Dale Carnegie

From farm to farm

Born on Missouri farm 10 from railway, he never saw a streetcar until he was 12 yo. Young Carnegie had to struggle for an education. Year after year, the "102" River rose and drowned the corn and swept away the hay. Season after season, the fat hogs sickened and died from cholera, the bottom fell out of the market for cattle and mules, and the bank threatened to foreclose the mortgage.

Sick with discouragement, the family sold out and bought another farm near State Teachers' College at Warrensburg, Missouri. Board and room could be had in town for a dollar day, but young Carnegie couldn't afford it. So he stayed on the farm and commuted on horseback 3 miles to college each day. At home, he milked the cows, cut the wood, fed the hogs, and studied his Latin verbs buy the light of coal-oil lamp until his eyes blurred and he began to nod.

Eager to win a speaking contest

He was ashamed of the poverty that made it necessary for him to ride back to the farm and milk the cows every night. He was ashamed of his clothes. Rapidly developing an inferiority complex, he looked about for some shortcut to distinction. He soon saw that there were certain groups in college that enjoyed influence and prestige - the football and baseball players and the chaps who won the debating and public-speaking contests. Realizing that he had no flair for athletics, he decided to win one of the speaking contests. He practiced and practiced.

But in spite of all his earnestness and preparation, he met with defeat after defeat. He was 18 at the time - sensitive and proud. He became so discouraged, so depressed, that he even thought of suicide. And then suddenly he began to win, not one contest, but every speaking contest in college. Other students pleaded with him to train them; and also they won.

Job after job

After graduating, he started selling correspondence courses, but he couldn't make the grade. Wept in despair. He resolved to go to Omaha and get another job. He didn't have the money for a railroad ticket, so he traveled on a freight train, feeding and watering 2 carloads of wild horses in return for his passage. After landing in south Omaha, he got a job selling bacon and soap and lard for Armour and Company. He studied books on salesmanship, rode bucking bronchos, played poker with the Indians, and learned how to collect money.

Within 2 years, he had taken an unproductive territory that had stood in the 25th place and had boosted it to first place among all the 29 car routes leading out of south Omaha. Armour and Company offered to promoted him. But he refused the promotion and resigned, went to the New York, studied at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts, and toured the country, playing the role of Dr. Hartley in Polly of the Circus.

He would never be a Booth or a Barrymore. He had the good sense to recognize that, so back he went to sales work, selling automobiles and trucks for the Packard Motor Car Company. He knew nothing about machinery and cared noting about it. Dreadfully unhappy. He longed to have time to study, to write books he had dreamed about writing back in college. So he resigned.

As he looked back and evaluated his college work, he saw that his training in public speaking had done more to give him confidence, courage, poise and the ability to meet and deal with people in business than had all the rest of his college courses put together, so he urged the Y.M.C.A. schools in New York to give him a chance to conduct courses in public speaking for people in business.

Y. M. C. A thought that it was an absurd idea, coz they had tried such courses - and had always failed. They refused t pay him salary 2 dollars a night, and he agreed to teach on a commission basis and take a percentage of the net profits - if there were any profits to take. And inside of 3 years they were paying him 30 dollars a night n that basis - instead of 2.

The course grew. The he wrote his own book.

He claimed that almost any person can speak acceptably in public if he / she has self-confidence and an idea that is boiling and stewing within. The way to develop self-confidence is to do the thing you fear to do and get a record of successful experiences behind you. So he forced each class member to talk at every session in the course.

Dale Carnegie would tell you that he made a living all these years, not by teaching public speaking. His main job was to help people conquer their fears and develop courage.

Source: Dale Carnegie - How to Win Friends and Influence People (A Shortcut to Distinction - A Biographical Sketch of Dale Carnegie by Lowell Thomas)