Rensselaer Republican, Volume 27, Number 39, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 23 May 1895 — A Modest Millionaire. [ARTICLE]

A Modest Millionaire.

I never saw a man take life less serfously than John D. Rockefeller. He has an easy way saying and doing things that appeals! no the aesthetic nature. That $1,000,000 suit brought by Lon Merritt is not costing him a wink of sleep. - Nothing worries him, not all his millions. At times I have known to seem dull. I have known people to' take him for a soft, slow, stupid fellow instead of the hard, gliding, firm, rocky follow that he is. He once had an employe, a nervous, irritable young man, full of his own importance, but, withal, a capable clerk. He occupied an office in which there was one of those pulling and lifting machines, and regularly every morning about 9, when ho was immersed in figures or correspondence, a small, black-moustached man, quiet and ,diffident iu manner, entered, said “goodmorning,” walked on tiptoe to the corner aud exercised for a quarter of an hour. It became a bore to tho clerk, who at last, unable to stand it longer, remarked,- with considerable beat and fireworks, to the inoffensive, but annoying stranger: “How do yon expect me to do my work properly while you are fooling with machine? I’m getting tired of it. Why don’t you put it where it won’t worry a person to death?” The stranger replied with a blush: “I am very sorry if it annoys you. I will have it removed at once.” A porter took it awuy within an. hour, A few days later the clerk was sent for by Mr. Flagler, whom lie found in earnest conversation with the small, black-moustached man. The latter smiled at seeing him, gave Flagler some Instructions and left the room. “Will you tell me who that gentleman Is?” the young man asked, a light beginning to break upon lilm. “That was Mr. Rockefeller,” was the reply. With a gasp for breath, the clerk staggered back to Ills office to think. It was his first acquaintance with the Standard Oil magnate.—New York Tress.