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The Immigrant Lad who Became a King of Industry · Stories of Grit

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  Section six of Stories of Grit. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox
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  recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please
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  visit LibriVox dot org. Read by Lisa Green. Stories of Grit by Archer
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  Wallace, the immigrant lad who became a king of industry in November eighteen thirty
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  seven, the year in which Queen Victoria ascended the throne. Andrew Carnegie was
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  born in Dunfermline, Scotland. His father was a weaver and, before the
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  invention of the steam loom, made a comfortable, if modest living. Andrew's
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  mother early impressed upon him that economy was a virtue, a lesson which he
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  never forgot in later days. On one occasion, Missus Carnegie asked her children
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  to repeat a proverb from the Bible. When it came to Andrew's turn,
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  he stood up and said, take care of the pence, and the pounds
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  will take care of themselves. While Andrew was mistaken in thinking this was in
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  the Bible, it shows how deeply it had been fixed in his mind.
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  One day, Andrew's father came home very dejected. Andy he said, I
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  have no more work up until that time, all weaving had been done on
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  hand looms, and the introduction of the steam looms through hundreds of men out
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  of work. Andrew never forgot how bitter and harsh his father's words sounded.
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  No more work that meant no more money, and poverty stared them in the
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  face. Andrew's father could not obtain work in the town. Hundreds of others,
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  like himself, were thrown out of work. It was no use moving
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  to another town, for conditions were the same everywhere. After some anxious days
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  of planning together, the family decided that the only thing to do was to
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  follow the example of some relations and move to the United States. The Carnegie
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  sold their handlooms and household belongings and got ready for their long voyage. There
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  were only two children, Andrew and his younger brother Tom. Those were the
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  days of sailing vessels, and crossing the Atlantic meant a rough voyage of many
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  weary weeks, and after that long entiresome railway journeys, Andrew was only eleven
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  at this time. The family reached Pittsburgh safely, and mister Carnegie obtained work
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  at a cotton factory. Soon after this, Andrew got a position as a
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  bobbin boy at one dollar twenty cents a week. He was delighted to be
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  actually earning money. At the end of the first week, when his wages
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  were put into his hand, he felt as happy as a king. One
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  dollar and twenty cents earned by his own efforts. How proud he felt.
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  The work was hard, and the hours of labor very long. He worked
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  from early morning till late at night, with only an interval of forty minutes
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  for dinner. After a time, he got another situation, which was,
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  if anything, even harder. The work was to fire the boiler and run
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  the steam engine which drove the machinery of a small factory. The work was
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  so hard that it soon began to tell upon his health. Night and day
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  he was haunted by the possibility of a calamity, and in his sleep he
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  would often put out his hand to test the water gage. Those were dark
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  days for the young Scotch boy, but he determined not to bring his troubles
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  into the home. He was blessed with a keen spirit of determination to succeed,
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  and no matter how hard he found his work, he never complained.
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  There was poverty in the home, but it was honest poverty, and he
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  was not ashamed of it. He often had to deny himself pleasures which other
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  boys could afford, and had to wear his clothes long after they had become
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  shabby, but nobody ever heard him grumble or complaint. When he became fourteen,
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  Andrew got a position as a telegraph boy at three dollars a week.
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  There was not a prouder boy in Pittsburgh. Besides the advance in wages,
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  the work was healthier. He was so overjoyed with his position that soon he
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  began to fear lest he should lose it. He was not acquainted with the
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  business section of the city, where he had to deliver most of his messages,
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  but he overcame this by using his excellent memory. He committed to memory
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  the exact location of all the business houses in the principal streets, so that
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  when a telegram was handed to him, he knew at once where it had
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  to be delivered. His regular habits and attention to his work soon attracted the
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  attention of those over him, and at the age of sixteen, he was
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  promoted to the position of telegraph operator at a salary of three hundred dollars a
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  year. This advance came at the right time, for Andrew's father had just
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  died, and the burden of carrying on the home fell upon Andrew's shoulders.
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  Soon after this, he accepted a position with the Pittsburgh Division of the Pennsylvania
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  Railroad at an increase of ten dollars a month. At this time, something
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  happened which did much to change his whole life. Through the interest of his
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  superintendent, it became possible for him to purchase ten shares in the Adams Express
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  Company for five hundred dollars. Andrew's business instinct led him to see that it
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  was a splendid opportunity, and his mother was just as anxious as he was
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  to make the venture. After a consultation, they decided to mortgage their little
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  home and buy the shares. This little transaction was destined to be the forerunner
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  of many successful business deals. One day, while he was traveling on the
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  railway, a man showed him the mind I love a sleeping car. Such
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  things were at that time unknown, but Andrew saw instantly that the invention was
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  a good one, and made arrangements for the inventor to meet the superintendent of
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  the railroad. The outcome was that a company was formed to build sleeping cars,
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  and Andrew Carnegie was one of the number. Soon after this, he
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  was made superintendent of the Pittsburgh Division of the Pennsylvania Railroad. Not long after
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  he was promoted to this position, the company began to make experiments with an
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  iron bridge. Up to this time, all bridges had been built of wood.
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  The experiments with iron proved successful. There had been so much delay on
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  the railways by the bridges being broken or burned that the cast iron bridges were
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  welcomed. Mister Carnegie, with his keen business instinct, saw at once that
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  iron bridges must displace the wooden ones. He formed a syndicate known as the
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  Keystone Bridgeworks, and his first undertaking was to build a bridge with a span
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  of three hundred feet over the Ohio River. Thus began the work of iron
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  and steel constructions, which mister Carnegie followed up until he became known throughout the
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  world as the Steel King. Before many years had passed, mister Carnegie not
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  only owned his own immense iron and steel works, but also a fleet of
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  steamers which were used to transport the iron ore across the Great Lakes. He
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  built his own railroad to convey the ore from the Lakeports to Pittsburgh, a
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  distance of four hundred and twenty five miles. In nineteen hundred, the Carnegie
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  Steel Company was organized with a capital of one hundred million dollars. The enormous
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  concern gave employment to forty five thousand people. One of the plants alone covers
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  an area of seventy five acres. It is no exaggeration to say that it
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  is by far the greatest manufacturing concern of its kind in the world. When
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  mister Carnegie decided to retire, he sold out his interest in the steelworks for
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  two hundred and fifty million dollars. It was said at the time that he
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  could give away thirty five thousand dollars a day and never touch his capital.
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  For many years, he gave large sums of money for public libraries and other
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  enterprises which seemed to him to be deserving of assistance. Having worked his own
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  way in the world from a very humble beginning to a position of great power
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  and influence, mister Carnegie never had much patience with lazy people. He would
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  never tolerate around him what are known as deadheads. Concentration, he said,
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  is my motto first honesty, then industry, then concentration. He expected everyone
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  in his employ to be anxious to do their best throughout his life. He
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  was a man of good habits and a non smoker, and attributed his vigor
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  of mind and body to the fact that he avoided anything which would undermine his
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  health. The careful religious training which he received in his humble home in Scotland
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  had a lasting influence for good upon his life. Clean living, honesty,
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  and devotion to his work, no matter how hard it was made Andrew Carnegie
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  one of the foremost business men of his generation. End of Section six