DAVID MAYDOLE 


AND HIS HAMMER.



IN one of his lectures, Mr. James Parton tells how some men have succeeded in life. 

In connection, he relates the story of the famous American hammer-smith. It proves the frequently-urged lesson that the sure way to prosperity is the honest way, to do everything well, better than anybody else, if you can.

Last winter, in Norwich, a beautiful town near the center of New York, I went over to David Maydole's manufactory, where one hundred men were employed making hammers; enough men, you would suppose, to supply the world with hammers. He is one of the most perfect examples of a king of business I have ever met with in my life. A plain little man is he, past sixty now, but in the full enjoyment of life, and in the full enjoyment of his work. Upon being introduced to him in his office, not knowing what else to say, and not being aware that there was anything to be said or thought about hammers, having, in fact, taken hammers for granted, I said,"And here you make hammers for mankind, Mr. Maydole?"

"Yes," said he, " I've made hammers here for twenty-eight years."

"Well, then," said I, still at a loss for a talk-opener, " you ought to be able to make a pretty good hammer by this time."

"No, sir," said he, "I never made a pretty good hammer; I make the best hammer made in the United States."

And so he does; every hammer is made most carefully by hand, and tempered over a slow fire as delicately as Delmonico's cook broils a steak for his pet gourmand. 

Then a hickory handle is put to it that has been seasoned for two years; and it is a hammer that dare show itself anywhere in the world.

There is thought, and conscience, and good feeling, and high principle, and business sense in it. It speaks its maker's praise wherever it goes, and as long as it lasts, and it will last very long indeed.  He did me the honor to give me one, which has ever since hung conspicuously in my room, admonishing me to work, not fast, nor too much with a showy polish, nor with any vain pretense, but as well as I can every time, never letting one thing go till I have done all that is possible to make it what it should be.

Upon our return to the office, after going over the works, he told me his story. It is a representative story. Twenty-nine years ago, when he was a roadside blacksmith, six carpenters came to the village from the next county to work upon a new church, one of whom, having left his hammer behind, came to the blacksmith's to get one made, there being none in the village store.

"Make me a good one," said the carpenter, "as good a one as you know how to make."

"But," said the young blacksmith, who had already considered hammers, and hadarrived at some notion of what a hammer ought to be, and had a proper contempt for cheapness in all its forms, " perhaps you don't want to pay for as good a one as I can make."

"Yes, I do; I want a good hammer." And so David Maydole made a good hammer, the best one, probably, that had ever been made, and one that perfectly satisfied the carpenter. The next day the man's five companions came, each of them wanting just such a hammer; and when they were done, the employer came and ordered two more.

Next, the storekeeper of the village ordered two dozen, which were bought by a New York tool merchant, who left a standing order for as many such hammers as David Maydole could make. And from that time to this he has gone on making hammers, until now he has one hundred and fifteen men at work. He has never advertised, he has never pushed, he has never borrowed. He has never tried to compete with others in price. He has never reduced a price because other men had done so. His only care has been to make a perfect hammer, to make as many such as people wanted, and no more, and to sell them at a fair price. 





Good Words.