Post by dex on Jan 26, 2020 10:06:28 GMT -5
The GREAT Daniel F. Harrington
MY TURN
The man behind the Dow
By Daniel F. Harrington
President Trump frequently mentions this man’s name in his tweets. You mention him, too, when engaging in idle chatter around the water cooler. And the major news networks have aired his name in practically every weekday broadcast since the television was invented!
And you can blame it all on George W. Danielson, editor of The Providence Journal.
It was Danielson who saw the potential in 24-year-old Charles H. Dow when he hired the writer away from the fledgling Springfield Republican in 1875. Dow, although born just outside Rhode Island, in Sterling, Connecticut, quickly became the quintessential Rhode Islander, mesmerizing his Journal readers with essays on Rhode Island history and emerging economic trends.
So in 1879, when the canny Danielson needed a man to cover the peculiar “get-rich-quick” mining craze sweeping Leadville, Colorado, he sent Dow packing for the story. It thrust the urbane young man onto the national scene.
Dow’s dispatches from the morally bankrupt mining town captured the public’s imagination. Along with stirring copy (“The majority [of prostitutes] have neither youth nor beauty to recommend them”), he astutely communicated the realities of boom-and-bust capitalism.
Men of power noticed.
On such man, Sen. Jerome Chaffee of Colorado, convinced Dow to return with him to Wall Street to continue his research on mining stocks. The tall, bookish Dow soon found himself working in Lower Manhattan for the Kiernan News Agency, but was convinced that actionable information was the future of Wall Street — yet no one was providing it. In 1882, Dow decided to start a company devoted to delivering timely market news to investors.
He couldn’t do it alone.
Dow tapped fellow Providence Journal employee Edward Jones to help launch his news service. Jones, a charismatic Brown University dropout and drama critic for The Journal, was known to spend most of his pay on theater tickets and bar tabs. But Dow knew Jones had a secret talent: he could read a financial statement as if it was a children’s book. A partnership was born.
Soon, the Dow Jones & Co. “Customers’ Afternoon Letter,” a two-page summary of the latest business news, had thousands of subscribers. Jones sourced information, dictated updates and rode the staff of messenger boys. “Professor” Dow analyzed the news and published cautionary editorials. Demand for their insights continued to grow.
In 1889, these two sons of The Providence Journal officially founded The Wall Street Journal, publishing their first issue on July 8. The paper is still published today.
Seven years later, in 1896 — and absent Jones, who left the firm to become a trader — Charles Dow ignited the Big Bang of modern investing by creating the Dow Jones Industrial Average.
His idea was simple. By tracking the combined average price of 30 industrial stocks representing the major industries in the American economy, one could properly measure the overall performance of the market.
Thus a benchmark, index and cultural icon was born, bearing the pithy name of its creator. Over time, the companies within the index have changed (General Electric remains the only original Dow component) but, astonishingly, the concept, born over a century ago, has not.
Dow continued to grow subscribership of The Wall Street Journal and, more importantly, influence the nation through his measured, yet often bold, editorials.
In 1902, Dow died of heart disease in his home in Brooklyn Heights, New York, at 51, a mere six years after first publishing his iconic index. Edward Jones eulogized him best: “His honesty was rugged, his industry was prodigious, his integrity unsullied and his home life ideal.”
Charles Dow wasn’t buried in New York or in his birth state of Connecticut, but in the North Burial Ground of his beloved Providence.
His modest gravestone quotes only Abraham Lincoln: “With malice toward none with charity for all,” reflecting the motivation behind his life’s work and, perhaps, some parting advice to those genuinely investing for the long term.
Daniel F. Harrington ( danielfharrington@ yahoo.com ), a monthly contributor, is president of Chartwell Wealth Management in Rumford.
MY TURN
The man behind the Dow
By Daniel F. Harrington
President Trump frequently mentions this man’s name in his tweets. You mention him, too, when engaging in idle chatter around the water cooler. And the major news networks have aired his name in practically every weekday broadcast since the television was invented!
And you can blame it all on George W. Danielson, editor of The Providence Journal.
It was Danielson who saw the potential in 24-year-old Charles H. Dow when he hired the writer away from the fledgling Springfield Republican in 1875. Dow, although born just outside Rhode Island, in Sterling, Connecticut, quickly became the quintessential Rhode Islander, mesmerizing his Journal readers with essays on Rhode Island history and emerging economic trends.
So in 1879, when the canny Danielson needed a man to cover the peculiar “get-rich-quick” mining craze sweeping Leadville, Colorado, he sent Dow packing for the story. It thrust the urbane young man onto the national scene.
Dow’s dispatches from the morally bankrupt mining town captured the public’s imagination. Along with stirring copy (“The majority [of prostitutes] have neither youth nor beauty to recommend them”), he astutely communicated the realities of boom-and-bust capitalism.
Men of power noticed.
On such man, Sen. Jerome Chaffee of Colorado, convinced Dow to return with him to Wall Street to continue his research on mining stocks. The tall, bookish Dow soon found himself working in Lower Manhattan for the Kiernan News Agency, but was convinced that actionable information was the future of Wall Street — yet no one was providing it. In 1882, Dow decided to start a company devoted to delivering timely market news to investors.
He couldn’t do it alone.
Dow tapped fellow Providence Journal employee Edward Jones to help launch his news service. Jones, a charismatic Brown University dropout and drama critic for The Journal, was known to spend most of his pay on theater tickets and bar tabs. But Dow knew Jones had a secret talent: he could read a financial statement as if it was a children’s book. A partnership was born.
Soon, the Dow Jones & Co. “Customers’ Afternoon Letter,” a two-page summary of the latest business news, had thousands of subscribers. Jones sourced information, dictated updates and rode the staff of messenger boys. “Professor” Dow analyzed the news and published cautionary editorials. Demand for their insights continued to grow.
In 1889, these two sons of The Providence Journal officially founded The Wall Street Journal, publishing their first issue on July 8. The paper is still published today.
Seven years later, in 1896 — and absent Jones, who left the firm to become a trader — Charles Dow ignited the Big Bang of modern investing by creating the Dow Jones Industrial Average.
His idea was simple. By tracking the combined average price of 30 industrial stocks representing the major industries in the American economy, one could properly measure the overall performance of the market.
Thus a benchmark, index and cultural icon was born, bearing the pithy name of its creator. Over time, the companies within the index have changed (General Electric remains the only original Dow component) but, astonishingly, the concept, born over a century ago, has not.
Dow continued to grow subscribership of The Wall Street Journal and, more importantly, influence the nation through his measured, yet often bold, editorials.
In 1902, Dow died of heart disease in his home in Brooklyn Heights, New York, at 51, a mere six years after first publishing his iconic index. Edward Jones eulogized him best: “His honesty was rugged, his industry was prodigious, his integrity unsullied and his home life ideal.”
Charles Dow wasn’t buried in New York or in his birth state of Connecticut, but in the North Burial Ground of his beloved Providence.
His modest gravestone quotes only Abraham Lincoln: “With malice toward none with charity for all,” reflecting the motivation behind his life’s work and, perhaps, some parting advice to those genuinely investing for the long term.
Daniel F. Harrington ( danielfharrington@ yahoo.com ), a monthly contributor, is president of Chartwell Wealth Management in Rumford.