Hart High School - Hartian Yearbook (Hart, MI)

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GREAT MEN AND GREAT WOMEN BOUT sixty years ago there (jeor°C W was a boy living in Brooklyn. ® N. Y., who, after school hours each day, hurried away to his work as a cashier in a New York market. He did this from the time he was eleven years old, as his parents needed the money, and he wanted to help them. In this way George Washington Goethals supported himself while at school. Still working each evening he entered college and began to study to be a doctor, but the long hours of study and work told on his health, and he had to give up the idea. In 1876, when he was eighteen, he entered West Point Academy, and began to study army engineering. His willingness to work and his efficiency brought him to the attention of Mr. W. H. Taft, who was at that time secretary of war. In 1905 Mr. Taft found it necessary to inspect the work being done on the Panama Canal, and to make plans for fortifying it. He took George W. Goethals—who by this time had been promoted to a major—along with him. The great French engineer, Ferdinand De Lesseps, builder of the Suez Canal, had undertaken to construct the Panama Canal, but after two hundred and fifty million dollars had been spent the work had scarcely been begun and De Lesseps, broken-hearted, was compelled to give up. In 1907 Mr. Goethals was put in charge of the Panama Canal, and it remained to be seen if he could succeed where others had failed. He knew perfectly well that he had tackled one of the hardest jobs that any man ever undertook. In the first place the climate was a serious handicap, as, chiefly through lack of proper sanitation, hundreds of workmen had died. Then men were of so many different nationalities that trouble broke out continually. A passage nine miles long had to be made through the mountain rock at what is now called the “Culebra Cut.” The rock seemed like granite and offered stubborn resistance to the great army of workmen who. armed with huge drills and picks, swarmed among the rocks, carving a way through the mountain. Day after day for months and even years tremendous explosions of dynamite were necessary to split rocks asunder. Then, after the explosion, tons of earth had to be shoveled away. “We have to fight against nature.” said Goethals, and the hard, stiff battle went on lor years. For years he had under him not less than forty thousand men, speaking forty-five different languages He was responsible for seeing that they were all properly housed and fed; for keeping up enormous supplies of machinery and tools, and what was the hardest task of all, keeping everybody in good humor and satisfied. He succeeded in doing these things; never was an employer more popular with his men. They liked his modesty. Although he was a colonel in the army, he never wore his uniform while at the Panama and gave himself no overbearing airs. He was patient and good-natured, with a keen sense of humor, and his men enjoyed that. Then he believed that the canal could be built and his confidence spread to all around him with the result that every man went to work with a will inspired by his fine example. Fur- Goethals thermore, every man knew that there was no harder worker on the canal than Colonel Goethals himself. He war up early and late, and there was no detail that escaped his attention, and no advice he was not willing to give. “The only time that Colonel isn’t working,” said one foreman, “is between ten p. m. and five a. m., and then he is asleep.” The heat was often terrific and, of course, with so much machinery pounding away, the noise was deafening. Holes cannot be bored through great mountains without noise, yet Goethals stayed or f job for seven years and set an example of hard work and perseverance which has seldom been equalled, and which inspired the workmen to do their best. “All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.” Colonel Goethals realized this and he knew that recreation was necessary for men as well as boys. He saw that provision was made for all manner of games, both indoor and outdoor. Basketball, football, bowling, baseball and other games were all made possible, and good equipment supplied; reading rooms with books, magazines and newspapers were provided. The women who were brave enough to live down at the Panama with its dangers and monotony, were not forgotten, and first class bands concerts and other fine entertainments were arranged. These things all proved well worth while, and the result was forty thousand contented workmen; every man anxious to do his best. “He’s the squarest boss I ever worked for,” said one workman to a visitor, and that is how the entire Panama gang felt about their “boss.” It is well known that Colonel Goethals frowned upon graft and dishonesty of every kind. Honest and straight forward himself, he would not tolerate dishonesty in others. From the time he took charge of the great task until he finished it he was determined to make it a clean job, and in this high purpose he was successful. One of the hardest fights that Colonel Goethals had was against disease. For years workmen had died at an alarming rate; some dry seasons they had died like flies. It was largely due to the determination of Goethals to make the Panama a reasonably safe place in which to live that the menace of disease was greatly reduced. He carried through a fine system of sanitation and engaged the best medical advice possible to insure the safety and comfort of the workmen and their families. The great day came in September, 1913. In spite of the misgivings of his friends, and the doleful prophecies of adverse critics the Panama was completed; the first ship sailed safely through Gat Locks and the canal was thrown open to the ships of the world. Letters and telegrams of congratulation came to Colonel Goethals from all parts of the world; he had succeeded where others had failed, and many who had often said that the canal could never be constructed were the first to acknowledge themselves in the wrong and offer their congratulations. One thing he made clear: he was not solely responsible for the success of the entire project. He could not forget the thousands of others, whether foremen or laborers, who had worked hard. PAGE 2