“Keep away from the
gin mill,
And save up your rocks,
And you’ll always have tobacco,
In your own tobacco box.”
What an incentive to saving in one’s younger
days is the thought that when the burden of years comes there will be freedom
from worry! It used to be that year s added to the usefulness of the capable
and industrious man, and while he might not be able to accomplish as much work
in a day at 50 as he did at 30, yet his experience was worth more to his
employer. The careful, prudent workman, no matter how small or how big his pay
check, is wise in his younger days if he lays by a portion each week for the
coming day when, like a bit of old machinery, he is into the scrap heap. There
is no pensioning provision for the faithful, worn out workman, who has given
the best years of his life to his employers. WE have in mind as we write, a man
who has worked for one company 40 years or more, and in that time has held
responsible positions and received the average wages. He has been saving his
earnings, but the expense of rearing and educating a family and providing for
them the comforts of life cut heavily into his weekly pay check. The boys and
girls had the example of an industrious father and mother, have grown up fitted
to take their places in this workday world, and have never given their parents
an hour’s sorrow because of misdoing on their part, and all but two have left
the home nest to build one of their own. The old home was lonely for awhile,
but father and mother became accustomed to it. They looked back in their own
lives to the time when they, too, left father and mother to begin life for
themselves. Forty years’ faithful service is something to be reckoned with, and
if there such conditions that would put one on a pension list, surely here is a
case that might be considered. And there are scores of such even in a small city like Hamilton.
Pensions are only for high up bank officials and for government officers who
have held down easy jobs for thirty or forty years. “This world is a muddle.”
Our Hamilton boy was born on the mountain top, and came down into this old town
to begin the fight for bread and butter at a very early age, and now, having
reached the three score and ten mark in the downward journey toward God’s acre,
there is nothing but the scrap heap for him. Fortunately, he was fugal in his
habits in his younger days, and has a home in which to finish his days and a
few thousand dollars to keep the wolf from the door. The tax collector does not
forget that the old boy was not a spendthrift in his youth, and he tips the
wink to the assessors to dig out every dllar so that it will not escape. The
man who not only saves in his youth for old age is not allowed any exemption,
because he has passed the earning period, but the man who spends his earnings
down to the last dollar is allowed by our laws generous exemption from the
burdens of city government. But what is the use of complaining; the laws are
not meant to encourage thrift, but rather for the spendthrift.
LOOK OUT FOR THE FRIEND WHO WANTS TO INVEST
YOUR MONEY
Not many years ago there was a scholarly
bookkeeper and accountant employed by one of the hardware firms in this city to
look after the finaces and the credits; and he was a faithful guardian of the
business interests of his employers, for if ever a dollar was lost by
over-crediting, it was always against his judgment . The old bookkeeper and his
good wife lived in comfort, and never was a payday that they did not lay by a
few dollars for the future. They were English, and came to Canada in an early
day, and they loved their Canadian home and the kind neighbours by whom they
were surrounded. One day the old bookkeeper received a formidable-looking
letter from a London firm of attorneys, notifying that a relative had lived out
her days of usefulness in this world, and, being possessed of more than she
needed in her final transit, she had thoughtfully remembered him and his dear
old wife in her will, and that an amount far beyond his dream of wealth would
be payable on making the necessary proof. It was hard to break away from his
old desk in the counting room and from the men employed in the hardware store
which he had been so long accustomed to meet daily. The firm had been kind and
generous in their dealings with him; and then there were the friends and
neighbours with whom they had pleasant intercourse for a long number of years.
To leave Hamilton and all the associations that had made life happy was no easy
matter; but, in going, there was an independence in the future and a return to
the old home across the seas that they had left in their youth.
To shorten up the story, the old bookkeeper
and his good wife bade farewell to Hamilton and all its pleasant memories, and
entered into possession of the little fortune, which, added to their own
savings of years in Hamilton, made a bright future for them. No more toiling
over account books, no more worry as to the future! For a few years life was
very happy for those old Hamiltonians, but one day the angel of death entered
that English home and bereft it of the dear old wife. Misfortunes never come
singly. That simple-hearted couple had a friend in whom they placed the
greatest confidence, and this friend proved in time to be a snake in the grass,
and was the cause of their undoing. He persuaded the old bookkeeper to invest
his means in some wildcat scheme that promised large dividends; and for a short
time, the dividends were prompt, but one day the newspapers told the story of
the crash of the company, and of the hundreds of innocent stockholders who
would lose every dollar of their investment. The bubble of wealth had burst,
and our confiding Hamiltonian was left stranded, every dollar of the little
fortune that had been bequested to him and of his own savings of years going
out like a flash.
There were more expert bookkeepers in old
London town than there were situations to fill, and as the preference is
generally for young men or young women, our Hamiltonian was out of a job. Left alone
in the wilderness of a large city, with the wife of his mature years asleep in
God’s acre, all ambition in life gone, he must struggle on till the death angel
will make a final visit to his humble home to unite him once more with his
beloved wife.
There is a lesson in this. Never trust a
friend or anybody else to invest your money for you; and never loan a dollar to
even your dearest friend. This old muser speaks from personal experience.
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This reminds us of another story that
fits in very nicely with the one above. It might be called an ancient story
were it not that the principal actor is still living. Let us go back twenty
years, for it was about that time that a lady left Hamilton to make her home in
a western town this side of the Detroit river. She had means aplenty to provide
for her future years, and settled down in a bright little cottage, which she
fitted up with all the elegancies in keeping with her refined nature. She was
an accomplished scholar, and her fine library was an index to her intellectual
character. Her early life had been spent among the most refined people, who
made Hamilton their home a half century ago, and the future promised equal
pleasure and happiness in the western town she had selected to end her days.
That western town got up a boom, and a
few sharpers took advantage of it to transfer the wealth of their friends to
their own pockets. A man who had a pious reputation, and was looked upon as the
very soul of honor, started a private bank, and with the promise of paying
large dividends, had but little difficulty in persuading the people into
purchasing stock. Even the newspaper of the town gave the enterprising banker
liberal puffs for what was being done in a financial way to build up the town. Newspapers
sometimes do great harm in a community by advertising wildcat speculations. The
bank prospered for a season, and then there was a collapse. Nearly everybody
living in that town who had a little money were stockholders, and when the
crash came, it submerged the town in financial ruin. The lady of whom we are
telling this story had such such confidence in the banker that she trusted to
the full extent of her wealth, and even the charming little cottage with all of
its luxuries, was swept into the melting pot and she was left stranded without
a dollar. The banker was arrested and sent to the penitentiary for a term of
years; but what satisfaction was there in his imprisonment, for on his release
he had a few thousand that he had carefully stored away when the crash came,
while the robbed stockholders were left with the empty bag to hold.
The dear lady, now advanced in years
came back to Hamilton to spend the closing years of her life, and with a few
hundred dollars which she had saved from the wreck, secured a residence in the
old ladies’ home, and is enjoying the comforts of that elegant retreat.
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AN OLD-TIME HAMILTON GIRL
It is doubtful if one-fourth of the
present population of Hamilton ever heard that there was such a household
necessity as a sewing machine manufactured in this town; and it will be a
greater surprise when we tell them that there were no less than seven
factories, turning out hundreds of the best machines every week, and a large
regiment of men and women employed at good wages. And all that happened less
than half a century ago, and today there are but few to hark back to the old
Wanzer machine that sold for $35, when American- made machines were selling up
about the century mark, and not worth a penny more than the Wanzer machine in
intrinsic value. Canadians had not got educated up to the idea of encouraging
home industry, and would rather patronize the Singers, the Wheeler and Wilsons,
the Elias Howes, and the other American machines that flooded the Canadian
market. By the way, it may be an item of interest to the women folks to know
that the first perfect machine made was through the ingenuity of a woman. The
Howe was the invention of Elias Howe, but he got stuck on one point, and unless
he could overcome that his machine could not be made workable. He succeeded in
everything except in the adjustment of the needle, and there he was at his wit’s
end. The story is told that Elias went from home on a short vacation to rest
his fevered brain, and during he absence his good wife concluded to try her
mechanical skill in the adjustment of the needle, and by the greatest good
fortune she hit the adjustment and the machine was a success. Like a sensible
woman she kept the secret from her husband till his return from his vacation,
so that he might get the much-needed rest , and she triumphantly led him to the
workshop and began running the completed machine. That was said to be the first
perfect sewing machine ever manufactured. Elias Howe immediately took out
patents to protect his invention, and it was but a few years till he became a
millionaire, and all the result of having a bright wife. When the American
civil war broke out, Elias Howe, like a true patriot, enlisted as a private
soldier, although he was tendered a commission by the governor of his state.
There were times when Uncle Sam’s bank account got pretty low, and as a
consequence the paymaster was not able to pay his regiment. The wives and
children were feeling the pressure as much and the men themselves were without
a dollar for the necessities of camp. The regiment to which he belonged was
several months in arrears in arrears. One day Private Howe suggested to the
colonel that he would be able to help Uncle Sam bear his burden, and that it
the colonel would tell him the amount necessary to pay off the regiment, he
would advance that sum. The result was that Private Howe drew a check upon his
personal account, handed it over to the colonel, and in a few days that
regiment was revealing in greenbacks. Now the story as it was told more than
half a century ago. What a difference between the old-time patriots and the
fellows who are today making their millions out of the government by supplying
the fighting troops from Canada with bacon!
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Well, where has this sewing machine
story to do with the old-time Hamilton girl? Just wait patiently. It will come
out. About the time that Private Elias Howe was drawing his check for the money
to pay off the regiment to which he belonged, R. M. Wanzer had hiked from
Buffalo to open a little shop on the corner of James and Vine streets in which
to begin the manufacture of the first sewing machines made in Canada. It is a fact that Mr. Wanzer was a
schoolmaster by profession, but somewhat of a genius in mechanics, and to help
in his new industry, he brought a half dozen or so expert machinist machinists
with him. He was not bothered about patents, for by that time there was a
number of different machines on the American market, and all he had to do was
to combine the best in one machine, and add a few screws here and there to the
Wanzer, and there you are. Mr. Wanzer’s idea was to make a strong machine and
put it on the market at a small profit, and trust to his business energy to
make it go. Not having an Elias Howe bank account to back him up, the new
factory adopted the plan of manufacturing a dozen or two swing machines at a
time, and then Mr. Wanzer and his agents travelled the country till the stock
was disposed of. Then he would discount his notes with his banker and start out
on a new stock. That sewing machine business grew and grew till the Vine street
shop got to be too small, and then came the big factory on the lot now occupied
by the Terminal station. A Yankee machinist became a member of the firm, and
every boy in Hamilton that wanted work got a job. Some of those boys became
preachers in course of time, and others went out into the workaday world as
finished mechanics. The Yankee machinist had the euphonious name of Tarbox, and
while he was head of the mechanical department business prospered. Some five or
six other companies began the making of sewing machines in Hamilton, and all
prospered for a time till they began to sell out to each other, and finally Mr.
Wanzer had the bag to hold. Tarbox finally sold out his stock in the Wanzer
factory, receiving $75,000 or more, and in those days was counted as a man of
wealth.
And here is where the old-time
Hamilton girl comes in. Mr. Tarbox was the father of a family of four children.
He was an indulgent father, and nothing was too rich or too good for his wife
and children. When he retired from business, he bought an elegant home on King
street east, said to be the present Proctor home, and furnished it with all the
luxurious appointments that wealth could purchase. His daughters were specially
bright girls and were educated in the public and private schools of Hamilton.
It is of Jessie Tarbox, one of those accomplished daughters that we started
this story with. When a young girl and a student in the Hamilton art school,
Jessie first developed that talent for sketching that has made for her a name
and fortune in New York city. Through unfortunate speculations, the fortune her
father had accumulated in the Wanzer factory melted away so rapidly that one
day the family found themselves digging down for the bottom dollars, and the
family went back to their native home across the Niagara river to begin life
anew. And it was then that Jessie Tarbox found that her talents and education
were a mine of wealth in helping support the family. Today her skill as a sketch
artist, as a photographist, and as a descriptive writer have placed her among
the highbrows of culture in New York, with a bank account that is pleasant to
cast her bright eyes over once a month. She is happily married, so that her
name is now Jessie Tarbox Seals.
