The one who undertakes to develop a boy"s interest in business affairs has really before him a problem in experimental psychology. Many of the youth"s best apt.i.tudes are necessarily still slumbering and unknown to either himself or others. The fundamental steps preparatory for a successful commercial venture on the part of a young man are comparatively few but none of them can safely be omitted. They are as follows:--
1. _Willingness to work._--In this connection, perhaps something will be recalled from Chapter IX. We may at least be reminded of the difference in the att.i.tude of mind of the boy who regards labor as a painful necessity and the one who enjoys a willingness to work. So long as the youth feels as if he were driven to his tasks there is little hope of arousing his interest in the business side of it. His mind will continue too much on the problem of avoiding work and on ways and means by which to get something for nothing.
There is probably a period of dishonesty in the life of every normal youth. Following the dawn of adolescence there is a great wave of new interest and new meaning coming to him out of the business and social world. The world is so full of interesting enticements. Everything looks to be good and within easy reach. He is especially p.r.o.ne to accept material things at their advertised value. He spends his dimes for prize boxes thought to contain gold rings and other such finery. His quarters and half dollars frequently go in payment for the "valuable" things offered "free for the price of the transportation," the purpose of this tempting gift being "simply for the sake of introducing the goods."
But it is well to see the boy safe through this period of allurement. So long as the world seems to hold out so many highly valued things which may be had for a trifle the youth will see little need of his working to obtain them. So, attend him in his efforts to get something for nothing. Permit him to be stung a few times and thus teach him how and where to look for the sting. Finally, impress him with the thought that every material thing worth while represents the price of somebody"s honest labor. At length he will see the reasonableness of industry and settle down with a purpose of making his way through life by means of honest endeavor. You now have the youth so far on his way to successful business undertaking.
2. _Ability to save._--All healthy boys are naturally inclined to be spendthrifts. Saving a part of one"s means is a fine art acquired only through judicious practice. It is a.s.sumed that the young son is being reasonably paid for certain required tasks. So the next duty is to see that he saves a part of his earnings. For the purpose of this training in saving, a toy bank may be procured; or he may be directed in depositing a small weekly sum in a penny savings bank. Still another way is to teach him to keep a book account of his earnings, giving him due-bills for the amounts withheld from his wages.
There is one small business practice, the importance of which for the boy is too frequently overlooked; that is, the practice of carrying a small amount of change in his pocket. He must learn to use his money thoughtfully and not merely on every occasion of his being allowed to have it. He must acquire the habit of self-restraint in the use of money. To do this is to learn to spend judiciously. To have reached this stage of financial training is a sufficient guarantee that the youth is proceeding well on his way toward success in business enterprise.
START ON A SMALL SCALE
Then, give your growing son as wide a variety of experience in work and in watching business affairs as the situation will permit of. During the process of this mental growth help him to make a small investment in something that will grow and increase under his intelligent care. Let us a.s.sume that your specialty is a certain strain of corn or a certain breed of cattle. If the boy shows an interest in this matter, start him in at an early age, say ten to fourteen, on his own account. Give him in exchange for his work a small plot of ground on which to grow corn, perhaps with a view to his later entering the boys" contest for a prize.
Or, help him to get a small beginning in the cattle business.
But in case the lad shows no interest in your business, do not let the matter seriously trouble you for a moment. Simply continue to give him his general education, including the best school course available and a training in the performance of work as well as the judicious use of the spending money that may come into his hands. Careful study of the boy may indicate to you that his apt.i.tude for business runs in the direction of something to which you are giving little or no attention but to which you may in time bring him.
There is the case of a successful wheat raiser who discovered his son"s fondness for thoroughbred cattle. So the boy was carefully started on a small scale in the business of raising short-horns. To-day that son is known far and wide as an able specialist in this line of stock breeding.
Now, if the father in this case had done as thousands of other farmers are still doing; namely, if he had attempted to force the boy, against the latter"s natural inclination, to take up wheat raising or any other undesirable business, then, the son would have most probably skipped off for the city and secured a fourth-rate place for the mere wages it would bring. Some day this tragic, oft-repeated story of mismanagement and misdirection of the growing boy will come out in all its distressing details.
GIVE YOUR SON A SQUARE DEAL
Deal with your young son on business principles from the beginning. Do not hastily and unwisely give him a piece of property that will have to be taken from him in the future because of its having grown into a disproportionate value. This old form of mistreatment of the country boy has been the means of thwarting the business integrity of many a promising youth.
If the boy"s small beginning develops under his care into a business of large proportions, the only check or hindrance that the ethics of the case will allow is that you treat with him on fair business terms, just as you would with any good business man. You may cause him to bear all his own personal expenses and all the expense connected with the care and development of his live stock or crop. Then the matter of curtailing him must stop. And if the son soon becomes able to buy you out, it is certainly an affair to be proud of, not a thing to hinder by unfair means.
KEEP THE BOY"S PERFECT GOOD WILL
It is a serious matter to lose the boy"s confidence or in any way break faith with him, even though there be nothing about the place in which you can make him take a business interest. As he grows to maturity his own inner nature must gradually guide him into the way of a calling--and a divine calling at that it may prove to be. It may not seem out of place to quote the words of a religious teacher who says: "Do you not know that if one"s inner nature points out clearly and inspiringly what he should undertake for a life work, such thing may be regarded as the Voice of the Divine One speaking faithfully through the instrumentality of one of his own creatures?"
So it may prove at length that you will have to sell a load of corn in order to set up in the garret of your house a miniature art studio of some kind for your young son. Or, perhaps you may have to establish a small machine shop as an adjunct to the barn or wood shed, wherein the budding genius may blossom into that beauty of manly power and efficiency which all the world is glad to admire. Out of just such a wise indulgence as that last named a certain Kansas boy finally became enabled to revolutionize the old farm home and the work done there through the installation of an excellent motor power plant. Electric light for the house and barn, power for operating feed grinder, washing machine, grindstone, fanning mill, and many other such machines--all this has resulted from the rightly directed work of a youth who could have easily been driven to the city into some treadmill of mere wage earning.
But, occasionally the boy will prove himself a versatile character, succeeding in a measure in every line of small business to which you introduce him, yet showing a marked success in none. In such case the advisable thing to do is to continue his general education for a longer period than is necessary for the boy who shows an early inclination toward a given line of work.
SOME WILL BE RETAINED ON THE FARM
It is admittedly desirable, all things fairly considered, that many of the very best boys remain on the farm and help develop rural life into what it should be. Hence the necessity of finding a way to interest such boys in some of the many business affairs connected with the farm home.
Perhaps there is no better way to develop the lad"s interest in the affairs of the place than that of allowing him to partic.i.p.ate in the practical business transactions as the conditions may allow. Let the parents take him to the store, the bank, and other such places for the benefit of his experience. Send him in with the produce with authority to sell and to invest a part of the proceeds in whatever the family may need. The father should have the boy with him when selecting and buying machinery or live stock at public sales. Send him to the bank with checks or drafts to be deposited or collected. Give him an opportunity to keep the family accounts, or at least to keep his own recorded in a book.
The ordinary farmer can think of more ways than the foregoing whereby to give his growing son the needed experience in money matters. The best result of such practice is that if there be anything in connection with the affairs of the farm in which the boy will have a native interest this apt.i.tude will be discovered; and it can then be made the basis of the young man"s introduction into a successful partic.i.p.ation in some practical business. The boy"s permanent calling is seriously involved in this discussion. On page 279 of this book will be found a description of three methods of vocational training.
THE AWAKENING OFTEN COMES FROM WITHOUT
Parents who find it difficult to arouse the farm boy"s interest in any part of the home business may sometimes easily secure the desired result by sending the youth away on a trip to the county fair or other such place. As a means of stimulating boys in respect to some kind of productive home industry the Oklahoma Agricultural and Mechanical College inst.i.tuted a school of agriculture for country youths at the state fair. Each organized farmers" inst.i.tute and each county superintendent was asked to send one boy. A large tent was furnished by the college. This served for a lecture and display room during the day and a boys" sleeping room during the night.
At the first session 122 boys attended, coming from 57 counties. The lectures covered such subjects as farm crops, veterinary science, track and field athletics. The displays at the fair were used for ill.u.s.trative matter. So far the results of the school have been reported most favorable. An increasing number of boys throughout the state are making preparation for it.
AN AWAKENING IN THE SOUTH
It is most encouraging to observe the changing ideals of business and industry now in progress throughout the nation. The many vocational-training schools and the increasing attendance at the mechanical and industrial colleges bear witness of this fact. The American Negro, ever a faithful laborer, is now being taught in such inst.i.tutions as Tuskegee and Hampton, not only to perform some honest work well but also to plan and prepare for a business of his own.
The son of the southern planter is becoming more and more imbued with the new spirit of efficiency through personal industry. On this matter a member of the faculty of the Louisiana Agricultural and Mechanical College says: "It is a mistake to think that the best of the country youth of the south are continuing in the old-fashioned ideal of becoming mere gentlemen of culture and leisure. In 1910 there were nearly 50,000 boys living in a dozen of the southern states, who astonished the entire country with their achievements in corn-raising. They ranged in age from fifteen to eighteen years. At the national exhibit held in Columbus, Ohio, one hundred of them showed an average yield of 134 bushels of corn to the acre. This corn-growing practice is under the direction of the national government, and is more than a big, exciting contest, it is a splendid course in rural home education.
[Ill.u.s.tration: PLATE XXV.
FIG. 32.--A group of "coming" Kansans. Every boy pictured here carried away some sort of prize at a state corn show.]
"We have at this college hundreds of young men from the plantations and they are intensely interested in working out the industrial problems that pertain to their own home affairs. I have been surprised at their eagerness to get into the soil and to do the mechanical work connected with their studies. All over the south there seems to be an awakening among the boys and young men, of an interest in the industrial and commercial problems of the plantation."
The farm papers and the educational magazines in the southern states give much evidence of this same sort of awakening. The farmers" and planters" organizations, the local improvement and school betterment clubs, and many other movements, are giving both incentive and direction to the country youths who are at all inclined to find an interest in the home affairs. The rural parents who desire outside aid in arousing their boys" interest in the home business may well seek such a.s.sistance by bringing the latter into closer touch with one of these progressive organizations.
PARTNERSHIP BETWEEN FATHER AND SON
After the farmer"s son has fully settled upon his father"s business as an ideal one for himself, there may be brought to the latter a gradual relief from the worry of details, and that through a partnership management. A. G. Hulting, Jr., of Geneseo, Illinois, thus describes such a plan of cooperation in a letter to Arthur J. Bill, the agricultural writer:--
"We have 160 acres of land in the farm. My father owns the land. I do the work, provide all the labor, horses, and machinery, and we have an equal interest in the live stock and we share equally in the net returns."
Other terms of cooperation have proved successful. In many cases, the son rents all or a part of the place on terms similar to those allowed the outside renter; excepting that he is usually given the advantages of free board and the use of the home conveniences. In all such business transactions between father and son it is highly advisable that the contract be carefully drawn in writing. The verbal contract is proverbially a trouble maker, and that even among relatives.
SUMMARY AND CONCLUDING SUGGESTIONS
1. Not nearly all promising youths can be encouraged to take a vital interest in the father"s business.
2. In case the boy cannot be induced to take a permanent interest in anything on the home farm, he may at least have much practice in the transaction of the small business connected therewith.
3. The ability to work willingly, the ideal that an honest living is to be earned through personal effort, and the practice of saving a part of the weekly or monthly earnings--these will give any boy an excellent start on the road to success and affluence.
4. Deal with the young son on business principles from the first, seeing that he shares reasonably in the losses as well as in the gains.
Although his interest in any chosen line of work may not become vital till he makes some money out of it, hold him persistently in line during the "lean" years and thus allow him to learn the excellent lessons of failure.
5. It may prove unfair to the members of the family to permit one of the sons to secure control of the business of the home farm. Some pathetic instances of this kind have really occurred. For the sake of the peace and well-being of all, such an occurrence must be prevented by careful forethought.
6. On the other hand, in case where the boy has started with a scrawny pig or through renting a piece of the home place, and, after dealing fair and square with all, has come into possession of considerable property of his own, do not wrest it from him or in any way take advantage of his minority. Such a youth will in time most probably reflect high credit upon the family.
7. Finally, the farm parent needs to be warned against the possibility of developing his son into a mere money-maker. Such is a poor standard of success. The man whose only aim in life is merely to prosper financially is a poor citizen of any community. Teach the boy to succeed in his business ventures, but at the same time imbue him with the thought that his money wealth must be regarded as so much opportunity to help build up the community, the state, and the nation. Teach him that financial success is worthy of the name only when it is linked with social efficiency.
REFERENCES