JOHN GRAHAM.

+-------------------------------+
| No. 3 |
+-------------------------------+
| From John Graham, at the |
| Union Stock Yards in |
| Chicago, to his son, |
| Pierrepont, at Harvard |
| University. Mr. Pierrepont |
| finds Cambridge to his |
| liking, and has suggested |
| that he take a post-graduate |
| course to fill up some |
| gaps which he has found |
| in his education. |
+-------------------------------+

III

June 1, 189-

_Dear Pierrepont:_ No, I can't say that I think anything of your
post-graduate course idea. You're not going to be a poet or a professor,
but a packer, and the place to take a post-graduate course for that
calling is in the packing-house. Some men learn all they know from
books; others from life; both kinds are narrow. The first are all
theory; the second are all practice. It's the fellow who knows enough
about practice to test his theories for blow-holes that gives the world
a shove ahead, and finds a fair margin of profit in shoving it.

There's a chance for everything you have learned, from Latin to poetry,
in the packing business, though we don't use much poetry here except in
our street-car ads., and about the only time our products are given
Latin names is when the State Board of Health condemns them. So I think
you'll find it safe to go short a little on the frills of education; if
you want them bad enough you'll find a way to pick them up later, after
business hours.

The main thing is to get a start along right lines, and that is what I
sent you to college for. I didn't expect you to carry off all the
education in sight--I knew you'd leave a little for the next fellow.
But I wanted you to form good mental habits, just as I want you to have
clean, straight physical ones. Because I was run through a threshing
machine when I was a boy, and didn't begin to get the straw out of my
hair till I was past thirty, I haven't any sympathy with a lot of these
old fellows who go around bragging of their ignorance and