it had ever known. The teacher at this institution of learning was Mrs. Hicks. She was a kind but strict woman who made us learn the “three R’s” and kept order in the room with the assistance of a most dependable hickory stick that al ways stood threateningly near her desk within both quick and easy reach. In those sunny days of my child hood I often sat and daydreamed. Sometimes I would imagine that I was a successful merchant, the owner of a big store and a beau tiful home, with plenty of money. Many times when my lessons were finished I would try to imagine how happy I should be if and when my dreams came true. So, day after day, I lived through the time of imagined wealth and prosperity that I hoped would sometime be mine. Then one morning sorrow came to our schoolhouse door. Mr. Fen worthy, a kind and friendly neigh bor, rode on his flea-bitten, white horse to tell Tom and me to come home; our father had been kicked by our horse and killed. The fol lowing day we laid our father’s body in the little iron-railed ceme tery beside the small stone church. After the funeral Mother told Tom and me that we would have to take our father’s place and work even harder than before to keep the farm work from getting behind. This we willingly did for seven years — sometimes working both day and night. We kept the old homestead as it had been kept be fore our father’s death. At the end of seven years Mother sold the farm and we moved to town, 60 miles away. Here I got a job as clerk in the hardware store of Zechariah Winters where I worked for about five years. Sud denly one day Zech was taken ill and two days later he died. In his will he provided for my buying the store on easy terms which put the entire business within my ambitious and happy reach. So I bought building, fixtures, stock and good will. By adding new and better lines of merchandise and using well-chosen advertising the business grew until, within two years after my purchase, the store produced twice its former volume of sales. Five years later I added a complete
line of house furnishings, then clothing and shoes and finally, after the seven-story building was erect ed, the name was changed from Higgins Hardware to The Higgins Store. My business success and conse quent financial stand ing have gained for me the recognition and respect of my fellow merchants and townsmen. I am president of the First National Bank, one of the largest banking institutions in Cler mont County, and I have twice
hood daydreams in Mrs. Hicks’ lit tle one-room schoolhouse have be come a reality. But what a surprise these days and years of business success and financial prosperity have carried with them, a surprise that in the sunny days of my childhood I nev er imagined would be mine. It is the surprise of having reached the coveted goal only to find it some what of a disappointment. When I sat in Mrs. Hicks’ schoolroom I was sure that a joy beyond the description of words would be mine when once I would begin to live in my dream castle, the possessor of money and the owner of many of the things that money buys. How mistaken I was! Now as I look out across the green-carpeted lawn and beyond the rolling hills of the golf course I wish, oh so earnestly, that it might be the springtime of life once again at my childhood on the farm. I wish, too, that Mrs. Hicks could, as in days gone by, be a teacher in the little schoolhouse near Hawk ins’ woods, and that I might sit at the little crude desk with patches in my trousers, my bare feet rest ing on the dusty floor while I lis tened to the mocking bird singing in the tall pine tree that moaned in the breeze nearby. When I sat at that little desk I wanted to be where I am now. Now I wish I were where I was then. So I am not so happy now as I was when I was an almost penniless boy in Mrs. Hicks’ one-room schoolhouse 57 years ago. Mr. Higgins: The reason your business, your money, the First Na tional Bank, your home, your li brary, your Miami apartment, your Vermont estate, your yacht, your trailer, your cars and your station wagon have not brought you heart satisfaction is very easily found. When God made the human heart He made it so it can be satis fied with only one thing. That “thing” is a Person. That Person is God. Therefore nothing less than a personal knowledge of God will produce satisfaction for a human heart. Many hundreds of years ago the wealthiest and wisest king who ever sat on a throne or wore a crown— Solomon by name—was allowed by God to procure everything that
S o » # for Saturday Night Bath-time over, Prayers all said, Sunday clothes Beside my bed.
Tucked in snugly, Turned out light, Eyes close slowly, So—Good-night.
— Nancy M. Bettesworth
served as president of the Broadway and Main Streets Merchants Asso ciation. Last year I built a 12-room resi dence on Clermont Blvd. facing the main building and golf course of the Kennebeck Country Club. Every comfort and convenience that sci ence has produced and money can buy are in my new house. In this dwelling I have a library containing 2000 books. Many of these rare p rin ting s are coveted collectors’ items. Every January Mrs. Higgins and I go to our reserved apartment in Miami. Here the first months of the year are spent in warm winter sunshine. July and August are en joyed in our summer home in Ver mont. Last year we lived about six weeks on the yacht I bought two years ago for $75,000 and often we go for a week-end trip to the moun tains with our $5,000 trailer. I have three family cars and two months ago I bought a station wag on. So I think it can truthfully be said that, so far as business and finances are concerned, my child
The King's Business
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