FIRST-CLASS MEN BRITISH RAILWAY SENSATION

Evening Post, Volume LXXXVII, Issue 74, 28 March 1914, Page 9

FIRST-CLASS MEN BRITISH RAILWAY SENSATION

IMPORTANT APPOINTMENT FOR AMERICAN PROTEST BY COMMERCIAL COMMUNITY. j (MOM OUR OWN CORRESPONDENT.) LONDON, 18th Febiuary. A bombshell was flung into the railway world by Lord Claud Hamilton, | who declared that young men of sufficient ability to become genera! managers of British railways could not lie j found at Home and that he had had to go to America to find a successor to Mr. Walter Hyde as general manager of the Great Eastern Railway. In his speech to the shareholders, Lord Claud Hamilton, who is chairman of the company, said : I "It is a subject of great regret to. my mind and to the minds of all chairmen that on our English railway systems at the present time there is an acknowledged dearth of first-class men coming to the front capable of fulfilling the duties of general managers. But this does not apply merely to the office of general manager. There is a dearth of first-rate men coming 4 -to the front for «yen our minor .appointment:. , " Now, what is the cause of that ? I am certain in these days of education there are heaps of able young men in the ranks of the railway companies. Why do they not come to the front? Why are not opportunities given them to come to the front?" Lord Claud blamed " Government trammels " and the system in vogue on our railways, which, he said, had outgrown its usefulness. Our railway systems were divided into water-tight compartments, which were kept apart, with the result that there was very little exchange from one to the other on the part ot young men who formed the majority of clerks belonging to those departments. The inevitable effect was to ramove the incentive to new ideas and new methods, and to open up nothing but a mere vista of endless uniformity. It reduced these young men to mere human automatons ; .hey began in a department, and they ended their lives there. That was a system not advantageous to railways in the present day, and it was not followed in the United States. In the United States the presidents and general managers knew every rising young man on their system, because, under their system, young men were interchangeable from one department to another. The chief at headquarters knew all about them, and at any moment, to meet his particular requirements, he was able to summon one of those young men to his aid. "GO TO THE UNITED STATES." ' ' Not only lately, but for some years, I have been looking -throughout England in the hope of iinding young men who would be competent, should occasion arise, to undertake the duties of general manager of this company. I have only found two men of great resouices, but not having sufficient experience to take the position. " My colleagues were very good, and I think they acted wisely. When I told them I could not find a gentleman in the United Kingdom, they said, ' Go, if you like, to the United States,' and I did. I ascertained through the good offices of a railwayman in whom I hacj the utmost confidence that there was a gentleman in the United States who, in his opinion, would be admirably qualified to fulfil the duties of general manager of this railway. ' " I cabled for him at once, subject to leave fiom his president, to cross the Atlantic, and, with the promptitude ■which characterises our American cousins, he , came by the first available boat. He has been here a fortnight ; he has been over our system, and lias carefully watched oui suburban traffic, and has been frequently interviewed by my co-directors and myself. " The gentleman in question is Mr. Henry W. 'Ihornton, the general superintendent of the Long Island Railroad, which works under the authority of the Pennsylvania Railroad, the premier railway of the United States, and I might almost say the premier railway of the world. He is. forty-one years of age, and has been for twenty years in the service of the Pennsylvania Railroad Company, and his career has been one succession of intellectual and railway triumphs. Mr. Thornton will to-day sign an agreement with me; he will return to the United States to-morrow, and he hopes to be over here with his family and settled in office during the first week in April." BUSINESS LEADERS' VIEWS. Lord Claud Hamilton's suggestion that there is no young man in this country capable of managing the Great Eastern line is indignantly denied in business circles. Chairmen of big railway companies like Sir Alexander Henderson, Sir C. B. Renshaw, Lord Churchill, Mr. Whitelaw, and Sir David Stewart all say that there is no dearth of "young talent" in the railway service. Colonel Lockwood, a director of the London and North-Western system, says hi 3 company has plenty of capable young men. Sir Guy, Granet, the general manager of the Midland, entirely dissents from Lord Claud Hamilton's opinion. Sir George Pragnell, managing partner of Messrs. Cook, Son, and Co., St. Paul's Churchyard,, says: "So long as we put noble lords ana lawyers in control of things about which they axe completely ignorant, we cannot expect the best results. I congratulate hundreds of smart men on the Great Eastern Railway. They are going to be discovered." Sir John Barker (chairman of John Barker and Co) : "There are plenty of clever young men in England. A large corporation like the Great Eastern Railway ought to train up its men for important positions. Yon cannot always find an experienced man for a post, but it has never occurred, to me to go to America." Mr. Richard Burbidge (head of Harrod's): "A3 a business man, I deplore the fact that Lord Claud Hamilton has gone to America for his general manager. Capable Englishmen exist, and, if the railways knew how, they could find them; the young men don't get a chance. In trading circles it is different. I started with four years' apprenticeship, and went on to a salary of £20 a year. It is the same with all the hands in our house." NEW MANAGER'S INTENTIONS. Mr. H. W. Thornton, the new manager of tltfc ' Great Eastern Railway left London on Saturday- to join the Carmania for New York, interviewed at Euston station he said that the surprise and annoyance at his appointment expressed in various newspapers was perhaps natural, but he felt it was unjustified. "I have met many of your English managers in. the States," he said, ''and have entertained them there. 1 have always found them charming and efficient, and I look forward with the greatest pleasure to getting into closer touch with them. 1 don't want anyone to think that my appointment to the Great Eastern Railway \ will mean unjustifiable introduction of 1 American methodo.. We are only going

to introduce those things which axe consonant with English railway practice and satisfactory to our patrons. It would be a veiy dangeious thing to introduce methods and practices which did not suit our patrons. Quite irrespective of what Lord Claud Hamilton said with regard to the EnglisTi system of management precluding those in authority from discovering young talent amongst the staffs, I shall make it my business, as in the States, to get in touch with all my staif. 1 shall want to know all toe membera of my immediate staff personally, ar.a I hope T shall nob miss anyone wi.e is capable of higher things. If that vs an American innovation I shall carry it out." • Mr. Thornton added that his family originally nailed Loin Yorkshire ] and 'emigrated to Virginia in 1650.