Читать книгу How They Succeeded: Life Stories of Successful Men Told by Themselves онлайн

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“How much had you made, altogether?”

“About four thousand dollars.”

This was when Mr. Armour was twenty-four years old,—his capital for beginning to do business.

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“Did you return to Stockbridge?”

“A little while, but my ambition set in another direction. I had been studying the methods then used for moving the vast and growing food products of the West, such as grain and cattle, and I believed that I could improve them and make money. The idea and the field interested me and I decided to enter it.

“My standing was good, and I raised the money, and bought what was then the largest elevator in Milwaukee. This put me in contact with the movement of grain. At that time, John Plankington had been established in Milwaukee a number of years, and, in partnership with Frederick Layton, had built up a good pork-packing concern. I bought in with those gentlemen, and so came in contact with the work I liked. One of my brothers, Herman, had established himself in Chicago some time before, in the grain-commission business. I got him to turn that over to the care of another brother, Joseph, so that he might go to New York as a member of the new firm, of which I was a partner. It was important that the Milwaukee and Chicago houses should be able to ship to a house of their own in New York,—that is, to themselves. Risks were avoided in this way, and we were certain of obtaining all that the ever-changing markets could offer us.”