Rockefeller Philosophy

Last summer Mr. & Mrs. John Davison Rockefeller Jr. took three of their sons for a trip in Europe. One of the boys looked after all the funds; another looked after the baggage; the third ran errands. Each week each received a salary for his duties. Thus Mr. & Mrs. Rockefeller taught their sons integrity & responsibility, to pay for what they received, to receive what they paid for.

Mr. Rockefeller, who assiduously guards the privacy of his family life, last week used the summer's experience to illustrate that corporations as well as individuals must have character training. He spoke at the sixth annual banquet of the Twenty-six Broadway Club, composed of employes and executives of the Standard Oil Co. of New Jersey. Chairman George H. Jones and President Walter Clark Teagle of the corporation spoke; Mrs. Rockefeller sat at the dinner table.

Said Mr. Rockefeller, in introduction: "In the days when my father was active in affairs, the great problem with which business was grappling was how to organize on a scale commensurate with the growing demands for service made by the ever-increasing population. Now the gigantic corporate form of business, suspected and harrassed during the years of its evolution, is accepted as not only useful but indispensable.

"Then business turned its attention to the development of better relations between employer and employe, and while much remains to be done marvelous progress has been made.

"Today the vital matter to which business must needs address itself is the re-emphasizing of a high standard of business ethics, for upon such a foundation only can buiness be permanently successful.

"This company was a pioneer in the first two of these fields and made a contribution of immense value. Here again in this third field can it render to business a further inestimable service by the example which it sets." While Mr. Rockefeller was preparing for the banquet his father, aged 88, was enroute to his winter home in Florida. At Savannah, Ga. his train stopped for 15 minutes and deferential reporters sidled into his car. They asked the beaming old man whom they saw for a statement. He smiled and read to them a tract in his modulated voice: "A smile is the greatest thing in life. There is nothing like a smile to bring cheerfulness, and the world would be worth but little were there no smiles. . . ."

Next he handed them the tract entitled Sunlit Days. It read:

"A smile, resting on a foundation of sincerity, is one of the most valuable things in the world. It cheers when nothing else would make an impression. It gives a thrill of which no human agency is capable. A smile has changed the whole course of a human life. A smile serves as a guidepost at a turning point for a man who is hesitating at the intersection of two paths. A smile is the sun that dissipates the clouds of despair. It is just the ray of light that many a soul needs to make life seem preferable to death. It is the cheapest and most valuable gift we can make. When smiles can do so much, why are we not more liberal with them?"

"And this," said he finally, "is a copy of my daily prayer which I read at least once daily."

Reporters read: "Heavenly Father, we thank Thee for the glad and wholesome contagion of cheerfulness. If frowns and distempers are contagious, we thank Thee that smiles are not less so. The smile goes forth from face to face. By the strange law of increase, gladness begets gladness. Remembering then that no frown ever made a heart glad, help us go forth to meet the day with high hope and smiling face; and even though it has not been easy to smile, let us rejoice if so we have been able to add to the sum of human happiness and make burdens lighter."