Rensselaer Union and Jasper Republican, Volume 8, Number 32, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 27 April 1876 — A. T. Stewart’s Exactness. [ARTICLE]

A. T. Stewart’s Exactness.

If n piece of gtxxlH ww not perfect, Mr. Stewart said so; if the colors were aot fast, he explained that at the outset, having moreover peflfect pieces and fast <x>lors at the disposal of ids after the explanation. One of iris clerks, it is said, left his service in disgust because the young merchant rebuked him for selling a dress pattern along witli two or three glib lies about its quality. You're bound to fail on such principles,’ ’ remarked thia brilliant gentleman,.. and disappeared forthwith from history. Mr. Stewart’s exactness had not this way of exhibition pnly, but it pervaded all his business habits, and as his business grew larger and absorbed his whole attention, became the most marked characteristic of the man. Small men, physically, are apt to be exact whether anybody has explained it or not. In his first shop and in the immense “dry-goods palaces" that succeeded it, he required of his clerks and salesmen the most scrupulous exactness. Any trifling disarrangement, Amounting to no more than an untidiness, annoyed ano even deeply displeased him. Knowing Iris business as he did down to the minutest details, he knew at a gljmco if everything on the great floors of his marble and iron stores was as it should be, and whenever he spied a fault he made it his personal business to set the fault right and render his reason on the spot. With so many men in his employment many naturally hardly saw him from week to week. “He never spoke to me but twice,’’ said an ex-clerk. “ Once I tore a piece of wrapping-paper roughlji across, and be came around to tell me I should have folded it and made even edges. ‘ People,’ he said. ‘ didn’t like to get shiftless-look-ing bundles.’ Again, I wound a bundle round with an extra turn of string, and before I could cut it he had the bundle out of my hand and unwound the unnecessary turn. ‘Never waste even a piece of string,’ he said; ‘waste is_-alw*yß .. wumgiHi ll Is easily Imfiginaule that in in the forty-five or more years of his business life, with his thousands of clerks, the repression of individual wastes, though they were minute, made, in the aggregate, no inconsiderable economy, and the unreasonableness of any waste may very naturally have strongly impressed itself upon his mind. Passing through his retail store on his morning visit, without any special inspection, he noted a dozen minor points which the floor walkers and department managers had overlooked entirely. Had a cate come to his knowledge where in the sale of a bit of ribbon or calico a fraction of an inch less than the proper length ordered had been sent, dismissal would have been the punishment of the oflending salesman. In.matters of ventilation Mr. Stewart was notably particular. Was the air in either of his stores in tlie least out of the proper condition, he detected it, and ordered its correction. Were his orders neglected, the case was noted by him on his return that way, and an instant investigation followed. ».It seemsprobable, from the numerous stories told of his private relations with his subordinates, that, he erred in expecting from all and singular the necessarily somewhat miscellaneous company the same exact apprehension which he had himself developed. Thereby he appeared to novices a hard master, and was somewhat dreaded by them. It is said that the pay of the army of minor clerks was kept pretty low; For those" aV any rate who had worked long and faithfully in his service he was liberal. The managers of his various

departments, his agents in one line or another of his work, and his chief clerks, received salaries in excess .of those paid by other houses for similar services. To such as broke down in his service or became disabled pensions were offered. One man, who had been a watchman, became deranged, and was kept for a year at a lunatic asylum, all charges being paid by Mr. Stewart, and upon a partial recovery was given a light task at a full salary. To such as were willing to give full and faithful labor and could wait long enough, the reward of advancement was certain. To exactness Mr. Stewart added the keenest business foresight and a tact that was forever manifesting itself in some new direction. He did a cash business, even in these latter days. He never speculated outside of his business, nor, strictly speaking, inside of it. To know what the next popular demand would be—it could scarcely be less than knowledge since there are few of his mistakes recorded—and to have the supply ready when the want announced itself, was the work at which he surpassed. He studied politics to understand the markets they bred, •and finance with the result at least of es caping disaster after disaster, emptying his acres of shelves while yet there were buyers, accepting the earlier and lighter loss, if need be, but within the limits of his business never taken unawares. An isolated example of his business tact in little things may be noticed. Some years ago he gave special-orders to the clerks of his up town store to treat with particular courtesy the middle-class and poor women customers who came in on the Fourth avenue entrances. His avowed object was to gain the custom that might otherwise go to the Bowery stores, and in this he was in a large measure successful.—N. F. Tribune.