A SUCCESSFUL PUBLISHER.

545 might be considered by some young gentlemen nowadays as menial work, and therefore beneath them.

"While I was working as errand-boy, I improved such opportunity as I had to read books and to attend book-sales at night, so as to learn the market value of books, and anything else that might be useful to me hereafter in my business. It was my aim always to be in a position where I could use my best talents to the best advantage. I fixed my ambition high, so that, even if I did not realize the highest, I might at least always be tending upwards."

The new firm was well calculated to succeed. Mr. Peterson had good literary taste, and his partner had the business aptitude of knowing whether a book was salable, so that after a book had been issued young Childs was able to push its sale to a remunerative number of copies. Thus the combination prospered. One of the first works published by the firm was "Wells's Familiar Science," which Mr. Childs's energy pushed to a sale of 200,000 copies. Other well-known successes of the firm were "Dr. Kane's Arctic Explorations," "Institutes of American Law," "Fletcher's Brazil," "Parson Brownlow's Book," and many others.

Mr. Childs remained in the publishing business for about twelve years. He had long desired to be the owner of a leading newspaper. This had been his ambition for years, and while he was still a lad he fixed his eyes upon what was then the popular daily journal of Philadelphia-the Public Ledger-and resolved that one day he would be its proprietor. The audacity of such a thought in a boy of eighteen can hardly be appreciated by any one who was not familiar with Philadelphia at the time and with the solid basis of prosperity upon which the Ledger stood.

HE BUYS THE "LEDGER."

At last the long-wished-for opportunity came. James Parton tells the story in this way: "The Public Ledger had fallen upon evil days. Started as a penny paper in 1836, the proprietors had been able to keep it at that price for a quarter of a century. But the war, by doubling But the war, by doubling the cost of material and labor, had rendered it impossible to continue the paper at the original price, except at a loss. The proprietors were men naturally averse to a change. They clung to the penny feature of their system too long, believing it vital to the prosperity of the Ledger. They were both right and wrong. Cheapness was vital, but in 1864 a cent for such a sheet as the Ledger was no price at all; it was giving it half away. Retaining the original price was carrying a good principle to that extreme which endangered the principle itself.

"The establishment was then losing $480 upon every number of the paper which it issued. This was not generally known. The paper looked as prosperous as ever; its circulation was immense, and its columns were crowded with advertisements. And yet there was a weekly loss of $3000,-$150,000 a year!

Upon learning this fact the friends of Mr. Childs whose opinion he sought said with decision, Don't buy!' Nevertheless, he looked the ground carefully over; he made minute calculations; he kept on his thinking cap day and evening. He bought the Public Ledger-the whole of it, just as it stood-for a sum little exceeding the amount of its annual loss."

From the day of the purchase of the Ledger Mr. Childs became its sole controller and gave all his attention to the work. He brought the paper up out of the depths to which it had sunk financially, until at the time of his death it was one of the most valuable and profitable in this country, and Mr. Childs for many years had been in the receipt of a princely income.

A GREAT BENEFACTOR.

How generously and nobly this wealth has been employed all the world knows in a general way, though no one will probably ever know all the good done by him. Of George W. Childs it may be said with exact truth that since Providence blessed him with means he constantly sought out opportunities to benefit his fellow-creatures. He not only gave liberally when it was asked of him, but it was his delight to seek out deserving cases where his money and his friendship would exchange poverty for comfort, suffering for happiness.

He often gave in secret, and thousands who were too proud and sensitive to make their wants known have blessed an unknown donor for substantial help which was sadly needed. Mr. Childs loved to make those in his employ happy and prosperous. He erected a new building for his newspaper which combined comfort with elegance in a remarkable degree. Such conveniences as bathrooms and ice-water fountains abound, and every work-room is a model of comfort. Every man in his employ received a good salary and a handsome Christmas present every year.

When the Typographical Union voluntarily reduced the price of composition in 1878, Mr. Childs, on receiving the official notification, said quietly: "I shall not make any reduction of wages in this office. My business has not suffered by the depression, and why should my men suffer? Why should not they continue to receive the benefit of my success?"

Every man in his employ was assured of a position during good behavior, and Mr. Childs said more than once that he had provided in his will that no changes were to be made in the personnel of the Ledger after his death. He took a personal interest in the affairs of his workmen, and often made a careless, unthrifty fellow a present of a bank book, with a sum to his credit, as an induce ment to save money. It was his pride that every man of family in his employ should own his dwelling-house, and he frequently advanced money to pay for the houses of his workmen, without security. He presented his assistants with insurance on their lives, and sent to Europe or on other pleasure trips the

THE PRINTERS' HOME.

547

heads of his departments when confinement to business affected their health. He presented to the Typographical Society a large burial plot in Woodlands Cemetery, besides contributing to the society's endowment. He frequently sent entire charitable institutions on pleasure excursions during the hot weather, and the Fourth of July and Christmas he was accustomed to celebrate by a banquet to the newsboys or bootblacks, or by some other entertainment to the street waifs.

Messrs. Childs and Drexel sent their respective checks for $5000 to the Convention of the International Typographical Union in 1886, then in session

at Pittsburgh, provision being made that the individual members should have the opportunity to assist in augmenting the fund until it was sufficient to establish a "Home" for disabled printers. It was arranged that the printers east of the Mississippi should, for this purpose, contribute the price paid for setting one thousand ems on Mr. Childs' birthday, May 12, of each year, and those west of the Mississippi should do likewise on the annual recurrence of Mr. Drexel's birthday, September 13.

Speaking of giving, Mr. Childs wrote: "I think the habit of generosity may be cultivated, like other habits. And I have felt that it is a great mistake to put

off being generous until after you are dead. In the first place, you lose the pleasure of witnessing the good that you may do; and, again, no one can administer your gifts for you as well as you can do it for yourself. It is a great pleasure to be brought into personal relations of that kind, and to make people feel that you are not a philanthropist in the abstract, but that you are interested in them personally, and care for their welfare."

"One naturally thinks of Childs," writes Julian Hawthorne, "in connection with the late George Peabody. The two men were friends, and in the latter years of Peabody's life he once spoke to Childs as one rich man to another. 'I have worked hard to make money,' he said, 'with the intention of giving it away in large amounts. I mean to give it away in my own lifetime, so as to enjoy the pleasure of seeing and overseeing the good it does. I do not wish my heirs and connections to be impatient for my death, consequently have given to each of them liberally. I wish to distribute its effects widely, rather than concentrate them in any one direction. There is value, not only in the act, but in the example it furnishes to others. If you will take my advice, you will be your own executor, and begin betimes.' Mr. Childs was quick to adopt counsel so consonant with his own predilections; and he has bettered his instructions."

GIFTS TO OTHER COUNTRIES.

So great was his reputation for liberality that he probably received more applications for help than any other man in the country. Begging letters came to him by the score in his daily mail, and visitors on begging missions were constantly calling on him. He was always easy of access, and very seldom turned a deaf ear to a deserving case. But his good works were not confined to his own city and country. He presented to Westminster Abbey an elegant stained glass memorial window in honor of the poets George Herbert and William Cowper. In 1887, the jubilee year of Queen Victoria, Mr. Childs presented to the town of Stratford-upon-Avon, the birthplace of Shakespeare, a public drinking fountain, with clock tower. He subsequently gave to St. Margaret's Church, Westminster, London, a memorial window to John Milton. This gift was inspired by his friend, Archdeacon Farrar. This window was formally unveiled on the 18th of February, 1888. In March, 1889, there was unveiled in St. Thomas' Church, Winchester, England, a reredos, the gift of Mr. Childs also.

In many other ways he has given of his wealth to worthy objects in England and on the continent. As a compliment from the English government he was appointed in 1876 Honorary Commissioner for Great Britain and the Colonies to the Centennial Exhibition. He never held any other public office. He was frequently urged to accept a political appointment, and was asked to represent his country abroad in an exceedingly exalted position, but he refused this, as he did every other similar offer.

DISTINGUISHED GUESTS.

549

The homes of Mr. Childs were the abodes of picturesque beauty and of everything that could make them inviting. In Bryn Mawr, one of Philadelphia's prettiest suburbs, was his country house, known by the name of "Wootton." Great lawns sloping away on all sides of the house are dotted here and there with trees, every one of which has been planted by some man or woman whose name has served to make the history of to-day. It is a bright, breezy, widehalled, and charmingly rambling structure, and it is filled with costly, quaint, and beautiful things from all parts of the world.

Among Mr. Childs' guests were Generals Grant, Sherman, Meade, Sheri

dan, Hancock, McDowell, and Patterson; Edmund Quincy, Chief Justice Waite, A. J. Drexel, Asa Packer, the Astors, Cadwaladers, Professor Joseph Henry, Hamilton Fish, Robert C. Winthrop, Charles Francis Adams, Presidents Hayes, Arthur, and Cleveland; Chauncey M. Depew, Cornelius Vanderbilt, Thomas A Edison, Simon Cameron, Henry Wilson, William M. Evarts, James G. Blaine, John Welsh, August Belmont, Alexander H. Stephens, Samuel J. Tilden, Cyrus W. Field, B. J. Lossing, Mrs. Grover Cleveland, Charlotte Cushman, Christine Nilsson, Harriet Hosmer, John Bigelow, Thomas F. Bayard, Parke Godwin, Edwards Pierrepont, and many others.

Mr. Childs said that one of the chief pleasures of his life had been the