JacksonvilIe, ItI. 62650

Volume 1 5

Number 1O

May, 1977

Monthly Newsleller ofthe HORAIIO ATGERSOCIETY. The World'sOnly Publicotion Devol-ed io Thot Wonderf ul

World of Horotio Alger.

Fourult'ti 1961 bq Forrest Cantpbcll !.t Kcnneth Butler

IIttl rykre s0mAnYI'pros{lSfirxLsa,-oa

$xnryshaiemel.^lmeri(.All

fn Boston

inBoston

INBOSTON

This yearrs Horatio Alger Society Convention promises to be one of the bestverve ever hac[. There will be notable persons like the Honorable John W. McCormack,retirecl Speaker of the House of Representativesl Herbert R. Mayes and. Ralph D. Gard-ner, both authcrs of Alger biographies; and Florence Ogilvie Schnell, granddaughterof Alger publisher J. S. Ogilvie. Massachusetts Governor Michael Dukakis will pro-claim the week of the convention as rrAlger Week, I' and present a proclamation to theAlger Society officers at the State House in Boston. We are fortunate in that thisconvention is inrrAlger countryr'r and HAS past President Dr. Max Goldberg will ar-range an Alger memorial service and conduct a tour of the places and locales withr.rhich Alger was assoclatecl . HAS Director Dick Seddon is hosting this event, and itwiII be held from May 12-15t 1977, at the Waltham Motor fnrr in l{altham, Massachu-setts (a suburb of Boston). Plan now to attend

- g6nvsn{,isn time is almost here.

)

JERBY B. FRIEDLANDBRADFORD S. CHASE

CABL T. HARTMANNDALE E. THOMAS

RALPH D. GARDNER

I,ESLIE I. POSTERICHARD R. SEDDON

I,EO R. BENNETT

NE1{SBOY

HORATIO ALGER SOCIETY

To further the philosophy of HoratioAlger, Jr., and to encourage the spiritof Strive ancl Succeed that for half acentury guided Algerrs undauntedheroes

- lads whose struggles epito-

mized the Great American Dream andflamed hero id.eals in countless millionsof young Americans.

OFFICERS

NEW I{T]}tsIIRS REPORTED

PF-5O8 Harry R. Smith615 lst Street N. E.Hampton, Iova 50441

Harry owns 438 A1ger books, of vhich88 are <iifferent titles. A manager ofan oil company and owner of a bookexchange, he learned of HAS throughthe Antique Trader ancl Jack Schorr.

BOOK MART

The listing of Alger books in thisilepartment is free to HAS members.Pl-ease list title, publisher, concli-tion, and price.

Harvey Seidel , H#1, Box 1820, Cody,I{yoming 82414, has the foI1-owingAlgers for sale or trade. Publishingcompanies are unknown. Bob Burton,Bound. to Rise, Do and Dare, Erie TrainBoy, Facing the lrtorlcl , 1@kt" I{ard.,Joers Luck, Making His \Iay, PauI . The

s!}$, Shifting for Himself , &ulterSherwoocl t s Probation.

J(**

Donrt vait until the last minute anclend up pulling your hair out. rrBookecl

in Bostonrt is almost here. Make yourpreparations NOW to attend the thir-teenth annual convention of the HoratioAlger Society! ! !

v

PRES]DEMIYICE-PRESIDEMI

SECRETARYTREASI]RER

DIRECTORD]RECTORDIRECTORDIBECTOR

Ner+sboy, the official organ of theHoratio Alger Society, is publishedmonthly (bimonthly January-Bebruary andJune-July) and is distributed to HAS

members. Membership fee for any trselvemonth period is $1O.OO. Cost for singleissues of Newsboy is $1.00 apiece.

PIease make aII remittances payable tothe Horatio Atger Society. Membershipapplications, renewals, changes of acl-dress, claims for missing issues, andorders for single copies of current orback mrmbers of Newsboy should. be sentto the societyrs secretary, Carl T.Hartmann, 4907 Allison Drive, Lansing,Michigan 48910.

A subject, inclex to the first ten yearsof Newsboy (Juty, 1962

- June, 1972) is

availabte for $1.50 from CarI Hartmannat the above acldress.

Manuscripts relating to HoratioAlgerrs life ancl works are solicitetl ,but the ed.itor reserves the right toreject submitted material.

***REI{EMBER: Convention time vilI soon

be here! ! Donrt forget the dateThursday, May 1 2 through SundaY, MaY

15t 1977, in Waltham, Massachusetts, a

suburb of Boston.*J(*

May

NEWSBOY

PORTRAIT OF TItr NEWSBOY AS A YOUNG MAN:SO}M REMARKS ON T}M ALGER STORIES

by John G. Cawelti

(naitorts note: The follor^ring arti-cle, originally presented. at the annualmeeting of the Southern Historical As-sociation in Chattanooga, Tennessee,November-9, 1961 , is from the Wint,er,1961-62 [vol. XLY, #2), issue of theI{isconsin Magazine of History. I wishto thank PauI H. Hass, editor of thisjournal, for kinclly permitting me toreprint the piece for the benefit ofNewsboy readers).

Subliterature, is, in general, short-Iived.. It fills some immecliate need,,expresses some p€rssing idea or fashion,and then fades into an obscurity onlyoccasionally clisturbed- by curious hi-s-torians in search of information onpopular attitud.es. Sonetimes, however,a writer of subliterature retains hisholcl over a culture, and clefies theforces of time and change over a longperiod. of time. Such is the case withHoratio Alger. Despite generations ofcriticism and cond.emnation, his namelives on as a household word., ancl hisbooks, though largely unread, continueto be objects of reverent sentiment inmany circles. While I was in theprocess of preparing this paper, LukeU-alton. or, The Chicago lrylgg. *r"serialized by a major metropolitandaily, The Chicago Daily News.

Yet, there is little danger thatRaggecl Dick or Grit, the Young Boatmanof Pine Point rrill replace Gone With theI{incl or Pe)rton Place on tr,rentieth cen-tury best-seller Iists. Though Algerrsbooks are occasionally reprinted r+ithgreat eclat, this is the exceptionrather than the rule. They are oftendefendecl or criticized, but rarely read.

Stit1, Algerrs narne itself is probab-ly more r'iidely known among aclults todaythan it was at the time his books wereenjoyed and loved. As the late R.Richard I{ohI pointed out in an excellentarticle on Alger, we are confrontedwith the paradox of a widely knom and

1 977

respectecl author whose books are almosttotally unread. (1 )

The usual explanation of this persis-tence of Algerrs reputation stressesAlgerrs association with the theme ofsuccess, the rise of the poor youngman from rags to riches. Thus, it isargued. that as rrthe d"ream of successrrhas persistecl as a theme in Americanculture, so has the name of Alger, itschief exponent.

The trouble with this explanation,as more sophisticated observers havenoted, is that Alger rras neither theonly, or eyen the chief exponent ofsuccess, nor clicl his stories emboclythe values of intlividualism, enter-prise and vigorous competition withrrhich they are usually cred.ited. (Z)

The social and economic values re-flected in Algerrs stories rrere notthose of unbridlecl success, but thetrad.itional midclle-class virtues ofinclustry, integrity, piety, socialrespectability, neatness, punctuatity,temperance, kinclness, and generosity.These virtues had formecl the majorcontent of didactic literature sinceat least the seventeenth century, andcan be for.rld. r+i-th equal force in A1-gerts forgotten pred.ecessors. (f)

I{ohI has suggested that tr+entiethcentury advocates of success borrowedAlgerts name and" slogans and. trans-femed them rras something known andesteemecl, to a new explanation, a ne]rrhetoric of persuasion.t' (4) This, Ithink, suggests the process by rrhichAlger the r.rriter was transmuted intoAlger the contemporary s;rmbol of suc-cess and free enterprise, but does notexplain why A1ger, and not some moreobviously appropriate figure-lraschosen to occupy this important s5rm-bolic roIe.

Somehow Alger mad-e an impact on thegenerations who reaal him of such a kinclthat he was remembered favorably vhenothers associatect with the theme ofsuccess were either forgotten or hadfal1en into public disfavor. Probably

NE'I,{SBOY

one important factor w'as Algerrs verytraditionalism. His stories presenteclthe triurnph of simple virtue at a timewhen the brutal competition of largecorporations with its accompanying mani-festations of political corruption, de-pression, monopoly, antl inclustrial war-fare were shaking the nation. Algerrssuccessful heroes suggested that trad.i-tional values rrere stiIl operative, anclthereby helped reassure a frightenedmiclclle class that social change had notmade their traditional ideals obsolete.

However, such explanations clo notfully take into account the fact thatAlger wrote for chil<Iren, and presumab-Iy macle most of his impact on a juvenileauclience. fn this discussion, I want tosuggest some sources of Algerrs appealquite d.ifferent from either his advocacyof the gospel of success or his expres-sion of traciitional virtues, by consid-ering his work in the context ofchild.renr s Iiterature.

Alger began his career aL a time whenAmerican child.ren were, for the mostpartr confronted. with a choice betweenparentally approved juvenile literatureof a strongly d.idactic characLer, Euro-pean fairy tales, and- the stories ofromantic aclventure found. in shillingshockers ancl clime novels. (i)

Even Jacob Abbott, the best of theearly 19th century child-renrs rrriters,had no doubt that moral and retigiousinstruction was the central purpose ofbooks for chilclren. (6) Though Ab-bottts Rotlos ancl Calebs manifestedtheir creatorts love for ancl understancl-ing of his young heroes, his storiesw'ere always built around a series ofepisodes in which the central characterlearned. an important moral lesson frombenevolent aclu1ts. In Caleb in theCountry, for example, the entire storyvas d-evoted to the narrative of how thehero learnecl to work through the graclu-aIly increasing closages aclministered- bya wise antl kinclly uncle.

To a contemporary reacler, most ofAbbottts vorks seem more like manualsfor parents than books for chilclren.

One can easily see why children turnedwith delight from this strenuous mor-alism to the excitement of fairy talesand aclventure stories. Yet, most ofthese tales wer:e either vholly of thesupernatural or set in far-away landsand times beyoncl the experience ofAmerican children. Children who hadoutgrown the fairy-tale stage and vantedmore realistic stories must have foundmuch that perplexed ancl dissatisfied.them in the romantic adventure tale.

Alger was one of a number of enter-prising chiklrenrs writers r+ho set outto create a juvenile literature nativein setting and exciting in incident,with enough d,idactic flavor to win theapproval of parents. Though the basicframework of most of the Alger storiesrlid shor+ a virtuous young manf s risefrom poverty ancl obscurity to socialrespectability, thus containing an ob-vious moral message, it should be em-phasizecl that the major portion of thenarrative presented aclventures whichhacl litt1e relation to this <liclacticscaffolcling. Hairbreaclth rescues,narrow escapes from the plots of vil-Iainous criminals, the <lefeat in combatof brutal bullies, the herors revengeon those who had snubbecl or cheatecl him,these, presented in terms reaclilycomprehensible to young chilclren, werethe real heart of the Alger story.Along vith other enterprising writerslike Oliver Optic and Harry Castlemon,Alger transformed the romantic ailventurestory into a form more meaningful tonineteenth-century American childrenand more. acceptable to their parents. (7)

But Alger went even further in hisappeal to chil<lren than his successfulcontemporaries by attopting, probablyunconsciously, a child.rs perspective onthe world.. An analysis of the plot andcharacters of Algerrs stories suggestsvery strongly that the major source oftheir appeal lay in Algerrs ability toexpress and resolve some of his juvenileauclience I s deepest ambivalences towarclthe adutt worlcl. (B)

The Alger plot presented a boy-herowho overcame the villainous machinations \'

v

v

Mry

NEWSBOY

of a group of aalults, winning for him-self the covetecl status of man]rood.Every Alger book began r+ith the hero notonly impoverished-, but also sufferingunder the tyranny or treachery of one ormore adults. The story itself was de-voted to the suspenseful narration of howthe hero overcame this enemy, and it wasahrays accomplished in the same fashion.By some act of personal bravery andclaring-for example, an exciting rescuefrom runarray horse5-{,hs trsrs encoun-tered. a benevolent eltlerly patron whohelpecl him escape from the plots of hisenemies. Sonetimes this patron rras arealthy merchant, vho gave the hero astart in business, but in many of thestories an elderly well-to-clo lad.yfillecl this position.

The importance of this patron in theAlger books is a source of some diffi-culty if we try to interpret the storiesin the light of the contemporary Algers5rnbolism, for the hero of free enter-prise is supposed to make his lray aloneanil unaidetl, not on the coattails ofsrreet olcl laclies. OnIy if we examinetheir actual function in the stories tlothese patrons make sense. The majorrole of the patron was to accord. ad"ultstatus to the hero, by giving himdangerous ancl responsible missions, bytreating him as an equal and asking hisadvice, and. by presenting him with suchs5rmbols of adulthoocl as a gold watch anda new store-bought suit. It is signifi-cant, I think, that the patron aras al-rvays an elderly person; Alger was pro-bably reflecting here the special re-lationship of sSrmpathy that often grorrsup betveen grand.parents and. children.

The major event of every Alger bookr.'as the hero I s encounter with this icle-alized. elclerly adult w'ho accorded. himaclult status ancl helpecl him to escapefrom the authority and. control of otheradults. Most of the other characterslrere representations of aspects of thead.ult world. resentecl by chililren.Prominent in the tSrpical story was thefigure mentioned. above who tried. to keepthe hero in chilclish subservience. Thisfigure was frequentty a foster-father orwicked. uncle, for it shoulcl not surprise

1977

you by thi.s time to hear that all theAlger heroes had lost their fathers.

This authority-figure invariablyturnecl out to be a villain rrho had.cheatecl the hero out of his rightfulinheritance, or who sought to exploitthe hero I s atrilities for his own bene-fit. Iihen his manhoocl hatL been reeog-nized. by the benevolent patron, thehero was able to expose ancl overthrowthis villain. Other seconclary charac-ters caricatured such things as theaclu1t claim to greater sophisticationtsnobbish superiority to the activitiesancl icleas of chilclren, old-maidish iLis-like of boyish exuberance and. the con-clescension of young men who hacL justemerged from boyhoocl themselves. Byfar the greater part of the Alger bookswere d.evoted not to the hero I s indus-trious pursuit of business, but to epi-socles in vhich the boy-hero turned thetables on these representations of thead.ult worlcl.

I think I can graphically illustratethis aspect of Algerrs stories by onebrief and striking example of his treat-ment of the acl,ult-chiltl relationship.So important was the demonstration ofaclult shortcomings to the Alger storythat even the hero I s mother does notescape. Contrary to the traditionalAmerican mother-r,rorship, the Algermother was usually a weak, vaeillating,helpless female both d.epend.ent on, andin awe of , her ctoughty young son. Thefollowing quotation illustrates in briefthe nray in which Alger expressecl bothhis audiencers suspicion of aclults andtheir strong }onging for adulthood,rsprivileges and- prestige:

The boy spoke with calm and- reso-lute dignity, hard.ty to be expecteclin one so young, and. rrith a d.eep con-viction that surprised. his mother.

rrl,ukeett she said., rrl harclly knovyou tonight. You clonf t seem like aboy. You speak like a man. "trI feel so, mother. It is thethought of this man, triumphant inhis crime, that makes me feel oklerthan I am. Now, mother, that f feel

NEWSBOY

til r-----T:;Tm;tfit--

iIt

-trr"t r-rr".." l- i"ipi-=E I"-rTrE.- It-il To-r_l..a Tr'i"-man and- punish him for what he has ilone, unlesshe rrill make reparation. "

Mrs. Walton shook her head. It was not fromher that Luke had inheritecl his independentspirit. She was a fond mother, of great ami-bility, but of a timid., shrinking disposition,which led her to deprecaLe any aggressivesteps. (9)

Our Freduclian friendswould doubtless point outthat a universal boyhooctfantasy is embod.ied in theAlger story and that ourhero, wtro overcomes theplots of a wicked" uncle andfind a new protector vhogrants his rrish to be anadult, is none other thanOedipus d.isguiserl as a neys-boy. But the popularity ofAlgerrs stories was alsorooted in a particular timeancl place. The laternineteenth century r^ras aperiod of particular strainon the American family be-cause the impact of ind.us-trialism and the influenceof romantic icleas of child-hood. and chilcl-rearing had.rreakened, but not entirelyd.estroyed the traditionalinoage of the chitcl as an impof Satan rrhose moral recal--citrance demarded completeparental clominance. (1O)

Chilclren r+ere caught be-tveen conflicting expecta-tions, encouraged in thedirection of spontaneity andindepend.ence, and thenpullerl sharply back intosubservience to parentalauthority. Alger, probablybecause of his own psycho-logical makeup, ancl his ornctifficulties with the aclultvor1d., had a strong sense ofthese tensions, expressingthem in his stories throughthe plot and charactersdescribed above.

For children resentful ofad.u1t interference withtheir freedom, ancl longingthemselves for the status ofadulthood, Algerrs implicitcondemnation of authorita-tive uncles, peevish auntsand snobbish young men,together with his ascrip-tion of superior manhood to

HAS CONYENTIONFEATURE

Alger biographer

Ratph D. Gardner

and his annual contest

rrA0 FOR AErSrr

[alcun guorrENT FoRALGER EXPERTS]

Lots of ChaltengingQuestions

Study Your Algers Norr

RM{EUBERrrBooked. in Bostonrl

HASts Annual Conventionwi}l be held from

. M.y 12-1r, 1977in l{altham, Mass.

(a suburb of Boston)

BE TIJERE

May

NEWSBOY

a boyhero, must have been a compellingancl reassuring message.

l{hen, in the 192Ot s and- 1930' s, new

standards of adult-chiId relationshipsbecame widely accepteil and childrenfound status and- new kinrls of normswithin their own peer groups, the pop-ularity of the Alger stories rapidlydeclined to nothing. Their impact re-maineil with the ]ast generation who hacl

read. them, however, as this generationgrew up to face the Problems of thetwentieth century.

As a source of favorable sentimentAlgerts name lived on and became usefulin a variety of ways. Journalists foundit an effective clevice for dramaLl_zlngthe careers of successful businessmen.Defenclers of business against the :

attacks of reformers found that the pub-1ic esteem for Alger made his mantle auseful one for legitimating tventieth-century business. For those r+ho f eareclthe growing power of government andlabor, invoking the name of Alger vas a

.way of expressing nostalgia for the, simpler ways of an earlier PerioclVwhen enterprise was ,ro1 sr.rbjected to

legislative regulation ancl the harass-ment of unions.

As the memory of the real Alger andhis books fadecl , the s;,,rnbolic Alger be-came more and more important as the ex-ponent of what people like to consid-erthe peculiarly American values of enter-prise and upwarcl mobility. How farthis process of s;rmbolic transformationmay go on, it is hard to say, but thefact that for the lasi ilecade theAmerican Schools and Colleges Associ-ation has given, in Algerrs name, awidely publicized awartl for distin-guished- achievement on the part of men

who started in humble circumstances, maybe a straw in the wind..

The transformation of Horatio Algerfrom an obscure writer of popular chil-drenrs books into a s;rmbol of valueswhich many Americans esteem above anY-thing else illustrates a process ollreat importance to a cult,ure whj ch r-s

Vcontinually changing. The necessi ly o f

constant adaptation to new icleologies,technologies, and social condit,ionsplaces great strain on a culture I s

expressi-ve s;rmbols.

The process by which new slmbols arecreatecl and old ones atljusteil to newcircumstances is of considerable im-portance t,ecause it is one of the mainways in vhich a culture expresses itshopes ancl fears, its aspirations andits understanding of itself. If we

could discover more about the operationof this process, not just in the caseof Horatio A1ger, but of all of ours;,.rnbols and heroes, we woulcl betterunderstand the course of our hi-story.

FOOTNOTES

1'R. Richard l{ohI in Reinhard Bend-ixancl Se;rmour M. Lipset, eds., @,Status and Power (GIencoe, Illinois,@ na4s,

)'Cf. ibid.. and the analysis in JohnG. cawefl 'rA History of serf-MadeManhoodrt (Unpublisheti Ph.D. disserta-tion, State University of Iowa, 1960)t341 -378.

?-Louis B. Wright, Middle-Class Culturein Elizabethan England (Cnapet Hilt,1%5), 12'l-2O1, and rrFranklinrs Legacyto the Gilded. Ager" in the Yirglniaguarterly Review, XXII: 268-279 (946) .

l 'I{ohl, q. cit.5'May HiIl Arbuthnot, Children and

Books (Cnicago, 1957), 47-50; MonicaKiefer, American Children Through TheirBooks (Ptritaaetphia, 1948), passiml C.L. Meigs, et aI., A Critical History gfChildren'sJiterature (New York, 1954) ,142-15O; Alice M. Jordan, From Rollo toTom Sawyer (Boston, 1948), 1-1).

6Cr,. .ro"ob Atrboi,t, Caleb in(Nev York, 186l), )-4.

Town

7'Cf. Jordan, @ Rollo to Tom Sawyer,14-46, for a general account of devel-opments in childrenfs books cont,emporaryr..1 t.h Alger.

1977

NEWSBOYa"Th" following analysis of Algerts

stories is based on a reading of about4O of the 120-odd books he wrote. Ascanning of the remainder suggests thatthe authorrs formula, as here presented,hold.s good for all of them. For a listof secondary materials on Alger, seeCawelti, rrHistory of Self-Made Manhood.rr

g-Horatio Alger, Luke Walton. or TheChicago Nevsboy (ffritaaetphia, 1BB9),22. This is the book reprinted by theChicago D.:.iIy News. Presumably, it wasselected because it r,ras about Chicago.

lorohr, Sirjamaki, The American Familyin the Twentieth Century (Cambridge,Massachusetts, 1953), 46-47, 1o8-113;Arthur Calhoun, A Social Historlr of theAmerican Family (New York, 1960),)2131-156.

**xA COMMENTARY ON

''PORTRATT OF THE NEWSBOY AS A YOI]NG MANII

by Jack BaIes

Author John G. Cawelti-a professor althe University of Chicagq-i5 vell-knownin the upper echelons of the PopularCulture Association, and he has vrittenmany articles for its organ, the Journalof Popular Culture. He has long beeninterested. in the theory of the rrself-made manrr (tris rn.l. clissertation Isttt"University of lor+a, 1960] was entitled'rA History of Self-Mad.e Manhoocl") anil Iregard as one of his most intriguingworks his Apostles of the Self-Made Man(Chicago: University of Chicago Press,1965) .

His rrPortrait of the Nevsboy as aYoung Manrr ralses some interestingpoints and questions, all of whichmerit a good deal of ponclering. First.of all, it was Cavelti in his Apostlesvho coined. the catch phrase, rrrags torespectatrilityr" as used in describingthe Alger heroes I eventual perch uponthe top rung of the lackler of success,and he has touched upon this philosophyin this article. A careful reading ofHoratio I s novels r,sill reveal that fewof his heroes became fabulously rich-just moclerately wealthy. Quoting fromthe last chapter of Risen from the

Ranks: "Tbe income derived- from [theiFpap""] *r" double that which ityield.ed. in the days of his pred.ecessoriand both he and Ferguson were enableclto lay by a fernr hunclred d.ollars everyyear. But Harry had never soughtwealth. He was conl;ent with a comfor-table support and a competence.rt

But I differ with Cawelti on a ma.jorpoint. One of his theses is in regardsto the contemporary concept of Algerrsworks vs. their actual story lines.Quoting from the second paragraph ofhis article: il. . . nor clid his[ltg".ts] stories embody the values ofindividualism, enterprise ancl vigorouscompetition with which they are usuallycredited.rr Cawelti later supports hisopinion by analyzing the functions ofthe renowned Benefactor and the fortui-tous aid always given the Alger Hero.

But what difference cloes it all make?Are free enterprise ancl "success throughassistance" in that great a degree ofdiametric contracliction? Did Yand.er-bilt, Carnegie, Morgan, Mellon, Schwabb,Hearst, and a host of other robberbarons antl tycoons achieve their pros-perity soleIy through their own unswerv-ing declication and Ayn Rancl Objectivism?I doubt it. So r,rhat if Lady Luck dealtthe Atger Hero a royal flush once inavhile? The opportunities for advance-ment .were always present in every Algerbook, but vhile the arrogant rich snobpassed by these flitting chances,squantlering away his time and money amongwastrels and profligates, the AlgerHero worilcl seize the bull by the hornand pull up his bootstraps anothernotch.

Yes, the benevolent patron (or patron-ess) did play a large a part in most ofthe stories, but his/her presence andaction in no way detracteil from thesinglemindeclness of purpose which eachhero continually helcl uppermost in hismincl, nor from the competitive spiritthat each boy possessed.

The aforementionecl argument notw.ith-standing, I find Caweltirs work to beone of the better critical articles on

May

NE\{SBOY

a boyhero, must have been a compellingand reassuring message.

I{hen, in the 192O1s and 1930' sr nevstandards of adult-child relationshipsbecame widely accepted and childrenfound status and new kinds of normswithin their own peer groups, the pop-ularity of the Alger stories rapidlydeclinetl to nothing. Their impact re-mainecl with the last generation who hadreacl them, however, as this generationgrew up to face the Problems of thetwentieth century.

As a source of favorable sentimentAlgerts name lived on and trecame usefulin a variety of ways. Journalists foundit an effective clevice for dramaLizitgthe careers of successful businessmen.Defenclers of business against the :

ai,tacks of reformers found that the pub-1ic esteem for Atger made his mantle auseful one for legitimating tventieth-century business. For those who fearedthe growing power of government andlatror, invoking the name of Alger was away of expressing nostalgia for the

. simpler ways of an earlier periodVwhen enterprise was totr sr.rbjectetl to

legislative regulation ancl the harass-ment of unions.

As the memory of the real Alger andhis books fad.ed, the s;rmbolic Alger be-came more and more important as the ex-ponent of what people like to considerthe peculiarly Ameri-can values of enter-prise and upward- mobility. How farthis process of s;rmbotic transformationmay go on, it is hard to say, but thefact that for the lasi clecade theAmerican Schools and Colleges Associ-ation has given, in Algerrs name, awidely publicized awarcl for dist,in-guished achievement on the part of men

who startetl in humble circumstances, maybe a straw in the wind.

The transformation of Horat,io Algerfrom an obscure writer of popular chil-drenrs books into a sr.rnbol of valueswhich many Americans esteem above anY-thing etse illustrat,es a process ofpeat importance to a culture vltjclt ls

Vcontinually changing. The necessi Ly o t'

1977

constant ad,aptation to new ideologies,technologies, and social condil,ionsplaces great strain on a culture I s

expressive symbols.

The process by which new s;'urbols arecreated and old. ones adjustecl to new

circumstances is of consiclerable im-portance because it is one of the mainways in which a culture expresses itshopes ancl fears, its aspiratlons andits understanding of itself. If we

could iliscover more about the operationof this process, not just in the caseof Horatio Alger, but of all of ours;rmbols and heroes, we would betterunderstand the course of our history.

FOOTNOTES

1'R. Richard l{oht in Reinhard Bend.ixand Se;zmour M. Lipset, eds., @,Status and Power (GIencoe, Illinois,@Ttaff

)-Cf. ibid. and the analysis in JohnG. cawefl r?A Ilistory of self-MadeManhoodrr (Unpublished Ph.D. disserta-tion, State University of Iowa, 1960),341 -378 .

1-Louis B. Wright, MitIdIe-Class Cult]rrein Elizabethan Englanct (Cfrapet Hi11,1%5), 121 -2O1 , and rrFranklinrs Legacyto the Gilded Ager" in the YirginiaQuarterfy Review, XXII: 268-279 (946) .

A'Woh1, sI. cit.5-May Hill Arbuthnot, Children and

Books (Cnicago, 1957), 47-501 MonieaKiefer, American Children Through TheirBooks (fnitaaelptria, 1948) , passiml C.L. Meigs, et g!., A Critica} History 9fChildren' sJilerature (New York

' 1954) ,

142-150; Alice M. Jordan, From Ro11o toTom Sawyer (Bost,on, 1948), 1-1 ).

6"C1'. Ja cob A1r1-rol,t, , Caleb in Town(New York , 1863) , )-4.

..j

'Cf. Jordan, @ Rolto to Tom Savyer,14-46, for a general account of clevel-opments in ctrildrents books contemporaryr,,i t h A1ger.

IO NI,]WSBOY

BOOKED IN BOSTON

A real treat is in store for you when

you attend the annual convention on

May 12-15, 1977 at Waltham,

Massachusetts.

Thursday, May 12th from 8 to 10

p.m. Dick Seddon and his charming

wife, Mary, will host our group at

their beautiful home in Winchester.

While thereyou willview 174 Alger

titles, over 80 first editions, 31 of the

Garfield Algers, every Alger

published in BRAVE AND BOLD

WEEKLY and EOIS HOME WEEKLY

plus copies of Timothy, The

Disagreeable Woman and The New

School Marm.

ln August 1971, Dick joined the

HAS. At that time he had 1O Algers.

To build his collection Dick traveled

up and down the New England states,

sent cards to book dealers and other

collectors and put ads in various trade

publications.

As the pictures on this page attest,

you would have a hard time f inding a

better collection anywhere in the

world. This is a MUST for you - see

you May 12th?

NEWSBOY 11

\,

COI]LD }IORATIO ALGERIS }MROESMAKE IT IN TODAYIS BUSTNESS WORLD?

by Ra1ph D. GardnerDirectorHoratio Alger Society

(faitorrs note: The following articleis reprintecl rrith permission of T'lfAAmbassailor Magazine, cop3rright TilnsI{orlrl Airlines , 1975. It appeared inthe January, 1975, issue of this maga-zine as a correr story, and. f thank bothRalph and TYA for permitting me to printit again in l*Ievsboy).

The t3rpieal Americar success story:From theater usher to Holl;rwoocl star.From farm boy to senator. From officeboy to chairnan of the board..

Te read the stories all the time,about hors these self-macle insn-an{, in-creasingly norad.ays, vomen-pu1led them-selves up by their own bootstraps in thefinest Iloratio Alger traclition to pos-sess the American Dream.

, . Horatio Alger, Jr, to be precise,! lingers as a sJmonSm for success, but

it rras success obtained in a far lesscomplicated. time-the America of the19th century. Yho, exactly, was thisbygone exponent of rags-to-richesachievement? Aacl the principles he ad-vanced, are they still valiil, or arethey merely the stuff that nostalgia ismade of?

Horatio Alger, J.., vas the real nameof a real person born at Chelsea, Massa-chusetts, on Friclay, January 13, 1832.As an aclult, Atger rrote more than ahunclred action-packed stories that vereissued. in millions of copies during theyears between the Civil lrar and l{or}dI{ar I. Even after Alger I s death in1899, his books were avidly read andre-read, bought, borrowed ancl sr+apped.Every putrlic library stocked the svift-moving adventures: they were favoredas gifts, awarded as school prizesand recommeniled in sermons. Indeecl ,there was a very long period during

\ t+hich almost every American boy-andmany girls-1safl and enjoyed. AIger.

1 977

Even though his literary quality r+asmarginal at best, his influence on asociety that aspired. to success a7'as

phenomenal.

A Harvarrl-educated. minister and teach-€rr Alger promulgatecl his oyn strictprinciples of success through the livesand careers of his youthfu] hgrsss-Ragged Dick, Tattered Tom (vho wasreally a girt), Phil the Fiddler,Julius the Street Boy, Dan the Nevs-boy. He chronicled their inevitablesuccesses in such stirring tales asFame and. Fortune, Sink or Srrim, Roughand Ready, Brave and. BoIcI ancl Striveand Succeecl .

Strive-and succeerl-they cliti. Thet;rpical Alger hero xas a city rraif , orrecently-orphaned. country boy, forced.to leave the mortgaged homestead. to seekhis fortune. Alger-himself sickly asan infant and affected all his life bybronchial asthma-patterned. his hero ashe wished him, himself, could have been:not hand.some, but physically attractive,rrthe picture of health . . . slenderlybut strongly macie, riith clear skin andconsiderable color in his cheeks, darkeyes ancl straightforrrard look . . . awinning smile that attracted all who sarrit . strong lines a,round- his mouththat indicated calm resolution and.strength of purpose . . . not one tobe imposed upon . . . properly tena-cious of his rights.rr

The ruddy, self-reliant youngster wasgenerally thrust upon torer Broailnay orThe Bowery with but a few cents in hispocket. Though ragged, he v'as brightand ambitious, cheerfully accepting amenial station as bootblack, messengeror peddler. It was a start, and viththe sterling qualities enrlowed him byhis creater-hs1ssLy, a penchant forhard work, an engaging aggressiveness,temperance, and consideration for6{,hsp5-he couldntt, go wrong.

But like anyone on the way up, he hadsnsrniss-the swaggering snob, thecriminally-inclined guardian, thepenurious village squire, the bulIy,the tra.veling con man, pickpocket,burglar and kidnapper.

12 NEWSBOY

Scoundrels conspired. to waylay him onhis road to success. They d.efamecl himby false accusation, stole his waIIet,ilumpecl him into an abandoned rrell.But between daring escapes he per-formed heroic cleeds, rescuing a ladyor child from the path of a runawayhorse, jumping into the East River tosave a life, flagging ilown a speerlingtrain, or preventing an old. man frombeing sandbagged and robbecl.

The hero vas inevitably revard.ed, rrithcash (which he visely invested in realestate, mining stocks or Erie Rail-road shares) and a better job-perhapsas a clerk earning $1O a week, a fairlyd.ecent salary in those rlays. Then, be-cause he shorrecl initiative ancl shrevd-ness, he was seni on a conficlential,perilous journey. The mission w'as aI-vays a triumph, and in its course hediscovered. a secret that clearecl up themystery of his orrn id.entity, or acci-clentally met the benefactor rrho helped.recover his legacy. tlhile the hero mostoften dicl not achieve great financialrrealth, he ras nell on his vay, nriththe clouds past, the mortgage paicl, ancla bright future predicted.

The Anerican idea of success w'as notinvented by Horatio Alger. It probablylanded rrith the Pilgrims and rvas publ-i-cized. by Benjamin Franklin, rrho pre-seribed thrift, industry ancl temperance.Alger adapted Franklinr s principles,combined the basic plots of Cinclerellaand" Jack the Giant s!!g, and. to thisd.ay remains the legendary exponent ofthe l{ork Ethic.

Touldnrt it be interesting, though, ifAlger were able to return toilay to un-Ieash his same hustling heroes on anation a century 6]i[sr-6nd morecomplex-than the one they clealt vith?Obviously the Alger heroes woultl beoverwhelmetL vith culture shock, not tomention hampered by retl tape. Dozensof todayr s ord.inances woulcl hinder theirability to earn a livetihood. as Algerrsboys d.id: in adclition to minimum wageancl hour statutes, theyrcl have to contendwith compulsory education rules, incometaxes, social security and other

paycheck decluctions, license fees,zoning restrictions, and probably ahundred other hinclrances.

Becoming a success toclay just isnrt vthe same ball game. But though themethocls have changecl, are the prin-ciples themselve5-h6ns5f,y, temperance,aggressiveness, and s6 611-s{,iII thesame?

"In my opinion, nothing has changedon the road to successrtt says Mary WellsLar.rrence, hard-driving chairman of theadvertising agency Wells, Bich, Greene,Inc. rrBusiness life is tough, ancl itisnf t fair. \{e can be honest; we canwork harcl and. aggressively; rre can besober and. consiilsla,t,s-ancl get no place.

rrHov'ever, if we are smart, talented-and intuitive, it hei-ps to be honest,harcl-working, aggressive, temperateanil consid erate . tr

In the recent past, these prineipleshave been appliecl by many nhose risefrom poverty vas monumental. BenjaminFairless (vho reacl Alger in his youth)rose from a part-time school teacher to \/heacl Uniteil States Steel. DvightEisenhower performecl oclil jobs arouncl hisboyhood. farm home in Abilene, Kansas,long before he was electetl 34th Presi-clent of the United States. BernarclBaruch vas a $3-a-week clerk vho becamea leailer in finance and atlviser toPresirlents. Dr. Ralph Bunche worked asa janitor in Detroit rrhile continuinghis eclucation, ancl eventually becamethe U.S.. delegate to the Unitecl Nations,holder of more i,}aan 35 honorary clegreesand recipient of 6O major awards, in-cluding the Nobel Peace Prize. ConradHilton began his career by renting rooms(in ttre San Antonio house where he rsasborn) for $1 a night, inclucling meals.

Now there t s a new generation. Menlike Charles G. Bluhdorn, tho arrivetlhere from his native Austria at theage of 1 6 and ai 32 took over as boardchairman of GuIf & l{estern Industries,Tnc. Like Liclo A. Iacocca who, afterfinishing college, joined the Ford. Motor.-Company as a salesman and 22 years

May

NEWSBOY 13

\,

v

later-at age 44-was named corporationpresident. Antl frving S. Shapiro, whorecently took over as chairman of theboard of E. I. du Pont de Nemours & Co.,Inc. After getting his law degree in1941, Shapiro practiced law and servedwith the Justice Department beforejoining du Pont in 1951.

MalcoIm Bricklin, the 35-year-oIdfouniler of the Phoenix-based BricklinYehicle Corporation, rrhich has succeecledin bringing out Americars first inde-penclently made new car in 28 years,clropperl out of the University of Floridain '1958 to make his first millioncleveloping a chain of harclware stores.Hers not the prototype of the AmericanExecutive: instead of gray flannel, hewears jeans and open-neck shirts; in-stearl of shiny lace-ups, h"ts comfort-able in cowboy bootsl insteacl of a tie,he sports stranils of lndian beads.

But Bricklin is no less a businessmanthan more-conventional-looking types .

And even for todayrs business worId,Bricklin believes strongly in Algerrsprinciples for success: I'f think con-sid.eration for others is probably themost important part of becoming a suc-cess in tod-ayt s worlcl ,

tt he says. ilI rve

seen successful people who arenrt con-sid.erate of others, vhich bothers me. Iquestion hov they can be successful.The best I can say is that theyrretemporarily successful-especially to-day, when therers no such thing as aninctividual really achleving anythingalone, vithout heIp.r'

Bricklin adcls a principle of his own:luck. rrThat doesnrt mean you sit in thecorner ancl wait for luck to hit you onthe heacl,r he explains. "You know,there are lots of people who own grocerystores. Some just happen to pick whatturns out to be the right location. A

guy tloesnrt know it rshen he picks it.And all of a sudden somebocly comes byand offers him $2 million for theproperty. He didnrt make it in thegrocery store business. He made it be-cause he was lucky.rt

Jeno Paulucci, founiler of the Chun

1 977

King Corporatlon and chairman of Jenos,Inc., the pizzafsnack company, is a sortof Mid.western Fireball who makes himselfhsar'fl-even by Presidents of the UniteclStates who, on several occasions, haveopenecl the l{ashington Post to find afull page "open letter" from Paulucci,in which he spells out in no uncertainterms what he thinks the Presi<lentshoulti or shouldnrt do about a certainissue. Paulucci founclecl Chun King in1946 and. sold. it 2O years later to R. J.ReSmolds Industries, Inc.l for $63 mil-lion. His rise from hawker at a fruitstand to chairman of two of Americarsbest known food corporations won him a1 965 National Horatio Alger Awartl-presented bv the American Schools andColleges Association.

Paulucci believes that atlherence toAlgerts principles can result in successin todayrs business world. But vithcharacteristic candor, he upclates thelist to include a perhaps not-so-nob1ebut nevertheless realistic principle-contacts. "One of the greatest marks ofsuccess r tt says Pau1ucci, ttis not so muchwhat you do as whom you know. AntI to beable to either pick up the phone or senda letter to talk to various people whomight help in a particular problem. Ibelieve contacts are very, veryimportant.rr

Honesty. Hard work. Aggressiveness.Temperance. Consicleration for others.

Tried-and-true principles, these.Tenets that have stood. the test of time

-by dint. of which, Ragged Dick, Phil

the Fiddler a,nd. other Alger lad.s justmight make it in todayrs business world.Formulas for success just havenrtchanged all that much in the last hun-clred years, it seems.

0f course, lt canrt hurt if TatteredTom anil Dan the Newsboy are smart,tal-ented and intuitive (as noted byMary We11s Lawrence), or have luck(MaIcolm Bricklin), or can establishcontacts (Jeno Paulucci). And for anyJulius the Street Boy who is scalingtodayrs corporate lad.cler, one furtherprinciple may be suggested: show socialv

14

responsibility once yourve achievedsuccess.

do for your community. Unless you clo, Itlonrt think your success is going to beas long-lasting. "

After all, Algerrs heroes did returnhome to pay off the mortgage.

NEWSBOY

rrl,ike a farmer, yourve got to returnback to the soil some of each yearrsharvestrrr Paulucci says. ttThe moresuccess you have, the more you should

*

EOOKBUT F

rH[EOY'$

The Bovrs Book Buff is a new fanzine devoted to collectors of boysr(ancl girlsr) series and aclventure books. Everything from Tom Sr'riftto Tom Corbett, from Horatio Alger to Leo Edwards is our sphere ofinfluence.

ff you are a collector of this fj-e1il of literature, or are simplycurious, then this is the publication for you. Yourll find issuesfillect with long and interesting articles that examine characters,wri-ters, separate series, and backgrounds with a fresh, in-depthapproach. Every phase of boysr book collecting is covered in ourissues, and r+e ilo it rrith a fresh, informal style.

Our first issue features a sturly of the Don Sturrly series ofadventure titles, also a look r+ith an index at the aufLtorized llhit-man hardbacks of the mid forties, and a glance at the Grain and SaItPrinting Company. Plus other articles and features that will holdyour interest and will help develop your unclerstanding of thisoften neglected fieIcI of popular literature.

Sample copies of The Bolrrs Book Buff are 75d, a six issue sub-scription is a mere $4.0O. If you have a serious interest in thisfiekl of collecting, or are simply curious, give us a try. Your1lfind it worth your while.

Robert Jennings, RFD 2, WhitinC Bd., Dudley, Mass. O157O

May

NEWSBOY 15

COLLECT]NG TIIE VARIANTSby Jack Schorr

There are many collectors and manyd.ifferent Alger collections. I{hen onehears of an Alger collector, one in thetrade thinks of the A. K. LoringCompany. Loring and Alger are s)mony-mous. I know of quite a fev collectorsvho d-onrt collect Lorings and this isfrom choice.

f sav the late A1 Yogt I s A1ger collec-tion, anil though his was extensive hedidnrt own a Loring. He started when hecoukl have pickecl up good Lorings for$:.OO. He had a large collection of theWinstons with the coloreat plates whichhe loved.. I{hen he obtainecl al} of thosehe started, on cover color variants. Hiswas an impressive array of three largelong rows of Ifinstons with the boy onthe cover. Another frienil of miae hasall the l{inston Library Eilitions in nearmint conclition. These inrleed make asharp looking collection anal whichdid.nrt tie up too much money either.

I met a man in Pasad.ena whose entirecollection is Ner, York Book ancl he hasthem all rrith covers facing out on whatappears to be plate racks arranged fromfloor to ceiling behind glass. Youknow, they lookerl great. He was verycareful to pick only those in finecondition.

f have seen a coll-ection in Fresnocomposed of one book from each publish-er, and these compriserl a sizablecollection. I know an elderly gentle-man in the Bay area rrith a fine collec-tion that includes all the McKays anclStreet ancl Sniths and those are alldust jacketed. I couldnrt believe ituntil f saw i-t. f correspond. with ayoung man who collects the color vari-ants of Loring. He has large mrmbers offuchsia colorecl Lorings with spinesbright and not faded. If you arefamiliar with these then you know thattheyrre hard. to fincl .

-\,

'. Porter and Coates turned. out some\1-hand.some eclitions. Brave and BoIcI\ Series are foremost, with the blue-gray

ed.ition vith the beehive on it (trl{ay toSuccessrt Series) Ueing a close second.AncI then there is the edition r+ith thewinged wheel on the cover, the rrl,uck andPluckrr Series. These make a sptendidlooking group if theytre in top shape.

The Street and Smith paperback AlgerSeries make a colorful collection iffacecl with cover out and protected.

A person can be an Alger collectorancl have an interesting and beautifulcollection without the Lorings and theexpense if he chooses. Collectingvariants is one vay. Arrangement andd.isplay is primary to any interestingcollection. I have seen $/r5OO worthof Algers clouble shelved ancl theydidnrt look anybhing tike the $4OOcollection of the New York Books,simply because of the latterrs uliquedispl-ay arrangement.

So if re'e are going to put money intoa collection, Ietrs acld a few bucksand make the room something toremember.

te**

Above is theHAS member Bob

bookplate d.esigned bySarryer. Ver]r nice, Bob !

LIBRISR E. Sowyer

2O4 Mill sl., Gohonno, OhioTcl. (614) 471-9963

1 977

1(t Nu\rst]0\ rssN oo28-9396

FROM THE EDITOR'SSCRAP BOOK

Bob Sawyer reports that he r+ill bepresent at the rrBooked. in BostonrlHoratio Alger Society Convention, andthat he will again be d.onating an I'A1ger

dulcimer" for the annual auction. Thlsitem brought into the coffers of HAS

quite a bit of money last year, and Ithank Bob for his generosity. A ilulci-mer, sometimes called the Appalachianguitar, is a very simple four stringeclmusical instrument. Bob carves these byhand., and the one at the previous con-vention hacl Algert s heacl carveil intothe instrumentrs neck. A11 those atthe convention will want to see thisinteresting item.

And again, I hope that many, manythings witl be donated for the auction.Ralph Gardner, our illustrious auction-eer, is already getting his vocal corclsin top shape for an evening of speaking.Herets hoping that the auction will beso long that he cannot talk at the endof it!

Remember the material on AnthonYComstock in the last issue of Newsboy?If you recall, Comstock rras the notedreformer who macle scathing attacksagainst I'objectionableI literatureancl material aimed at children. In a

recent letter, Bob Jennings vrites:rrFor:nd- the Newsboy to be very interest-irrg. The stuff by Comstock was a riot.You forgot to mention one very perti-nent fact about the man, however, andthat is that it vas discovered after hisdeath that he maintained a secretlibrary which housecl one of the largestancl most comprehensive collections ofhard- core pornography then in existencein the Western world.rl

This just in. Irene Gurman has achange of address. Her new home is at2607 lularathon Lane, Fort Lautlerda1e,Floricla )3)12. Remember to mark thischange in your membership roster.

f received a nice letter from Les1ieMcFar1ane, vho complimentecl me on my

review of his book, Ghost of the HardyBoys, in the last issue of @!gy.. He

says: t'It is always gratifying to a

writer when a reader appreciates eIe-ments on which he prided himself. Younoticed the transitions. They presentedenormous problems, and of course f usedeveryLhing from Maughamrs time shift toa film editorrs jump cuts to achieve theftow I was after. Then again, it de-lighted me that you enjoyecl the bookrshumor because I had. a lot of fun writingit.'r I hope that many HAS membershave purchasecl this book. For pureentertainment you canrt find a. betterbargain.

Through an oversight, HAS past Presi-dent Max Golclberg I s title, rrDoctor, It was -\not printed in the current society ros-ter. Ho1der of two <loctorate clegrees , *Max deserves this recognition.

Herb Risteen has picked- up the entireI'Ragged Dicktr Series r ( six volumes, Por-ter & Coates). They are in barely faircondition, and are fad.ed ancl vorn, withsome flyleaves missing and some hingescrackeil. Contents are aII there. He

is open for biils on this set.

In the last issue of Ner'rsboy I an-nounced that if one rp'ants a good studyof the article, r?Blowing Out theBoyts Brainsrrt then he should read theFalI, 1970, antl Winter, 1971, issues ofThe Boys t Book Collector. Copies ofthis magazine are scarce, and author ofthe analysis, Dr. John T. Dizer, Jr.(1ot32 Ridgecrest Roarl, Utica, N. Y.13502) has kintlly informed me that hevill- sencl xerox copies of the artlclefree to any HAS member upon receipt ofa self-aclclressed envelope vith trtro

stamps ("Fortune and the Slandicats,- ,/in two parTsllIa heavy article). ManfvJthanks for your choughtfulness, .Tack! !