Pushing to the Front | Page 5

identify himself with steam navigation. To the surprise
of all his friends, he abandoned his prosperous business and took
command of one of the first steamboats launched, at a salary of one
thousand dollars a year. Livingston and Fulton had acquired the sole
right to navigate New York waters by steam, but Vanderbilt thought the
law unconstitutional, and defied it until it was repealed. He soon
became a steamboat owner. When the government was paying a large
subsidy for carrying the European mails, he offered to carry them free
and give better service. His offer was accepted, and in this way he soon

built up an enormous freight and passenger traffic.
Foreseeing the great future of railroads in a country like ours, he
plunged into railroad enterprises with all his might, laying the
foundation for the vast Vanderbilt system of to-day.
Young Philip Armour joined the long caravan of Forty-Niners, and
crossed the "Great American Desert" with all his possessions in a
prairie schooner drawn by mules. Hard work and steady gains carefully
saved in the mines enabled him to start, six years later, in the grain and
warehouse business in Milwaukee. In nine years he made five hundred
thousand dollars. But he saw his great opportunity in Grant's order, "On
to Richmond." One morning in 1864 he knocked at the door of
Plankinton, partner in his venture as a pork packer. "I am going to take
the next train to New York," said he, "to sell pork 'short.' Grant and
Sherman have the rebellion by the throat, and pork will go down to
twelve dollars a barrel." This was his opportunity. He went to New
York and offered pork in large quantities at forty dollars per barrel. It
was eagerly taken. The shrewd Wall Street speculators laughed at the
young Westerner, and told him pork would go to sixty dollars, for the
war was not nearly over. Mr. Armour, however, kept on selling, Grant
continued to advance. Richmond fell, pork fell with it to twelve dollars
a barrel, and Mr. Armour cleared two millions of dollars.
John D. Rockefeller saw his opportunity in petroleum. He could see a
large population in this country with very poor lights. Petroleum was
plentiful, but the refining process was so crude that the product was
inferior, and not wholly safe. Here was Rockefeller's chance. Taking
into partnership Samuel Andrews, the porter in a machine shop where
both men had worked, he started a single barrel "still" in 1870, using an
improved process discovered by his partner. They made a superior
grade of oil and prospered rapidly. They admitted a third partner, Mr.
Flagler, but Andrews soon became dissatisfied. "What will you take for
your interest?" asked Rockefeller. Andrews wrote carelessly on a piece
of paper, "One million dollars." Within twenty-four hours Mr.
Rockefeller handed him the amount, saying, "Cheaper at one million
than ten." In twenty years the business of the little refinery, scarcely

worth one thousand dollars for building and apparatus, had grown into
the Standard Oil Trust, capitalized at ninety millions of dollars, with
stock quoted at 170, giving a market value of one hundred and fifty
millions.
These are illustrations of seizing opportunity for the purpose of making
money. But fortunately there is a new generation of electricians, of
engineers, of scholars, of artists, of authors, and of poets, who find
opportunities, thick as thistles, for doing something nobler than merely
amassing riches. Wealth is not an end to strive for, but an opportunity;
not the climax of a man's career, but an incident.
Mrs. Elizabeth Fry, a Quaker lady, saw her opportunity in the prisons
of England. From three hundred to four hundred half-naked women, as
late as 1813, would often be huddled in a single ward of Newgate,
London, awaiting trial. They had neither beds nor bedding, but women,
old and young, and little girls, slept in filth and rags on the floor. No
one seemed to care for them, and the Government merely furnished
food to keep them alive. Mrs. Fry visited Newgate, calmed the howling
mob, and told them she wished to establish a school for the young
women and the girls, and asked them to select a schoolmistress from
their own number. They were amazed, but chose a young woman who
had been committed for stealing a watch. In three months these "wild
beasts," as they were sometimes called, became harmless and kind. The
reform spread until the Government legalized the system, and good
women throughout Great Britain became interested in the work of
educating and clothing these outcasts. Fourscore years have passed, and
her plan has been adopted throughout the civilized world.
A boy in England had been run over by a car, and the bright blood
spurted from a severed artery. No one seemed to