D. Rockefeller,
Chapter two, The difficult art of getting to my father.
I owe a great debt in that he himself trained
me to practical ways. He was engaged in different enterprises.
He used to tell me about these things, explaining their significance,

(00:46):
and he taught me the principles and methods of business.
From early boyhood, I kept a little book, which I
remember I called ledger a, and this little volume is
still preserved, containing my receipts and expending, as well as
an account of the small sums that I was taught
to give away regularly. Naturally, people of modest means lead

(01:08):
a closer family life than those who have plenty of
servants to do everything for them. I counted a blessing
that I was of the former class. When I was
seven or eight years old, I engaged in my first
business enterprise with the assistance of my mother. I owned
some turkeys, and she presented me with the kurds from
the milk to feed them. I took care of the

(01:29):
birds myself and sold them all in business like fashion.
My receipts were all profits, as I had nothing to
do with the expense account, and my records were kept
as carefully as I knew. How. We thoroughly enjoyed this
little business affair, and I can still close my eyes
and distinctly see the gentle and dignified birds walking quietly

(01:52):
along the brook and through the woods, cautiously stealing the
way to their nests. To this day, I enjoy the
sight of a flock of turkeys and never miss an
opportunity of studying them. My mother was a good deal
of a disciplinarian and upheld the standard of the family
with a birch switch when it showed a tendency to deteriorate. Once,

(02:14):
when I was being punished for some unfortunate doings which
had taken place in the village school, I felt called
upon to explain, after the whipping had begun, that I
was innocent of the charge. Never mind, said my mother.
We have started in on this whipping and it will
do for the next time. This attitude was maintained to
its final conclusion in many ways. One night, I remember

(02:38):
we boys could not resist the temptation to go skating
in the moonlight, notwithstanding the fact that we had been
expressly forbidden to skate at night. Almost before we got
fairly started, we heard a cry for help. We found
a neighbor who had broken through the ice was in
danger of drowning. By pushing a pole to him, we
succeeded in fishing him out and restored him safe and

(03:01):
sound to his grateful family. As we were not generally
expected to save a man's life every time we skated.
My brother William and I felt that there were mitigating
circumstances connected with this particular disobedience which might be taken
into account in the final judgment. But this idea proved
to be erroneous. Starting at work, although the plan had

(03:26):
been to send me to college, it seemed best at
sixteen that I should leave the high school in which
I had nearly completed the course and go into a
commercial college in Cleveland. For a few months, they taught
bookkeeping and some of the fundamental principles of commercial transactions.
This training, though it lasted only a few months, was
very valuable to me. But how to get a job?

(03:49):
That was the question. I tramped the streets for days
and weeks, asking merchants and storekeepers if they didn't want
a boy, But the offer of my service met with
little appreciation. No one wanted a boy, and very few
showed any overwhelming anxiety to talk with me on the subject.

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At last, one man on the Cleveland docks told me
that I might come back after a noonday meal. I
was elated. It now seemed that I might get a start.
I was in a fever of anxiety lest I should
lose this one opportunity that I had unearthed. When finally,
at what seemed to me the time, I presented myself

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to my would be employer, we will give you a chance,
he said, but not a word passed between us about pay.
This was September twenty sixth, eighteen fifty five. I joyfully
went to work. The name of the firm was Hewett
and Tuttle. In beginning the work, I had some advantages.
My father's training, as I have said, was practical. The

(04:53):
course at the Commercial College had taught me the rudiments
of business, and I thus had a groundwork to build upon.
I was fortunate also in working under the supervision of
the bookkeeper, who was a fine disciplinarian and well disposed
toward me. When January eighteen fifty six arrived, mister Tuttle
presented me with fifty dollars for my three months work,

(05:15):
which was no doubt all that I was worth, and
it was entirely satisfactory For the next year with twenty
five dollars a month. I kept my position, learning the
details and clerical work connected with such a business. It
was a wholesale produce, commission and forwarding concern, my department
being particularly the office duties. Just above me was the

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bookkeeper for the house, and he received two thousand dollars
a year's salary in lieu of his share of the
profits of the firm of which he was a member
at the end of the first fiscal year. When he left,
I assumed his clerical and bookkeeping work, for which I
received the salary of five hundred dollars. As I look
back upon this term of business apprenticeship, I see that

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its influence was vitally important in its relations to what
came after. To begin with, My work was done in
the office of the firm itself. I was almost always
present when they talked of their affairs, laid out their plans,
and decided upon the course of action. I thus had
an advantage over other boys of my age, who were

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quicker and who could figure and write better than I.
The firm conducted a business with so many ramifications that
this education was quite extensive. They owned dwelling houses, warehouses
and buildings which were rented for offices and a variety
of uses, and I had to collect the rents. They
shipped by rail, canal and lake. There were many different

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kinds of negotiations and transactions going on, and with all
these I was in close touch. Thus it happened that
my duties were vastly more interesting than those of an
office boy in a large house. To day I thoroughly
enjoyed the work. Gradually the auditing of accounts was left
in my hands. All the bills were first passed upon me,

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and I took this duty very seriously. One day, I
remember I was in a neighbor's office when the local
plumber presented himself with a bill about a yard long.
This neighbor was one of those very busy men. He
was connected with what seemed to me an unlimited number
of enterprises. He merely glanced at this tiresome bill, turned

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it to the bookkeeper and said, please pay this bill.
As I was studying the same plumber's bills in great detail,
checking every item, if only for a few cents, and
finding it to be greatly to the firm's interest to
do so. This casual way of conducting affairs did not
appeal to me. I had trained myself to the point

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of view doubtless held by many young men in business
to day, that my check on a bill was the
executive act which released my employer's money from the till,
and was attended with more responsibility than the spending of
my own funds. I made up my mind that such
business methods could not succeed. Passing bills, collecting rents, adjusting claims,

(08:11):
and work of this kind brought me in association with
a great variety of people. I had to learn how
to get on with all these different classes and still
keep the relations between them and the house pleasant. One
particular kind of negotiation came to me, which took all
the skill I could muster to bring a successful end

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we would receive, for example, a shipment of marble from
Vermont to Cleveland. This involved handling by railroad, canal and
lake boats. The cost of losses or damage had to
be somehow fixed between these three different carriers, and it
taxed all the ingenuity of a boy of seventeen to
work out this problem to the satisfaction of all concerned,

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including my employers. But I thought the task no hardship,
and so far as I can remember, I never had
any disagreement of moment with any of these transportation interests.
This experience, in conducting all sorts of transactions at such
an impressionable age, with the helping hand of my superiors
to fall back upon in an emergency, was highly interesting

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to me. It was my first step in learning the
principle of negotiation, of which I hoped to speak later.
The training that comes from working for some one else
to whom we feel a responsibility, I am sure was
of great value to me. I should estimate that the
salaries of that time were far less than half of
what is paid for equivalent positions to day. The next year,

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I was offered a salary of seven hundred dollars, but
thought I was worth eight hundred dollars. We had not
settled the matter by April, and as a favorable opportunity
had presented itself for carrying on the same business on
my own account, I resigned my position. In those days
in Cleveland, everyone knew ALM most everyone else in town.

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Among the merchants was a young Englishman named M. B. Clark,
perhaps ten years older than I, who wanted to establish
a business and was in search of a partner. He
had two thousand dollars to contribute to the firm and
wanted a partner who could furnish an equal amount. This
seemed a good opportunity for me. I had saved up
seven hundred or eight hundred dollars, but where to get

(10:24):
the rest was a problem. I talked the matter over
with my father, who told me that he had always
intended to give one thousand dollars to each of his
children when they reached twenty one. He said that if
I wished to receive my share at once instead of waiting,
he would advance it to me and I could pay
interest upon the sum until I was twenty one. But John,

(10:46):
he added, the rate is ten at that time ten
percent a year interest was a very common rate for
such loans. At the banks. The rate might not have
been quite so high, but of course the financial institutions
could not supply all the demands, so there was much
private borrowing and high figures. As I needed this money

(11:07):
for the partnership, I gladly accepted my father's offer, and
so began business as the junior partner of the new firm,
which was called Clark and Rockefeller. It was a great
thing to be my own employer. Mentally, I swelled with
pride a partner in a firm with four thousand dollars capital.
Mister Clark attended to the buying and selling, and I

(11:29):
took charge of the finance and the books. We at
once began to do a large business, dealing in car
load lots and cargoes of produce. Naturally, we soon needed
more money to take care of the increasing trade. There
was nothing to do but to attempt to borrow from
a bank. But with a bank lent to us the

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first loan, I went to a bank president whom I
knew and who knew me. I remember perfectly how anxious
I was to get that loan and to establish myself
favorably with the banker. This gentleman was T. P. Handy,
a sweet and gentle old man well known as a
high grade beautiful character for fifty years. He was interested

(12:11):
in young men. He knew me as a boy in
the Cleveland schools. I gave him all the particulars of
our business, telling him frankly about our affairs, what we
wanted to use the money for, et cetera, et cetera.
I waited for the verdict with almost trembling eagerness. How
much do you want, he said, two thousand dollars. All right,

(12:34):
mister Rockefeller, you can have it, he replied, just give
me your own warehouse receipts. They're good enough for me.
As I left that bank, my elation can hardly be imagined.
I held up my head. Think of it. A bank
had trusted me for two thousand dollars. I felt that
I was now a man of importance in the community.

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For long years after the head of this bank was
a friend. Indeed, he loaned me money when I needed it,
and I needed it almost all the time, and all
the money he had it was a source of gratification
that later I was able to go to him and
recommend that he should make a certain investment in standard
oil stock. He agreed that he would like to do so,

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but he said that the sum involved was not at
the moment available, and so at my suggestion, I turned
a banker for him, and in the end he took
out his principle with a very handsome profit. It is
a pleasure to testify, even at this late date, to
his great kindness and faith in me sticking to business principles.

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Mister Handy trusted me because he believed we would conduct
our young business on conservative and proper lines. And I
well remember about this time an example of how hard
it is sometimes to live up to what one knows
as the right business principle. Not long after our concern
was started, our best customer, that is, the man who

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made the largest consignments, asked that we should allow him
to draw in advance on current shipments before the produce
or a bill of lading were actually in hand. We
of course wished to oblige this important man, but I,
as a financial member of the firm, objected, though I
feared we should lose his business. The situation seemed very serious.

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My partner was impatient with me for refusing to yield,
and in this dilemma, I decided to go personally to
see if I could not induce our customer to relent.
I had been unusually fortunate when I came face to
face with men in winning their friendship, and my partner's
displeasure put me on my mettle. I felt that when
I got into touch with this gentleman, I could convince

(14:42):
him that what he proposed would result in a bad precedent.
My reasoning, in my own mind, was logical and convincing.
I went to see him and put forth all the
arguments that I had so carefully thought out, but he
stormed about, and in the end I had the further
humiliation of confessing to my partner that I had failed.

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I had been able to accomplish absolutely nothing. Naturally, he
was very much disturbed at the possibility of losing our
most valued connection, but I insisted, and we stuck to
our principles and refused to give the shipper the accommodation
he had asked. What was our surprise and gratification to
find that he continued his relations with us as though

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nothing had happened, and did not again refer to the matter.
I learned afterward that an old country banker named John
Gardner of Norwalk, Ohio, who had much to do with
our consignor, was watching this little matter intently, and I
have ever since believed that he originated the suggestion to
tempt us to do what we stated we did not do.

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As a test, and his story about our firm stand
for what we regarded as sound business principles did us
great good. About this time, I began to go out
and solicit business, a branch of work I had never
before attempted. I undertook to visit every person in our
part of the country who was in any way connected

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with the kind of business that we were engaged in,
and went pretty well over the states of Ohio and Indiana.
I made up my mind that I could do this
best by simply introducing our firm and not pressing for
immediate consignments. I told them that I represented Clark and
Rockefeller commissioned merchants, and that I had no wish to

(16:27):
interfere with any connection that they had at present, but
if the opportunity offered, we should be glad to serve them,
et cetera, et cetera. To our great surprise, business came
in upon us so fast that we hardly knew how
to take care of it, and in the first year
our sales amounted to half a million dollars. Then, and

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indeed for many years after, it seemed as though there
was no end to the money needed to carry on
and develop the business. As our successes began to come,
I seldom put my head upon the pillow at night
without speaking a few words to myself in this wise,
Now a little success, Soon you will fall down. Soon,

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you will be overthrown because you have got a start.
You think you are quite a merchant. Look out, or
you will lose your head. Go steady. These intimate conversations
with myself, I am sure, had a great influence on
my life. I was afraid I could not stand my prosperity,
and try to teach myself not to get puffed up

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with any foolish notions. My loans for my father were many.
Our relations on finances were a source of some anxiety
to me, and were not quite so humorous as they
seem now as I look back at them. Occasionally he
would come to me and say that if I needed
money in the business, he would be able to loan some,

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and as I always needed capital, I was glad indeed
to get it even at ten percent interest, just at
the moment when I require the money most. He was
apt to say, my son, I find I have got
to have that money. Of course, you shall have it
at once, I would answer, But I knew that he
was testing me, and that when I paid him, he

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would hold the money without its earning anything, for a
little time, and then offer it back later. I confess
that this little discipline should have done me good, and
perhaps did, But while I concealed it from him, the
truth is I was not particularly pleased with his application
of tests to discover if my financial ability was equal

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to such shocks interest at ten percent. These experiences with
my father remind me that in the early days, there
was often much discussion as to what should be paid
for the use of money. Many people protested that the
rate of ten percent was outrageous, and none but a
wicked man would exact such a charge. I was accustomed

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to argue that money was worth what it would bring.
No one would pay ten percent, or five percent or
eight percent unless the borrower believed that at this rate
it was profitable to employ it. As I was always
a borrower at that time, I certainly did not argue
for paying more than was necessary. Among the most persistent

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and heated discussions I ever had were those with the
dear old lady who kept the boarding house where my
brother William and I lived when we were away from
home at school. I used to greatly enjoy these talks,
for she was an able woman and a good talker,
And as she charged us only a dollar a week
for board and lodging, and fed us well, I certainly

(19:39):
was her friend. This was about the usual price for
board in the small towns in those days, where the
produce was raised almost entirely on the place. This estimable
lady was violently opposed to loaners obtaining high rates of interest,
and we had frequent and earnest arguments on the subject.
She knew that I was accustomed to make loans for
my father, and she was familiar with the rate secured.

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But all the arguments in the world did not change
the rate, and it came down only when the supply
of money grew more plentiful. I have usually found that
important alterations in public opinion in regard to business matters
have been of slow growth along the line of proved
economic theory. Very rarely have improvements in these relationships come

(20:24):
about through hastily devised legislation. One can hardly realize how
difficult it was to get capital for active business enterprises
at that time. In the country farther west, much higher
rates were paid, which applied usually to personal loans on
which a business risk was run. But it shows how
different the conditions for young business men were then than now.

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A nimble borrower speaking of borrowing at the banks reminds
me of one of the most strenuous financial efforts I
ever made. We had to raise the money to accept
an offer for a large business required many hundreds of
thousands of dollars and in cash securities would not answer.
I received the message at about noon and had to

(21:09):
get off on the three o'clock train. I drove from
bank to bank, asking each president or cashier whommever I
could find first, to get ready for me all the
funds he could possibly lay hands on. I told them
I would be back to get the money later. I
rounded up all of our banks in the city and
made a second journey to get the money, and kept

(21:31):
going until I secured the necessary amount. With this, I
was off on the three o'clock train and closed the transaction.
In these early days, I was a good deal of
a traveler, visiting our plans, making new connections, seeing people,
arranging plans to extend our business, and it often called
for very rapid work raising church funds. When I was

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but seventeen or eighteen, I was elected as a trustee
in the church. It was a mission branch, and occasionally
I had to hear members who belonged to the main
body speak of the missions as though it were not
quite so good as the big mother church. This strengthened
our resolved to show them that we could paddle our
own canoe. Our first church was not a very grand affair,

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and there was a mortgage of two thousand dollars on it,
which had been a dispiriting influence for years. The holder
of the mortgage had long demanded that he should be paid,
but somehow even the interest was barely kept up, and
the creditor finally threatened to sell us out. As it
happened the money had been lent by a deacon in
the church, but notwithstanding this fact, he felt that he

(22:43):
should have his money, and perhaps he really needed it. Anyhow,
he proposed to take such steps as were necessary to
get it. The matter came to a head one Sunday morning,
when the minister announced from the pulpit that the two
thousand dollars would have to be raised or we should
lose our church building. I therefore found myself at the
door of the church as the congregation came and went.

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As each member came by, I button holed him and
got him to promise to give something toward the extinguishing
of that debt. I pleaded, and urged, and almost threatened.
As each one promised, I put his name and the
amount down in my little book, and continued to solicit
from every possible subscriber. This campaign for raising the money,

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which started that morning after church, lasted for several months.
It was a great undertaking to raise such a sum
of money in small amounts ranging from a few cents
to the more magnificent promises of gifts to be paid
at the rate of twenty five or fifty cents per week.
The plan absorbed me. I contributed what I could, and

(23:47):
my first ambition to earn more money was aroused by
this and similar undertakings in which I was constantly engaged,
but at last the two thousand dollars was all in hand,
and a proud day it was when the debt was extinguished.
I hope the members of their mother church were properly
humiliated to see how far we had gone beyond their expectations.

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But I do not now recall that they expressed the
surprise that we flattered ourselves. They must have felt the
begging experiences I had at that time were full of interest.
I went at the task with pride rather than the reverse,
and I continued it until my increasing cares and responsibilities
compelled me to resign the actual working out of details

(24:31):
to others. End of Chapter two, recording by William tom
co