348 



SELLING LUMBER 



Which 

 Wood? 



The All- 

 Importance 

 of the 

 Salesman 



unless we are at it all the time get properly pickled, and cured and 

 preserved; and if we nibble at it, why then we decay. So you see, 

 we can't handle it at all and keep on our jobs. (Applause.) 



Another matter, which deals with J;he ethical side of life, 

 has been made also quite clear. I now know, gentlemen, why 

 you, during your visit here in St. Louis, when you would pass a 

 street corner, and a little gust of wind would happen to come, 

 and a pretty girl was crossing the street, why you would stop, 

 look and listen. I know now why it is. It wasn't because you 

 were anxious to find out the contour of the ankle; not at all. It 

 was because you wanted to find out whether she was patronizing 

 yellow pine, hemlock, or cedar. (Applause.) 



When I met Mr. Rhodes the other day at Washington, where 

 I was up on your business, in fact, because it is but one industry, 

 no matter what part in it you perform, or function, it is one great 

 industry I was up there working for and trying to get some- 

 thing for this industry, and he asked me if I could arrange my 

 time to, come here and talk to you men, and I was glad of the 

 opportunity, for, gentlemen, after all it matters not how much 

 they may improve the mill; it matters not how much they may 

 develop and perfect the machinery for the making of boards; it 

 matters not how fine the trees have grown, or how straight and 

 tall and splendid they are; all of these is as nothing if at your 

 end of the line there is not a live wire. You have got to have 

 salesmen, gentlemen, or the lumber business would go off of the 

 map, and you are one of the great, important functions in this 

 industry. Now, I am not familiar with the technique of sales- 

 manship. I am not here to advise you how to sell lumber. You 

 know more about that in a minute than I could learji in a year. 

 That is your business. But there are some things that I might 

 be able to say to you that would interest you, because in every 

 walk of life nowadays it seems we have got to know something 

 about everything round out our minds, as it were because the 

 world is growing smaller every year, we are getting closer to- 

 gether, and it is essential that we know more each year. 



It has been a habit in this country to condemn things because 

 they are big. Big business has been thought of as bad business. 

 The successful man has been only too frequently looked upon as 

 an evil doer, and not an aid in the nation's building. Now, that 

 is due to a wrong mental attitude. It is due to the fact that in 



