I do not know what to make of the recent political campaign quote/gaff, “If you’ve got a business, you didn’t build that.” Was the speaker saying that businesses are only successful because of what government provides and that individual initiative is secondary or was he simply and quite frankly speaking extemporaneously without the aid of his Teleprompter about his own personal ideological beliefs?
This caused me to think of someone I know whose successful business experiences resoundingly refute the suggestion that ‘big brother’ is ultimately the creative genius behind successful businesses.
He was born in 1890 on a then Marion County farm where there was little likelihood of his ever achieving any measurable level of success except that of a day laborer/tenant farmer. He lived in a single parent family with his mother and his four brothers, he being the youngest. Getting a basic education was a challenge he overcame. The one room school was in walking distance of his home if you consider several miles only a mild inconvenience plus having to pull his weight working in the field to help support the struggling family, always a priority over learning. Back then there was no economic safety net, no multiple government financed programs for the poor, and no preferential treatment for the needy in other words you were on your own.
But unexpected progress came to the community when the Hamer Cotton Mill was opened in 1903, and like many other marginal income tenant farmers, the new manufacturer of yarn presented an undreamed of opportunity for a better life. No longer would the family huddle in a two room ‘shack’ with no conveniences but instead would live in comparatively ‘middle class’ splendor in a newly constructed company home where extreme weather conditions would not present a serious problem for the inhabitants. The family would no longer be tied to self-sufficient farming and bartering with only seasonal income but rather as a mill worker, there would be a payroll every week. By comparison it presented an almost unbelievable feeling of prosperity.
The youngest member of the family, now only a teenager became a wage earner. He was quick to learn and in a relatively brief time, he was promoted to become a ‘section boss’ who was responsible for supervising a section or shift of workers in the mill. But he had a yearning for greater success and assessing the situation came up with the idea of providing refreshments for mill workers, a task he performed himself after his normal shift hours. The business was uncommonly simple. It consisted of a mobile cart that could take the business to his thirsty mill worker customers. Initially his offering was only one item, milk shakes. He could get the needed ingredients locally and the ice man delivered. The only equipment he had consisted of several glasses plus an aluminum ‘shaker’ he used to mix the refreshments. It gave him his first experience as a business man, one working for himself, an entrepreneur. He built the business;
government was absent and back then unheard of as a partner. He was still in his teens.
By 1911 when he was 21, he saw an opportunity to expand his business when a commercial rental property became available across the railroad from the mill village. By this time he and his brother had accumulated enough money to stock the business and named it LEE & LEE. For them, there then was no opportunity for bank financing or governmental assistance. The store building had modest living quarters attached so soon thereafter, the two families left the village to devote full time to their new venture. For the next 15 years (1926) this was home for both families.
The timing was fortunate, the location was ideal and the families provided all the labor necessary for the operation. By being thrifty and developing a loyal customer base, the business prospered which led to another later opportunity: farming interests. Over the years the brothers invested in land and ultimately devoted full time to their farming operations.
The family was blessed in unbelievable ways and always understood the Providential Source of all things good. But other than that, their success was because of their initiative, their hard work, their innate abilities, the support of their immediate families, and the availability of so many pieces of the puzzle called life which seemingly fell into place thereby bringing about success called the American Dream
The government needless to say was not the overriding factor for my father’s business success notwithstanding that some political opportunists might later want to give government bureaucrats undue credit.
Effridge P Lee – 1890 -1966
*
Bill Lee
PO Box 128
Hamer, SC 29547