Oh, AM also published a great many profiles of real people too. I set up a separate blog to highlight those: http://ipeopleblog.wordpress.com/

That's pretty neat, thanks for collecting all of those. I've spent hundreds of hours reading newspapers from that period for a historical novel I've been working on for a long while.

It's equally fascinating to see the parallels and the divergences in our culture.

Any way to get updates relating to your novel?

Many of today's most popular business books are written in this fashion. I believe the style is called "business parable". A couple popular titles from recent years are "The Five Dysfunctions of a Team" and "Who Moved My Cheese". I would not be so worried about the actual source of the story. The principles are still the same. At one point in my life I was very much like this individual but not now...while the story may be fiction my life is not :)

I personally found it hard to believe. This fellow seems smart, but was foolish enough to leave college and a promised job at a Bank to work at a hardware store. He did so during a social visit at his friend's family for "moral support" against the family's push for the hardware store job? .

It's useful and well written article - even if the story is fiction, we can take away something from it.

The "Square D" company mentioned is real; in fact your circuit breaker box probably has a [D] logo in or on it.

That doesn't prove the truth of the rest of the story, of course.

Does it mention the company name? I couldn't find it in either the transcribed or the scanned versions.

Sorry, I mixed up my tabs. "Square D" was in the other 1922 article.

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4969041

Thanks for pointing that out. I had been assuming it was factual.