Hidden Treasures | Page 9

ladder, taking down shutters
and sweeping out the store in which he was employed. When
twenty-one, he went into business in a small way, doing a retail
business, which prospered, and at the end of three years Mr. Dodge felt
able to support a wife.
In 1834 he was invited to become a partner in the firm with his
father-in-law, Mr. Anson Phelps, and a brother-in-law, under the
firm-style of Phelps, Dodge and Company. This connection proved a

most profitable business venture, and at the end of twenty years Mr.
Dodge was accounted a wealthy man. Looking about for investments,
his keen perception espied a vast fortune in lumber, and then followed
those vast accumulations of timber lands, by buying thousands of acres
in West Virginia, Michigan, Wisconsin, Georgia and Canada.
He also became greatly interested in coal lands, and as he must find a
conveyance to bring his coal to market, he was naturally drawn into
railroad schemes. His ability and enterprise soon placed him on the
board of directors for such roads as the Delaware, Lackawanna and
Western, and New Jersey Central, being at one time President of the
Houston and Texas.
He helped found several of the most noted Insurance Companies in the
country, and was a director until his death, of the Greenwich Saving
Bank, City Bank, The American Exchange National Bank, the United
States Trust Company, the Bowery Fire Insurance Company, and the
Mutual Life Insurance Company. He was President of the Chamber of
Commerce, and owned a very large number of saw-mills, besides
carrying on the regular business of the firm. What will those people,
who would do this or that if they only had time, say to all this work
done by one man who then found time to serve on the board of
management of religious organizations innumerable?
He was a great temperance advocate, giving thousands of dollars
annually toward the support of various societies. There were others
who had wealth, and gave possibly as much to the betterment of
mankind as did Dodge, but we cannot now recall any man of great
wealth who would deny himself as much personally, beside giving, as
he did. In fact he seemed to be crowded to death with work, yet he
never refused to aid all who were worthy applicants. For years he gave
away annually over $200,000, yet it was found at his death, February,
1883, that his wealth amounted to something like $5,000,000, a large
share of which was also given to charitable purposes.

JAY GOULD.

We have written the lives of journalists, of eminent statesmen, but we
are now going to write the life of one of the most powerful men in
America. A man who has far greater influence over his fellow-men
than many a king or emperor, and a man who has played a most
prominent part in the development of our Republic.
Such a man is Jay Gould to-day who has risen to this dizzy height,
from a penniless boy on his father's farm, which he left at the age of
only fourteen to seek his fortune. He asked his father's permission first,
which was readily given, he thinking it would cure the boy of his
restlessness, and when young Gould left, his father fully expected to
see him again within a few days, but even the father was mistaken in
calculating the stick-to-it-iveness of the son. He at last found
employment in a store where he remained two years when his health
compelled outdoor work. He therefore obtained employment carrying
chains for some surveyors at $10 a month. These men were making
surveys from which an Albany publishing firm expected to issue maps
for an atlas they were getting out. Not only did Gould carry the chains
but he improved every opportunity for picking up points in surveying.
We see one characteristic of the man plainly showing itself at this early
age, for when the firm failed, Gould had the maps published himself,
and then personally sold enough of them to clear $1,000. With this start
he went to Pennsylvania, and was employed in a tannery. As one sees,
nearly every successful man owes that success largely to the cultivation
of pleasing manners, so it was with Gould. So apparent was his ability,
and so well did he please his employer, that the man set Gould up in
business at Gouldsborough, where he cleared $6,000 within the next
two years. Gould was not satisfied with this moderate success, fine as it
seemed to be; he only regarded these enterprises as stepping-stones to
something higher. He next enters the metropolis where he buys and
sells hides in a small office at No. 49 Gold street.
About this time Gould met a young lady at the Everett House, where he