George Horace Lorimer

“ Naturally, a young man who expects to hold his own when he is thrown in with a lot of men like these must be as clean and sharp as a hound's tooth, or some other fellow's simply going to eat him up.
The first college man I ever hired was old John Durham's son, Jim. That was a good many years ago when the house was a much smaller affair. Jim's father had a lot of money till he started out to buck the universe and corner wheat. And the boy took all the fancy courses and trimmings at college. The old man was mighty proud of Jim. Wanted him to be a literary fellow. ”

“ We didn't have to know fractions to figure out our profits. Now a merchant needs astronomy to see them, and when he locates them they are out somewhere near the fifth decimal place. There are sixteen ounces to the pound still, but two of them are wrapping paper in a good many stores. And there're just as many chances for a fellow as ever, but they're a little gun shy, and you can't catch them by any such coarse method as putting salt on their tails. ”

“ But habits of thought ain't the only thing a fellow picks up at college.
I see you've been elected President of your class. I'm glad the boys aren't down on you, but while the most popular man in his class isn't always a failure in business, being as popular as that takes up a heap of time. ”

“ You're not going to be a poet or a professor, but a packer, and the place to take a post-graduate course for that calling is in the packing-house. Some men learn all they know from books; others from life ”

“ Because I was run through a threshing machine when I was a boy, and didn't begin to get the straw out of my hair till I was past thirty, I haven't any sympathy with a lot of these old fellows who go around bragging of their ignorance and saying that boys don't need to know anything except addition and the "best policy" brand of honesty. ”

“ Then it was all up with Mister Jim's job again. I raised his salary without his asking for it this time, and put him out on the road to introduce a new product that we were making—beef extract.
Jim made two trips without selling enough to keep them working overtime at the factory, and then he came into my office with a long story about how we were doing it all wrong. Said we ought to go for the consumer by advertising, and make the trade come to us, instead of chasing it up. ”