A Dutch Boy Fifty Years After Part 1

A Dutch Boy Fifty Years After.

by Edward Bok.

INTRODUCTION

In recent years American literature has been enriched by certain autobiographies of men and women who had been born abroad, but who had been brought to this country, where they grew up as loyal citizens of our great nation. Such a.s.similated Americans had to face not only the usual conditions confronting a stranger in a strange land, but had to develop within themselves the n.o.ble conception of Americanism that was later to become for them a flaming gospel. Andrew Carnegie, the canny Scotch lad who began as a cotton weaver's a.s.sistant, became a steel magnate and an eminent constructive philanthropist. Jacob Riis, the ambitious Dane, told in _The Making of an American_ the story of his rise to prominence as a social and civic worker in New York. Mary Antin, who was brought from a Russian ghetto at the age of thirteen, gave us in _The Promised Land_ a most impressive interpretation of America's significance to the foreign-born. The very t.i.tle of her book was a flash of inspiration.

To this group of notable autobiographies belongs _The Americanization of Edward Bok_, which received, from Columbia University, the Joseph Pulitzer Prize of one thousand dollars as "the best American biography teaching patriotic and unselfish service to the Nation and at the same time ill.u.s.trating an eminent example." The judges who framed that decision could not have stated more aptly the scope and value of the book. It is the story of an unusual education, a conspicuous achievement, and an ideal now in course of realization.

At the age of six Edward Bok was brought to America by his parents, who had met with financial reverses in their native country of the Netherlands. He spent six years in the public schools of Brooklyn, but even while getting the rudiments of a formal education he had to work during his spare hours to bring home a few more dollars to aid his needy family. His first job was cleaning the show-window of a small bakery for fifty cents a week. At twelve he became an office boy in the Western Union Telegraph Company; at nineteen he was a stenographer; at twenty-six he became editor of _The Ladies' Home Journal_, which during the thirty years of his supervision achieved the remarkable circulation of two million copies and reached every month an audience of perhaps ten million persons. Such is the bare outline of a career that has the essential characteristics of struggle and achievement, of intimate contact with eminent men and women, and, most interesting of all, is not a fulfilled career, but a life still in the making.

The significance of _The Americanization of Edward Bok_ is threefold and is clearly indicated by the author's own conception of the three periods that should const.i.tute a well-rounded life.. These he characterizes as education, achievement, and service for others.

Conceived in this ideal spirit, the autobiography has a message for every American schoolboy or schoolgirl who is looking forward to the years of achievement and who should be made to understand that there is a finer duty beyond. It has an equally important message for those of us who in the turmoil of a busy world are struggling to achieve, in many instances with no vision beyond the desire to provide as best we can for the welfare of ourselves and our families. Lastly, it has an inspiring, constructive message for those who are now in a position to render altruistic service and thus contribute their share toward making the world in general and America in particular a better place in which to live.

Because of the recognized value of Edward Bok's life-story, the present abridged edition, which is re-named _A Dutch Boy Fifty Years After_, has been undertaken. The chapters here brought together, with the approval of Mr. Bok, tell the story of the Dutch boy in the American school, his earnest efforts to help his parents, his journalistic and literary experiences, his wide-spread influence as editor, and a vision of what he still hopes to accomplish for the land of his adoption.

Our boys and girls who become familiar with the story of this resourceful Dutch lad should note that he is not ashamed to tell us he helped his mother by building the fire, preparing the breakfast, and washing the dishes before he went to school, and when he returned from school he did not play but swept, scrubbed, and washed more dishes after the evening meal. He did not whine and mope because his parents could no longer keep the retinue of servants to which they had been accustomed in the Netherlands. He simply pitched in and helped. The same spirit impelled him to clean the baker's windows for fifty cents a week, to deliver a newspaper over a regular route, to sell ice water on the Coney Island horse-cars--in short, to do any honorable work to overcome the burden of poverty. Meanwhile he strove to acquire what little education he could, but he probably learned more from his a.s.sociation with the prominent persons whom he met as a result of his early pa.s.sion for autograph collecting. Such a boyhood brings home the important truth that necessity is the mother of self-reliance.

Mr. Bok's story indicates the road to success and gives encouragement to those who would tread that pleasant way, but it also sounds a frank warning against the pitfalls that beset ambitious youth. When he was sent by the city editor of the _Brooklyn Eagle_ to review a theatrical performance and decided to write his review without going to the theatre, he had, of course, no warning that the performance would not take place. He took what many a more experienced reporter would consider a reasonable chance and he suffered keen humiliation when the lesson was forced home that it does not pay to attempt deception. He tells us that the incident left a lasting impression and he felt grateful because it happened so early in life that he could take the experience to heart and profit by it. With equal candor he tells of the stock-market "tips" that resulted from his intimacy with Jay Gould.

Wisely he records that he resolved to keep out of Wall Street thereafter, in spite of his initial success in speculation. When he gave up an a.s.sociation that probably would have led to his becoming a stock-broker, and somewhat later, when he declined an offer to be the business manager for a popular American actress, Edward Bok was called upon to make fateful decisions. In this story he lays ample stress upon the need for careful and deliberate consideration at such crucial moments.

The account of his long and successful editorship of _The Ladies' Home Journal_ reveals the extent of his influence on American social and domestic conditions. He broadened the scope of _The Journal_ until it touched the life of the nation at many points. The earlier women's magazines had devoted most attention to fashions, needle-work, and cookery, printing a few sentimental stories and poems to give the necessary literary atmosphere. _The Ladies' Home Journal_ took up a great variety of problems concerning the American home and those who dwelled therein. A corps of editors was a.s.sembled to conduct departments and to answer questions either by mail or in the pages of _The Journal_. Free scholarships in colleges and in musical conservatories were given in place of the usual magazine premiums.

Series of articles were published to foster our national appreciation for better architecture, better furniture, better pictures--in brief, for better homes in every respect.

Mr. Bok discouraged the taking of patent medicines, the wearing of aigrettes, the use of the public drinking-cup, the disfiguring of American scenery with glaring signs and bill-posting, the use of fireworks on the Fourth of July, and many similar matters that were not to our credit or advantage. He printed convincing photographs taken in various "dirty cities" that tolerated refuse and other evidences of untidiness on their streets and literally shamed those communities into cleaning up the plague-spots. Had he been a commonplace editor with his main thought on the subscription list he would have avoided controversy by confining his leading articles to subjects unlikely to offend any one, but he would not pursue any policy that meant a surrender of his ideals. When occasion demanded he did not hesitate to hit squarely from the shoulder. Whether the public agreed with him or not, it knew that _The Journal_ was very much in earnest whenever it espoused any cause.

Mr. Bok's last important service as editor of _The Journal_ was a direct outcome of our partic.i.p.ation in the Great War. The problems raised by that world cataclysm called for a restatement of American ideals and aspirations. He therefore arranged for a number of articles adapted to the needs of every community, whether large or small, and these were soon acclaimed as the most comprehensive exposition of practical Americanization that had yet been published. As a far-sighted editor with a long experience behind him he knew that many of the immigrants coming to this country were ready to enjoy our privileges without undertaking to share our responsibilities. The newcomer could realize a freedom unknown in Europe, he had a chance to achieve higher standards of living and to establish a better home for himself and his family; what were we asking in return? We did not subject him to a political confession of faith and we did not fix his social caste; were we justified in asking him to accept our language and to uphold our inst.i.tutions? The intelligent immigrant knows that the culture of America is a transplanted European culture, but he quickly realizes that it has become something distinctive because it developed under conditions where social barriers or racial jealousies are of slight importance. The person who grasps this truth, as did Edward Bok, knows well that America stands ready to accept any man, whether native-born or alien, at his true worth and will give him unequalled opportunity to make the most of his abilities.

In accomplishing his Americanization, Mr. Bok learned much from us and he has given his fellow-Americans a chance to learn something from him.

He is aware of our pride in what we have achieved, but he points the way to still greater triumphs in the years to come. He urges us to give more regard to thrift, to be more painstaking and thorough in what we do, and finally, to overcome our prevalent lack of respect for authority. Such advice is especially appropriate at this time. During the present critical period in the wake of the greatest and most destructive of all wars, a prudent nation will follow the fundamental political and economic virtues. It is no time for extravagance, for slipshod service, or for defiance of established law. Our young people need every incentive to make the most of their talents and of their opportunities. If they observe closely the successive steps of Mr.

Bok's career they will understand why he did not continue to wash shop-windows all his life or why the Western Union's office-boy did not grow up to be a mere clerk or local manager. In the important chapters ent.i.tled "The Chances for Success" and "What I Owe to America" they will learn that ambition and industry must be supplemented by other admirable qualities in the loyal American who is eager to serve his country to the utmost.

The concluding chapters of the autobiography have a most valuable lesson for every American, young or old. In them Mr. Bok calls upon us to give a helping hand to the other fellow and to accept in more genuine spirit the gospel of the brotherhood of man. The civic pride that urged him to join in the movement to beautify his home community of Merion and that caused his activity in the raising of an endowment fund of almost two million dollars for the Philadelphia Orchestra is what we would expect of the idealist who sets out to observe the wise precept of his Dutch grandparents: "Make you the world a bit more beautiful and better because you have been in it."

Throughout the book the observant reader will note the author's pride in his Dutch ancestry and his consciousness of the fact that he owes so much to the splendid qualities of his forbears. Such pride may be shared by every other progressive American of foreign birth or parentage who feels that he is bringing into our social and industrial life certain commendable traits that characterize the best sons and daughters of his fatherland, whatever that fatherland may be.

The admirable dedication that Mr. Bok has prepared for this little volume is addressed to American schoolboys and schoolgirls, but its message is just as vital for the older reader. In the prime of life and on the threshold of his Third Period, Mr. Bok has begun to give practical demonstration of the kind of service that is possible for those who are sincerely ready to serve. He is alive to the fact that as a nation we are still young and eager to learn. We have made serious mistakes in the past and our inst.i.tutions are as yet far from perfect, but with more of our intellectual leaders accepting the watchword of altruistic service in the spirit of Mr. Bok's conception, there can be virtually no limitations to the part that America seems destined to play in the future.

JOHN L. HANEY

CENTRAL HIGH SCHOOL

PHILADELPHIA

AN INTRODUCTION OF TWO PERSONS

IN WHOSE LIVES ARE FOUND THE SOURCE AND MAINSPRING OF SOME OF THE EFFORTS OF THE AUTHOR OF THIS BOOK IN HIS LATER YEARS

Along an island in the North Sea, five miles from the Dutch coast, stretches a dangerous ledge of rocks that has proved the graveyard of many a vessel sailing that turbulent sea. On this island once lived a group of men who, as each vessel was wrecked, looted the vessel and murdered those of the crew who reached sh.o.r.e. The government of the Netherlands decided to exterminate the island pirates, and for the job King William selected a young lawyer at The Hague.

"I want you to clean up that island," was the royal order. It was a formidable job for a young man of twenty-odd years. By royal proclamation he was made mayor of the island, and within a year, a court of law being established, the young attorney was appointed judge; and in that dual capacity he "cleaned up" the island.

The young man now decided to settle on the island, and began to look around for a home. It was a grim place, barren of tree or living green of any kind; it was as if a man had been exiled to Siberia. Still, argued the young mayor, an ugly place is ugly only because it is not beautiful. And beautiful he determined this island should be.

One day the young mayor-judge called together his council. "We must have trees," he said; "we can make this island a spot of beauty if we will!" But the practical seafaring men demurred; the little money they had was needed for matters far more urgent than trees.

"Very well," was the mayor's decision--and little they guessed what the words were destined to mean--"I will do it myself." And that year he planted one hundred trees, the first the island had ever seen.

"Too cold," said the islanders; "the severe north winds and storms will kill them all."

"Then I will plant more," said the unperturbed mayor. And for the fifty years that he lived on the island he did so. He planted trees each year; and, moreover, he had deeded to the island government land which he turned into public squares and parks, and where each spring he set out shrubs and plants.

Moistened by the salt mist the trees did not wither, but grew prodigiously. In all that expanse of turbulent sea--and only those who have seen the North Sea in a storm know how turbulent it can be--there had not been a foot of ground on which the birds, storm-driven across the water-waste, could rest in their flight. Hundreds of dead birds often covered the surface of the sea. Then one day the trees had grown tall enough to look over the sea, and, spent and driven, the first birds came and rested in their leafy shelter. And others came and found protection, and gave their grat.i.tude vent in song. Within a few years so many birds had discovered the trees in this new island home that they attracted the attention not only of the native islanders but also of the people on the sh.o.r.e five miles distant, and the island became famous as the home of the rarest and most beautiful birds. So grateful were the birds for their resting-place that they chose one end of the island as a special spot for the laying of their eggs and the raising of their young, and they fairly peopled it. It was not long before ornithologists from various parts of the world came to "Egg-land," as the farthermost point of the island came to be known, to see the marvellous sight, not of thousands but of hundreds of thousands of bird-eggs.

A pair of storm-driven nightingales had now found the island and mated there; their wonderful notes thrilled even the souls of the natives; and as dusk fell upon the seabound strip of land the women and children would come to "the square" and listen to the evening notes of the birds of golden song. The two nightingales soon grew into a colony, and within a few years so rich was the island in its nightingales that over to the Dutch coast and throughout the land and into other countries spread the fame of "The Island of Nightingales."

Meantime, the young mayor-judge, grown to manhood, had kept on planting trees each year, setting out his shrubbery and plants, until their verdure now beautifully shaded the quaint, narrow lanes, and transformed into wooded roads what once had been only barren wastes.

Artists began to hear of the place and brought their canvases, and on the walls of hundreds of homes throughout the world hang to-day bits of the beautiful lanes and wooded spots of "The Island of Nightingales."

The American artist, William M. Chase, took his pupils there almost annually. "In all the world to-day," he declared to his students, as they exclaimed at the natural cool restfulness of the island, "there is no more beautiful place."

The trees are now majestic in their height of forty or more feet, for it is nearly a hundred years since the young attorney went to the island and planted the first tree; to-day the churchyard where he lies is a bower of cool green, with the trees that he planted dropping their moisture on the lichen-covered stone on his grave.

This much did one man do. But he did more.

After he had been on the barren island two years he went to the mainland one day, and brought back with him a bride. It was a bleak place for a bridal home, but the young wife had the qualities of the husband. "While you raise your trees," she said, "I will raise our children." And within a score of years the young bride sent thirteen happy-faced, well-brought-up children over that island, and there was reared a home such as is given to few. Said a man who subsequently married a daughter of that home: "It was such a home that once you had been in it you felt you must be of it, and that if you couldn't marry one of the daughters you would have been glad to have married the cook."

One day when the children had grown to man's and woman's estate the mother called them all together and said to them, "I want to tell you the story of your father and of this island," and she told them the simple story that is written here.

"And now," she said, "as you go out into the world I want each of you to take with you the spirit of your father's work, and each, in your own way and place, to do as he has done: make you the world a bit more beautiful and better because you have been in it. That is your mother's message to you."

The first son to leave the island home went with a band of hardy men to South Africa, where they settled and became known as "the Boers."

Tirelessly they worked at the colony until towns and cities sprang up and a new nation came into being: The Transvaal Republic. The son became secretary of state of the new country, and to-day the United States of South Africa bears tribute, in part, to the mother's message to "make the world a bit more beautiful and better."

The second son left home for the Dutch mainland, where he took charge of a small parish; and when he had finished his work he was mourned by king and peasant as one of the leading clergymen of his time and people.

A third son, scorning his own safety, plunged into the boiling surf on one of those nights of terror so common to that coast, rescued a half-dead sailor, carried him to his father's house, and brought him back to a life of usefulness that gave the world a record of imperishable value. For the half-drowned sailor was Heinrich Schliemann, the famous explorer of the dead cities of Troy.

The first daughter now left the island nest; to her inspiration her husband owed, at his life's close, a shelf of works in philosophy which to-day are among the standard books of their cla.s.s.

The second daughter worked beside her husband until she brought him to be regarded as one of the ablest preachers of his land, speaking for more than forty years the message of man's betterment.

To another son it was given to sit wisely in the councils of his land; another followed the footsteps of his father. Another daughter, refusing marriage for duty, ministered unto and made a home for one whose eyes could see not.