THE MULTI-MILLIONAIRE BUTCHER-PHILIP D. ARMOUR.

Auckland Star, Volume XXXII, Issue 52, 2 March 1901, Page 6 (Supplement)

THE MULTI-MILLIONAIRE BUTCHER-PHILIP D. ARMOUR.

HIS REMARKABLE CAREER

(From Our Special Correspondent.)

LONDON, January 11, 1901

Memories of an appalling hour spent ta the mammoth butchering factories Chicago give a quaintly morbid mge to the news of Philip D. Armour s death Everybody knew this mighty multi-m.l llonaire by name. From the Arctic explorer just touching the North Pole to the up-country storekeeper in the *everNever Land of Australia, all of us na heard of "Armour's" canned meat,. A . however, did not know the perfections of must be seen to be-well api Twenty millions sterling (says the Davy News") is the estimated value o the transactions annually earned out by tms remarkable multi-millionaire butcher Seventy years ago he was a poor boy on a New York State farm, picking up what education he could in the of labour at the common school. His carte is a marvellous instance of what hard work foresight, and courage can accomplish when combined with the genius for accumulating money. Mr Armour himself was of opinion that millionaires are born, not made. The power of making nnd accumulating money and of handling large business affairs were as much a natural gift, he held, as those of a singer or an artist. Mr Armour had no business training whatever, and in after years he attributed his success in business to thrift and economy, his mother's training, and a good line of Scotch ancestors, who had always been thrifty and economical.

When he was twenty the gold fever seized him, and he made the long overland journey to California. The hardships of that long tramp he never forgot. His shoes were out. and the spines of the cactus lacerated his feet as he trudged mile after mile towards the promised land of wealth. He arrived in California with little experience and great expectations. The latter were destined

to grievous disappointment. Young Armour retraced his steps eastward, and settled as a clerk in a pigslaughtering business at Milwaukee. In hogs Mr Armour found a richer gold mine than any which the western gold diggers ever struck. Mr Armour had the gift of seeing into the future, and the courage to play for high stakes. He laid the foundation of his immense fortune by a bold bid on the successful termination of the Civil War. Things were looking bad for the Northern armies, but Mr Armour astonished his partner one day by suddenly announcing, "I am going to New York at once. The war is over. Grant has practically beaten the rebels, and we will have peace in a few weeks. I am going to New York to buy up all the pork I can get." He went and bought right and left. Prices ■were low, and sellers were eager to part with their holdings. Suddenly news reached New York which proved the war to be practically over. Prices went bounding upwards, and Mr Armour made a profit of something like £200,000 on the transaction.

A NAPOLEON .OF INDUSTRY. In ISTS he moved to Chicago, and began to build up his great packing business. He had already made his reputation as a bold and daring business speculator of remarkable foresight. His business deals have always been upon a Napoleonic scale. Some of his largest transactions have been in grain. His inflexible will, which refused to be daunted by any obstacle, has always carried them to a successful conclusion. "Mr Armour," said an acquaintance, "fixes his eye on something ahead, and no matter what rises on the right or left, he never sees it. He goes straight ahead in pursuit of the object and overtakes it at last." On one occasron Mr Armour had bought three million bushels of wheat, to be delivered in May. All the Chicago elevators were full, and there was no place in which to store the immense quantity of wheat. On April Ist Mr Armour sent for his architect and builder, and said: "I must have within thirty days elevators built large enough to store 3,000,000 bushels of wheat." "It can't be done," said the architect flatly. "It musj be done," replied Mr Armour coolly. "It is a physical impossibility," was the reply, "We might do it in a year. We can't do it in a month!"

Mr Armour listened; his iron jaw came together more firmly than ever, as he said: "I tell you it must be done, and it will be done." He then gave his orders. He bought a little island on which to build the elevators. He put up an electric lighting system, and worked three gangs of men eight hours at a stretch. The elevators were completed three days before the wheat began to arrive. A BATTLE BETWEEN ARMOUR AND NATURE. Another of his immense wheat deals attracted a good deal of attention a year or two ago. Mr Armour had entered into an agreement to deliver to Joseph Lelter six million bushels of wheat by January 1. Before that date this huge amount of grain had to be warehoused and inspected. Mr Armour calculated that he could secure sufficient wheat in the Northwest. He had no difficulty in doing so. The problem was how to transport it to Chicago before the frost covered Lake Michigan with impenetrable ice. It was a battle between Armour and nature, and Armour won. Every steamship that could be engaged was hired. Wheat came pouring into Chicago by rail, by canal, and by steamer. To transport the three million bushels of wheat by rail required 3000 cars and cost £30,000. The wheat brought by water cost almost £20,000 to transport. Before the last cargoes were shipped the harbours began to freeze up. Mr Armour at once secured a dozen tug boats, which crashed their way througn the inches of ice and kept the way clear. Before the stipulated date every bushet was warehoused, and Mr Armour haa once more triumphed. A MILLIONAIRE BUSINESS CREED.

Mr Armour believed that business was business, and never allowed sentiment to interfere with any of his plans. All that he ever professed to do was to give sixteen ounces to the pound, and 100 cents to the dollar. Business is not mission work, and we don't try to do business for charity, were two of his maxims. Mr Armour was a firm believer in the doctrine of the survival of the fittest. If small butchers did not deal wdth him he undersold them till they were either compelled to give up the struggle or to close their shops. "It is a question of the greatest good to the greatest nunVber," _c replied to all objections to great monopolies. "Why should people pay high prices for the privilege of keeping any small class of men at work? We can give better and cheaper meat to the people than they can

get anywhere else." Mr Armour did not make his proiiis out of selling his. meat,

bur out of the utilisation of 1:1s waste pro

ducts. Some years ago he explained how it was that he could sell meat than his rivals. 'When the ordinary butcher," .aid Mr Armour, "kills his animals, a great part of the cow or hog goes to waste. In the packing houses every bit of the animal is saved. It is said that we save every piece of the hog except his squeal. There are a number of different works connected witii the packmg houses. Take, for instance, our glue works. We use in them every year materials which to the ordinary butcher would be worth £10,----000. We mix the waste with brains, and by scientific manipulation, care and labour, we put it through certain processes by which we turn the £10,000 into products we can sell for £200,000. We send bones by the shipload across the Paciiic. The Japanese buy them, and make buttons and carved work out of them. It is so with every part of the animal. Our profits come out of the waste."

A SLAVE TO MONEY-MAKING.

Down to the very last years of his life Mr Armour worked as hard aa any of his clerks. He was an early riser, and, winter and summer, was down at his office by half-past seven every morning, and there remained until six in the evening. He lived in his business, and finally became little more than a human money-making machine. A friend once asked him why he did not retire, and make room for younger men. "Because," replied Mr Armour, "I have no other interest in life

but my business. I do not want any more money. I have more than I want. I do not love the money; what I do love is the getting of it. the making it. All the years of my life I have put into my work, and now it is my life, and I cannot give it up. What other interest can you suggest to me? I do not read; I do not take, any part in polities; what can I do? But in my counting house I am in my element, there I live, and the struggle is the very breath of life to me."

Like Mr Carnegie, Mr Armour was a great believer in young men and young brains. He once described himself as a buyer of youth and brains. It is said he never discharged a man if he could bslp it. If he was not efficient, he changed his work. Three things, however, he would never tolerate—laziness, intemperance, and debt. He knew personally every man in his office, and set all his clerks a striking example of punctuality; despatcn and close attention to affairs. TEN PER CENT. IN SATISFACTION. Mr Armour spent large sums of money upon the Armour Institute, a first-class college for boys and girls, resembling our Polytechnics, which his brother had founded. He gave it at various , times £GOO,OOO, and endowed it with house property sufficient to meet its working expenses. Mr Armour looked upon his philanthropy in a strictly business spirit. It was a good investment, bringing him in

"more than ten per cent, in satisfaction." He believed in spending- his money wdiile he was alive. To leave it till one was dead, he regarded as "bad business." "1 prefer," he said, "to do the work now. It is cheaper. It saves the commission, and it-, gives a man. a chance to kick if his plans are not carried out as they should be." Mr Armour's chief personal interest was in the mission to the children in connection with the Institute. "I don't care much for the old men and hardened sinners," he said, in explaining his ideas on the art of right giving. "I don't think you can do much with the one-legged, oneeyed drunkard who lies In the gutter. I tell the preachers they ought to step over him and save his young child who is playing on the street. You can't make much out of the old drunkard; there is some margin in the child."

On religion Mr Armour had very definite and practical ideas, which he enforced In the conduct of the Institute mission. He would have none of the "hell-fire and brimstone kind," he declared. He would not tolerate doctrines of any description.

"When we baptise," he said, in explanation of the principles on whic- he wished his misson run, "we feel that we can use a finger-bowl or a dish pan just as well as a cut glass jar or an immersion vat. It is the fact and not the means which we want."